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Circular Flow of Tradition in Old Norse Religion

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Circular Flow of Tradition in Old Norse Religion •• JOURNAL OF SWEDISH ANTIQUARIAN RESEARCH 2018:2 Art. Nordberg 76-88_Layout 1 2018-05-22 11:21 Sida 76 Circular flow of tradition in Old Norse religion By Andreas Nordberg Nordberg, A., 2018. Circular flow of tradition in Old Norse religion. Fornvännen 113. Stockholm. This paper discusses processes that drove the ability of pre-Christian religion in Scandinavia to vary and adapt to shifting conditions and contexts in society. They also helped to keep religion cohesive over both social and geographical boundaries and hierarchies. Based on a substantially reduced and contextually modified vari- ant of McKim Marriott’s description of the changeability of religious traditions as a constantly on-going circular flow, I tentatively exemplify the dynamism of reli- gion in the Late Iron Age through three case studies. The first of these concerns the relationship between local, regional and supra- regional deities; the second addresses the axis mundi complex and the relationship between private and public worship; and the third examines the exchange of mor- tuary practices and eschatological religious traditions across social boundaries. All these cases also illustrate the ability of religious elements to spread geographically, and in doing so adapt to varying sociocultural contexts. Such processes took place in all contexts where people interacted. The sociocultural foundations of religion can in this sense be compared to a multitude of overlapping, interacting, change- able networks of social and cultural relationships. The characteristics that kept religion dynamic and alive were flexibility and an ability to adapt to this sociocultural patchwork. Religion was part of culture, and just like culture, it was shaped by the constant circular flow of tradition. Andreas Nordberg, Dept of Ethnology, History of Religions and Gender Studies, Stockholm University, SE–106 91 Stockholm [email protected] Cultural variation in time and space have always In terms of the variations in pre-Christian been a central issue in research into pre-Christian religion, it appears that historians of religion have and pre-modern Scandinavia. Anyone studying above all shown interest in change over time, cultural diffusion patterns will, however, find a while the study of regionality and social hierar- kaleidoscopic picture. Admittedly, from a gener- chies has mainly been pursued by toponymists alising bird’s-eye perspective it is possible to ob- and archaeologists. This is a multifaceted field of serve overarching structures, but strikingly often research, however, and often individual scholars the reach of various regional elements of culture decide whether to focus on regionality or on larger and tradition does not coincide with distinct common patterns. mutual boundaries. Cultural diffusion patterns For example: during the pre-Roman Iron Age, might therefore perhaps be best represented gra- internal burial arrangement and the composition phically as a continuum of innumerable, irregular of grave goods in urn graves in southern Scandi- overlapping distribution areas. navia bear considerable resemblance to the urn Fornvännen 113 (2018) Art. Nordberg 76-88_Layout 1 2018-05-22 11:21 Sida 77 Circular flow of tradition in Old Norse religion 77 grave tradition in the continental northern Ger- there are risks in overemphasising the sociocul- manic area. Based on these circumstances, many tural differences between a perceived locally and archaeologists have regarded this entire area as a regionally based people and a supra-regional mo- single cultural province or unbroken continuum. bile elite. This would in practice follow the now Swedish archaeologists Tore Artelius and Mats broadly questioned model launched in the 1930s Lindqvist (2007, p. 17 f) have, however, observed by a group of social anthropologists working with- that a completely different picture emerges if our in the so-called Community Studies school. A de- focus is placed on the graves’ superstructures. fining characteristic of this school was the sepa- This varies widely between regions, which may ration of culture into several local and regional indicate that southern Sweden was divided into popular Little Traditions on one hand, and a supra- several cultural regions during this period. regional Great Tradition maintained by the social Concerning the issue of regional differences and religious elite on the other. This model was and common supra-regional patterns in culture eventually abandoned as it is simply impossible and religion, various aspects of the same urn grave to divide culture in this manner, since social, cul- tradition therefore point in partly different direc- tural and religious interactions