Aardvarchaeology
Dr. Martin Rundkvist is a Swedish archaeologist, journal editor, public speaker, chairman of the Swedish Skeptics Society, atheist, lefty liberal, board gamer, bookworm, and father of two.
aardvarchaeology | October 1, 2007
Happy Djurhamn project co-directors Katarina Schoerner and August Boj.
Aided by many volunteers and using tools borrowed from my dad and the Stockholm County Museum, I've spent the day getting the Djurhamn sword out of the ground.
I found the sword on 30 August while metal detecting around the Harbour of the Sheaf Kings. Today we marked out a 2.5 by 2.0 metre trench around the sword, got rid of a lot of vegetation, dug and sieved 2.5 square metres and got the sword out. Its point was wedged between the roots of a large hazel bush, so I only got it out in one piece thanks to its excellent…
aardvarchaeology | September 30, 2007
Two weeks ago when I worked for Thomas Englund and Bo Knarrström at the 1719 battlefield on Skogsö, I came across a variant on a type of archaeological site that I've blogged about before. A site where children have built and abandoned something, but this time it wasn't a tree house ruin: to me it looks more like the remains of an outdoor gym built by the cub scouts who periodically camp in a nearby house. You know, chin-ups and stuff.
To this end, the kids nailed and tied horizontal spires to trees, clumsily and with very little regard for the trees' well-being. While they were at it, they…
aardvarchaeology | September 28, 2007I was musing about how haphazardly I learned about certain indispensable software and information sources. Then it struck me -- maybe there are people who don't know about Google Definitions? OMG! I've got to tell them!
I use Google Definitions daily. It's an on-line meta-dictionary, collecting definitions from all over the web. To use it, just type "DEFINE:" into Google's search box and then whatever it is you need defined. And it knows everything, not just the sort of straight-laced stuff you find in printed dictionaries.
define: myrmecology
Myrmecology is the branch of entomology dealing…
aardvarchaeology | September 27, 2007Here's a link page that I used during a talk about internet culture to advertising students at Bergh's on 28 September. This blog entry will move down the page as I write new ones, but I'll leave the link page on-line. Bookmark it in your browser!
If you, Dear Reader, weren't at the talk and still want to hear my comments on the links, I'd be very happy to give more talks on the subject at the venue of your choice.
aardvarchaeology | September 27, 2007From today's issue of free subway paper Metro, I translate:
Hey there...
... Martin Rundkvist, 35, the archaeologist who has found a unique 16th century sword in the woods.
How did you make the find -- through cutting-edge methods?
-- I sat down in the lotus position and took in the vibrations with my astral antennae.
Astral antennae?
-- You've got to have long hair to take in the vibes. All hair dressers are paid by the government to cut off the astral antennae. They've got a hidden agenda, them hair dressers.
Really? So, how many lives do you think the sword has taken?
-- Well, it really…
aardvarchaeology | September 26, 2007
Welcome everyone to Aardvarchaeology and the 89th Tangled Bank blog carnival. Aard is strictly focused on whatever strikes the fancy of its archaeologist proprietor. The Tangled Bank provides a leafy warren for all little furry bloggers with an interest in the life sciences. We have good stuff here, so dive in!
Beasties
RPM at Evolgen offers some taxonomic insights apropos of a giant web spun by a diverse gang of distantly related spiders.
Grrlscientist at Living the Scientific Life reports on research into embryo manipulation that would allow common fish species to spawn endangered ones.…
aardvarchaeology | September 25, 2007
Found an early-16th century officer's sword at the Harbour of the Sheaf Kings. I tried to keep it quiet, but now the mainstream media want my ass. I'm seeing the County Archaeologist about an excavation permit this afternoon. More anon.
Media coverage: Metro, Radio Skaraborg, SVT, ABC-nytt, Radio Stockholm, Svenska Dagbladet, Dagens Nyheter, Östgöta Correspondenten, Jönköpingsposten, you tell me what else please.
[More blog entries about archaeology, history, Sweden, swords, 16thcentury; arkeologi, historia, Djurö, Värmdö, svärd, 1500-talet.]
aardvarchaeology | September 25, 2007
The twenty-fourth Four Stone Hearth blog carnival is on-line at Paddy K's Swedish Extravaganza. It's a particularly populous and witty edition. Check it out! Archaeology and anthropology to scratch your pubic lice and soothe your fear of the cave bear.
The next open hosting slot is on 24 October 7 November. All bloggers with an interest in the subject are welcome to volunteer to me. You don't have to be an anthropologist, but bipedalism is encouraged.
aardvarchaeology | September 25, 2007A guest entry, graciously granted by Secular Humanist warrior queen Felicia of Life Before Death, with her own photograph.
As I start writing this post*, the air has an autumn tang to it, it is windy, and definitely not as warm as it could be in August. And yet, the bees are working. There's something comforting about how their lives go on irrespective of what happens in the world of humans. All they care about is the turning of seasons, the treachery of weather, the health of their queen.
