Kerkko Nordqvist

Cultivation of Perception and the Emergence of the Neolithic World

This article develops the idea that the emergence of the Neolithic world was closely linked to discovering and becoming aware of new aspects and dimensions of reality. Practices such as pottery making and cultivation promoted attentiveness to new aspects of things and the environment, which in turn generated a new kind of lived world that was, in a sense, richer, larger and deeper than before. It is proposed that new forms of material culture and new material practices – new ways of engaging with the material world – expanded people’s horizons of perception and thinking. This cultivation of perception was an important mechanism through which new ways of life and thought associated with the Neolithic came into being.

Daughters of magic: esoteric traditions, relational ontology and the archaeology of the post-medieval past

Abstract Animistic and other alternative ontologies have recently been discussed in archaeology and material culture studies, but these discussions, while not entirely unfamiliar to historical archaeology, have so far had a limited impact on our understanding of the post-medieval Western world. This paper uses Western esoteric thought and folk beliefs to engage with the idea of the relational constitution of reality. It is argued that forms of ‘magical thinking’ are relevant not only to the interpretation of particular ‘special’ activities and things but can provide new perspectives on the very dynamics of how people perceived and engaged with the world. The proposed reassessment of esoteric thought and folk beliefs has implications for, and is informed by, material culture studies. The paper begins with alchemy and proceeds to discuss broader issues.

Lost in Narration: Rediscovering the Suomussalmi Copper Adze

The Suomussalmi copper adze is a native copper artefact discovered in 1980 on Kukkosaari Island (Suomussalmi, north-eastern Finland). Since then the artefact has been repeatedly used as an example when narrating the introduction of metal technology in prehistoric Finland, while its chronological position, function and significance have remained poorly studied. Here the object is reviewed both through the results of new metallographic analyses and by re-examining its position in the context of early metal use in north-eastern Europe during the Neolithic and the Bronze Age. The results of metallographic analyses indicate that the adze was shaped by melting/casting followed by cold hammering; both techniques are shown to have been used in the research area – Finland and north-west Russia – as early as during the Neolithic. While the provenance of the metal remains to be assigned, possible domestic, Karelian as well as Uralian sources are assayed critically. Instead of plain analyses regarding techno-typology and function, the Suomussalmi adze is here connected to the general enrichment of the (material) world that took place multi-locally through the adoption of new raw materials and the increased interest in their real or presumed properties.

A military camp in the middle of nowhere: mobilities, dislocation and the archaeology of a Second World War German military base in Finnish Lapland

Abstract This article discusses military mobilities and encampment, and associated themes such as dislocation and displacement of people, through the case of a Second World War German military camp in Finnish Lapland. The article describes the camp and its archaeological research and discusses various aspects of the camp and camp life in its particular subarctic ‘wilderness’ setting, framing the discussion within the themes of mobilities and dislocations, and especially their multiple impacts on the German troops and their multinational prisoners-of-war based in the camp. A particular emphasis is put on how mobilities and dislocation – in effect ‘being stuck’ in a northern wilderness – were intertwined and how the inhabitants of the camp coped with the situation, as well as how this is reflected in the different features of the camp itself and the archaeological material that the fieldwork produced.

Beneath the Surface of the World: High-Quality Quartzes, Crystal Cavities, and Neolithization in Circumpolar Europe

Quartz was an important and widely used lithic material in the prehistory of circumpolar Eurasia. While ethnographic and other data indicate that quartz has been invested with special qualities and meanings in various cultures around the world, archaeological studies in circumpolar Europe have tended to discuss quartz use in exclusively practical and technological terms. This article takes a “nontechnological” approach to quartz finds from the boreal zone of northeastern Europe. We identify spatiotemporal variations in quartz use and explore how quartzes were perceived and signified in the cultural and cosmological context of Stone Age eastern Fennoscandia, concentrating particularly on what we call “high-quality quartzes.” More specifically, we analyze and interpret patterns of quartz use in relation to the Neolithization of northern Eurasia. We discuss our findings against the animistic-shamanistic cosmologies of circumpolar communities and especially in regard to the emerging Neolithic worldview in the north.