Periodic Reporting for period 2 - SILVER (Silver and the Origins of the Viking Age)
Reporting period: 2020-09-01 to 2022-02-28
The Viking Age (c. 750-1050 AD) is widely recognised as a pivotal episode of cultural expansion in Eurasia, but the fundamental questions concerning the start of the Viking Age - when, where and why did it begin? - remain unclear. Traditionally, the Viking Age is seen as starting in the West, with attacks on wealthy, neighbouring polities like Anglo-Saxon England and the Carolingian Empire from c. 800 AD, but new archaeological evidence points to Scandinavian military activity in the Baltic as early as c. 750. Since the Viking Age left an indelible legacy in northern Europe - still seen today in the network of towns, in language and in the political landscape - it is important to understand how the phenomenon of the Viking Age came about.
Our project seeks to address these questions from a new perspective - that of silver. The Viking Age is characterised by large number of silver hoards, as well as hundreds of silver artefacts and weights found on settlements and as single finds. Since no silver was mined in Scandinavia during this period, it had to be imported. If we can understand the source of this silver - and in particular assess the relative contribution of Western European and Islamic coinage to Viking wealth - we can reveal the underlying connections that characterised Scandinavian society at the start of the Viking Age.
The overall objectives are therefore to evaluate the origin of Viking silver and specifically to assess Scandinavia's depth of connection with the Islamic Caliphate via the eastern (Russian) riverine trade route in the ninth century. This is being achieved through an extensive programme of archaeometric analyses, which can reveal the source of lead contained within the silver, and therefore reveal its sources. We will further assess the uses of Viking silver, to work out how it is being used, and work out the timeline of the import of Islamic and Western silver. We are testing the hypothesis that the Vikings used silver within a monetary economy, rather than simply as a means of display, and that this economy was strongly rooted in an Eastern trade network in its nascent stages before the Viking expansion. Far from being simple treasure hunters, we conceive the Vikings as first eastern traders, who later diversified into raiding in the West out of economic necessity.
Our project seeks to address these questions from a new perspective - that of silver. The Viking Age is characterised by large number of silver hoards, as well as hundreds of silver artefacts and weights found on settlements and as single finds. Since no silver was mined in Scandinavia during this period, it had to be imported. If we can understand the source of this silver - and in particular assess the relative contribution of Western European and Islamic coinage to Viking wealth - we can reveal the underlying connections that characterised Scandinavian society at the start of the Viking Age.
The overall objectives are therefore to evaluate the origin of Viking silver and specifically to assess Scandinavia's depth of connection with the Islamic Caliphate via the eastern (Russian) riverine trade route in the ninth century. This is being achieved through an extensive programme of archaeometric analyses, which can reveal the source of lead contained within the silver, and therefore reveal its sources. We will further assess the uses of Viking silver, to work out how it is being used, and work out the timeline of the import of Islamic and Western silver. We are testing the hypothesis that the Vikings used silver within a monetary economy, rather than simply as a means of display, and that this economy was strongly rooted in an Eastern trade network in its nascent stages before the Viking expansion. Far from being simple treasure hunters, we conceive the Vikings as first eastern traders, who later diversified into raiding in the West out of economic necessity.
To date, our work has focused on 1) documenting the material - carried out through museum visits and, more recently during the pandemic, with the aid of high-quality images from museum curators, and 2) undertaking archaeometric analyses, of both reference material and Viking-Age silver.
We now have an extensive database of silver, weights and dirhams either dating to the ninth century or found in association with ninth-century coinage, from the core study area of Denmark, southern Sweden and southern Norway (collectively: Viking Age Denmark). This has revealed several settlement sites with a particularly rich number of finds, where the distribution can be mapped against settlement features revealed through excavation (e.g. Munkebo Bakke and Lejre, Denmark) - something that will help to reveal how the silver is being used. From this database we have been able to model the chronological inflow of Islamic dirhams, producing histograms which show a sawtooth like pattern across the ninth century. We can see clear evidence of a 'silver crisis' in c. 870-900, roughly the same time as the Viking armies start to overwinter in western settlement areas.
