EASE Finland

FULL-Kierikkikangas Stone Age Excavations, FINLAND

Dates: 30th June to 10th August 2008

Number of UK participants: 8

The Kierikkikangas Stone Age Excavations are hosted by the Kierikki stone age centre. http://www.kierikki.fi/ The excavations focus on a stone-age dwelling site circa 4000-3500BC.

The centre has been running an international archaeological field school for several years. While conducting in research, participants are also going to be interacting with tourists and site visitors; the wooden pathway to Stone Age village goes through the site.The UK participants will be working alongside Finnish archaeologists and students from Oulu University. The main aim of the placement will be to complete the excavation of a stone-age house depression and, time allowing, to complete some test pits in the area.

Stone Age village is located less than half a kilometre from Centre and during the summer it will be open to visitors. We have at least one person there between 10.00 - 17.00 guiding tourists. Usually our guides do something 'stone ageish', like stone polishing or archery. We hope you participants would be interested to do some craft and artefact production using wood/bone/antler tools, pottery etc.
UK participants will be welcome to participate in some experimental archaeology, depending on skills, experience and interests.

Participants will be taken on field trips in the surrounding area to visit different kinds of sites and monuments. Also a visit to Oulu University's archaeology department and lab will take place. More about our lab and archaeology at http://www.oulu.fi/taida/arkeologia/labra/welcome.html

Please do not hesitate to contact Leena Lehtinen (Director of Kierikki), if you have any questions about the programme for the 2008 placement in Finland.

SITE INFORMATION AND BACKGROUND

YLI-II (28) KIERIKINKANGAS – STONE AGE DWELLING SITE CIRCA 4000 - 3500 BC.
Stone Age dwelling site, dwelling depressions. The category of relics I - II.
Surveys: 1966 A. Kehusmaa, 1986 E-L and H-P Schulz, 1995 P. Koivunen, 1997 - 98 H-P Schulz,
Excavations: 1998 P. Pesonen, 1998 H-P Schulz and E. Ojanlatva, 1999 P. Pesonen, 2000 M. Hietala, 2003 S.Viljanmaa

The coastline of the Baltic extended to Kierikki around 7000 – 5000 years ago. Since then, land rise has moved the mouth of the river Iijoki 30 kilometres westwards. Five thousand years ago, the population was concentrated close to the coast in several large villages, the remains of which have been preserved nearly untouched in the area stretching from the village of Yli-Ii eastwards to the Pahkakoski rapids. This complex constitutes one of the most important archaeological sites in Finland. However, the rich Stone Age culture was not an isolated phenomenon but a part of the more extensive ancient settlement in northern Finland.

Archaeological research in Yli-Ii began in 1960 in connection with the harnessing of the river Iijoki for hydroelectric power. The National Board of Antiquities mapped and excavated Stone Age sites for example at Pahkakoski and on Kierikkisaari island. After these very productive excavations, several smaller one were carried out in the 1970s and 80s. In 1993, archaeologists from the University of Oulu discovered the rich Kuuselankangas site, and a few years later the prehistoric wood deposits of Purkajasuo bog. Since then, the region has been the focus of continuing archaeological research under the combined auspices of the University of Oulu and the National Board of Antiquities.

The subject of excavations in summer 2006, Kierikinkangas, is nearby Kuuselankangas site. In both places there are several remains of semi-subterranean houses which in case of Kierikinkangas are a bit older, around 4000 – 3500 BC. Today the remains of almost 50 semi-subterranean houses are oval,
about five to ten metres size depressions nearby each other. They are easy to locate, also the ancient bank is clearly visible in southern and eastern sides of dwelling site where dry pine forest becomes boggy. Houses were probably built during several generations and only part of the ones visible today were in use at the same time.

The surrounding area of Kierikkicentre in its southern and western sides is still almost untouched. In the northern side of Centre there is a gravel pit which has destroyed part of the site – the archaeological excavations took place there in 1998, 1999 and 2003. In Stone Age there used to be a shallow bound in place where the main building of Kierikkicentre stands today. Since Stone Age the area has become boggy.

The Neolithic was a time of increasing population densities, social complexification, and technological change. The shift from small, circular dwellings to larger, more permanent rectangular multi-hearth dwellings in the Ii river estuary 5000 years ago reflects a changing society facing new environmental and social challenges. The research has focused on the evolution of dwelling structures in the period 6000-4000 years ago in the Ii estuary. We have gained a great deal of insight into the social evolution of the region at the time of the Neolithic transition. There are several questions which still need to be answered. How does a society go from having small mobile groups to having large sedentary ones? How does it go from having little or no inequality to having significant, institutionalized ranking?
Kierikinkangas represents time, when society was becoming more complex and typical Neolithic phenomena such as trading were starting to take place.

Pictures of typical materials found at the site:


Grey Slate Axe	Quartz Scraper

Burnt bone	Typical Comb-Ware

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