A Viking Age political economy from soil core tephrochronology
Saga accounts describe Viking Age Iceland as an egalitarian society of independent household farms. By the medieval period, the stateless, agriculturally marginal society had become highly stratified in exploitative landlord-tenant relationships. Classical economists place the origin of differential...
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University of Massachusetts Boston
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ftproquest:oai:pqdtoai.proquest.com:1494022 2023-05-15T16:47:51+02:00 A Viking Age political economy from soil core tephrochronology Catlin, Kathryn A. 2011-01-01 00:00:01.0 http://pqdtopen.proquest.com/#viewpdf?dispub=1494022 ENG eng University of Massachusetts Boston http://pqdtopen.proquest.com/#viewpdf?dispub=1494022 Archaeology|Icelandic & Scandinavian literature|Economic theory thesis 2011 ftproquest 2021-03-13T17:35:22Z Saga accounts describe Viking Age Iceland as an egalitarian society of independent household farms. By the medieval period, the stateless, agriculturally marginal society had become highly stratified in exploitative landlord-tenant relationships. Classical economists place the origin of differential wealth in unequal access to resources that are unevenly distributed across the landscape. This irregularity is manifested archaeologically as spatial variations in buried soil horizons, which are addressed through thousands of soil cores recorded across Langholt in support of the Skagafjörður Archaeological Settlement Survey. Soil accumulation rates, a proxy for land quality, are derived from tephrochronology and correlated with archaeological and historical data to describe relationships between local environmental conditions, farm size, and farm settlement order. Spatial variations in soil accumulation rate are inherent, persistent, and magnified by environmental decline. Settling early on high-quality land leads to long-term success, while farmers who settle later, or on more marginal land, can maintain high status by leveraging alternate sources of wealth to gain control over more productive agricultural land. Subtle differences in the rate of soil accumulation lead to large differences in the wealth of farmsteads during the Viking Age on Langholt in Skagafjörður, Iceland. Thesis Iceland PQDT Open: Open Access Dissertations and Theses (ProQuest) Langholt ENVELOPE(-22.050,-22.050,64.550,64.550) Skagafjörður ENVELOPE(-19.561,-19.561,65.875,65.875) |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
PQDT Open: Open Access Dissertations and Theses (ProQuest) |
op_collection_id |
ftproquest |
language |
English |
topic |
Archaeology|Icelandic & Scandinavian literature|Economic theory |
spellingShingle |
Archaeology|Icelandic & Scandinavian literature|Economic theory Catlin, Kathryn A. A Viking Age political economy from soil core tephrochronology |
topic_facet |
Archaeology|Icelandic & Scandinavian literature|Economic theory |
description |
Saga accounts describe Viking Age Iceland as an egalitarian society of independent household farms. By the medieval period, the stateless, agriculturally marginal society had become highly stratified in exploitative landlord-tenant relationships. Classical economists place the origin of differential wealth in unequal access to resources that are unevenly distributed across the landscape. This irregularity is manifested archaeologically as spatial variations in buried soil horizons, which are addressed through thousands of soil cores recorded across Langholt in support of the Skagafjörður Archaeological Settlement Survey. Soil accumulation rates, a proxy for land quality, are derived from tephrochronology and correlated with archaeological and historical data to describe relationships between local environmental conditions, farm size, and farm settlement order. Spatial variations in soil accumulation rate are inherent, persistent, and magnified by environmental decline. Settling early on high-quality land leads to long-term success, while farmers who settle later, or on more marginal land, can maintain high status by leveraging alternate sources of wealth to gain control over more productive agricultural land. Subtle differences in the rate of soil accumulation lead to large differences in the wealth of farmsteads during the Viking Age on Langholt in Skagafjörður, Iceland. |
format |
Thesis |
author |
Catlin, Kathryn A. |
author_facet |
Catlin, Kathryn A. |
author_sort |
Catlin, Kathryn A. |
title |
A Viking Age political economy from soil core tephrochronology |
title_short |
A Viking Age political economy from soil core tephrochronology |
title_full |
A Viking Age political economy from soil core tephrochronology |
title_fullStr |
A Viking Age political economy from soil core tephrochronology |
title_full_unstemmed |
A Viking Age political economy from soil core tephrochronology |
title_sort |
viking age political economy from soil core tephrochronology |
publisher |
University of Massachusetts Boston |
publishDate |
2011 |
url |
http://pqdtopen.proquest.com/#viewpdf?dispub=1494022 |
long_lat |
ENVELOPE(-22.050,-22.050,64.550,64.550) ENVELOPE(-19.561,-19.561,65.875,65.875) |
geographic |
Langholt Skagafjörður |
geographic_facet |
Langholt Skagafjörður |
genre |
Iceland |
genre_facet |
Iceland |
op_relation |
http://pqdtopen.proquest.com/#viewpdf?dispub=1494022 |
_version_ |
1766037949532602368 |