From sherds to streets Essays on later medieval archaeology

Abstract

The present volume is a small collection of articles based on papers presented in spring 2013 at the international meeting hosted by the Tallinn University, Institute of History. Between April 26 and 28, PhD students of medieval and later archaeology from seven countries shared their thoughts and research results among a small group of interested colleagues. During the weekend, thirteen presentations on various aspects of later medieval and early modern period archaeology were handled, from the artefact studies to the landscape research and further on to the analysis of the stratigraphy of complicated buildings. The event in Tallinn was a second attempt to bring together young scholars who have chosen to focus their research on the early medieval, medieval and post medieval material remains, e.g. the period from the 6th-7th centuries AD onwards. The first of these post-graduate meetings was jointly hosted by the University of Gottingen and the town of Einbeck in 2012 (see Kuhne & Lehnberg 2013), the seminar in Tallinn (for a thorough overview, see Kuhne 2014) was followed by a conference in Hall in Tyrol organized by the University of Innsbruck in March 2014. Next year's gathering will be in Luneburg (2015), and after that probably in Riga (2016), thus it seems that a new tradition of annual conferences on medieval and later archaeologies has been established. The initial idea behind the conference series was an effort to create a platform for the young scholars who are at the early stage of career-building--to discuss the ongoing research projects, meet the fellow graduate students with similar interests, as well as learn about future prospects on the job market (see Kuhne & Lehnberg 2013, 253), which, in case of archaeology, can range from a few positions at universities, museums and heritage departments to working in the private sector (archaeological excavation firms and consultancies of cultural resource management, to name a few). Visiting different places and organizations is a good chance to get to know and think about the current trends in our profession, about the current driving force for medieval archaeology, the main problems for the newcomers, etc. On a very broad scale we can compare this with successful post-graduate conference series of medieval archaeology--early medieval archaeology student symposium (EMASS), an interactive forum run for, and by, graduate research students in Great Britain (see earlymedievalarchaeology.co.uk). It is to be hoped that the above-mentioned conference series, started in 2012 in Einbeck will develop into a similar kind of lively forum for the younger generation archaeologists who will be shaping the discipline during the next decades. To support this new interesting initiative it was decided that the papers presented in Tallinn should be published, both as a chance to practice the writing skills and as an opportunity to disseminate the ideas, generated during the daily work with the ongoing dissertation projects--hence the word 'essay' (essay, n--a trial, testing, proof; experiment; see Oxford English Dictionary, online: www.oed.com) in the title. This volume presents one third of the papers given in Tallinn, due to the limited number of pages available and because of the tight deadline; a few others will be hopefully published in next issues of the Estonian Journal of Archaeology. In the near future, if possible, special compendiums linked to this conference series will be produced. The present volume serves as a stepping stone for this exciting development. The publication of this issue was supported by the Tallinn University and by institutional research funding IUT (IUT18-8) of the Estonian Ministry of Education and Research. Kaesolev ajakirjanumber on koostatud 2013. aasta kevadel Tallinnas TLU Ajaloo Instituudis toimunud rahvusvahelisel konverentsil esitatud ettekannete pohjal valminud artiklitest. 26.-28. …