stylager,f. - late roman weapon graves in eastern norway

KOLLEGER FRA NÆR OG FJERN : 243

’… AN ORNAMENT IN PEACE AND A DEFENCE IN WAR’LATE ROMAN WEAPON GRAVES AND

MILITARY ORGANISATION IN EASTERN NORWAY

Frans-Arne Stylegar

The types of weapons used by Germanic armies in the Late Roman period are well-known and well studied. Thanks to the excavations and subsequent publications of Illerup, Ejsbøl and other war-booty offerings in Denmark, we now also have a rather clear picture of the functional aspects and internal organisation of Germanic armies. However, still lacking are further regional studies dealing with questions that the recent analyses of the bog-deposits have enabled us to ask, but which this material cannot by itself provide the answers to. An important question seems to me to be how the contemporary armies were recruited. While I don’t believe that there is necessarily only one answer to this question, the present study of Late Roman weapon graves from South-East Norway suggests that in this area at least there is an inte-resting topographical aspect to the distribution of weapon combinations and types indicative of the different levels of military hierarchy, as these can be reconstructed from the war-booty offerings.

ILLERUP PLACE ’A’It has been stated that ’material of great value for the understanding of Roman history in Norway, is now amassed in museum collections in Denmark as a consequence of the excavations in Vimose and Illerup’ (von Carnap-Bornheim & Ilkjær 1999:138-9). The background for this statement is Jørgen Ilkjær’s work with the Illerup material, and his conclusion that the material from the Illerup ’A’ offering, dating to C1b, originated from the Western part of the Scandinavian peninsula (von Carnap-Bornheim 1992; Ilkjær 1990, 1993, 1997, 2003; Ilkjær & von Carnap-Bornheim 1999).

Ilkjær and von Carnap-Bornheim were able to differentiate between three qualitatively different combinations of weaponry and thus three different

244 : OAS NR. 10. FACETS OF ARCHEOLOGY. ESSAYS IN HONOUR OF LOTTE HEDEAGER ON HER 60TH BIRTHDAY

hierarchical levels in the besieged army, whose weapons and personal equipment (12.000 artefacts) had subsequently been deposited in the then lake at Illerup (fi gure 1). The fi rst and most prominent level (level 1), the army commanders, had swords, shields, belts, and riding gear decorated with mounts made of gilded silver. The second level (level 2) consisted of offi cers with swords, shields, belts, and riding gear decorated with bronze mounts, while the third level (level 3), the regulars or infantry, had a combi-nation of weapons different from the offi cers, most often a spear, a javelin, and a shield with mounts primarily made of iron. In Illerup ’A’, of which only c. 40 percent has been excavated, 5-6 sets of weapons associated with the uppermost level were found, against 35-40 associated with the middle level, and c. 350 with the lower (Ilkjær 2003:50). Furthermore, about a do-zen sets of equine equipment were rescued (Ilkjær 2000:102), indicating an identical number of equestrians. From the somewhat younger Ejsbøl fi nd (c. 300 AD) c. 200 sets of the combination lance/javelin/shield were res-cued, some of which also included bow and arrow. 60 weapon sets also had swords and (weapon) knives. 12-15 sets stood out by having more exclusi-vely worked sword grips, strap buckles and mounts, and 9 sets included equine equipment as well (Jensen 2003:571).

Ilkjær and von Carnap-Bornheim also suggested that there is a degree of correspondence between the internal organisation of the Illerup army and information supplied by Tacitus in the 1st century, that the Germanic ar-mies consisted of princeps (princes), comites (offi cers or retinue), and pedites (foot-soldiers). This tripartite organisation is also mentioned by Ammianus Marcellinus in the 4th century, thus suggesting that we are dealing with

Figure 1: 3rd century military leaders, from the Illerup exhibiton at Moesgaard Museum, Århus. Photo: Frans-Arne Stylegar.


a long-standing structural feature of Germanic armies. The very homoge-neity among parts of the Illerup ’A’ fi nd, especially the lances, javelins and shields – that is, in the equipment belonging to the bulk of the beaten army – could indicate that these weapons were handed out by the army leaders from armouries controlled by them (see, for instance, von Carnap-Bornheim 1993; Ilkjær & von Carnap-Bornheim 1999:144).

WARRIORS AND SOLDIERSThe numerical relationship between the three levels of hierarchy in the Illerup fi nd is interesting. There is a 1:8 proportion not only between levels 1 and 2, but also between levels 2 and 3. The latter relationship compares with the one between offi cers and foot-soldiers in the Roman army, where the smallest unit was a contubernium, a group of eight men led by a decurion and sharing a tent.

In a more recent contribution, Xenia Pauli Jensen et al. (2003) have discus-sed the Illerup fi nd and the Illerup army from a more anthropologically in-formed perspective. Drawing upon a distinction argued by the anthropo-logist Andrew Sanders, these authors seek to distinguish between warriors, whose vocation is war, soldiers, whose profession is war, and conscripts, who are ordered into war. Typical for warriors are personally acquired weapons and localised arms production. Soldiers and conscripts, on the other hand, have standardised weapon types supplied by their leader or employer, and weapon production is centralised (Pauli Jensen et al. 2003:313). While con-scripts in this sense do not seem to appear in the archaeological source ma-terial until the Late Iron Age, Pauli Jensen et al. argues that the distinction between warriors and soldiers is indeed relevant for interpreting the 3rd century Illerup hierarchy. Thus, the army leaders, the princeps and the comi-tes, seem to have had warrior status, while it is likely that the pedites were soldiers, as their weaponry appears very standardised (2003:313-14).

Both the Illerup and the Ejsbøl material seem to point to other divisions within the Germanic armies, perhaps of a different order from that between the three different hierarchical levels, and perhaps related to tactical aspects of the armies. For instance, the numbers of horsemen in the Illerup army is considerably higher than the number of princeps, and, on the other hand, considerably lower than the number of comites, strongly suggesting that only a proportion of the offi cers were equestrians. This corresponds well with the written sources:

’The Germanic hosts which swept into southern Europe in the late second century BC were mainly foot-soldiers. A century la-ter the warriors who formed the armies of Maraboduus and Ar-minius also fought largely on foot. The migrating peoples who


passed into the Roman provinces depended overwhelmingly upon their infantry troops, relying for the most part on mas-sed ranks of men. The use of mounted troops among most Ger-manic peoples was limited. … Julius Caesar employed German horsemen in his armies in Gaul … The cavalrymen who appear in the historical and archaeological record were mainly chiefs and their immediate retinues’ (Todd 1992:36-37).

Likewise, the pedites in both fi nds seem to consist of men with at least two different types of weapon combinations, with a smaller group displaying swords in addition to the numerically dominant lance/javelin/shield com-binations. Another, lesser group is suggested by the presence of arrows in both the Illerup and the Ejsbøl fi nds.

There is no doubt that these were specialised, highly organised armies. The presence of cavalry and of archery testifi es to the degree of discipline and structure needed. Furthermore, the standardised weapons, the presence of Roman weapons and the sheer speed by which new Roman weapon types are adopted in Germanic society throughout the Roman period, points to there being a rather close relationship between Roman and Germanic mili-tary developments in this period. As pointed out by Pauli Jensen et al., there are profound differences between the tribal armies that can be reconstructed from the early war-booty offerings like Hjortspring (4th century BC) and the later ones, like Illerup, Vimose, and Illerup. However, there are also obvious differences between the contemporary Roman legion and the Illerup army. One striking feature of the Germanic armies was noted by Tacitus as early as the late 1st century, namely that ’even iron is not plentiful with them, as we infer from the character of their weapons. But few use swords or long lances. They carry a spear (framea is their name for it), with a narrow and short head, but so sharp and easy to wield that the same weapon serves, accor-ding to circumstances, for close or distant confl ict. As for the horse-soldier, he is satisfi ed with a shield and spear; the foot-soldiers also scatter showers of missiles, each man having several and hurling them to an immense dis-tance…’ (Germania, ch. 6). Still in the 3rd century Illerup army, lance/javelin and shield seem to have been the normal combination of weapons among the foot-soldiers, unlike in the Roman army (as for instance testifi ed by Vegetius at the end of the 4th century, but with reference to ’olden days’).

