Architecture, Society, and Ritual in Viking Age Scandinavia: Doors, Dwellings, and Domestic Space

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Marianne Hem Eriksen

Architecture, Society, and Ritual in Viking Age Scandinavia

Doors, Dwellings, and Domestic Space

Marianne Hem Eriksen

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Hardback

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English

Cambridge University Press
28 February 2019

European history; Medieval European archaeology; Social & cultural anthropology

In this book, Marianne Hem Eriksen explores the social organization of Viking Age Scandinavia through a study of domestic architecture, and in particular, the doorway. A highly charged architectural element, the door is not merely a practical, constructional solution. Doors control access, generate movement, and demark boundaries, yet also serve as potent ritual objects. For this study, Eriksen analyzes and interprets the archaeological data of house remains from Viking Age Norway, which are here synthesized for the first time. Using social approaches to architecture, she demonstrates how the domestic space of the Viking household, which could include masters and slaves, wives and mistresses, children and cattle, was not neutral. Quotidian and ritual interactions with, through, and orchestrated by doorways prove to be central to the production of a social world in the Viking Age. Eriksen's book challenges the male-dominated focus of research on the Vikings and expands research questions beyond topics of seaborne warriors, trade, and craft.

By: Marianne Hem Eriksen
Imprint: Cambridge University Press
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Dimensions: Height: 262mm, Width: 185mm, Spine: 18mm
Weight: 800g
ISBN: 9781108497220
ISBN 10: 1108497225
Pages: 296
Publication Date: 28 February 2019
Audience: Professional and scholarly , Undergraduate
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

Part I. Opening Doors to the Viking Age: 1. Entry points; 2. The power of the door; Part II. Ordering Settlements and Landscapes: 3. Fleshing out the past: houses and households of the Viking Age; 4. Crossing the threshold: interior space; 5. Networked landscapes: exterior space; Part III. Ritual Objects, Ritual Spaces: 6. 'Lift me over door-hinges and lintels': doorways, bodies, and biographies; 7. Thresholds to other worlds; 8. Exits: a social archaeology of the Viking Age; Appendix.

Marianne Hem Eriksen is Associate Professor of Archaeology at the University of Oslo. She is a research fellow (2017–2019) at the University of Cambridge. An elected member of the Young Researchers of Norway, under the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters, she was awarded His Majesty the King's Gold Medal for Younger Scholars of Excellence in 2016.

Reviews for Architecture, Society, and Ritual in Viking Age Scandinavia: Doors, Dwellings, and Domestic Space

'It is a fabulous piece of work, lucid, well documented, imaginative and beautifully organised. It will be of interest to scholars working on other periods or in other parts of the world.' Richard Bradley, University of Reading 'Doors can be entries and exits, metaphors, symbols, and more. This fascinating work gives us Vikings as we've never seen them - their ideas on death and life, their sense of home, their bodies and behavior, it's all here. Marianne Hem Eriksen is one of the leading innovators in Viking archaeology today, and this book is the proof.' Neil Price, University of Uppsala 'It is a fabulous piece of work, lucid, well documented, imaginative and beautifully organised. It will be of interest to scholars working on other periods or in other parts of the world.' Richard Bradley, University of Reading 'Doors can be entries and exits, metaphors, symbols, and more. This fascinating work gives us Vikings as we've never seen them - their ideas on death and life, their sense of home, their bodies and behavior, it's all here. Marianne Hem Eriksen is one of the leading innovators in Viking archaeology today, and this book is the proof.' Neil Price, University of Uppsala