Our archaeometric analysis has included c. 145 Islamic dirhams, in addition to Anglo-Saxon and Anglo-Viking coins (total: c. 50), from the British, Fitzwilliam and Ashmolean Museums. We have carried out this work in collaboration with labs in Stockholm, Sweden; Southampton and Oxford, UK; Orleans, France; and Bochum, Germany. The work confirms the preliminary data we had that Western European and Islamic coinages are isotopically and chemically distinct. With such a large number of dirhams analysed, we have identified a regional framework for dirham production across four zones of the Caliphate (North Africa; Iraq; Iran and Central Asia), shedding light on Islamic silver resources for the first time (See Fig. 1 for a schematic map). Our study of dirhams also reveals that they were not always subject to cupellation, and must therefore derive from high-grade 'dry' silver ore. Because of the flexibility of the ERC grant, we have been able to pursue these issues, countering the established narrative that Islamic silver came chiefly from the Arab Peninsula and Central Asia, and that is was derived from lead-based ore (galena).
We have also characterised Anglo-Saxon/ Carolingian silver - which are not, in fact, the same. Carolingian silver relates to lead/ silver at the prominent mine of Melle in western France, but Anglo-Saxon silver is less easy to provenance. Isotopically, it matches British lead ores (especially Mendips and North Pennines), but these are not thought to have been silver bearing on a scale that would make them viable ores for silver.
Together, this data helps us to understand the potential isotopic signatures of Viking silver. We can see, for instance, that Viking hoards from Western settlement contexts have a more mixed isotopic profile than hoards from eastern Sweden. Nonetheless, remarkably, the Islamic signature is strong even in these Western hoards and the Melle/ Carolingian signature very weak - something which is at odds with the documentary references for extensive silver-taking during Continental raids. The hoards we have analysed in Britain are focused around the Irish Sea littoral and may reflect diverse sources of silver (Anglo-Saxon and Islamic) being channelled into Dublin. It is astonishing that the Vikings were not only taking wealth out of England, but also bringing it in.
In eastern Sweden Islamic dirhams are the dominant source of silver. This is not surprising, but what we hadn't expected is the early date of these dirhams. Since dirhams from different regions arrived in Scandinavia at different times (e.g. dirhams from Baghdad arrived in Scandinavia after c. 850 and then dominated the dirham stock), we have been able to chart the changing isotopic signature of dirham-based Scandinavian silver stocks over time (paper forthcoming in Fornvannen). This has revealed that many of the artefacts contained in silver hoards deposited in the late ninth/ early tenth century, were in fact made from silver that entered the Baltic already by c. 850. Scholars have missed this early dirham inflow because the coins were melted down on arrival and cast into jewellery. The isotope results thus reveal an otherwise invisible supply chain ultimately connected to the Caliphate, already well established in the first half of the ninth century.
We now have an extensive database of silver, weights and dirhams either dating to the ninth century or found in association with ninth-century coinage, from the core study area of Denmark, southern Sweden and southern Norway (collectively: Viking Age Denmark). This has revealed several settlement sites with a particularly rich number of finds, where the distribution can be mapped against settlement features revealed through excavation (e.g. Munkebo Bakke and Lejre, Denmark) - something that will help to reveal how the silver is being used. From this database we have been able to model the chronological inflow of Islamic dirhams, producing histograms which show a sawtooth like pattern across the ninth century. We can see clear evidence of a 'silver crisis' in c. 870-900, roughly the same time as the Viking armies start to overwinter in western settlement areas.
