Medieval reindeer drives at Sumtangen, Hardangervidda : two interpretations Blehr, Otto Fornvännen 2012(107):2, s. [115]-122 : ill. http://kulturarvsdata.se/raa/fornvannen/html/2012_115 Ingår i: samla.raa.se Fornva?nnen Debatt (kopia):Layout 1 12-06-01 12.31 Sida 115

Debatt 115 av främmande idéer och tankegångar. Vi måste Magnusson Staaf. B., 2010. Kontroll över kulturarvet sluta beskriva de gamla sakerna som om de vore SD:s medel för att nå makt. Dagens Nyheter 2010- en essentiell folkgrupps egendom. 10-03. Stockholm. Nordwall, J. & Svanström, B., 2010. SD:s hembygd är Den kritik som förts fram mot sverigede- inte vår hembygd. Aftonbladet 2010-10-02. Stock - mokra ter sammanblandar symptom och sjuk - holm. dom. Kritiken borde riktas mot den rådande kul - Persson, G. & Ulvskog, M., 1999. Regeringens proposi - turpolitiken som har skapat idén om »vårt kul - tion 1998/99:114. Kulturarv, kulturmiljöer och kultur- turarv» och därmed lagt grunden för ett kultu- föremål. Stockholm. rellt särartstänkande som förändrat bevarande- de los Reyes, P. & Kamali, M., 2005. (red.). Bortom vi ochdom.Teoretiskareflektionerommakt,integrationoch arbetets utgångspunkter. strukturell diskriminering . SOU 2005:41. Stockholm. Det är hög tid att arkeologer och forskare bör - Skalin, J. & Söder, B., 2010. Motion till Riksdagen 2010/ jar ägna kraft åt att granska kulturmiljövårdens 11:Kr320. Utgiftsområde 17, Kultur, medier, trossam - ideologiska förvandling de senaste 15 åren. San - fund och fritid. Stockholm. ningen är nog att Sverigedemokraterna inte alls SOU 1995:84. Kulturpolitikens inriktning. Slutbetänkan- missbrukar kulturarvet eller missförstår vad be- de . Stockholm. Sverigedemokraterna 2010. 99 förslag för ett bättre Sve- greppet signalerar. De använder sig av en tanke- rige. Sverigedemokraternas kontrakt med väljarna 2010– struktur som passar deras världsbild. De vet vad 2014. Stockholm. »vårt kulturarv» berättar och vill därför höra mer. Welinder, S., 2003. Min svenska arkeologihistoria. Ett ekonomiskt och socialt perspektiv på 1900-talet . Lund. Referenser Anderson, B., 1991. Denföreställdagemenskapen.Reflexio- Alexander Gill nerkringnationalismensursprungochspridning . Göte - Brännkyrkagatan 42 borg. SE–118 22 Stockholm Beckman, S., 1993. Om kulturarvets väsen och värde. [email protected] Anshelm, J. (red.). Modernisering och kulturarv . Stockholm/Stehag.

Medieval Reindeer Drives at Sumtangen, Hardangervidda: Two Interpretations

At a handful of the lakes on the rugged northern - in 1939–40 was it established that the huts most most parts of the mountain plateau Hardanger- probably date back to the Early Middle Ages, 1050– vidda in Norway are found remnants of large, 1350 (Bøe 1942, p. 32). Roughly thirty years later solidly built stone huts surrounded by layers of this was confirmed by radiocarbon dates on bones reindeer bones and antlers. The best known of from the middens (Blehr 1973, p. 106). As to how these are two at Sumtangen, a spit of land on Lake the hunt was carried out, Hjalmar Negaard's Finnsberg. The hut floors measure 4 by 6 metres. assumption (1911, pp. 63–64) that it was done in These were the first Hardangervidda huts that the same manner as known from the circumpolar came to the knowledge of antiquarians, in 1838. area has been confirmed. That is, the reindeer Ever since, more or less fanciful hypotheses have were scared with the aid of strategically placed been presented as to when and by whom the huts cairns and poles and thereby driven into lakes, had been used, and how the hunting had been where they were outmanoeuvred and killed by carried out. Only with Johannes Bøe's excava tions hunters in boats (Blehr 1973; 1982; 1987; 1990;

