Domed oblong brooches of Vendel Period Scandinavia Ørsnes types N & O and similar brooches, including transitional types surviving into the Early Viking Period Martin Rundkvist Abstract This is a study of domed oblong brooches of Vendel Period Scandinavia, i.e. Ørsnes types N & O and similar brooches, including transitional types surviving into the Early Viking Period. A database of 593 brooches from all of Scandinavia, most studied first-hand by the author, is the material base of the investigation. The brooches’ typology, chronology, function, social significance, technological characteristics, production sites, interregional variation and ideological connotations are studied and interpreted. Unique brooches are also described and discussed. Finally, the brooches from Uppåkra are discussed against the background of the new results. Two new seriation chronologies for Vendel Period female graves on Bornholm and in mainland Sweden are appended. Martin Rundkvist, Vantvägen 9, SE–133 44, Saltsjöbaden, Sweden,
[email protected] Introduction and delimitation This is a study of the domed oblong brooches of types onward (Petersen 1928; Brinch Mad- Vendel Period Scandinavia and the transitional sen 1984; Jansson 1985). Petersen (1928:24) types that survived into the earliest Viking Peri- considered P25 to be the earliest type of the od. It treats brooches of Ørsnes’ (1966) south Viking Period. The study likewise excludes Scandinavian types N (oval bowl brooches) similar brooch types of the later Viking Period and O (animal-shaped bowl brooches) as well indigenous to Finland and the Baltic States (cf. as similarly shaped brooches found in more Ailio 1922; Spirgis 2007). northerly parts of Scandinavia, including fea- The brooches under study exhibit bewilder- tureless and punch decorated ones.