Burial Site of Lahepera in Eastern Estonia Krista Karro*
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Karro, K 2015 Continuing Landscape, Continuing Life: Burial Site of Lahepera pia in Eastern Estonia. Papers from the Institute of Archaeology, 25(1): 4, pp. 1-11, DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5334/pia.480 RESEARCH PAPER Continuing Landscape, Continuing Life: Burial Site of Lahepera in Eastern Estonia Krista Karro* The article will comprise a discussion on the continual aspect of landscape based on a burial place in the eastern part of Estonia. This burial place was used for collective dispersed burials into a stone grave from the 3rd to 11th centuries AD. In the second half of the 11th century the burial tradition changed, and from that time on richly furnished inhumations were practiced in the very place next to the stone grave. Previously, I have interpreted such a change in social and religious landscape as a rupture, but it can also be considered as a continuation. The physical landscape remained the same, while new religious rituals (individual inhumations instead of collective cremations) were starting to be practiced at the same location. I will argue that there were various reasons for using this place in the landscape for such a long period of time. The main reason, however, was economic, for the place was probably used as a harbour site. But as practical everyday life was prob- ably closely connected to religious life during that period, I will argue that there was also a religious importance to the place. Introduction paruness von S.-i mälestustes, mida härra N. ei väsi umber jutustamast, on Nad lähevadki neid emaga mõisa juurde nad kõik veel elus… vaatama, sest härra N. on neile tea- tanud, et parunessi vennatütre lapsed (They are going to the mansion to see on neile külla tulnud. Aga need lapsed them, because Mr. N has told them that valmistavad Joosepile suure pettumuse. the children of the former baroness’s Need on täiesti tavaliselt riides, heledate cousin have come to visit him. But those tuulepluusidega tänapäeva vanain- children disappoint Joosep, because imesed. Nad tulevad hariliku autoga, they are in very common clothes – just ilma hobuste, püsside, tõldadeta, üldse like contemporary elderly people in ilma milletagi. Paistab nii, et päris mõis- light blouses. They come in a regular nikud ei tule enam kunagi tagasi. Aga car, without horses, rifles, coaches. It seems that the real barons and baron- esses are never coming back. But in the memoires of Baroness von S, constantly * Tallinn University, Estonian Institute of 1 Humanities, Estonia retold by Mr. S, they are all still here….”) [email protected] (Õnnepalu 2012, 68) Art. 4, page 2 of 11 Karro: Continuing Landscape, Continuing Life This article aims to discuss a burial site in being studied and described as they are, but eastern Estonia in a way that has not been this merely serves the function of setting the done before. Namely, the purpose is to context and justifying the choice of topic. look at previously known archaeological In conclusion, the article aims to study one information about the burial site from the of Estonia’s landscapes in a way that has pre- perspective of continuation in the land- viously been practiced very little in Estonia, scape. The site in question was excavated and seeks to understand why one place may quite thoroughly in the 1970s (Lavi 1977, have been in use for 1500 years. 1978a, 1978b), and further research about it has been conducted and published by the Why are we looking for continuation author of the present article in the 2000s in landscapes? (Karro 2010a, 2010b, 2012). Landscapes are continual spaces – never fin- The history of theoretical landscape ished, but the result of processes and prac- research on other sites is new to Estonian tices (Pred 1984). This type of (contemporary) archaeology. However, in other European thinking mostly emerged in the 1970s and countries it has been more widely discussed 1980s, for before this geographers,historians and some of this literature has been used in and also archaeologists, dealt more with the theoretical framework of this article. In single objects and places, and not so much Estonia, mostly North-Estonian archaeologi- with continuity (Baker 2003). However, it cal landscapes have been studied (e.g. Lang began to be felt that archaeologists should 1996; Vedru 2001, 2002, 2009, 2011, 2013a), actually not discuss single objects so much and an overview of Estonian settlement and as landscapes as a whole. Hans Gumbrecht’s landscape archaeology has also been pro- late concept of change of chronotopes in the vided (Lang and Laneman 2006). In addition perception of history after World War II is an to North-Estonia, the settlement of Saaremaa appropriate place to start the present discus- has also been researched (e.g. Mägi 2002a, sion. A ‘chronotope’ is the social construction 