Et jernaldergravfelt på Skillingstad i Løten

Abstract

The entire site at Skillingstad, id 140788, consisted of 109 features. However only the eastern part of the site was directly affected by road construction. 41 cairns and five charcoal pits were excavated during this project. The construction of the cairns at Skillingstad was relatively homogeneous and most of the graves were built up in the same way, although the size of the cairns varied a bit. They often had an outer chain of bigger stones and, on the inside of this, a dense filling of smaller stones measuring around 10 cm in diameter. A large stone was quite often placed in the centre of the cairn. Most of the cairns had a diameter of around 5 meters and a height of around 0.5 meters. The burial must have taken place at ground level or in the actual fill since no pits were found under the cairns. No human bones were unearthed. However, a tweezer, arrowheads, a key, knives, and undetermined fragments of metal were among the 46 artefacts found during the excavation. The lack of human bones and the scarcity of artefacts can partly be explained by the acid ground at Skillingstad. The cairns were also relatively open and the elements had easy access to artefacts and remains inside of the cairns. The graves are mostly from the Late Iron Age, from around 400 BC to AD 600. Later on no graves were constructed, although the finds of two arrowheads and a knife prove activity at the site between c. AD 600–800. A clear phase of coal production starts in AD 1050 and this lasts for around 200 years. No indicators pointing towards direct agriculture were found during the excavation. However, the area was probably cleared for pasture. Some cooking pits have been located in a field a short distance from Skillingstad, dated to Roman Iron Age/Migration Period. These two sites can probably be seen in light of each other and they tell a story about a larger context than just a gravesite connected to a single farm.