Zooarchaeology of the Scandinavian settlements in Iceland and Greenland: diverging pathways

• Main Authors: McGovern, Thomas, Smairowski, Konrad, Hambrecht, George, Brewington, Seth, Harrison, Ramona, Hicks, Megan, Feeley, Frank J., Prehal, Brenda, Woollett, James
• Format: Other/Unknown Material
• Language: English
• Published: CUNY Academic Works 2017
• Subjects: North Atlantic; zooarchaeology; Greenland; Iceland; climate change; human ecodynamics; Archaeological Anthropology
• Online Access: https://academicworks.cuny.edu/hc_pubs/638; https://academicworks.cuny.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1682&context=hc_pubs

The Scandinavian Viking Age and Medieval settlements of Iceland and Greenland have been subject to zooarchaeological research for over a century, and have come to represent two classic cases of survival and collapse in the literature of long-term human ecodynamics. The work of the past two decades by multiple projects coordinated through the North Atlantic Biocultural Organization (NABO) cooperative and by collaborating scholars has dramatically increased the available zooarchaeological evidence for economic organization of these two communities, their initial adaptation to different natural and social contexts, and their reaction to Late Medieval economic and climate change. This summary paper provides an overview of ongoing comparative research as well as references for data sets and more detailed discussion of archaeofauna from these two island communities. Keywords: North Atlantic, zooarchaeology, Greenland, Iceland, climate change, human ecodynamics