Pauli Jensen et al. provides a likely answer to the problem, namely that the army organisation evidenced in Illerup ’A’ is less reminiscent of the Roman legion itself than of the supporting, auxiliary units (cf Albrethsen 1997:216): ’The explanation might be as simple as this: the Germans who fought on the Roman side in the Marcomannic wars and later on served as mercenaries in the period after Marcus Aurelius, have brought home with


them their knowledge of the Roman military structure. The speed by which the Germanic armies adjust to Roman conditions – and vice versa – points to an interconnectedness, whereby each side continually adjust weapons and fi ghting techniques to the opponent’s newest innovations’ (2003:325).

The military capacity of Scandinavian society in this period is well do-cumented also by other types of archaeological fi nds and monuments, be it boathouses (Grimm 2006; Myhre 1997), water barriers (Nørgård Jørgensen 2001), or hill forts (Engström 1991). Fortifi ed settlements like the Early Roman period village of Priorsløkke in Eastern Jutland show defences in the form of palisades well-suited to resist attacks by mounted warriors (Kaul 1997).

ROMAN WEAPON GRAVESLet us consider the weapon graves. There have been several attempts to cor-relate the weapon combinations and military hierarchy from Illerup place ’A’ with other types of archaeological source material, mainly Scandinavian weapon graves, not least by Ilkjær himself (von Carnap-Bornheim 1992; Gansum 2000; Ilkjær 1990, 1993, 1997, 2001a, 2001b, 2002, 2003; Ilkjær & von Carnap-Bornheim 1999; Solberg 2003:103-123; for a more critical view of the feasibility of discussing military organisation based on burials, see Härke 1997). Naturally, much of the focus has been on the burials belonging to Ilkjær’s levels 1 and 2.

In Scandinavia, the fi rst weapon graves appear mainly in the late pre-Roman Iron Age, but not exclusively in parts of Denmark (Hedeager 1992:115). Although there are clear regional differences in leaving weapons with the dead (Hedeager & Kristiansen 1981:122f; Watt 2003), the practice as such from that point onward exists in many parts of Scandinavia right through to Christian times. In Denmark, the number of weapon graves in-creases steadily in the Early Roman period (ER), when approximately 7 % of all contemporary graves contain weapons. In the Late Roman period (LR), this percentage decreases to 2 % (Hedeager 1992:115). The same pattern oc-curs in SE Norway as well, but somewhat delayed. Thus, while the weapon grave ritual is established in the ER, it does not peak until the LR (actually in periods C1a and C1b), only to decrease in the Migration period. In the latter period, most weapon graves are found in the Western districts of SE Norway, such as Vestfold and Telemark, but even there the number of gra-ves is decreasing, even if the remaining ones are more elaborately furnished than in the preceding period.

As for regional differences, within SE Norway there is a core area with an exceptional number of graves in the inland areas around Lake Mjøsa and Lake Randsfjord, centred on the districts of Hadeland, Toten, and Valdres. The number of Roman weapon graves in these upland parts of SE Norway


is matched only by Gotland in the Nordic countries. We will return to these districts below.

What do the weapon graves represent, status wise? The use of weapons in burial rituals is defi nitely a refl ection of the militarization of societies in the tribal zone beyond the limes. But are we correct in interpreting the status associated with weapons and different combinations of weapons as mili-tary status? I think we are, and I believe the results from the present study strengthen this interpretation (below). This is also suggested by Hedeager’s study of the Roman burials in Denmark, and more specifi cally by her discus-sion of the signifi cance of spurs in the graves. She points to anthropological studies (from Northern German cemeteries) which show that weapons are usually found with younger men, while sets with spurs but without wea-pons belong to older men (1992:160):

’In other words, weapons are particularly linked to the function of the active warrior. Second, warriors with spurs similarly lose the weapon set with age, but keep the spurs and the wealth; that is, they maintain a status which overrides the warrior func-tion. Third, both weapons and spurs can be found in the graves of very young men, which leads us to conclude that the status/function marked by the right to carry both weapons and spurs is likely to be a matter of birth, rather than earned.’