Around Stockholm, where we live, the bees usually don't have anything to show for their labour at this…
aardvarchaeology | September 24, 2007The excruciatingly witty and multi-talented David Nessle has been alerted by his erudite father to a long enthusiastic article about cannabis in the classic Swedish 1909 dictionary Nordisk Familjebok (uggleupplagan). This dictionary was in every home with any pretentions to literacy and social respectability. A stoner among the dictionary's contributors, pharmacology professor Oskar Teodor Sandahl (1829-1894), has clearly done a lot of pot to be able to report the way he does (note that he mentions the munchies), and the editorial board has then felt it proper to devote an entire page to the…
aardvarchaeology | September 24, 2007
Swedish young skankers Seizure City are a new outfit with the Clash and the Skatalites looming large in their pedigree. Reedy kickass singer Tanja knows her glottal stops and is an archaeologist's daughter. Let's hope the band takes off so she can have a proper career in the music business instead of sliding back into the seedy gloom of the contract excavations!
aardvarchaeology | September 22, 2007
Friday last week I did some met-det for Thomas Englund and Bo Knarrström at the 1719 battlefield at Baggensstäket on Skogsö, of which I've blogged before. This time I was directed to a hillside that had seen heavy musket fire. I may not have had much balls when I came there, but I certainly did when the day's work was done, before I handed my finds over to the guys. Above is an intact 1719 musket ball, either dropped by a shaky soldier or fired into soft earth. Below is a ball that has hit a rock. Getting hit by one of those 15 mm lead spheres was not an enjoyable experience, but at least…
aardvarchaeology | September 20, 2007
Here are the fruits of my ten hours of metal detecting in Kaga while Immo and Per mucked around with the magnetometer Wednesday and Thursday.
Top left is a spool-shaped copper-alloy handle, cast around a slim iron rod that's broken off at the lower end. There's indistinct cast relief decoration on the handle, and its shape and size are identical to those of 11th century key handles. These keys are L-shaped with prongs toward the end of the horizontal rod.
The next thingie is also a handle, belonging to a key or an ear scoop. El Cheapo openwork decoration typical of the 10th century, where…
aardvarchaeology | September 20, 2007Originally posted 19 September from my handheld via the cell network and e-mail to my old site.
Drove to Linköping this morning listening to the Digital Planet podcast, M Coast's latest album and a Povel Ramel hits collection. On site in Kaga I was greeted by my friendly National Heritage Board colleages Immo Trinks and Per Karlsson. They were busy assembling Scandinavian archaeology's first motorised magnetometer setup, and informed me that my site would see the equipment's first non-trial run.
The setup consists of a long trailer made of aluminium and held together by bronze and plastic…
aardvarchaeology | September 17, 2007Dear Reader, did you know that ScienceBlogs has a newsletter, the Weekly Recap? It's a way to stay somewhat on top of Sb's ever-proliferating forest of blogs. Subscribe here.
aardvarchaeology | September 17, 2007My friend Howard Williams of the University of Exeter touched down at Arlanda airport in Sweden a couple of hours ago. He's here for a few weeks of study and also giving talks at four archaeology departments. Good stuff for all friends of the Dark Ages!
Wednesday 19th September, 13.00
University of Stockholm
'Memories in Miniature: New Perspectives on Artefacts and Commemoration in Early Medieval Britain c. 450-850 AD'
Thursday 20th September, 10.15
University of Uppsala
'The Archaeology of Early Medieval Commemoration'
Wednesday 26th September, 15.00
University of Lund
'The Archaeology of…
aardvarchaeology | September 17, 2007
Up until a thousand years ago, almost all buildings in Scandinavia through the ages had roof-supporting posts dug into the ground. Postholes are lovely things: they're deep enough for at least the bottom end to survive heavy ploughing, they trap a lot of interesting stuff while a house is being built - lived in - torn down, and their layout across the site lets you reconstruct the building in great detail.
When you machine off the ploughsoil from a site and find a posthole building foundation, it is common to mark the postholes with coloured sticks, paper plates or shaving foam and…
aardvarchaeology | September 17, 2007A couple of other bloggers here at Sb are writing a paper on the impact of science blogs on the outside world. You, Dear Reader, can help them by filling out a questionnaire.
This survey attempts to access the opinions of bloggers, blog-readers, and non-blog folk in regards to the impact of blogs on the outside world. The authors of the survey are completing an academic manuscript on the impact of science blogging and this survey will provide invaluable data to answer the following questions:
Who reads or writes blogs?
What are the perceptions of blogging, and
What are the views of those who…
aardvarchaeology | September 15, 2007
Here's something everybody's watching right now in Sweden because one of our best pop music journalists is linking to it from the main newspaper's web site. Thought music lovers elsewhere might like it too: Björk Guδmundsdóttir and P.J. Harvey performing "Satisfaction" at the 1994 Brit Awards. The ladies are 29 and 25 here, raw power!
aardvarchaeology | September 14, 2007From Tor yesterday (and I translate):
A short while ago I sat down in the subway beside a sixtyish lady, opened my backpack and got out a book titled From Frege to Gödel. A conversation ensued.
"Oh my, that's a thick book! Is it maths?"
(Tor sighs silently and pulls out his ear plugs.)
"Yes, mathematical logic."
"It's like a brick!"
"Yeah, but you don't have to read it from cover to cover, it's an antholo..."
"Have you read Wittgenstein's Taractus?"
"The Tractatus? Well, bits and..."
"When I am on the operating table, under the influence of hallucinogenic drugs, Bertrand Russell keeps me…