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116 Debatt 2011). However, when it comes to who organised killed over a 50-year period, or 312 if they had the hunt, fanciful hypotheses still live on. I am been killed over a 25-year period. Whereas, if the responsible for one of them, namely that the hunt estimate is based on 5500 animals, the figures are was organised and carried out by action groups 110 and 220 animals respectively (2010, p. 8). based on dyadic kinship relations between its members (1973, p. 111). Svein Indrelid and Ann- How Long Did the Communal Drives at Karin Hufthammer now suggest that the hunt Sumtangen Last? “may have been organised by merchants in the Indrelid’s and Hufthammer’s four estimations towns, possibly under the control by the Crown have one thing in common. They are based on the or the clergy” (2010, p. 10). premise that the drives took place only during Though I have considered that the yield from the peak period indicated by the mean dates of the communal reindeer drives must have been the fifteen bone samples. But a calibrated radio - considerable (1973, p. 106), I never estimated carbon date is a probability distribution with tops how many years of hunting the bones in middens and bottoms, and it is not sound methodology to represented. Based on my radiocarbon dates I calculate a mean BP value before calibration since concluded that the hunt had been carried out different years in each individual date's distribu - regularly through the Early Middle Ages only to tion have unequal levels of likelihood. end abruptly with the Black Death 1349–50 (1971, However, by building a Bayesian model in Ox- p. 99; 1973, p. 111). The attraction of Sumtangen, Cal, and modelling the sample dates as one phase, as well as the other localities with stone huts and we find that the activity took place over a dura - middens consisting of reindeer bones and ant- tion of between 62 and 182 years (95% probabil - lers, was not based on catching very large num - ity) – most likely between 88 and 139 years (68% bers of reindeer quickly, as I saw it, but rather on probability), or roughly speaking a century (figs dependability, allowing the hunters to be certain 1–2). Thus, the average annual yield would be 78 of getting the animals they needed for their own reindeer if based on 7800 animals, or 55 if based consumption by means of communal drives. on 5500 animals. Indrelid & Hufthammer take quite an oppo - site view. They see Sumtangen as a place where, Hunting With Communal Reindeer Drives by means of communal drives (what they label Negaard (1911, pp. 60–61, 63) pointed out that in “mass-hunts”), people managed to get entire herds areas with many lakes, the step to inventing rein - into the water and kill them (2010, p. 1). This deer drives must have short for hunters with poor hypothesis is based on an old legend from Sum - weapon technology. What he stated here implic - tangen and on the mean radiocarbon dates of fif - itly was that as reindeer are hampered in their teen bone samples from the middens outside the movements by water, they are an easier prey huts, as well as on an estimate of how many rein - swimming than when hunted on land. He thus deer all the bones in the same middens represent. explained why drives ending in lakes were the Calculating the mean BP date of their fifteen preferred form of hunting. By making relevant bones and then calibrating it, they conclude that the relationship between the weapon technology the hunting peaked in 1240–1290 (2010, p. 5). of the hunters and the behaviour of the species The estimated number of reindeer in the mid - hunted, he was in the archaeological context a dens are then calculated by the MNI (minimum pioneer. We learn from the writings of Arctic number of individuals necessary to account for ethnographers that an animal cannot be hit with the specimens observed) to be 5500 animals and tolerable accuracy with an arrow beyond a range by the MLNI (the most likely number of individ - of 20–25 meters (Stefansson 1914, p. 242; Ras - uals) 7800 animals. Indrelid & Hufthammer mussen 1931, p. 170; in the following I lump to- only take into account the years falling within gether the two main tundra subspecies that con - the mid-range given by the mean date. Thereby cern us here: Rangifer tarandus tarandus , reindeer; they estimate the annual average yield based on and R. tarandus groenlandicus , caribou, and use the 7800 animals to be 156, if the reindeer had been terms interchangeably). To get this close to a wild

