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Book Section: Sindbæk, Søren (2008) Routes and long-distance traffic : the nodal points of Wulfstan's voyage. In: Englert, A., Trakadas, A., Englert, A. and Trakadas, A., (eds.) Wulfstan's Voyage. Maritime Culture of the North . The Viking Ship Museum , Roskilde , pp. 72-78.
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Published chapter Sindbæk, Søren (2009) Routes and long-distance traffic: the nodal points of Wulfstan's voyage. In: Englert, A. & Trakadas, A. (Eds) Wulfstan's Voyage. The Baltic Sea Region in the Early Viking Age as Seen from Shipboard. Maritime Culture of the North (2). The Viking Ship Museum , Roskilde, pp. 72-78. ISBN 978-87-85180-56-8
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Routes and long-distance traffi c – the nodal points of Wulfstan’s voyage by Søren M. Sindbæk
Wulfstan, author of the sole preserved con- A route is an expression of the fact that temporary description of the th-century exchange between specifi c regions has been southern Baltic littoral, is an enigmatic fi g- ‘routinized’, or made routine. Although a ure. From archaeology we have learned that route may follow a natural geographical cor- the coast he followed was at this time speck- ridor, it is never a self-evident fact of geo- led with trading ports, large and small. Yet graphy, but must be ‘worked out’ as a social not only does Wulfstan’s party call in none of reality and – occurring in a specifi c period – these ports, but his description omits them as a historical process. Th is process can be completely, while supplying consistently ac- called ‘routinization’. curate information on the islands passed Routinized practices are essential to the to the north. Was Wulfstan therefore badly constitution and reproduction of any social informed? To approach an answer it will be institution. As argued by Anthony Giddens, useful to consider more closely the relation- social structures are essentially routines – the ship between the activities he was engaged in medium and outcome of organised action. and his geographical knowledge. Early historic trade and communication is no exception. It was not abstract logic that organised Viking-Age trade and exchange, Routes and ‘routinization’ as it has sometimes appeared in evolutionary models proposed by archaeologists and his- If by ‘route’ we mean the course followed by torians. Instead, it was the motivated acts of any particular journey, there would hardly individual agents that edited practices associ- be any point in trying to defi ne or study the ated with exchange into recognisable social routes of the Viking Age. Chance and ac- structures, recursively constituting travelling cidents, then as now, occasionally brought as routes and exchange as trade. people to move over any stretch of land and sea where physical barriers did not exclude the possibility. As a concept, ‘route’ must ‘Nodal points’ and regional markets be taken in another, more precise sense: as a well-known and frequently-used way be- Routinized exchange implies that the trans- tween specifi c destinations. In this sense of portation of goods takes place recurrently the word, a ’route’ is defi ned not by the in- along specifi c routes. Th is entails that long- cidents of the journey, but by the intention distance exchange is practiced in an organ- and knowledge available to the traveller be- ised form in specifi c localities, where large fore departure. In a pre-literate society such cargoes are loaded or unloaded. Th is prac- knowledge cannot be stored in archives, but tice, the assemblage or breaking down of is created and maintained only if the journey bulk, constitutes what can be called a ‘nodal is taken on a regular basis and is expressed in point.’ Th is concept is defi ned in order to . A term minted by Giddens verbal exchanges; that is, the route is being classify the activities pursued at a particular . performed as a social practice. site, rather than produce a general typology . Giddens : .
II. Th e western and central Baltic Sea region of sites. Th ere is nothing to suggest that the remarkably consistent picture emerges from nodal point role was fi xed to one uniform this comparison. Some obvious diff erences type of site in the Viking Age. How long- are conditioned by regional cultural distinc- distance exchange met with other activities tion, by the diff erent chronological limits of could vary in individual cases. Th erefore, this the sites, or by the activities in the particular defi nition is meant to characterise one prac- areas investigated. But relating the number tice among others and not a new locational of fi nds to the size of the investigations and archetype. the excavation methods employed (in par- A generation ago, only a handful of th- ticular the use of sieving), we fi nd the same century sites that could be identifi ed as nodal classes of imports occurring with great fre- points in long-distance trade were known ar- quency, while tools of exchange like coins, chaeologically in Northern Europe; the mod- weights and scales are found in numbers that el examples of these are Hedeby and Birka. are rarely approached in other archaeological Th ey were almost invariably sites that were contexts. also ascribed with such a role in contempo- It is quite a diff erent matter with sites rary written sources. At this stage Wulfstan’s such as Groß Strömkendorf, Dierkow, Rals- account seemed in perfect agreement with wiek, Menzlin, Bardy/Kołobrzeg or Ystad/ the archaeological evidence. Tankbåten. According to publications, im- In recent decades, however, many new ports and tools of exchange are found at sites have been added to this number. On these sites in incomparably low numbers, the southern Baltic coast, sites such as Dier- also when seen in proportion to the volume kow, Menzlin, Ralswiek or Wolin are now of earth excavated, or the methods of retriev- frequently compared to the classic examples. al. However, the structures uncovered give When systematic surveys in the s re- evidence that these sites were by no means vealed scores of Viking-Age harbour sites