{"id":3655,"date":"2021-03-23T07:54:30","date_gmt":"2021-03-23T06:54:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/?p=3655"},"modified":"2023-05-22T08:56:43","modified_gmt":"2023-05-22T06:56:43","slug":"urbanisation-of-viking-age-scandinavia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/en\/urbanisation-of-viking-age-scandinavia\/","title":{"rendered":"Urbanisation of Viking-age Scandinavia"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Dr. Sven Kalmring<\/strong><\/p>\n

The major proto-urban centres of the early medieval world in Northern Europe such as Hedeby, Ribe, Birka and Kaupang, possessed a specifically favourable traffic-geographic situation, were situated in borderlands and could attract many merchants from sometimes far-distant places, resulting in considerable economic prosperity. Even their denotations in the contemporary written sources partly overlap. The way in which the written sources label these kinds of trading places has long been the matter of academic discussion and is immediately connected to the vast field of \u201cearly stages of the European town\u201d and urbanisation in Central and Northern Europe in general. Apart from the process of the Christianisation of the North, there is hardly any other topic that has been debated as intensively and controversially within the field of Early Medieval archaeology and Viking age studies. Hence, it is not a coincidence that there still seems to be no generally accepted, straightforward interpretation. There seems little use in introducing yet another term to an already bewildering academic discussion. It is unlikely that one more suggestion, one more denotation for the first sparks of the urban phenomenon in the North, manifested by four recognised sites only (sic!), will bring us any further in the future debate of this major field of research in Scandinavian Early Medieval archaeology. It may even be raised the heretical question if our main concern is still a question of terminology.<\/p>\n

\"wordle\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Regardless of their academic denotation, the issue of what these places were about remains as primary as the problem. But what apart from the mere \u201ctrade and production\u201d as commonplace is at the very core of that discontinuous phenomenon of the dawn of high medieval towns that these very special sites constitute? It might be about time to shift the emphasis from a mere what? (towns) or how? (networks) to a more elaborate why? Obviously that answer cannot be achieved by focusing on the early urban centres only. It requires nothing less than a sincere holistic approach: A thorough examination of the societal framework of the circumjacent ordinary world, mirrored in a super-regional comparison with Anglo-Saxon England, Continental Europe as well as Byzantium and lastly \u2013 since we are dealing with protohistoric archaeology! \u2013 an inclusion of the sparse but not less important information from chronicles and legal texts. What sounds like a vast investment in research is indeed quite achievable since most of the jigsaw pieces have been known for quite some time within the scientific debate. It is on us to place them out into one coherent picture. In light of the evidence, the implementation of the concept of \u201cspecial economic zones\u201d seeks to contribute to helping understand the specific nature and function of these very distinct sites for the traditional Viking age society at the earliest stage of urbanism in Northern Europe.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Research clusters<\/h6>

Man and Society<\/p>

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Research Priorities<\/h6>

Research Cluster Hedeby, Slesvig and beyond<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Staff<\/h6>