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Figs 1–2. Bayesian model of Indrelid & Hufthammer’s radio - carbon dates on rein - deer bones from Sum - tangen's middens. The sampled reindeer died over a duration of most likely 88–139 years (68% probability). Analysis by Christopher Bronk Ramsey, Oxford Radiocarbon Accelera - tor Unit.

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118 Debatt reindeer before it notices you and takes flight is have panicked and trotted on more or less paral - extremely difficult. Thus hunting individual cari - lel to the rows of cairns and frightening poles bou with bow and arrows, as the Caribou Inuit until they reached the water, and also why the Igjugarjuk put it, demanded “great exertion, great cairns have such an insignificant appearance to- perseverance, and never yielded anything much” day when the disturbers are no longer attached to (Rasmussen 1930, p. 41). them. Before the introduction of the gun it was therefore only possible to depend on wild rein - The Communal Reindeer Drive at Sumtangen deer as a resource when you had a technology The “special trapping technique” that Indrelid & that enabled you to control their movements. Hufthammer refer to from Sumtangen is based Driving them into water has the advantage that on a legend that they summarise, with some reindeer take to water when threatened (cf. Cris- additions, as follows: ler 1956). This evolutionary adaptation to wolves, which will not pursue reindeer in water, clearly … a mass kill of reindeer took place in the became a disadvantage when the predators were sound [at Sumtangen] in ancient times. humans who in fact wanted to get the deer there. Herds of migrating reindeer were diverted Note that the main reason why hunters resorted towards the northern lake shore by means of to communal reindeer drives was not that the drift fences made of long rows of human like number of animals taken this way was necessari - closely spaced stone cairns or wooden sticks ly impressive. Rather, drives were preferred as a or poles creating funnel shaped systems. hunting method because they were so overwhel- Floating lines were stretched out in the mingly successful compared to individual hunt - water, preventing the animals from swim - ing with bow and arrows. Thus drives were often ming to the sides and escaping. Hunters in resorted to even when it came down to a only few boats killed the animals in the water and animals, or even a single one (Jenness 1922, pp. dragged them ashore at Sumtangen where 149–151; Taylor 1969, pp. 150–156). they were butchered. (2010, p. 3). The drives are marked by small stone cairns that allow us to map them. These cairns support - This description of how the drive was carried out ed what I will label “frightening poles”. Actually, has little to do with reality. The drive at Sumtan - they are usually not proper cairns, consisting as gen consists only of a single line of cairns and they often do only of one or a few stones on top frightening poles and shows that the reindeer of a larger one. When they are recognized as entered Lake Finnsberg in its western part where “cairns”, it is it often due solely to the fact that it is widest. The hunters would most probably they are placed so distinctively in line with each have waited in their boats on the opposite side of other. One should therefore not place too much the lake until the reindeer had swum so far that weight on their specific forms. they could no longer easily save themselves by Reindeer do not differentiate between what turning back (cf. Blehr 1973). It was therefore not is dangerous and what is not when the object is accidental that the drive ended at the shore just downwind from them and motionless. However, where it did: the width of the lake here would any movement is bound to make them suspicious have given the hunters an opportunity to catch of danger. This explains the paramount impor - up with the deer before they reached the nearest tance of attaching something that flutters in the shore (Blehr 1987, p. 90). wind to the cairns as well as to the frightening The “special trapping technique”, described poles. It might be pieces of birch bark, wooden by Indrelid & Hufthammer thus differs from the slats or bundles of twigs. Anything will do as long communal reindeer drives ending in water known as it flutters (cf. Finstad & Pilø 2010, p. 32). to have been used traditionally by reindeer as These “disturbers” would have hung down from well as caribou hunters. Indrelid et al. (2007, p. sticks stuck into the cairns, or from the frighten - 132) acknowledge that this hunting technique, ing poles. This explains why the reindeer would well documented from the Arctic, appears to

