Culture as cargo

Cultural cargo, cat, hen, Karelian Spitz, LEAK-ship, ard, plough, Buck, Agiri-buck, Knossos, running dog, Spiral Age, time boat, ritual ship, Egyptian bronze sickle, catch octopus,

 The world outlook in my childhood was a little bit narrow. In boys' fantasies it was romantic to think about wildies, aborigines and stonies making their canoes of birch bark or maybe from a tree. We learned that they burnt out the tree and especially the Danish word "udhule" sounded romantic. To that came that in Denmark with few woods and mostly open landscape we always dreamt about the wilderness and we thought that a primitive life was the only real life

… in reality I think all real people want life as easy as possible and rather use everything that make it easier.

In the middle of the sixties I spent a summer on a mansion near a bit of river between two power plants. I borrowed two boats from an old man. One was big and difficult to manage alone. The other was small and just so wide that one could sit in it. It was made of three ordinary boards as flat bottom and it was about three metres long. You had to be careful especially when they opened for the water in the other end. Another reason is that i cannot swim. Still many a fishermen say they cannot swim and that makes them careful.

Anyhow I could use it for setting out the long lines and also fish by casting and got the fish on board. Only once I had some problem when I got a pike weighing 6 kilos. Another accident was when some thief-fishermen took up my long line and dared to ask if they got anything on my line. Then they began to circle around me with their boat with outboard, but I managed to keep the peek against the waves.

With this I only want to tell that I can imagine how our ancestors went to seas with small vehicles. They do it still today in many places as I saw on TV some in the Indian Ocean on high seas just sitting or laying on his stomach on a piece of wood. It is not only the stomachs that make males risk their lives. Maybe it is some macho gene that has to prove how much we dare?

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The archaeologists tell that it could not be a cat since they have not found cat bones before late Iron Age. Some other hen and cock-pictures are seen on the rocks and in the Mycenean vase-paintings there are some hen. Maybe both animals were novelties in trade in middle of Bronze Age.

The dog is an old friend and we see them in Stone Sage Bronze carvings often in hunting. The Spitz is a good dog in the bear game. There is a Karelian Spitz in rock carvings at Lake Onega. They have dated it to 3^rd millennium BC. Anyhow they are newcomers depending on the time scale … in Australia they think by DNA that the dingo was introduced as domesticated Indian dog maybe 5000 years ago.

If the Scandinavian could sail on our big seas and along the Atlantic they surely could manage a trip to the Mediterranean by see or the rivers too. Simple vehicles they could make in most places. However making things with quality ask for dry and chosen material and a year or two of planning and preparing

It takes a day to polish the top piece of the front to a Rolls Royce. It is always a question of good tools and much time. We have to keep in mind that the Egyptian culture was made with simple tools. The oak coffins in Danish Bronze Age mounds seem primitive, but when we see the gifts we understand they were able to make things with great finish. Finds of chisels and woodcrafts from third millennium shows that Bronze Age people could rely on a tradition of more than thousand years.

In Guldhøj, Jutland they found a folding chair of the same model as in the tomb of Tuthankamun and seen in Aegean art. In the tomb there was also a boomerang wrapped in birch-bark and it is easy to think it came from North-Europe. Especially when we compare with the Egyptian ships on the Norwegian rocks.

Finds of cultural items of bronze and wood tells about cultural influence but also about very good craftsmanship. It is not sure that the houses were those turf-barns they reconstruct. Clay and wood disappear in the wet climate of Europe. Later style from Viking Age shows that they had figureheads on the houses and maybe other decorations. Then it is another thing that the style is always depending on the wealth of the builder.

Very often we see only the top of the iceberg. Archaeology is not allowed to speculate too much about the artefacts they get into light with their brushes. But when it comes to our ancestors believes and religion they have free hands and brains to speculate in sun cult, shamanism and ancestors afraid of ghost?

We have naturally all right in the world to build on what we know and try to fill the gaps. We have to use pure logic and try to understand the pictures and the symbolism. If we see big ships we must ask were they real even when we have no physical proof. The figurative material force us to make relative dating, but as long as possible bind it to physical facts or known things in other cultures

I have no statistics, but my feeling is that there are more ship-like figures than real ships and then also in that count ships meant for the virtual journey. However that make us realise they used the idea of the boat for more than describing boats and journeys. We see the same use in south.

However the cupmark and the broken stick make it more like a LEAK-ship as season symbol. There are a few on our rocks and some are just a slanting stick/pole. Naturally we have to compare with the Egyptian djed-pillar and the time was when the seed is growing. The same symbolism is on two of the boats in Haugsbyn. In one case there is a negative footprint instead of the cupmark above and in the other case there is a UN-symbol meaning to be/go below (surface).

Naturally this and other earlier symbolism force somebody to kill his believe in the "wild primitive Stone Age-man at least the past 7000 years. We are indoctrinated to think that big is best and that humankind need cities and machinery to solve the problems of survival. In nature normally the water seek the easiest way and otherwise nature use as little energy as possible. Humankind has lost the sense for proportions.

Mystery always fascinates man. Our rock-carvings carries mystery and so do much of our stony monuments. Studying them is more than a lifetime job. I have used much of my time for twenty years. Still I see new things and connections and find better formulations. I am pretty sure that they used the boat as symbol for picturing real journeys as well as when picturing abstract and virtual rounds. The boat encloses the suite or crowd in question on their way on the Time River.

