Den livgivande elden och det livsviktiga bränslet
Bruket av eld och behovet av bränsle på mesolitiska och tidigneolitiska boplatser i Norrland.
BoplatsvallarVinterboplatserNorrlandMesolitikumNeolitikumResurshanteringBrukningstidBränsleDöd vedEld
Research on Stone Age hunters and gatherers in Norrland has been lively since the 1960s. Central to this research are questions about the organization of society, sedentariness, continuity and resource management. One central part of life in the taiga is the need for fire and fuel. This aspect has been little discussed in conjunction with the mentioned research questions. My goal is to show that the matter of fire and fuel is an important one that needs to be taken in to consideration when discussing Stone Age Norrland and hunter/gatherers. The questions concerns fuel consumption and requirement, the amount of available fuel, the impact these factors may have had on settlement patterns and continuity and the possible ways in which we could proceed to study this subject further. The material consists of ethnographic records, forestry research on old-growth forests, archaeological and environmental archaeological material, experimental research on fuel consumption and records of traditional Sami fire techniques. With this information I have constructed a number of cases, not with the goal of gaining any conclusive answers but rather to discuss different factors and implications the use of fire and need for fuel could have had and how those may connect to the present archaeological record. Lastly I have looked at the possibility of further research, the material and methods that will allow researchers to approach these questions in further depth.