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Debatt 119 have been used in Hardangervidda as well, but of routes during their seasonal migrations. From they see it as one in addition to the technique the fragments of bucks' full grown antlers found using “rows of cairns with lines, as the legends in the middens (Grieg 1911, p. 12; cf. Bakke 1985, tell about” (my translation). However, all the p. 105–106) it is clear that the communal drives communal drives I have found differ from this took place when the bucks migrated south in the description. Already after my first field season in fall. This is confirmed by a study of antlers from 1970 it became obvious that in none of the rein - an excavation at Sumtangen in 1972. Both sexes deer drives I had found the row of cairns would and all age groups were represented in the mate - have been able to hold lines that could have rial, but with a slight overweight for buck antlers. stopped frightened reindeer (Blehr 1971, p. 101). Since such a male dominance is hardly likely in an Nor did any of them consist of “long rows of hu- area used by fostering flocks, where there would man like closely spaced stone cairns or wooden have been an excess of females and calves, this sticks or poles creating funnel shaped systems”, indicates that the area was mainly visited by bucks as added to the legend by Indrelid & Huftham - (Kjos-Hansen 1973, p. 78). Thus, in most cases it mer. would have been bucks migrating south in the Apparently Indrelid & Hufthammer have tak- fall that were driven into the water. en the legend about communal drives at Sumtan - Such flocks are, in contrast to fostering flocks, gen at face value from the start. Their statement very small. The largest flock I ever encountered that it was a special “trapping technique” used in myself in the Sumtangen area consisted of rough - the second half of the 13th century and different ly twenty bucks. But except for this flock, and from the ones otherwise used, has not been veri - another one of eight animals, all the others I ob- fied. They simply state categorically that their served over a period of four years consisted only research “confirms that the legend of the mass of two to four bucks. Nor were single bucks un- kill of reindeer at Sumtangen ... is based on real usual. Admittedly, these are anecdotal data (cf. events that took place 450–500 years earlier” Blehr 1997), but I believe they are of importance (2010, p. 10). But their conclusion is contradicted since they indicate that most of the flocks migrat - by the empirical data at hand. ing south at the onset of the rutting season have Historical legends can in exceptional cases pre- consisted of only a few animals. serve information from the past over centuries. I should add that the success of communal However, usually the particular event or events drives were not “totally dependent upon the described disappear behind a general legendary hunters' ability to anticipate the dispersal and motif in a relatively short time. In the legend movements of the herds” (Indrelid & Huftham - from Sumtangen, as in the other legends from mer 2010, p. 8). Insight into reindeer behaviour Hardangervidda, the use of floating lines as well on this level is simply not attainable. What the as lines with or without bells between the cairns hunters had to know was that in the fall, bucks and the frightening poles are the most often would pass by Lake Finnsberg, and that with the recurring elements. help of cairns and frightening poles as well as drivers, one could scare the bucks into the lake. How Extensive Were the Communal Reindeer Drives at Sumtangen in the Middle Ages? Who organised the communal reindeer drives? Sumtangen has attracted hunters again and again As most of the animals driven into the water were since the Middle Mesolithic (Indrelid & Huft- bucks, and therefore they would only have arriv- hammer 2010, p. 2). The place, situated as it is be - ed in small flocks, the annual yield could not have tween the summer grazing for the bucks further been devastating. This is confirmed by the Baye- to the north and the central parts of Hardanger- sian model of the bone dates. I therefore find it vidda where they return for the rutting season in unlikely that the drives were organised by mer - the fall, must have been extremely well suited for chants. They would not have bothered to organ - communal drives. The lakes created bottlenecks ise what would have appeared to them as rather that forced the bucks to follow a limited number insignificant hunts. Nor is that which has been

