Fortid møder nutid Når moderne mennesker flytter ind i jernalderen
Since the 1970ies, modern families have been invited to live in the reconstructed Iron Age longhouses at Lejre as a part of the reenactment of the Iron Age environment at the centre. Anthropological investigations of the phenomenon show that they chose to use their vacation in the Iron Age in the s...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | Danish |
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Primitive Tider
2016-12-01
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| Series: | Primitive Tider |
| Online Access: | https://journals.uio.no/PT/article/view/7195 |
| Summary: | Since the 1970ies, modern families have been invited to live in the reconstructed Iron Age longhouses at Lejre as a part of the reenactment of the Iron Age environment at the centre. Anthropological investigations of the phenomenon show that they chose to use their vacation in the Iron Age in the search for a more ‘authentic life’ as an anti-thesis to their modern everyday life. In this article it is argued that the families represent a very concrete example of active use of the past in the present and it should be investigated further as such. As a supplement to the existing anthropological studies, it is suggested that archaeological investigations of the phenomenon can give valuable information. As an example an excavation project where the southern entrance of a reconstructed, now demolished Iron Age house was investigated, is presented. The excavation revealed finds of both ‘Iron Age’ character and ‘Modern’ character. The distribution of the finds showed that most of the Iron Age finds were found outside the house, whereas most of the Modern finds were found inside the house. Together with an anthropological investigation of the same phenomenon, the finds and find distribution are interpreted as an example of how modern families cope with ’life in the past’ through consumption of modern commodities as a strategy to ’survive’. The use of modern commodities during a stay in the ‘Iron Age’ is called ‘cheating’ by the families and is sometimes experienced as shameful when the families do not live up to their own expectations of an ’authentic Iron Age life’. The presented case study is a concrete example of how archaeology and anthropology can be combined and used in the investigation of a contemporary phenomenon.
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| ISSN: | 1501-0430 2535-6194 |