Developer-Led Excavations, Geoarchaelogy & Bayesian Modelled Chronology of a Guild House and the Main Street at Medieval Odense
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 6094836 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Federica Sulas (0000-0003-1825-8133, University of Gothenburg, corresponding author), Cristiano Nicosia (0000-0002-4716-8893, Dipartimento di Geoscienze, Università degli Studi di Padova, Padua, Italy), Kirstine Haase (0000-0002-4288-3169, Aarhus University), Mikael Manøe Bjerregaard (0000-0002-5352-6204, Odense City Museums), Søren Munch Kristiansen (0000-0003-3128-4061, Aarhus University) |
| Year | 2025 |
| Volume | 58 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 44-70 |
| Publication date | 2025-01-02 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Norwegian Archaeological Review (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0029-3652 • E-ISSN: 1502-7678 |
| Publisher | Informa UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/00293652.2025.2515515 |
| OpenAlex | W4411847495 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 46 |
In Scandinavia, archaeological investigations have made much progress in detailing the characteristics of the earliest towns. Yet, understanding of urban stratigraphies remains limited, and this gap hampers our ability to define site formation processes and develop contextual palimpsests of town life at a formative time of urban development. This paper presents the results of a multi-scale analytical program applied to developer-led excavations of a medieval guild house and a paved street in the centre of Odense, Denmark, using soil micromorphology, trace elemental geochemistry (ICPMS) and radiocarbon-based Bayesian modelling. By integrating excavation and microstratigraphic data, our analysis shows that: (1) the use of space in the early medieval city was more dynamic than hitherto expected; (2) the guild house had separate spaces with floors that were maintained and re-laid several times; and (3) domestic waste was used to raise street levels in 1078–1162. This study also demonstrates the viability of integrating geoarchaeological methods, especially soil micromorphology and geochemistry, in developer-led excavations to aid and enhance the interpretation of complex urban stratigraphies
Archaeology · Art · Chronology · Excavation · Guild · Archaeology and ancient environmental studies · Historical and Archaeological Studies · History · Image Processing and 3D Reconstruction
Interpretation of micromorphological features of soils and regoliths
Lead pollution recorded in Greenland ice indicates European emissions tracked plagues, wars, and imperial expansion during antiquity
Handbook for Soil Thin Section Description
Micromorphological study of construction materials and living floors in the medieval motte of Werken (West Flanders, Belgium)
Animal Husbandry, Import Replacement, and Urban Growth in Medieval Odense, Denmark
The origins of Odense – new aspects of early urbanisation in southern Scandinavia
Floor formation processes and the interpretation of site activity areas
Studying urban stratigraphy
Medieval markets
Integrated microstratigraphic investigations of coastal archaeological soils and sediments in Norway
Micromorphology of earth building materials
A multi-proxy, diachronic and spatial perspective on the urban activities within an indigenous community in medieval Riga, Latvia
Soil micromorphological evidence from Iron Age land use at Tornby and Mörtlösa in Linköping, Sweden
The rural–urban connection as revealed in the terrestrial sediments at Nidarneset, Trondheim, Norway
Guidelines for analysis and description of soil and regolith thin sections
The role of geoarchaeology in the interpretation of fragmented buildings and occupation surfaces
Medieval D ark E arth in an Active Alluvial Setting from the U ffizi G allery Complex in F lorence, I taly
Geochemical analysis of the truncated Viking Age trading settlement of Heimdalsjordet, Norway
Urban geoarchaeology in Belgium
Geoarchaeology in an urban context
Revealing the invisible dead
Building Urbanity
Soil evolution in the remnants of natural forest vegetation
Bayesian Analysis of Radiocarbon Dates
The IntCal20 Northern Hemisphere Radiocarbon Age Calibration Curve (0–55 cal kBP)
Building a high‐resolution chronology of a medieval urban site through Bayesian modelling
Sampling density and spatial analysis
Visible near-infrared spectroscopy as an aid for archaeological interpretation
A multi-proxy geochemical and micromorphological study of the use of space and stratigraphy of a Viking-age house in Ribe, Denmark
Microstratigraphic traces of site formation processes and human activities
Cooperative Sanitation
Urban organic archaeology
Performing towns. Steps towards an understanding of medieval urban communities as social practice
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |