Re: Burial customs in the countries around Denmark

--- In cybalist@..., george knysh <gknysh@...> wrote:

>
> --- tgpedersen@... wrote:
> > IV The grave forms
> >
> > Burial customs in the countries around Denmark
>
> *****GK: In the search for "contact proof" between
> Nordic countries and the areas associated with
> Snorri's "Asaland" and "Vanaland" in the immediate
> pre- and post-Augustan period, the presence of
> INHUMATION as a rite is only the beginning. As
> Alexander Stolbov has intimated, there needs to be
> rather specific additional evidence from the
> gravesites which would characterize these inhumations
> (like the presence of sacrificial equines). Coffins
> were EXTREMELY rare in the Don=Volga area, but there
> were some.And we could also leave the shape of the
> graves aside. More important is the inventory, and
> also the presence of richly furnished women's graves
> (there were "Amazons" here until Alanic times, plenty
> of them). Among the furnishings one would expect would
> be such typical items as mirrors, little portable
> altars (for religious rites of shamanesses), and
> especially arrow points, sometimes quivers and bows.
> The jewellery could offer evidence of the famous
> "incrustation" style which was later borrowed by the
> Goths and Huns.==******
>
>

OK. I'll be back on that.

In the meanwhile I perhaps should point out again that on the
assumption that there was an invasion of Yaz/Vani we would see three
types of burials 1) Yaz, 2) Vani and 3) a continuation of Pre-Roman
(Celtic!) burial customs. Therefore I might claim that that the wood
coffins were Vani, which I believe Alexander Stolbov intimated were
found among the Vani. A very interesting detail is the orientation of
the graves. On Fyn inhumation graves are east-west (and with Roman
grave goods) but on Langeland (an longish island to the east of Fyn,
especially of Lundeborg, the "port" of Late Roman Iron Age center
Gudme), almost uniformly north-south, with the head northwards, as
Alexander Stolbov describes for the Vani (and without Roman garave
goods).

I read that Rasmus Rask had the crazy idea that the Aesir had invaded
Scandinavia and that he was looking for a Celtic substrate in
Germanic. Hm! Anyway he was from Fyn himself, as was my father's
family, so what can you expect?

Torsten