W. Paul Adderley

Fuel resource utilisation in landscapes of settlement

One little understood aspect of the settlement and colonisation of Iceland is fuel resource use. In this paper we identify fuel ash residues from temporally constrained middens at two contrasting settlement age sites in Mývatnssveit, northern Iceland, one high status, the other low status and ultimately abandoned. Fuel residues derived from experimental combustion of historically defined fuel resources are used to provide control for thin section micromorphology and complementary image analyses of fuel residue materials found in the midden deposits. The results suggest that fuel resources utilised at the time of settlement were for both low temperature and high temperature use, and included a mix of birch and willow wood, peat, mineral-based turf and cow dung. There are, however, marked variations in the mix of fuel resources utilised at the two sites. This is considered to reflect social regulation of fuel resources and socially driven changes to local and regional environments that may have contributed to the success or failure of early settlement sites in Iceland.

Soil Limitations to Agrarian Land Production in Premodern Iceland

Early arable activity in Iceland, introduced in the late ninth century A.D., has been characterized as marginal and at a subsistence level, largely abandoned by the 1500s as a result of climatic deterioration. This view has been advanced without considering soils data, the medium in which crops are grown and in which evidence of early land management is retained. Soil thin section micromorphology together with soil total phosphorus values are used to assess land manuring and cultivation strategies at two sites in south-west Iceland, where place name and palynological evidence indicate that arable activity has taken place. Agro-ecosystem modeling, using the CENTURY model, is undertaken to predict grain yields at these sites, and to assess the significance of soil properties and soil management in determining yields. The results of these analyses demonstrate that manure application rates were low, and support the view that grain yields were at a subsistence level. The results also suggest soils, and the management of soils, rather than climate was the major limitation to arable production. Shortages of both available manure and labor are suggested as barriers to soils and grain productivity improvements in early Iceland. The paper highlights the need to include soils analyses in discussions of early agricultural economies.

Colour description and quantification in mosaic images of soil thin sections

Quantitative micromorphological approaches have been developed for a variety of purposes in recent years. This paper describes a methodology developed for contexts where the spatial distribution of a large number of small objects is of interpretative value, and where colour is a determining criteria of the object description. Such contexts include anthropic soils, particularly plaggen soils, and geoarchaeological settings where objects may be variable in size, in relative distribution, and in colour, but where advances in interpretation are made through the quantification of these factors. Two novel methodological steps developed for such contexts are described in this paper. First, an approach using Munsell colour terms within micromorphological description is detailed. For both transmitted and reflected illuminations, the conversion of machine analytical colours captured by a camera to Munsell values is demonstrated. Second, the production of mosaic images is considered. These images are contiguous and cover a large area of the microscope slide at high resolution. This paper describes the successful use of these methods in an anthropic soil context and in doing so, variation in section thickness, regardless of the illumination method adopted, emerges as critical, highlighting that quantitative image analysis of preexisting sets of thin-section slides should be restricted to intra-slide comparison.

Modeling Traditional Manuring Practice: Soil Organic Matter Sustainability of an Early Shetland Community?

Modeling of soil systems is an essential approach to discussions of the historical dimensions of soil sustainability, but as yet there has been no formal testing and application of such models. In this paper we first test the ability of the CENTURY agroecosystem model to predict soil organic carbon levels in anthropogenic plaggen soils from ethnographic and historical land management information of manuring practices on the Shetland island of Papa Stour. Observations suggest that the model makes accurate predictions and can be used to develop and test hypothetical land management scenarios. Results suggest that within historic time the arable areas of Papa Stour were manured at a level above that required to maintain soil organic carbon levels, and consequently the hill-land source of organic material was overexploited with no real apparent gain. Modeled evidence suggests that short-term observations of soil organic carbon levels would indicate a greater degree of manure application than was actually required over the longer term. Successful use of the CENTURY model in this historic context suggests that it may be applicable to questions of soil sustainability in other areas of the North Atlantic region.

Gásir in Eyjafjörður: International Exchange and Local Economy in Medieval Iceland

Abstract The site of Gásir in Eyjafjörđur in northeast Iceland was excavated from 2001–2006, revealing details of one of the larger seasonal trading centers of medieval Iceland. Interdisciplinary investigations of the site have shed light upon the organization of the site and provided confirmation of documentary accounts of both prestige items (gyrfalcons, walrus ivory) and bulk goods (sulphur) concentrated for export. Gásir was a major point of cultural contact as well as economic exchange between Icelanders and the world of medieval Europe, and the zooarchaeological analyses indicated a mix of foodways and the presence of exotic animals and a well-developed provisioning system, which supplied high-quality meat and fresh fish to the traders. The excavations demonstrated an unexpected regional-level economic impact of the seasonally occupied site on the surrounding rural countryside, and contribute to ongoing investigations of the extent and impact of overseas trade in medieval Iceland.