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120 Debatt presented in support of this hypothesis very con - tion may have lasted into the Middle Ages. As vincing, as it is mainly based on some reindeer may have been the case at Fet, the people who bones with runic inscriptions. Indrelid & Huft- produced iron on the east side may also have had hammer do not believe that people from the near - to depend partly on reindeer meat to feed their by farming communities were literate. And so workers. That the reindeer were driven into pit - they argue that the inscriptions must have been falls here instead of water should be seen as an made by town dwellers (2010, p. 8). However, it adaptation to local conditions. is commonly accepted that Medieval runes were in common use at least to 1400, if not later, for Conclusion messages inscribed on wood or bone ( Samnordisk The picture of Medieval hunting at Sumtangen runtexdatabas 2004). Runic literacy thus does not presented by Indrelid & Hufthammer could hard- indicate any presence of urban merchants at Sum- ly be more different from the one presented by tangen. me. While I like to think of myself as committed Should I scrap my own old hypothesis con - to validation, Indrelid & Hufthammer appear cerning how the hunt had been organised and more ready to draw conclusions that have to be carried out and suggest a new, hopefully less fan - speculations from what is considered probable ciful one, then I would return to one that I pre - (Indrelid 2010, p. 31). But it is not only in our atti - sented already before I had started fieldwork in tude to empirical data that we differ. In my analy- Hardangervidda (Blehr 1971). To wit: that the sis I also take into account the relationship be- communal reindeer drives at Sumtangen should tween the reindeer as a prey animal and humans be seen in relation to iron production in neigh - as hunters. This relationship has always been bouring Sysendalen valley. Nicolay Nicolaysen determined by the possibilities and limitations (1861, p. 16) informs us that at Fet hamlet there inherent in the behaviour of reindeer as species have been found “40 worked steatites of which one and the weapon technology of the hunters. It in 1846 came to [Oslo] university's collection”. A should therefore not come as a surprise that pre - comparison of this stone with the ones f rom historic hunters at Sumtangen invented the same Sumtangen (Nicolaysen 1861, p. 25; Nega ard hunting method as known from the ethnogra - 1911, p. 37) might show that they are from the phies of the more recent caribou/reindeer hunters same quarry. Should this be the case, a Medieval all over the Arctic. Crucially, this hunting tech - connection between Fet and Sumtangen seems nique, based on communal drives, could never plausible. The production of iron, and the char - have had such a devastating effect on the reindeer coal this process demanded, would have employ- population as suggested by Indrelid & Huftham- ed many people, and thus made the meat from mer. reindeer killed at Sumtangen a necessary supple - Since the first radiocarbon dates back in the ment to the food produced at Fet. Those in charge 1970s, we have known approximately when the of the iron production would also have had the reindeer drives at Sumtangen, as well as at other resources to organise a work gang to build solid localities in Hardangervidda with large stone huts, stone huts for the men allocated to reindeer took place. As to the hunting technique, that Ne- hunting at Sumtangen. This hypothesis is simply gaard understood already in 1911, the most effi - tentative, but further research might lend it more cient way for the Hardangervidda hunters to catch support than my former hypothesis, or Indrelid their prey was to drive the reindeer into bodies of & Hufthammer's present one. I find it intriguing water. What is still unsolved today is who built that both near Jønndalen and Seterdalen valleys the solid stone huts and organised the drives. on the east side of Hardangervidda, there are Above, I have suggested a tentative hypothesis, extensive complexes with more than 100 and 50 one that could begin to be tested by a comparison pitfalls respectively (Blehr 1971, p. 100). Both of the steatites from Fet and Sumtangen. If the valleys had a settled population depending on steatites are from the same quarry, it could streng- iron production in the Late Iron Age (Hougen then the hunch I have that there is a connection 1947, p. 294). This dependency on iron produc - between the production of charcoal and iron at

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Fig. 3. The radiocarbon dates on reindeer bones from Sumtangen’s middens in Blehr 1973, p. 106, when calibrated, are consistent with an end date to the hunting in c. AD 1350. Sample IDs T-1424, T-1423, T-1466.

