In this chapter I present an analysis of resources tapped from the environment for barrow and farm construction during a rather brief period of 350 years in Denmark and in Thy during the Middle Bronze Age, roughly 1500-1100 BC. It can be demonstrated that the extraordinary constructional activities during this period, aimed at creating a landscape of ritual power, which legitimised local chiefly lineages, gradually undermined the economic foundation of the household economies, with the effects being manifested during the Late Bronze Age. Increasing conflict over land, cattle and metal was just one outcome of this crisis, which may have led to an attempt to unify larger regions, such as northern and southern Thy and parts of Mors and Salling under a single chiefdom. It should also be noted that this extraordinary development in Thy was part of a much larger and highly expansive economic/demographic system that extended from the Netherlands to southwest Norway

The aim of this short article is to question the archaeological classification of the Neolithic archaeolog- ical cultures, and to raise questions about how to understand the fragmentary material culture in terms of social agency and cultural expression. The settlement of Jonstorp in southern Sweden as a case of the south Scandinavian Pitted Ware complex presents theoretical and methodological implications for the study of economic systems in emerging complex societies. We have problems understanding the time in question. The problems might be in the archaeological material and our classifications, in our methods and our ability to understand the past. However, the narrative of the Neolithization and the introduc- tion of animal breeding and cereal production in southern Scandinavia describes a chaotic period with the construction of monuments and enclosures, technological innovations and colonizing the landscape. Does the material culture at the Pitted Ware sites reflect encounters between regional cultural identities? Can we talk about clashing cultural identities in altered regional economic systems in Scania, southern Scandinavia and in the rest of Europe? My contribution to the debate involves anthropological theories of economic systems, sociological theories of cultural representation, conflict and identity, and above all a critical perspective on archaeological classification.

This paper discusses how coastal societies in northwestern Scandinavia were able to rise in power by strategically utilizing the natural ecology and landscape in which they were situated. From two case studies (the Norwegian regions of Lista and Tananger), it is shown that it was possible to control the flow of goods up and down the coast at certain bottlenecks but that this also created an unstable society in which conflict between neighboring groups occurred often. More specifically the paper outlines an organizational strategy that may be applicable cross-culturally.

Summary This book is about socio-cultural developments in eastern Denmark (Zealand, Møn, Falster and Lolland) during the 3rd millennium BC, corresponding to the later Middle Neolithic and the Late Neolithic periods. Following the end of the Funnel Beaker culture, in the early 3rd millennium BC, eastern Denmark entered a culturally heterogeneous period displaying a mixture of various cultural elements usually ascribed to the so-called ‘Single Grave culture of the Danish islands’. This situation lasted until the end of the millennium and the beginning of the Late Neolithic around 2350 BC. Research on the 3rd millennium BC has mainly centred on one of the many archaeologically defined cultures such as the Funnel Beaker culture, the Pitted Ware culture, the Single Grave culture, the Battle-Axe culture, the Late Neolithic culture or the Bell Beaker culture. In order to understand the culturally complex period in eastern Denmark at this time, I go beyond these defined cultural groups and instead explain the decisive changes that took place here as part of one extended transformation process. The aim is thereby to advance a new and coherent understanding of cultural and social developments as evident from the late Funnel Beaker period to the emergence of incipient Bronze Age societies at the onset of the 2nd millennium BC. Traditionally, the Single Grave culture has been thought to have succeeded the Funnel Beaker culture around 2800 BC. However, material associated with the Single Grave culture did not appear in eastern Denmark before about 2600 BC. On the basis of a revision of new and existing radiocarbon dates from late Funnel Beaker contexts, I propose that the Funnel Beaker culture lasted until about 2600 BC in the eastern part of southern Scandinavia. Consequently, the late Funnel Beaker culture coexisted with the Single Grave and Pitted Ware cultures for more than 200 years. Based on an analysis of the archaeological record from the entire 3rd millennium BC, including artefacts, settlements, graves and hoards, I have shown that a high degree of continuity existed throughout the millennium. Nevertheless, some significant changes coincided with the widespread use of flint daggers in the Late Neolithic. I explain the culturally diffuse period that emerged following the end of the Funnel Beaker culture in terms of a cultural creolisation process by which Single Grave, Battle-Axe and Pitted Ware cultural elements were adopted into a setting that basically consisted of a continuation of Funnel Beaker norms and traditions. This process arose from the combination of a strong local identity rooted in eastern Denmark’s position as a Funnel Beaker and megalithic heartland, together with new influences from the Single Grave culture. As a consequence, the term ‘Single Grave culture of the Danish islands’ is abandoned. At the end of the culturally diversified Middle Neolithic, new material and cultural trends influenced southern Scandinavia, thereby creating, on a long-term basis, a new and far more homogeneous cultural expression as known from the Early Bronze Age. As eastern Denmark gradually became more and more involved in the European Bronze Age world, the old Funnel Beaker norms slowly vanished, and as contacts increased with the Únětice culture at the onset of the 2nd millennium BC, the flow of metal into Denmark reached levels that permitted the development of incipient hierarchies. The old kinship-based tribal Funnel Beaker communities focused on communal tombs and ancestor worship slowly changed and the way was laid open for the emergence of hierarchical Bronze Age societies.