2008). However, most of the landscape of temporality. While the old chronotope research has been done from the viewpoint considered the past as something that had to of settlement archaeology, and not so much be left behind, the new chronotope suggests from landscape archaeology (Lang 1996, that the past has settled in the present, or in Mägi 2002a). Some examples from the latter other words, presence is inundated by ‘past- are Gurly Vedru’s works (2009, 2011, 2013a, ness’ (Gumbrecht 2013). Driven by this idea, 2013b). Thus, this article also aims to dis- archaeological landscapes can also be seen as cuss aspects in the lives of people in the past spaces that are inundated by pastness, and through more phenomenological notions that this pastness is carried by archaeological like memory and narration. objects/monuments and artefacts. In other However, these concepts have been dealt words, the present is always affected by the with by human geographers in Estonia (e.g. past, because there is always something left Palang 2001), and there has also been some from the past in the present landscape, and co-operation with archaeologists (e.g. Palang it is this that archaeologists study. The most et al 2005). Continuation is the main theo- difficult part of archaeological research is retical conception used in the discussion. to set what remains from the past into the However, there are several other notions that context of processes and development, or as will be discussed in the context of continua- Chris Gosden and Gary Lock (1998, 4) have tion, for they form an essential part of con- stated: “For the archaeologists, sites are static tinuation itself: memory, narration/stories. entities, to be classified into land boundaries, Some attention is also paid to the research- burial monuments, hillforts and so on. We er’s perspective as to why the landscapes are arrive many millennia later when the heat Karro: Continuing Landscape, Continuing Life Art. 4, page 3 of 11 and urgency of daily life has cooled and cast in making places meaningful – after all, it a retrospective view over the landscape”. can be argued that this is the very way that So, continuation in landscapes should be locations are turned into places (Cresswell investigated, because this “retrospective” 2004). This meaningfulness is often mostly view is lacking this . By understanding the concerned with local people and their mem- concept of continuation, and some related ories of, and roots in, a place (Hernandés et concepts that will be discussed below, this al 2007) and its monuments and natural fea- can be to some extent achieved. tures (Van Dyke and Alcock 2003). This is the process by which place identity forms and a Landscape, memory, and continuation place becomes a bearer of memory (Vedru The meaning of landscape in this article and Karro 2012). should be explained, for it has many defini- Although Gumbrecht (2013) has stated tions. Landscapes are understood not only as that memory is an artefact from the past, natural and/or cultural, but as a system where it can instead be argued that artefacts and natural, cognitive and temporal components archaeological sites such as burial places are connected (Palang 2001). Landscape does facilitate memory. Landscape can also be not exist outside of the human mind (Vedru defined as the materialisation of memory, or 2002), but the human mind saves what it has the fixing of social and individual histories in had contact with - this (in a very broad sense) time. As human memory constructs rather can be called memory, and memory is a vital than retrieves, the past therefore originates aspect in the continuation of anything con- from cultural memory, which is itself socially nected with or in the human mind. constructed (Ashmore and Knapp 2000). In But landscape can also be explained as a this way landscape can become a collective network of places connected by paths, roads narrative about the people living there. and stories (Tilley 1994). Network is one Narrative is considered to be a spoken or of the key words in this definition – differ- written account of connected events (a story) ent landscapes form networks, because all or, in other words, a practice or an art of tell- landscapes (geographically, temporally or ing stories. Stories usually have a continual perceivably distanced) form one unity to a aspect, and can re-enact memories, as the certain extent, and it is only possible to study citation at the beginning of this article illus- parts of it more closely. The landscape dis- trates, and can also be mediators of a far-away cussed below is also only a part of this net- past that does not exist anymore. However, in work, for it is connected to other landscapes. a narrative the past can still be ‘hot’, ‘urgent’, Landscapes also consist of different layers, and real, while only fractions of this past real- which may each form connections with dif- ity may be physically extant.