Fet and the hunting at Sumtangen. Should this Acknowledgement prove to be right, then some still not emptied I am deeply indebted to professor Christopher charcoal kilns at Maurset, also in Sysendalen val - Ramsey, Director of the Oxford Radiocarbon ley, might perhaps help us determine when the Accelerator Unit, for his willingness to help me communal hunting might have ended. The fact build a Bayesian model in OxCal of the radiocar - that the charcoal was still in the kilns caused Nico- bon dates from Sumtangen. laysen, who visited Maurset in 1859, to conclude that something had happened to their owner. He References suggested that it had to do with the Black Death Bakke, Ø., 1985. W.F. Korens innberetning fra Har- (1861, p. 18). dangervidda I 1840. Hardanger 1985. Norheim - I find this to be a reasonable assumption. Had sund. Blehr, O., 1971. Noen fornminner og sagn fra Hardan - the plague, abruptly as it seems, killed the men gerviddas fangstliv. Viking XXXV. Oslo. burning charcoal, it would not have ended with – 1973. Traditional Reindeer Hunting and Social them. It would also have killed enough of the Change in the Local Communities Surrounding men engaged in the iron production, as well as Hardangervidda. Norwegian Archaeological Review among those hunting at Sumtangen, to put an 6:2. Oslo. end to these activities as well. But as reasonable – 1982. Når villreinen løper dit du vil: en fangst - metode og hva spor efter den i dag kan fortelle om as this line of argument might seem, it is not sup - fortidens jegersamfunn. Tromura. Kulturhistorie 1. ported by the 15 radiocarbon dates in their cali - Tromsø museum. brated form. Judging from them, it is likely that – 1987. The need for ethnographical analogies in the the communal drives at Sumtangen ended already study of prehistoric caribou/wild reindeer hunt - in the early 14th century, that is, before the Black ing: a case study from Sumtangen Norway. Buren - hult, G. et al. (eds). Theoretical Approaches to Arti - Death hit the area. However, three dates from the facts, Settlement and Society . BAR International 1970s (fig. 3; Blehr 1973, p. 104), when calibrated, Series 366. Oxford. are consistent with an end date of about 1350, – 1990. Communal hunting as a prerequisite for cari - though with so few dates and such low precision bou (wild reindeer) as a human resource. Davis, it could have been a century later too (which does L.B. & Reeves, B.O. (eds). Hunters of the Recent Past . not fit with the devastating effects of the plague). OneWorld Archaeology 15. London. – 1997. In defence of “anecdotal data”. A case study Thus, it seems certain that the communal rein - from a caribou area in West Greenland. Rangifer 17:1. deer drives at Sumtangen did come to an abrupt Nordic Council for Reindeer Husbandry Research. end when the plague hit the area in 1349. Tromsø. – 2011. Anlegget på Svoi, Hardangervidda. Viking LXXIV. Oslo.