Our archaeometric analysis has included c. 145 Islamic dirhams, in addition to Anglo-Saxon and Anglo-Viking coins (total: c. 50), from the British, Fitzwilliam and Ashmolean Museums. We have carried out this work in collaboration with labs in Stockholm, Sweden; Southampton and Oxford, UK; Orleans, France; and Bochum, Germany. The work confirms the preliminary data we had that Western European and Islamic coinages are isotopically and chemically distinct. With such a large number of dirhams analysed, we have identified a regional framework for dirham production across four zones of the Caliphate (North Africa; Iraq; Iran and Central Asia), shedding light on Islamic silver resources for the first time (See Fig. 1 for a schematic map). Our study of dirhams also reveals that they were not always subject to cupellation, and must therefore derive from high-grade 'dry' silver ore. Because of the flexibility of the ERC grant, we have been able to pursue these issues, countering the established narrative that Islamic silver came chiefly from the Arab Peninsula and Central Asia, and that is was derived from lead-based ore (galena).
We have also characterised Anglo-Saxon/ Carolingian silver - which are not, in fact, the same. Carolingian silver relates to lead/ silver at the prominent mine of Melle in western France, but Anglo-Saxon silver is less easy to provenance. Isotopically, it matches British lead ores (especially Mendips and North Pennines), but these are not thought to have been silver bearing on a scale that would make them viable ores for silver.
Together, this data helps us to understand the potential isotopic signatures of Viking silver. We can see, for instance, that Viking hoards from Western settlement contexts have a more mixed isotopic profile than hoards from eastern Sweden. Nonetheless, remarkably, the Islamic signature is strong even in these Western hoards and the Melle/ Carolingian signature very weak - something which is at odds with the documentary references for extensive silver-taking during Continental raids. The hoards we have analysed in Britain are focused around the Irish Sea littoral and may reflect diverse sources of silver (Anglo-Saxon and Islamic) being channelled into Dublin. It is astonishing that the Vikings were not only taking wealth out of England, but also bringing it in.
In eastern Sweden Islamic dirhams are the dominant source of silver. This is not surprising, but what we hadn't expected is the early date of these dirhams. Since dirhams from different regions arrived in Scandinavia at different times (e.g. dirhams from Baghdad arrived in Scandinavia after c. 850 and then dominated the dirham stock), we have been able to chart the changing isotopic signature of dirham-based Scandinavian silver stocks over time (paper forthcoming in Fornvannen). This has revealed that many of the artefacts contained in silver hoards deposited in the late ninth/ early tenth century, were in fact made from silver that entered the Baltic already by c. 850. Scholars have missed this early dirham inflow because the coins were melted down on arrival and cast into jewellery. The isotope results thus reveal an otherwise invisible supply chain ultimately connected to the Caliphate, already well established in the first half of the ninth century.
Our main progress so far relates to our analysis of Islamic dirhams, the discovery that they were often produced from dry silver ore, and that ores were exploited at a regional level. This is a big contribution to the fields of archaeometry as well as Islamic history - particularly since one of the ore sources is on the Islamic/ Byzantine frontier, the focus of border wars over many years (did the desire for silver ore fuel these wars?).
We are, however, delayed on the main analytical project, which is the analysis of silver from southern Scandinavia. The main hypothesis of the project thus remains to be tested. We have skirted this core are with case studies in Scotland, England, the Netherlands and eastern Sweden - but what about the central part of the Viking world, the meeting place of east and west? Given the strength of the Islamic connection we are seeing in other material, the expected results are that southern Scandinavian material reflects the same, Islamic source. Still, this raises the important questions about the date of this inflow - something that can be revealed by isotopic modelling, and well as the destiny of silver from the West. Where did the thousands of pounds of Carolingian silver go?
We are, however, delayed on the main analytical project, which is the analysis of silver from southern Scandinavia. The main hypothesis of the project thus remains to be tested. We have skirted this core are with case studies in Scotland, England, the Netherlands and eastern Sweden - but what about the central part of the Viking world, the meeting place of east and west? Given the strength of the Islamic connection we are seeing in other material, the expected results are that southern Scandinavian material reflects the same, Islamic source. Still, this raises the important questions about the date of this inflow - something that can be revealed by isotopic modelling, and well as the destiny of silver from the West. Where did the thousands of pounds of Carolingian silver go?