in unimportant for maritime communication. regions like Gotland, it was even suggested Indeed they may well have acted as region- that “the places we know of from written al markets for trade and exchange. It is not documents or which have been discovered by trade as such that distinguishes “great” from pure chance are only the tip of the iceberg. “small” trading places – but exactly the role We should calculate with a vast number of as nodal points for long-distance exchange. It trading places all around the Baltic coast.” is this role that was absent in the many minor It is this growing archaeological knowledge ports of the Baltic Sea area. that raises a question of Wulfstan’s report: . E.g., Jankuhn . why was the author seemingly ignorant of . Carlsson : . Crafts and raw materials: . Feveile & Jensen ; these sites? Fevejle (ed.) ; Malcolm It may be suggested that there was in- local and imported & Bowsher ; Skre (ed.) deed a critical diff erence between Wulfstan’s . terminal stations and the sites he passed in Th e distribution of crafts adds further to the . Survey in Jankuhn et al. silence. Recently, new results from exten- defi nition of nodal points. It is interesting to . . Sindbæk . sive archaeological investigations have been note that refuse from crafts like textile pro- . Wietrzichowski ; Jöns presented from a number of ‘classic’ th-cen- duction, iron working or antler working oc- et al. ; Warnke ; tury nodal points like Ribe, Lundenwic and cur in Groß Strömkendorf, Dierkow or Men- Herrmann ; Herrmann Kaupang. Th ey allow us for the fi rst time to zlin in quantities almost similar to those at ; Schoknecht ; Le- ciejewicz with further compare the archaeological evidence of these Birka, Hedeby, Kaupang and Ribe. Crafts us- references; Strömberg ; sites more specifi cally, and to compare them ing locally-available materials, or using only Strömberg . with earlier investigations such as Hedeby. A materials in small quantities, could be prac-
Routes and long-distance traffi c – the nodal points of Wulfstan’s voyage ticed where there was a demand for them – bile, and would occasionally practice at other and apparently there was in many regional sites. But for large-scale production there was markets. a need for a steady supply of raw materials, Remains from large-scale metal casting which could only be secured in the nodal and glass working, on the other hand, are points. Serial production with imported raw closely restricted to the latter sites. Th ough materials may therefore be added to the ar- some remains of both crafts are occasion- chaeological indications of nodal points. Th e ally found at other sites, especially in elite distinction is summarised in Fig. . residences, the question of scale indicates a In several respects the model is very sim- diff erence. Th e salient feature of large-scale plifi ed: the distribution of regional markets bronze or glass working is their consumption is likely to have been denser than indicated, of raw materials imported from a distance. their role must have been more varied and To manufacture quantities of delicate cire the number of crafts and the types of im- perdue fi ttings in serial production, Viking- ports involved more diverse. Moreover, the Age metal workers could not rely on scrap important aspect of cultural diversity in re- metal, but used mostly freshly alloyed brass. gards to production and consumption is not Th is was not produced in the Baltic region, considered here. Th e model shows the diff er- but in the th century was probably imported ence between the kinds of true nodal points from the Rhineland. Th e same is true for directly engaged in routinized long-distance raw glass. Craftsmen themselves were mo- transport, and regional markets served by lo-
Fig. . Raw material move- ments through nodal points and areas of craft produc- tion in the Baltic region.
. Sindbæk : ff . . Sode .
II. Th e western and central Baltic Sea region cal traffi c and by traffi c to the nodal points. logic was noted more than a hundred years Th e latter traffi c is also ‘local,’ in the geo- ago by the American sociologist Charles H. graphical sense that it serves to re-distribute Cooley. More recently, a similar point was goods between a centre and its satellites. argued by the urban historians Paul M. Ho- henberg and Lynn Hollen Lees. While these observations should not lead Th e logic of long-distance traffi c us to retreat to geographical determinism – physical as well as social barriers may be ne- Th e functional separation between nodal gotiated – they must be considered crucial points and more ordinary trading places may factors bearing on the action of individual be explained by reference to what is some- agents. Each participant in a long-distance times called the “logic of practice”. Th e role exchange will have a signifi cant incentive of a nodal point implies conditions that could to seek out what he considers the most fa- motivate the topographical localisation and vourable, safe and active places for trading. the spatial hierarchy that the sites display. Regardless of the political situation nodal Viking-Age trading places have often points will therefore tend to generate a hi- been described and analysed as central plac- erarchical network, conditioned by the very es, i.e., localities whose basic purpose was practices that defi ne them. Such a hierarchy to serve a hinterland in a regional re-distri- of settlements may also be described within bution. Working from this assumption re- central place theory, but not without loosing searchers have either sought to establish a the basic point that spatial structures are de- relation between the size and rank of sites termined by many independent and poten- and the political hierarchy of societies, or tially confl icting factors. to prove that trading sites were distributed Th e structural diff erence between sites in a dense network, from which only a few operating as centrals place and nodal points sites have hitherto been identifi ed archaeo- can be summarised in Table . logically. Both of these notions may rise from It should be noted that the