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122 Debatt Bøe, J., 1942. Til høgfjellets forhistorie. Boplassen på Negaard, H., 1912. Hardangerviddens ældste befolk- Sumtangen ved Finsevatn på Hardangervidda. Ber - ning. Undersøkelser og fund. BergensMuseumsAar - gens Museums Skrifter 21. bok 1911:4. Crisler, L., 1956. Observations on wolves hunting cari - Nicolaysen, N., 1861. Reiseberetning indsendt til det bou. Journal of Mammalogy 37. Lawrence, Kansas. akademiske Kollegium. Foreningen til Norske For - Finstad, E. & Pilø, L., Kulturminner og løsfunn ved is- tidsmerkers Bevaring. Aarsberetning . breer og snøfonner I høyfjellet. Økt sårbarhet som Rasmussen, K., 1930. Intellectual culture of the Cari - følge av nedsmelting – global oppvarming. FOU bou Eskimos. Report of the Fifth Thule Expedition prosjektet i Oppland. Oppland Fylkeskommune Kul - 1921–24, 7:2 . Copenhagen. turhistoriske skrifter 2010:1. Lillehammer. – 1931. The Netsilik Eskimos. Social life and spiritu - Grieg , J.A., 1912. Dyrelevninger fra de gamle bopladser al culture. Report of the Fifth Thule Expedition 1921– paa Hardangervidden. Bergens Museums Aarbok 1911: 24, 8:2 . Copenhagen. 5. Stefansson, V., 1914. The Stefansson-Anderson Arctic Hougen, B., 1947. Fra seter til gård.Studier i norsk boset - Expedition of the American museum: preliminary ningshistorie . Oslo. ethnological report. Anthropological Papers of the Indrelid, S., 2010. Om reinsdyrfangsten på Sumtangen American Museum of Natural History 14. New York. i gamal tid. Villreinen 2010. Villreinrådet i Norge. Taylor, J.G. (ed.), 1969. William Turner's journeys to Indrelid, S. et al., 2007. Fangstanlegget på Sumtangen, the caribou country with the Labrador Eskimos in Hardangervidda – utforskningen gjennom 165 år. 1780. Ethnohistory 16:2. Lubbock, Texas. Viking LXX. Oslo. Indrelid, S. & Hufthammer, A.K., 2010. Medieval Otto Blehr mass trapping of reindeer at the Hardangervidda Körsbärsvägen 8 mountain plateau, South Norway. Quaternary Inter- SE – 114 23 Stockholm national (2010). Oxford. doi:10.1016/j.quaint 2010. [email protected] 09.008. Jenness, D., 1922. Life of the Copper Eskimos. Report of theCanadianArcticExpedition , 1913–18, 12. Ottawa.

Svar till Claes Theliander om Maglarps rivna kyrka

I Fornvännen 2011:3 recenserar Claes Theliander Theliander menar att Jes Wienbergs accep - boken Maglarp – kyrkan som försvann (studier till tans av förgängligheten tillhör bokens mera nyk - Sveriges kyrkor 3, Riksantikvarieämbetet, Stock - tra inslag. En annan recensent (Paul Hansson i holm 2010). Jag finner mig nödgad att bemöta Byggnadskultur 2011:2) kallade samma acceptans hans recension med några kommentarer, i synner - för »relativisering», något som Wienberg själv het som han mest uppehåller sig vid min artikel i faktiskt också sade sig syssla med när han nyligen boken. presenterade sin artikel på en kyrkoantikvarisk Theliander vill ställa de svåra frågorna om kul- konferens i Kristianstad. Kyrkor har rivits förr turarvet. Så längt är jag helt ense med honom. Ett (exempelvis under medeltiden) och det är själv- kulturarv som inte diskuteras är inget kulturarv. klart att historien alltid kan ge intressanta per - Utgångspunkten för Maglarpsboken var emeller- spektiv på nutiden. Problemet är dock att en så- tid en annan, att en byggnad som var skyddad en- dan relativisering riskerar att blir kontraproduk - ligt lag tilläts förfalla och rivas. Hur kunde detta tiv för bevarandearbetet, och att den som histo - ske och varför? Det är sant att boken är en kultur - riesyn riskerar att slå över i nihilism. Vad män - miljövårdens självrannsakan och därmed kanske niskan sysslade med i forna tider är ju ofta inte en »partsinlaga», men riktigt vari det »gråtmil - alls särskilt föredömligt för oss. Kulturmiljövår - da» ligger har jag svårt att se. den uppstod just för att sätta ett slags balanshjul

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