A platform for research: civil engineering, architecture and urbanism
A platform for research: civil engineering, architecture and urbanism
Settlement patterns and field systems in medieval Norway
The paper gives a survey of settlement patterns and field systems in Norway c. 800–1500 A.D. based on archaeological evidence and contemporary written sources. As topography and climate varies considerably in a country that stretches across 13 degrees of latitude, the agricultural conditions vary accordingly, resulting in regional diversity in both settlement patterns and field systems. Separate, dispersed farms have for long been regarded as the predominant form of settlement for most of the country, but also clustered settlements seem to have been common along the western and north-western coast, at least from the Middle Ages up to the nineteenth century. The diversity of settlement and tenurial patterns as well as physical variations in the agricultural potential resulted in a variety of farm types and field systems. Scattered fields under more or less permanent cultivation without fallow periods were usual in larger parts of medieval Norway, especially to the west, while rotation of arable land was used in areas where the proportion between land and husbandry was less balanced and more extensive cultivable soils. Altogether, the Norwegian settlement patterns and field systems reflect both regional heterogeneity and variations within regions, but they also reveal similarities with the neighbouring countries.
Settlement patterns and field systems in medieval Norway
The paper gives a survey of settlement patterns and field systems in Norway c. 800–1500 A.D. based on archaeological evidence and contemporary written sources. As topography and climate varies considerably in a country that stretches across 13 degrees of latitude, the agricultural conditions vary accordingly, resulting in regional diversity in both settlement patterns and field systems. Separate, dispersed farms have for long been regarded as the predominant form of settlement for most of the country, but also clustered settlements seem to have been common along the western and north-western coast, at least from the Middle Ages up to the nineteenth century. The diversity of settlement and tenurial patterns as well as physical variations in the agricultural potential resulted in a variety of farm types and field systems. Scattered fields under more or less permanent cultivation without fallow periods were usual in larger parts of medieval Norway, especially to the west, while rotation of arable land was used in areas where the proportion between land and husbandry was less balanced and more extensive cultivable soils. Altogether, the Norwegian settlement patterns and field systems reflect both regional heterogeneity and variations within regions, but they also reveal similarities with the neighbouring countries.
Settlement patterns and field systems in medieval Norway
Øye, Ingvild (author)
Landscape History ; 30 ; 37-54
2009-01-01
18 pages
Article (Journal)
Electronic Resource
English
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