constantly take tions, which led Artelius & Lindqvist (p. 101 ff) to place between different regions, social groups and the conclusion that the urn grave tradition in a hierarchical strata. (For criticism of the Great/ multifaceted way actually exhibits local and regio- Little Tradition model, see e.g. Saler 2000, p. 34 nal expressions as well as supra-regional patterns. ff w. refs.) In a 1955 study, American anthropolo- Regarding the issue of a common Old Norse gist McKim Marriott explained these cultural religion, some researchers suggest that the com- movements between regions, social groups and mon Scandinavian elements of the religion pri- hierarchies as a constantly ongoing “circular flow”. marily belonged to a pan-Scandinavian aristo- cratic echelon of society. For example, archaeolo- Circular flow of tradition in pre-Christian gist Fredrik Svanberg (2003, pp. 101 f, 142 f) is of Scandinavia the opinion that the popular religious traditions Marriott accepted the theoretical framework of displayed such wide differences between regions the Community School. He studied how the that they cannot be reduced to variations of a supra-regional “indigenous civilisation” of Hindu common cultural heritage. Among the aristo- India and the Sanskrit Great Tradition – main- cratic supra-regional elements, which Svanberg tained above all by wandering Brahmins – rela- describes as “superficial” in relation to the “over- ted to the many Little Traditions in rural village whelming cultural diversity” of popular culture, communities. According to him, individual vil- he includes sacred and theophoric place-names, lages, surrounding regions and Indian society iconography and certain items of material cul- overall had to be understood “as relative struc- ture, as well as mythology. Similar socially hier- tural nexuses, as subsystems within greater sys- archical regional and supra-regional patterns tems, and as foci of individual identification have also been highlighted by other researchers within a greater field” (Marriott 1955, p. 191). (e.g. Andrén 2007, p. 34 f). Some have even sug- Between these many different sociocultural sys- gested that the worship of the pre-Christian gods tems and subsystems were constant circular flows was limited to a supra-regional, socially delimit- of cultural traditions, which were often so long- ed aristocracy, while the wider population above lived, multifaceted and complicated that their all worshipped lesser animistic beings (e.g. Hell- directions were impossible to determine retro- ström 1996, pp. 229, 231 ff; Sanmark 2004, pp. spectively. Marriott claimed, however, that there 147 ff, 163, 177 ff). were three main processes in this circular flow. In In my opinion, it is unambiguous that aristo- one, elements spread between various Little Tra- cratic culture – however its social group should ditions in local villages and regional areas. In be delimited and defined – was supra-regional to another, elements of the Sanskrit Great Tradi- a higher degree than the more localised culture of tion, divested of several aspects and adapted to the people they governed. However, I think that local contexts, became established in the local Fornvännen 113 (2018) Art. Nordberg 76-88_Layout 1 2018-05-22 11:21 Sida 78 78 Andreas Nordberg villages’ Little Traditions. Marriott called this less emphasised that the circular flow of culture process parochialisation. In a third process, Little often took such complex routes that the direc- Traditions from various villages were adopted tions of flow for most traditions were virtually into the Sanskrit Great Tradition; Marriott call- impossible to reconstruct retrospectively (Mar- ed this process universalisation. Often “little” riott 1955, pp. 71–91). This calls for reflection. local versions and the variant in the “great” tradi- Given the much scantier sources available to re- tion were then able to coexist, even in a single loca- searchers of pre-Christian Scandinavia, it is ob- tion. Furthermore, through combinations of par- vious that what was challenging to achieve with ochialisation and universalisation processes, some- the conditions Marriott had must be even more times local little traditions were adopted into the difficult for a researcher of Late Iron Age Scandi- great supra-regional tradition, thus spreading over navia. large geographic areas and subsequently being ab- This said, it is still apt to describe the proces- sorbed, adapted and established as a new little ses of cultural and religious change and variation tradition in totally different local communities in pre-Christian Scandinavia as a circular flow, (Marriott 1955, p. 197 ff). which both affected and was affected by all types Marriott’s fundamental acceptance of the Great of social situations; markets and þing assemblies, Tradition and Little Traditions categories
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