Archaeology Day update from Gothenburg University!

So, today I attended the annual Archaeology Day at my old university, the University of Gothenburg. I sadly could only be there for two thirds of the day due to other work appointments, but it was an assorted collection of archaeology that I had to enjoy for the time I was there.

A picture of the humanist section of Gothenburg University

I would say we were at least 100 archaeologists from around western Sweden that had found our way to the big auditorium for Gothenburg Universitys humanity students. We covered neolithic living and farming conditions, results and questions from different excavation sites, medieval clothes, methods that through 3D rendering allows in depth analysis of petroglyphs and new ways to present a historical landscape through mixed reality representations.
Over all a very interesting and fruitful day, I'd say.

The two presentations that grabbed my attention the most, even though all was interesting, was one about (and this is a direct translation) "Trans-medial narratives and interactive digital presentation techniques" and the presentation of the conservation of a leather garment found during the excavation of Nya Lödöse last summer.

The trans-medial narrative presentation was about the new rest stop that is being built by the World Heritage area in Tanum, Sweden, and how the region, museum and Interactive Institute has developed a plan for this rest stop to be a portal or gateway into the World Heritage area for visitors.
It involved a few very cool ideas, there will be an museum of sorts at the rest stop for visitors to view, audio guides to guide visitors 'into the landscape' but also, and this got me really excited, a kind of 'bronze age binocular" where the viewer steps up to what looks like an ordinary view point binocular, but in this binocular is a small smartphone based computer which also shows interesting cultural 'hotspots' in the landscape. If the viewer lingers on one of these spots, an animation of the place's story will start.

They apparently first look at a Oculus Rift kind of solution, but that is very specialized kind of hardware so they worked out a simpler and easier to tend to solution for this based on modern smartphones. It all seems really cool, and I hope it works out great.

This kind of mixed reality could really do wonders for the presentation of sites that are not monumental in their design themselves. It allows to showcase the difference in landscape, sea levels and flora and fauna compared to the landscape today and since they have used no audio nor textual context in the device (except for dates for the hotspots) it hopefully builds over the language problems that could had been there otherwise.
I hope it gets to be free from vandals and others destroying it, but they said they had thought about those kind of ideas and will work to prevent vandalism or sheer weather to make the device dysfunctional, which is nice. I like when people go in prepared for trouble on these kind of things.

I so hope this project turns out good, it is a very good concept and I will surely stop and take a look for myself when I go up there again!

But enough time travel now! Or kind of... The leather garments of Nya Lödöse was a thrilling story when I first heard they had been found, even more now when we have things to tell about them thanks to the hard work of archaeologists and conservationists. For people proficient in Swedes, or who are not above Google Translates translations, I'd recommend the projects own blog updates on the subject; Part 1 and Part 2 can be found on the links!

We are talking about a 16th century leather garment, which was found during the excavations in 2014 of  Nya Lödöse. It was a very interesting excavation over all since one of the areas from this medieval town (the predecessor for Gothenburg) was the old cemetery.
Beside this leather garment they also found a still intact coffin with it's residence, a 30-35 year old male found with no burial gifts nor preserved textiles, a child's grave with a ferule in its grave, and a few grave goods associated with christian pilgrims such as a rosemary, a mandala and a special kind of crucifix.  Otherwise it was a 'ordinary' kind of cemetery for medieval Sweden with few goods buried with the deceased, also the soil and these kind of elements makes preservation conditions here hard for textiles and other kinds of sensitive materials.

For this talk we got a almost step by step explanation on how they had picked up the garment in sitú and through careful in-studio-excavation removed it from the body, and how the only traces of earlier textiles or threads were indentures in the sand and mud on the find itself. I tried to take some photos of the power point during the talk, because they were fascinating, but I'm afraid they turned out so-so in quality.

It seems to be some kind of jacket though, we have the remains of two arms and the back of the garment. From the sketches and interpretations of the people working on the find it fits fairly neatly into late 16th century fashion. It seems to be similar to the jacket Nils Sture wore for his execution in 1567, although not as fancy.

The clothes Svante, Nils and Erik Sture wore to their execution in 1567.

Photo:Anders Damberg  / Geobild

There are no traces of buttons, but plenty for holes for lacing the jacket together and the traces and holes from the stitching tells of at least good craftsmanship. I'm looking forward to hear more about this and possibly see the sketches that they can generate when the rest of the work is done!

I look forward to the next Archaeology Day already, and hope to see even more familiar faces in the years to come!