role as central the false employment of the concept of the place vs. nodal point does not denote separate central place. Central place theory not only localities, but separate functions that may to pays too little attention to topography, but a varying extent be performed at the same or even stresses the wrong topographical and diff erent sites. Th e two groups of functions traffi c criteria in relation to Viking-Age long- are mutually stimulating, but the degree distance exchange. to which they become developed may vary While most central place functions are greatly. Evidently a site like Hedeby related served by local traffi c and thus depend on to a hinterland, but it was the function as a maximum accessibility from the greatest pos- nodal point on trade routes that conditioned sible hinterland, the role of a nodal point is its special importance. exercised through long-distance traffi c and will therefore be stimulated in particular by topographical restrictions that guide traffi c Enigma solved into narrow corridors. A situation of particu- lar signifi cance occurs where a topographical Wulfstan’s voyage brought him directly by . Voppel : . or social barrier causes a break of traffi c and ship from Hedeby to Truso in the Vistula . Bourdieu : ff . demands the trans-shipment and perhaps Delta. Th e course of the voyage and the . See also Christaller . . Cooley []. temporary storage of goods. Where such a character of the destinations would suggest . Hohenberg & Lees : physical break occurs, a social transaction is that he was either himself engaged in long- ff . likely to take place as well. Th is topographical distance trade or a passenger with a trading
Routes and long-distance traffi c – the nodal points of Wulfstan’s voyage Table . Th e diff erences Function central place nodal point between sites operating as Constituting structure hinterland routes central places and nodal points. Dominant mode of transport local long distance
Dominant economic function regional re-distribution transmission
Dominant economic activity market break-of-bulk
Dominant external relation peer polity interaction hierarchic network
Topographic logic accessibility barrier
Ystad, Dierkow, Ralswiek, Hedeby, Birka, Truso, Wolin Examples Wolin (9th century) (10th century)
party. Th e separation between nodal points to form a hub of early long-distance com- and regional markets, as concerns routinized munication. But before the th century, the long-distance transport and exchange, may settlement lacked most features that were lat- thus be a key to understand the seeming er to identify the site as a major nodal point. omissions in his account. It may be suggested that Wolin rapidly took Th ere is little doubt that Hedeby was up this role at the turn of the th century, as the most signifi cant nodal point in the Baltic a parallel development to the processes that area. Th ough much less information is pub- fashioned the formation of the Piast King- lished for the site of Truso (Janów Pomorski), dom in central Poland. there seem to be reasons to consider this also Once the nature of Viking-Age long-dis- as a nodal point. Besides more than Ku- tance exchange and its spatial organisation fi c coins found in excavations, archaeological has been realised, some of the odd points in reports record Badorf ceramics and a “large Wulfstan’s account become clearer. Wulfstan volume” of broken glass. did not mention any of the small ports and No other site on the southern Baltic coastal settlements identifi ed through ar- coast in the th century possesses compara- chaeological fi nds along the coast he followed ble evidence. Th is is true even for Wolin – a because these sites were not nodal points fact that deserves mention, since this town in concerned with routinized, long-distance particular is often considered to have rivalled traffi c. Th is was the case because it was in the Hedeby or Birka. While the th-century interest of the individual agents engaged in archaeological evidence of Wolin as a trad- trade that such nodal points occurred widely . Jagodziński : ; ing centre is overwhelming, few imported spaced and in very limited numbers. In the Brather ; Jagodziński & objects or trading tools are found there from entire Baltic Sea region, it is likely that no Kasprzycka : ; see earlier periods. An examination of the un- more than a handful of sites performed such also Jagodziński this volume. published fi nds from the harbour area, the a function. In the th century, Hedeby and . E.g., Herrmann : ; most important fi nd complex from th-cen- Ambrosiani & Clarke : Truso were in all probability the only sites . tury Wolin, confi rms this. Th e settlement active on the southern Baltic shores. Other . See also Wojtasik ; area provides similar evidence. Th e large har- trading sites served as regional markets, com- Filipowiak & Gundlach ; bour facilities were mainly constructed in the municating with the nodal points, but not Stanisławski . years -, and the main fortifi cations with the long-distance traffi c between them . Sindbæk . . Filipowiak : . erected ca . From a perspective of natu- that served Wulfstan for the voyage that he . Filipowiak a; Filip- ral geography, Wolin may seem pre-destined relates. owiak b.
II. Th e western and central Baltic Sea region Borrowing terms from trigonometry, the plausible description of the southern Bal- nodal points communicated as a fi rst-order tic coast from the perspective of routinized, network, to which local markets were linked long-distance maritime traffi c. Th ere were as a second order. In the dendritic (‘tree-like’) other more regional aspects of trade and set of contacts that ensued, communication communication that were certainly ignored in the fi rst-order network would generally by Wulfstan, but the account is in accord- by-pass the second. ance with the archaeological evidence of the Th us considered, Wulfstan’s account is ports in which he called, as well as the sites no longer enigmatic. Indeed, it off ers us a he passed en route.
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II. Th e western and central Baltic Sea region