 … The Buck is hardly visible on the ship. It is maybe an agiri-buck known from the Minoan sphere and on it is an IN-spiral, which make us think that it is "spring equinox in the Buck". I have not found any of the kind in my Scandinavian material. The ship has the Greek shape and as cargo … there is an ritual axe of the balta-type … the pair of lures seem to be of late type … there is another unidentified figure in front of the lure-blowers,. Besides the ship is the arm-less man we see in many place and I just wonder what the other man carry in his right hand.

I have discussed rock- images many times and it is fascinating how many opinions we have. Still I think that after a deeper discussion we would reach a point where the main explanation is that it is their year ritual we see as the red thread.

The Greeks have analysed the poems about Orpheus (go beneath logic) and they think the poems were written between 1800 and 1300 BC. They think that Aries were used from the 13^th/ 12^th century onwards as fix-stars of spring equinox.

From Egypt we know of the adjustment of calendar by Ramesses in 1159 BC and the Khnum-symbolism became fashion in many places. In Bohuslaen we find the ram symbolism at Aspeberget, Balken and Hede for instance. Naturally the horns have another shape at Haugsbyn where most of them are found in the woods. Maybe they had the spring rituals in the grove (Lund, Hult).

We find the rose in the ceiling in the palace Knossos on Crete, but also on rhytons (seed silos/oliveoil) together with the agiri-buck, the horn-altar, the double-spiral and a long-legged bird and they surely picture the four seasons. The single double-spiral we find at Haugsbyn and in other places and in Bohuslaen there are some rosette also from the ceiling of Knossos

When we see the direct loans we have to consider that they think the palace was destroyed before 1400 BC, however the culture continued later in Mycenae. Among the figures are some swords we can date to the middle of the Scandinavian Bronze Age. Still these facts help us in dating

These examples show that "the cargo" may be merchandises, tools and also culture of various kinds. We do not know how much of it comes into use. They analysed and made maybe trials and then they decided if it fitted for the Scandinavian conditions. The same patterns were surely the normal all over Europe.

Even if they could live on what nature gave at the place, but soon they discovered that they could get better supplies from other places. We have normally only flint and stones left from Stone Age but we can see the trade with these items. The bronzes tell the same story. Another thin is that young men are dreaming about adventures during the long Northern winter and a little trip abroad cool them down … it is something timeless and universal in that.

In this article I mention some of the things they brought home as we see it from the rocks or artefacts. Rare fruit, textiles, salt and other vanishing products leave no track.

Domesticated animals, seed and other plants were imported and with them the instruction in shape of some myth easy to understand and remember. Some special tools and machinery was also import.

On the rocks we see clearly that the ard (plough) was brought from different places as far as Egypt. They surely tried to develop it and Scandinavia was early producer of Iron so maybe they made a shoe for the plough and they could of course always take raw iron as cargo too.

The heavy wheel came early in fourth millennium to Poland and Denmark too. On the rocks we see pictures of the heavy four-wheel wagon with cows or oxen as draught animals. The light wagon for male pride and horses were brought in the middle of Bronze Age. In Denmark they have recently discovered stony roads that may have been useable for male riders.

 … the spiral usually express the IN or OUT situation. In this case it could also mean the ram horns of Aries and then spring equinox in Aries. The cargo on the ships at the rock-carvings may time-symbols as well as real things. They often decorate the stern and stem and sometimes it tells "to and fro" but not always. The tail-looking thing should rather be the front-mark on the ship but the oar seems to be an oar. On some ships there are paddling crew and they normally are having their back against the travel direction.

The Time boat need not be drawn perfectly, even when we expect well-drawn figures. However it may be a sign when they draw them only schematic, which shows that they were used as symbols. At least on Dal and nearby Skepplanda they systematically draw the winter-ships with double lines and a ship with three lines should be an abstract boat up to the logic of symbolising.

This figure is a ritual-ship from the Simris fields in Skaane and nearby on the rock is also a horse telling that it was known at that time. It tells also that the horse may have been sun-symbol at the time.

Naturally we have also to ask if they build ships for a dozen men at that time? This is the very current type in general and it is easy to see the shape in the Hjortspring-ship from 300 BC.

 …The Cat is surely from Egypt too … but when? And when did the tail-less cat come to Zealand and Manx? …from Where? And maybe the hen came at the same time. The domesticated animals could have been driven at least to Denmark. However all animals were small so it was possible to have a few on board. Since the rock-carvings are in Bohuslaen or East Gautland a boat has been necessary at least the last bit of the journey.

They are still using the method in the Mediterranean. They fasten pots on the long-line and offer the octopus a nest. There is a hole in the bottom and they pour a little of extra salt water in the hole and the octopus flees the pot.

These rock-carvings are from the Danish isle Bornholm in the Baltic seas. They were early skilled in making thin plate in bronze and gold. That skill they must have learnt in Greece. Many of the ships in their rock-carvings are of the Greek type. No doubt they have been in Greece.

We cannot for sure say if the traders came from south or if our traders went to the Mediterranean, but does it matter? We can for sure say that there were influences and that Scandinavia was part of the Old World.