Testing High-resolution X-ray Computed Tomography for the Micromorphological Analyses of Archaeological Soils and Sediments

Micromorphological analysis of soils and sediment thin-sections is a recently established interpretative method applied to samples from geoarchaeological contexts. To further the quantitative element of thin-section micromorphology studies, image analysis methods have been used to segment and quantify section images. Despite these advances, the production of sections is prone to the introduction of artefacts and the fundamental limitation of a two-dimensional section can restrict interpretation of spatially complex samples such as occupation surfaces. High-resolution X-ray computed tomography offers the potential to surmount these inherent problems and allow quantitative analysis in three-dimensions. This paper demonstrates this and presents a test of the high-resolution computed tomography method against conventional thin-section micromorphology. The results of a comparative quantitative assessment of these methods are given. Copyright

Lordship and Environmental Change in Central Highland Scotland c.1300–c.1400

ABSTRACT Whilst there has been an increasing recognition of the influence of natural agency on human society in Scotland in the medieval period, conventional historiography has generally presented the wholesale reconfiguration of structures of secular lordship in the Scottish central Highlands in the 14th century as an essentially political consequence of the socio-political dislocation associated with the Anglo-Scottish wars that occurred after 1296. The establishment within the region of militarised Gaelic kindreds from the West Highlands and Hebrides of Scotland has come to be regarded as either a symptom of efforts by externally based regional lords to bolster their authority, or an opportunistic territorial aggrandise-ment by newly dominant neighbouring lords. Feuding and predatory raiding associated with these kindreds is recognised as competition for resources but generally in a context of projection of superior lordship over weaker neighbours. Evidence for long-term changes in climate extrapolated from North Atlantic proxy data, however, suggests that the cattle-based economy of Atlantic Scotland was experiencing protracted environmentally induced stress in the period c.1300–c.1350. Using this evidence, we discuss whether exchange systems operating within traditional lordship structures could offset localised and short-term pressures on the livestock-based regime, but could not be sustained long-term on the reduced fodder and contracting herd sizes caused by climatic deterioration. Territorial expansion and development of a predatory culture, it is argued, were responses to an environment-triggered economic crisis.

The lead legacy: The relationship between historical mining, pollution and the post-mining landscape

ABSTRACT The British lead mining industry peaked and declined well before environmental protection and aftercare became a statutory requirement in the post-war period, and as a consequence left in its wake pockets of barren and degraded land. Metal-rich waste tips rarely return to vegetation, and environmental pollution continues through wind erosion and adit drainage. Yet the upland and often remote situation of the mines has permitted many of these small scattered wastelands to escape extensive remediation. These abandoned mine sites have often been interpreted in terms of their historic economic and technological narratives or studied in relation to contemporary heavy metals pollution and current risks to public health. This interdisciplinary study explores the value and benefits of integrating these two approaches towards a better understanding of mining landscapes in relation to their pollution history; grounding the methodology in research questions rather than in any specific discipline. It combines the history of a small abandoned lead mine at Tyndrum, Stirlingshire, with the environmental record contained with the soil material at the site. The integration of traditional historical research with geo-scientific analysis both expands, and not only deepens, knowledge of the historic processes that have brought the specific landscape at Tyndrum to its current state of degradation but also sets the long-term environmental legacies of historic mineral exploitation in the wider British context.

25 – Anthropogenic Features

Publisher Summary This chapter discusses anthropogenic features. There are many challenges in developing through micromorphology, an understanding of soils and regoliths that have been influenced by direct human interventions, the application of micromophology to Anthrosols and Technosols may lead to better understanding of both their past and future management. Various classifications for risk assessment of contaminated land have been developed and may be furthered through use of soil micromorphology. In both the Anthrosol and Technosol contexts, confounding the typical questions posed to the micromorphologist on the identification of the type, nature and intensity of these human interventions are many process-led issues. Seasonal changes, and the different rates of change for natural and anthropogenic processes operating in a single soil profile, create many localized phenomena and localized alterations of different soil constituents.

Ground-breaking: Scientific and Sonic Perceptions of Environmental Change in the African Sahel

ABSTRACT Soils surrounding ancient settlements can hold evidence of the activities of past societies. To seek an understanding of how past societies have reacted and contributed to environmental change requires many data sources. The real-time audiovisual installation Ground-breaking problematizes the presentation of such data, gained in this case through the image-analysis of soil materials. These data are used to connote environmental events and consequent human responses. By combining these data with audiovisual synthesis and environmental recordings, the authors present a basis for developing conceptualizations of new locales undergoing environmental change; the visual and sonic narratives that are developed allow the art-science interface to be explored.