Hofstaðir

I was so overjoyed yesterday at lunch that I almost grabbed the hand of the gentlemen sitting next to me, and then remembered I had just met him, so that might be weird. But our other luncheon companion, Tom McGovern, had started telling me about his find from Hofstaðir two summers ago, I guess it was. Woops, I am tearing up now writing about it. 

Tom is a scientist, all about core samples for precise long-term measurements, bar graphs, and data data data. When I first met him, a fresh eyed assistant curator babbling on about the sagas and Iceland, I got the feeling he did not think my scholarship would have much to contribute to his scholarship. But he was always very friendly, and it was cool to go visit the site he has been working on in Northern Iceland, near Lake Myvatn, which I did some summers back. 

Yesterday at lunch Tom was talking about collaborative projects, ways basically that we could get an extra research agenda through linking it with the public outreach potential of my museum (for as long as that lasts as such....). He'd had the same sort of ideas, though perhaps more diffuse, with the Arctic Studies Center. 

But then he got around to talking about Hofstaðir. Everytime I have ever heard him talk about this site, it was always about soil degredation, the bone profile extracted from the middens, or local resource exploitation. When it came around to explaining the name of the site, Hofstaðir, he always joked about how some silly antiquarian thought it had something to do with pagan sacrifice. Ala, 'Those silly sagas! Those silly people that believe Icelanders actually know something about their past without the aid of archaeology. Those silly placename etomologies, so cute!'

I have not read Gavin's article on the subject, but guess what? The last summer they were working at Hofstaðir, they finally got around to excavating two pits that were a bit outside the hall walls. The pits were full of bull skulls that had been ritually slaughtered. And in going back through the excavation notes, it turns out other bull skulls had been placed around the entire hall, just no one had bothered to take any note of them as important. Tearing up again. 

They were likely slaughtered over a 100 year or more period of time, and then the skulls left out to weather. What is more, they were likely slaughtered in such a way that blood would come shooting out of the mouth of the bull. 

If that does not count as a Hofstaðir (sacrifice place), I do not know what does. 

And thus I do my happy dance on the graves of all the empiricist scientists who scoff at those who choose to believe in modes of knowledge beyond their own.  

Comments

Iris said…
O Liz, this is GREAT!
May 22, 2009 at 11:20 AM
Anonymous said…
haha, brilliant! :D
May 22, 2009 at 1:06 PM
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