CHAPTER X.

THE IRON AGE.

The three historic ages overlap each other—Division of the iron age by archæologists—Gradual development in the mode of burial during the three ages—Appearance of silver, lead, and glass—Greek and Roman objects—Cinerary deposits—Cremation—The Kannikegaard cemetery—Primitive kettle-shaped graves—Intentional destruction of weapons and armour in graves—Cinerary urns—Symbolic signs—Ornaments of the iron age.

In the iron age, when the knowledge of all the metals was known, and weapons were made of iron, bones were still sometimes used for arrow-heads; this age gradually merges into the historic period. It is impossible to assign definite limits of time to the three prehistoric ages; they run by degrees into each other; the classification specifies no division of time, but marks degrees of development in man.

Northern archæologists divide the iron age in the North into the _earlier_, _middle_, and _later_ iron age, in the same manner as they have divided the preceding stone and bronze ages; and it may safely be said that in all these ages the North surpasses other countries in the beauty and number of its objects. All the antiquities, as well as the Eddas and Sagas, plainly show that the people who inhabited the eastern and southern shores of the present Scandinavia[118], the islands of the Baltic, and the southern shores of that sea, to a certain distance inland, which now comprise Northern Germany, were of the same origin and belonged to the same race; and the vast number of weapons of various kinds testify equally with the records to the warlike character of the people. The finish of the weapons of the later stone age is something wonderful, many of them are as polished as glass; the weapons of bronze are equally remarkable.

In the beginning of the iron age appear the shears, which are very similar to those now in use. Clothes during this period were generally kept together by pins and buckles, which have been found in great numbers; horns were used as drinking cups, and domestic vessels of glass, bronze, silver, gold, wood, or burnt clay, and objects of Roman manufacture, dice, checkers or draughtsmen, and chessmen, have also been unearthed.

At a very early period of this age remains of brynjas, or coats of ring armour, have been found in graves where burning of the dead has taken place; this shows that they were known in the North even in the beginning of the Christian era, if not before; they are also met with in graves of a later period, and in the bog finds of the third and fourth century.

Along with iron the people became also acquainted with silver, lead, glass, &c., and knew the art of soldering and gilding metals. The jewels and ornaments in their design and workmanship show a considerable advance in taste.

At what time the use of iron began to be known among the people and when it superseded bronze is impossible to tell: the change must have taken place a long time before the ships of the Suiones were described by Tacitus, a wonderful example of the accuracy of whose description is found in the Nydam boat of which I will speak hereafter. Iron is very abundant in Sweden and Norway, and bog iron was no doubt plentiful in the islands of the Baltic; the use of the latter is proved by masses of slag, weapons, &c. found in the earliest graves of the iron age. The use of the bronze of the preceding period continued, and many objects of bronze are evidently of home manufacture.

The earliest graves[119] belonging to this iron age in the North are called by Northern archæologists _depôts cineraires_ (cinerary deposits). These graves are round bowl-shaped holes, the excavations being from about two to four feet in diameter, and three to four feet deep: into these the remains of the funeral pyre, such as burnt bones of the corpse, ashes, charcoal, fragments of clay, urns, ornaments, jewels, other objects and weapons are thrown in, without order or method. The burnt bones and the charcoal are scattered sometimes over a bed covering a certain space, or sometimes in a heap together.

In other graves the antiquities are found resting on the black mould itself. What were the causes which led to the temporary disuse of the mound-burials we cannot tell.

Then came a period when after the burning of the corpse on the pyre the pieces of the bones were gathered into urns of clay, wooden buckets with metal mountings, vessels of bronze or glass bowls; these latter being very rare. These urns, &c., which are frequently found covered, for protection, by other vessels, were placed in chambers of varying sizes, those of the earliest graves being made of slabs, and just large enough to contain the sepulchral urn.

It should be mentioned that the development of the form of these graves runs in an unbroken chain, beginning with the large grave chamber of the stone age, and culminating in the insignificant receptacles for preserving a mere handful of burnt bones.

These graves are found sometimes singly, and at others in many hundreds, and even thousands, together.

The Kannikegaard cemetery on the island of Bornholm in the Baltic, and that of Möllegaard by Broholm on the island of Fyen, are perhaps the two richest antiquarian fields of the earliest iron grave period. Kannikegaard must have been a very large common graveyard; it is over 1,000 feet long and over 150 feet wide, and formed, no doubt, part of a more extensive burial ground, as there are other graves some 200 feet further on. In nearly all the graves scorched stones have been found, often in such quantities that they nearly fill the grave; a clay urn was also often found standing at the bottom of the burnt spots or lying on its side, sometimes with the bottom up or in broken pieces; many graves contain no antiquities, and hold only burnt bones and charcoal.[120]

In no other part of Europe do we see such a vast number of graves of this period, showing that the North must then have been inhabited by a far more dense population than other countries; from the number and contents of these _depôts cineraires_, we gather that the population burned its dead in large burial-grounds.

The practice of burning the dead had already become common in the latter part of the bronze age, and prevailed most extensively, if not entirely, during the iron period immediately following it.

Connected with the burning of the dead was the intentional damage done to objects which were exposed to the heat of the funeral pyre. Special care seems to have been taken to render swords and other weapons thoroughly useless. Swords are cut on the edges, bent and twisted; shield bosses are dented or flattened; and jewels and other objects are entirely ruined, and the illustrations seen in these volumes will show how thorough the destruction was. Bent swords and shield bosses, &c., were sometimes placed over the cinerary urn, at other times they were put at their side.

We find that the same custom also existed during the cremation period of the bronze age,[121] many of the swords of that period being broken in several places.

Among the objects most commonly found are shears, iron knives, silver and bronze fibulæ, glass beads, melted or whole in many of which the colours are unaltered, and as fresh as if made to-day; iron and bone combs, tweezers of iron, amber beads, buckles, dice, draughtsmen, fragments of trappings for horses and waggons, ornaments of gold and silver, fragments of cloth, weapons, iron keys, fragments of bronze and iron vessels, iron clinch nails, spurs of bronze and iron (showing that horses were used at a very early period in the North), clay urns, &c., &c. A remarkable fact is that the earliest swords seem to be chiefly single-edged, a departure from the shape of the bronze swords: the fragments of the shields are of wood, with heavy iron bosses and handles.

The cinerary urns are of different sizes and shapes, many of which are not ungraceful: the clay of which they are made is of a black or greyish colour, coarse and rough, porous, and often very tender; the people even at a later period never seeming to have been skilled in the potter’s art. Many of the designs upon them are peculiar, and were, no doubt, symbolical. Among these are circles with dots, triangles, the svastika and triad, &c., &c. Glazed pottery was unknown in the North.

In Gotland, the graves are made of lime slabs. Some of these stone cists are not deep under the ground, and without apparently any mound.

The following objects in one grave in Möllegaard will give a thorough idea of the destruction wrought on the pyre.