Chiefs:<\/strong>
Docent Dr. Sven Kalmring<\/p>

\u00a0<\/div>
\u00a0<\/div>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dr. Sven Kalmring The major proto-urban centres of the early medieval world in Northern Europe such as Hedeby, Ribe, Birka and Kaupang, possessed a specifically favourable traffic-geographic situation, were situated in borderlands and could attract many merchants from sometimes far-distant places, resulting in considerable economic prosperity. Even their denotations in the contemporary written sources partly overlap. The way in which the written sources label these kinds of trading places has long been the matter of academic discussion and is immediately connected to the vast field of \u201cearly stages of the European town\u201d and urbanisation in Central and Northern Europe in general. Apart from the process of the Christianisation of the North, there is hardly any other topic that has been debated as intensively and controversially within the field of Early Medieval archaeology and Viking age studies. Hence, it is not a coincidence that there still seems to be no generally accepted, straightforward interpretation. There seems little use in introducing yet another term to an already bewildering academic discussion. It is unlikely that one more suggestion, one more denotation for the first sparks of the urban phenomenon in the North, manifested by four recognised sites only (sic!), will bring us any further in the future debate of this major field of research in Scandinavian Early Medieval archaeology. It may even be raised the heretical question if our main concern is still a question of terminology. Regardless of their academic denotation, the issue of what these places were about remains as primary as the problem. But what apart from the mere \u201ctrade and production\u201d as commonplace is at the very core of that discontinuous phenomenon of the dawn of high medieval towns that these very special sites constitute? It might be about time to shift the emphasis from a mere what? (towns) or how? (networks) to a more elaborate why? Obviously that answer cannot be achieved by focusing on the early urban centres only. It requires nothing less than a sincere holistic approach: A thorough examination of the societal framework of the circumjacent ordinary world, mirrored in a super-regional comparison with Anglo-Saxon England, Continental Europe as well as Byzantium and lastly \u2013 since we are dealing with protohistoric archaeology! \u2013 an inclusion of the sparse but not less important information from chronicles and legal texts. What sounds like a vast investment in research is indeed quite achievable since most of the jigsaw pieces have been known for quite some time within the scientific debate. It is on us to place them out into one coherent picture. In light of the evidence, the implementation of the concept of \u201cspecial economic zones\u201d seeks to contribute to helping understand the specific nature and function of these very distinct sites for the traditional Viking age society at the earliest stage of urbanism in Northern Europe. Themenbereiche Mensch und Gesellschaft \u00a0\u00a0 Forschungsschwerpunkte Research Cluster Hedeby, Slesvig and beyond Mitarbeiter Leitung:Docent Dr. Sven Kalmring \u00a0\u00a0<\/p>","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_eb_attr":"","inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[40,48,42],"tags":[68,69],"class_list":["post-3655","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-forschungsschwerpunkte","category-research-cluster-hedeby","category-mensch-und-gesellschaft","tag-research-cluster-hedeby","tag-slesvig-and-beyond"],"yoast_head":"\nUrbanisation of Viking-age Scandinavia - Zentrum f\u00fcr Baltische und Skandinavische Arch\u00e4ologie (ZBSA) \u2014 Zentrum f\u00fcr Baltische und Skandinavische Arch\u00e4ologie<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/en\/urbanisation-of-viking-age-scandinavia\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_GB\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Urbanisation of Viking-age Scandinavia - Zentrum f\u00fcr Baltische und Skandinavische Arch\u00e4ologie (ZBSA) \u2014 Zentrum f\u00fcr Baltische und Skandinavische Arch\u00e4ologie\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Dr. Sven Kalmring The major proto-urban centres of the early medieval world in Northern Europe such as Hedeby, Ribe, Birka and Kaupang, possessed a specifically favourable traffic-geographic situation, were situated in borderlands and could attract many merchants from sometimes far-distant places, resulting in considerable economic prosperity. Even their denotations in the contemporary written sources partly overlap. The way in which the written sources label these kinds of trading places has long been the matter of academic discussion and is immediately connected to the vast field of \u201cearly stages of the European town\u201d and urbanisation in Central and Northern Europe in general. Apart from the process of the Christianisation of the North, there is hardly any other topic that has been debated as intensively and controversially within the field of Early Medieval archaeology and Viking age studies. Hence, it is not a coincidence that there still seems to be no generally accepted, straightforward interpretation. There seems little use in introducing yet another term to an already bewildering academic discussion. It is unlikely that one more suggestion, one more denotation for the first sparks of the urban phenomenon in the North, manifested by four recognised sites only (sic!), will bring us any further in the future debate of this major field of research in Scandinavian Early Medieval archaeology. It may even be raised the heretical question if our main concern is still a question of terminology. Regardless of their academic denotation, the issue of what these places were about remains as primary as the problem. But what apart from the mere \u201ctrade and production\u201d as commonplace is at the very core of that discontinuous phenomenon of the dawn of high medieval towns that these very special sites constitute? It might be about time to shift the emphasis from a mere what? (towns) or how? (networks) to a more elaborate why? Obviously that answer cannot be achieved by focusing on the early urban centres only. It requires nothing less than a sincere holistic approach: A thorough examination of the societal framework of the circumjacent ordinary world, mirrored in a super-regional comparison with Anglo-Saxon England, Continental Europe as well as Byzantium and lastly \u2013 since we are dealing with protohistoric archaeology! \u2013 an inclusion of the sparse but not less important information from chronicles and legal texts. What sounds like a vast investment in research is indeed quite achievable since most of the jigsaw pieces have been known for quite some time within the scientific debate. It is on us to place them out into one coherent picture. In light of the evidence, the implementation of the concept of \u201cspecial economic zones\u201d seeks to contribute to helping understand the specific nature and function of these very distinct sites for the traditional Viking age society at the earliest stage of urbanism in Northern Europe. Themenbereiche Mensch und Gesellschaft \u00a0\u00a0 Forschungsschwerpunkte Research Cluster Hedeby, Slesvig and beyond Mitarbeiter Leitung:Docent Dr. Sven Kalmring \u00a0\u00a0\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/en\/urbanisation-of-viking-age-scandinavia\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Zentrum f\u00fcr Baltische und Skandinavische Arch\u00e4ologie (ZBSA) \u2014 Zentrum f\u00fcr Baltische und Skandinavische Arch\u00e4ologie\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2021-03-23T06:54:30+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2023-05-22T06:56:43+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/zbsa-195x300.png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Matthias Bolte\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Matthias Bolte\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Estimated reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/urbanisation-of-viking-age-scandinavia\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/urbanisation-of-viking-age-scandinavia\/\",\"name\":\"Urbanisation of Viking-age Scandinavia - 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It is unlikely that one more suggestion, one more denotation for the first sparks of the urban phenomenon in the North, manifested by four recognised sites only (sic!), will bring us any further in the future debate of this major field of research in Scandinavian Early Medieval archaeology. It may even be raised the heretical question if our main concern is still a question of terminology. Regardless of their academic denotation, the issue of what these places were about remains as primary as the problem. But what apart from the mere \u201ctrade and production\u201d as commonplace is at the very core of that discontinuous phenomenon of the dawn of high medieval towns that these very special sites constitute? It might be about time to shift the emphasis from a mere what? (towns) or how? (networks) to a more elaborate why? Obviously that answer cannot be achieved by focusing on the early urban centres only. It requires nothing less than a sincere holistic approach: A thorough examination of the societal framework of the circumjacent ordinary world, mirrored in a super-regional comparison with Anglo-Saxon England, Continental Europe as well as Byzantium and lastly \u2013 since we are dealing with protohistoric archaeology! \u2013 an inclusion of the sparse but not less important information from chronicles and legal texts. What sounds like a vast investment in research is indeed quite achievable since most of the jigsaw pieces have been known for quite some time within the scientific debate. It is on us to place them out into one coherent picture. In light of the evidence, the implementation of the concept of \u201cspecial economic zones\u201d seeks to contribute to helping understand the specific nature and function of these very distinct sites for the traditional Viking age society at the earliest stage of urbanism in Northern Europe. Themenbereiche Mensch und Gesellschaft \u00a0\u00a0 Forschungsschwerpunkte Research Cluster Hedeby, Slesvig and beyond Mitarbeiter Leitung:Docent Dr. Sven Kalmring \u00a0\u00a0","og_url":"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/en\/urbanisation-of-viking-age-scandinavia\/","og_site_name":"Zentrum f\u00fcr Baltische und Skandinavische Arch\u00e4ologie (ZBSA) \u2014 Zentrum f\u00fcr Baltische und Skandinavische Arch\u00e4ologie","article_published_time":"2021-03-23T06:54:30+00:00","article_modified_time":"2023-05-22T06:56:43+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/zbsa-195x300.png","type":"","width":"","height":""}],"author":"Matthias Bolte","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Matthias Bolte","Estimated reading time":"3 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Bolte","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-GB","@id":"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/1f3bc1bfe4b641855cb944e558d4f3de1b57120f6dfe8f4368ebfe0384a5acab?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/1f3bc1bfe4b641855cb944e558d4f3de1b57120f6dfe8f4368ebfe0384a5acab?