Computational modelling of the coastal Mesolithic in south-eastern Norway

Abstract

Over the last few decades, Norwegian Stone Age archaeology has generated an enormous amount of data. To able to get a handle on this material at even the most basic level we are dependent on digital and quantitative methods. In his thesis, Isak Roalkvam has applied and developed novel computational tools for engaging with this data, with the aim of improving our understanding of the Mesolithic period which encompasses the first five thousand years of human settlement in Norway. A main focus in the thesis has been to combine geological reconstructions of past sea-level change with the location of prehistoric settlements, to assess how people have adjusted to the at times dramatic sea-level fall that has characterised south-eastern Norway throughout prehistory. By combining this with both an evaluation of the intensity of coastal settlement and the artefacts left behind at these sites, the thesis provides a window into the various ways that people have engaged with the coastal areas of south-eastern Norway through the Mesolithic.