Hedeby or Haithabu(Pronounced Haithabu)
All the following material quoted from pages 93 - 95 of Thurston, Tina L., Landscapes of Power, Landscapes of Conflict: State Formation in the South Scandinavian Iron Age 2001, http://www.myilibrary.com.login.ezproxy.library.ualberta.ca/Browse/open.asp?ID=20736&loc=Cover (11 January 2009) In 808 the Frankish annals record the following:
He [King Godfred] ordered the destruction of a trading station, Reric [Mecklenburg or Lübeck on the Continent] which gave his realm great benefit by the collection of taxes. He carried the merchants away with him to Sleisthorp. Here he stayed for several days and decided to protect the borders of his realm with a wall. (Roesdahl 1982:73)
The Danish king Godfred had “owned” or conquered a continental market town, but felt insecure about its location. He razed it and moved it, along with everyone who worked there, up into Denmark proper, on the banks of the Schlei fjord. The “wall” refers to new additions Godfred made to the Danevirke. The town he founded, Hedeby, is well known archaeologically and has been the focus of extensive excavations since before World War II. Hedeby was remarkable in its strategic placement on the border articulating the lands of the Danes, the Franks, and the Slavs. By A.D. 900 it had become the largest center in western Denmark (Figure 4.6). While the harbor was certainly important, as one would expect in a maritime land, the Weiglesdor, or gate through the Danevirke, had a tollhouse, mentioned by Theitmar of Merseburg in about A.D. 1000, and even more goods appear to have passed through this entry than through the sea route. Traders are said to have landed at Hollingstedt and sent wares overland to the town by wagon (Jansen 1985:189). An extensive road system beginning in Hedeby consists of the main Army/Ox Road (Heervej) and many smaller roads connecting to rural areas; parts of it have been excavated in several places. These major, cobble-paved roads must have been maintained by Godfred’s central authority, and that of his heirs, because they traverse many districts and continue on the Islands.
At its greatest extent
Hedeby was a walled, 24-hectare site, and by A.D. 1000 it had
associated cemeteries with over 10,000 individuals. Based on the length
of occupation and the number of graves, a conservative population
estimate of about 1,000 people has been postulated (Randsborg 1980:80).
Different cemeteries contain different socioeconomic classes, ranging
from poor and meagrely furnished to large, rich chamber graves. The
excavated portion of the town has produced only one byre, indicating
that provisions had to be procured from the surrounding farming
communities, several of which are known archaeologically. The town’s
economy was centered on production and international trade, clearly
represented by the trade goods found there: soapstone and whetstone
from Norway; querns, ceramics, and wine barrels from the Rhine;
ceramics from the Baltic Slavs; luxury textiles of Continental and even
Far Eastern origin; English and Frankish jewelry. Trades practiced
there included smithing, textile production, bronze casting, comb
making, amber working, leather working, and shoemaking, carpentry, and
probably archaeological “invisibles,” such as furs and slaves. A slave
market in Hedeby is mentioned by missionaries who passed through and
rescued Christian slaves by buying them free (Roesdahl 1982:24). Coins were minted there in the ninth century, the first in Scandinavia, and in 850 a church was built, probably, like the one at Ribe, for the convenience and goodwill of Christian traders who put in there. The size and nature of the town, the mint, and the church, are indicative of an important administrative center (Randsborg 1980; Roesdahl 1982). In the mid-ninth century reign of Horik II, a “Count of Hedeby” is mentioned by the Franks. Count is equivalent to the English Earl (linguistic cognate of the Danish Jarl), a type of elite second only to the king, often mentioned as advisers or administrators in historical sources. By A.D. 900, Hedeby and Ribe were both active centers. The specific site of Hedeby was abandoned in about 1020, probably because its harbor was silting in and the new deep-bottomed trading ships of the times needed a deeper harbor. The town did not disappear, though; the population transferred to a site just across the fjord, Slesvik, and continued, uninterrupted, to function in the same way. Unlike transport and harbor-related sites, towns like Hedeby and Ribe, and especially those in Scania (Lund, Tummatorp, Vä, and Helsingborg) appear to have been royal foundations with the express intention of attracting and regulating trade, administering the province by replacing previous large or wealthy elite settlements like those at Dankirke, Uppåkra, and Vä and inserting others where no such large settlements existed, such as at Tummatorp. |
Hedeby |