Catching fire – On cremations in Late Iron Age Åland Islands, Baltic sea

Abstract

The cremation was an important part of the mortuary rituals in Late Iron Age Åland Islands, c.550–1050 CE. More than 10 000 burial mounds with cremations found in c.440 farmstead cemeteries are known from the Åland Islands. The burial practice is characteristic of those common in Eastern Sweden. We here analyse how the cremation was carried out, considering detailed macroscopic analyses of the level of calcination of the cremated remains of humans and included animals. We examine 207 cremations found on two farmstead cemeteries, Långängsbacken and Kvarnbacken, and noted that the frequency of burials showing incomplete calcination was high: 50 % at Kvarnbacken and 61 % at Långängsbacken. The amount of cremated remains deposited in the burials was small considering complete bodies of the humans and included animals. Thus, incomplete calcination of the remains was accepted and the recovery and removal of all remains from the pyre site to be deposited in the burial mounds appear not to have been necessary. The burials with small amounts of bone exhibited a higher frequency of completely calcined fragments than those with larger amounts. Burials probably built on the place of the funeral pyre, by contrast, exhibited more remains of incomplete calcination. This suggests there was some level of selection in the recovery and subsequent handling of the remains. The level of calcination was also affected by the number of animals included on the funeral pyre as the frequency of incompletely calcined fragments increased with the number of animals included on the pyre. Also, the inclusion of horse ( Equus caballus ) and cattle ( Bos taurus ) affected the degree of calcination more than the smaller sized animals. The cremation evidently served its purpose and fulfilled community expectations regardless of what here might be seen as technically incomplete. Thus, the variability in the degree of calcination is probably not evidence of an unskilled practice but rather the cremation was affected and shaped by the use of different material of fuel but also the social contexts in general. Investigations of the level of calcination of cremated remains can contribute to a better understanding of cremation rituals and burial practices.

The authors' abstract, as published at the source. Journal of Archaeological Science Reports, 2026 · DOI ↗