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Matthias Bolte"},"url":"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/en\/author\/matthias-bolte\/"}]}},"featured_image_src":" ","featured_image_src_square":" ","author_info":{"display_name":"Matthias Bolte","author_link":"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/en\/author\/matthias-bolte\/"},"category_info":"<a href=\"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/en\/category\/themenbereiche\/forschungsschwerpunkte\/\" rel=\"category tag\">Forschungsschwerpunkte<\/a>,<a href=\"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/en\/category\/themenbereiche\/forschungsschwerpunkte\/research-cluster-hedeby\/\" rel=\"category tag\">Hedeby<\/a>,<a href=\"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/en\/category\/themenbereiche\/mensch-und-gesellschaft\/\" rel=\"category tag\">Mensch und Gesellschaft<\/a>","tags_info":"<a href=\"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/en\/tag\/research-cluster-hedeby\/\" rel=\"tag\">Research Cluster Hedeby<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/en\/tag\/slesvig-and-beyond\/\" rel=\"tag\">Slesvig and beyond<\/a>","social_share_info":"<a data-share=\"facebook\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/en\/urbanisation-of-viking-age-scandinavia\/\" class=\"pl-facebook-share social-share-default pl-social-share\" target=\"_blank\"><i class=\"fab fa-facebook-f\" aria-hidden=\"true\"><\/i><\/a><a data-share=\"twitter\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/share?url=https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/en\/urbanisation-of-viking-age-scandinavia\/\" class=\"pl-twiiter-share social-share-default pl-social-share\" target=\"_blank\"><i class=\"fab fa-twitter\" aria-hidden=\"true\"><\/i><\/a><a data-share=\"linkedin\" href=\"https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/shareArticle?url=https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/en\/urbanisation-of-viking-age-scandinavia\/\" class=\"pl-linkedin-share social-share-default pl-social-share\" target=\"_blank\"><i class=\"fab fa-linkedin-in\" aria-hidden=\"true\"><\/i><\/a>","wordExcerpt_info":"<p><strong>Dr. Sven Kalmring<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The major proto-urban centres of the early medieval world in Northern Europe such as Hedeby, Ribe, Birka and Kaupang, possessed a specifically favourable traffic-geographic situation, were situated in borderlands and could attract many merchants from sometimes far-distant places, resulting in considerable economic prosperity. Even their denotations in the contemporary written sources partly overlap. The way in which the written sources label these kinds of trading places has long been the matter of academic discussion and is immediately connected to the vast field of \u201cearly stages of the European town\u201d and urbanisation in Central and Northern Europe in general. Apart from the process of the Christianisation of the North, there is hardly any other topic that has been debated as intensively and controversially within the field of Early Medieval archaeology and Viking age studies. Hence, it is not a coincidence that there still seems to be no generally accepted, straightforward interpretation. There seems little use in introducing yet another term to an already bewildering academic discussion. It is unlikely that one more suggestion, one more denotation for the first sparks of the urban phenomenon in the North, manifested by four recognised sites only (sic!), will bring us any further in the future debate of this major field of research in Scandinavian Early Medieval archaeology. It may even be raised the heretical question if our main concern is still a question of terminology.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/zbsa.png\"><img src=\"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/zbsa-195x300.png\" alt=\"wordle\" width=\"220\" height=\"338\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Regardless of their academic denotation, the issue of what these places were about remains as primary as the problem. But what apart from the mere \u201ctrade and production\u201d as commonplace is at the very core of that discontinuous phenomenon of the dawn of high medieval towns that these very special sites constitute? It might be about time to shift the emphasis from a mere what? (towns) or how? (networks) to a more elaborate why? Obviously that answer cannot be achieved by focusing on the early urban centres only. It requires nothing less than a sincere holistic approach: A thorough examination of the societal framework of the circumjacent ordinary world, mirrored in a super-regional comparison with Anglo-Saxon England, Continental Europe as well as Byzantium and lastly \u2013 since we are dealing with protohistoric archaeology! \u2013 an inclusion of the sparse but not less important information from chronicles and legal texts. What sounds like a vast investment in research is indeed quite achievable since most of the jigsaw pieces have been known for quite some time within the scientific debate. It is on us to place them out into one coherent picture. In light of the evidence, the implementation of the concept of \u201cspecial economic zones\u201d seeks to contribute to helping understand the specific nature and function of these very distinct sites for the traditional Viking age society at the earliest stage of urbanism in Northern Europe.<\/p>\n<h6>Themenbereiche<\/h6>\n<p>Mensch und Gesellschaft<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<h6>Forschungsschwerpunkte<\/h6>\n<p>Research Cluster Hedeby, Slesvig and beyond<\/p>\n<h6>Mitarbeiter<\/h6>\n<p><strong>Leitung:<\/strong><br \/>Docent Dr. Sven Kalmring<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n","comment_info":"No Comments","acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3655","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3655"}],"version-history":[{"count":15,"href":"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3655\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9060,"href":"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3655\/revisions\/9060"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3655"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3655"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zbsa.eu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3655"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}