This book presents the first big synthesis of sociopolitical development in northwestern Scandinavia, and outlines a theoretical model for concurrent but contrasting sociopolitical strategies that can be applied cross-culturally. It focuses on the sociopolitical development and the organisational differences between societies in northwestern Scandinavia in the Late Neolithic and Early Bronze Age (2350–1100 BCE). Grounded in a political economy approach, this book presents a theoretical model that emphasises a dialectic negotiation between societies exercising coercive or cooperative strategies through processes of categorisation. Within this theoretical model the archaeological material is studied using a two-tiered approach. First, an extensive archaeological corpus, consisting of settlement and burial patterns, lithics, metal, and rock art is investigated comparatively for patterns of diachronic, regional and societal differences. Second, patterns from the first-tier are scrutinised and three case studies are selected, each expressing different organisational patterns based on local ecological advantages and/or restrictions. These aspects are then discussed on an interregional level, suggesting that utilisation of the seaway was one of the primary movers of increased complexity along the coast. The intended readership for this book is scholars and students within the field of prehistoric archaeology, and the European Bronze Age in particular. However, the book’s comparative basis and emphasis on theoretical development within anthropological archaeology also make it accessible to a broader scholarly field.

In South Scandinavia, the Funnel Beaker culture is synonymous with the emergence of Neolithic societies (c 4000 BC), the construction of megalithic monuments and agricultural lifestyle. After c 1300 years of existence the Funnel Beaker culture ceased and a culturally blurred period began. In the south-western parts of the Jutland Peninsula, the Single Grave culture emerged (c 2850 BC) expressing a high degree of cultural uniformity. In Eastern Denmark this uniformity was absent and instead the material culture shows a mixture of late Funnel Beaker, Pitted Ware and Single Grave culture elements. The question is whether the end of the Funnel Beaker culture in Eastern Denmark marks a period of decline and fragmentation or one of continuity and incorporation of new cultural elements and subsistence strategies. In particular the revival of hunter-fisher-gatherer strategies applied by the Pitted Ware culture represents a different economic focus than that held by the Funnel Beaker culture. The renewed focus on hunter-fisher-gatherer strategies, 1000 years after the introduction of agriculture, challenges the prevalent understanding of the dynamics behind the Neolithisation.

This article discusses the archaeologically excavated settlement sites in South-Eastern Norway in relation to three hypotheses under discussion in Scandinavian archaeology. It is suggested that also processes of inheritance and landownership is important to understand the changing settlement pattern on the threshold of the Merovingian period. Changes of hereditary rights may then have been a strategy that was motivated by and stimulated to this desired development of both larger estates and split up settlements and farm land.