These patterns are consistent with Tacitus’ description of Germanic practices (Germania, ch. 13):

’They transact no public or private business without being ar-med. It is not, however, usual for anyone to wear arms till the state has recognised his power to use them. Then in the pre-sence of the council one of the chiefs, or the young man’s father, or some kinsman, equips him with a shield and a spear. These arms are what the ’toga’ is with us, the fi rst honour with which youth is invested. Up to this time he is regarded as a member of a household, afterwards as a member of the commonwealth. Very noble birth or great services rendered by the father secure for lads the rank of a chief; such lads attach themselves to men of mature strength and of long approved valour. It is no shame to be seen among a chief’s followers. Even in his escort there are gradations of rank, dependent on the choice of the man to whom they are attached. These followers vie keenly with each others as to who shall rank fi rst with his chiefs, the chiefs as to who shall have the most numerous and the bravest followers.


It is an honour as well as a source of strength to be thus always surrounded by a large body of picked youths; it is an ornament in peace and a defence in war.’

There is, however, one aspect of the mortuary customs in the Roman pe-riod that argues against assuming a too direct and causal relationship bet-ween arming in life and weapon combinations in death. It seems that only one individual per family in each generation got a furnished burial, i.e. the fi rst spouse that died, whether a woman or a man (Jørgensen 1988; Stylegar 2006). Most of the weapon graves ought to be sought in graves of this type. They are a way of showing status common to all families, but only once every generation. And not all families had access to the same resources, or the same weapons. Thus, while a male weaponless grave does not rule out the warrior status of the deceased, a grave with weapons is indeed a refl ec-tion military status of the deceased. But it seems to me that the implications of this distinction are quantitative rather than qualitative, i.e. it does not rule out the possibility of reconstructing the relative size of different levels of the Roman period military hierarchy, only their defi nite numbers.

For East Jutland it has been suggested that the distribution of Roman gra-ves with spurs indicate a political division of the landscape into a whole num-ber of similar ’area modules’, each of a size comparable to the later ’herreder’ (Hedeager & Kristiansen 1981:125f.). Lund Hansen, too, argues for a military interpretation of the weapon graves (Lund Hansen 1995). Starting from the richly furnished graves at the Himlingøje cemetery in Stevns in Zeeland, she points out that not only are weapons basically absent from Himlingøje; they are absent from a much larger area from Roskilde to Prestø. The weapon graves in Zeeland occur in a belt outside this area, and Lund Hansen inter-prets the weapon graves as belonging to a body of armed followers placed securely at some distance from the political centre at Himlingøje. But admit-tedly, her material is rather sparse. Hedeager grouped the weapon graves into three different categories based on the number of weapon types in each grave (three, two, and one weapon, respectively), and she argued that this tripartite division refl ected a military hierarchy (Hedeager 1990). She found that graves with a ’full’ set of weapons comprised only 10-15 percent of the weapon graves (1992:121). Her study predates the publications and analyses of the Illerup material, and the suggested military hierarchy, based solely on the grave fi nds as is, represents a much coarser structure than the one argued by Ilkjær. Thus, to a certain degree all of Hedeager’s three groups can be found within each and every one of Ilkjær’s.

As for Norway, Roman weapon graves have been the subject of a number of recent studies (Joki 2006; Eketuft Rygh 2007; Storli 2006). Thus, Storli has suggested that a relative distribution of weapon groups similar to the one


argued by Hedeager can be discerned in Northern Norway. She too argues that individuals buried with a complete set of weapons represent military elite (Storli 2006:88-89). As for the relative distribution of different weapon types, Solberg (2003:81-82) gives a brief summary of the Norwegian material as a whole. How does this apply in SE Norway?

WEAPON GRAVES IN SE NORWAYThe empirical basis for the present study is Late Roman period weapon fi nds from the modern-day counties of Østfold, Akershus, Oslo, Hedmark, Buskerud, Oppland, Vestfold, and Telemark. Altogether, approx. 150 grave fi nds and stray fi nds with weapons that can be dated to C1-C3 are known from this rather extensive area. Most of the fi nds in question are listed in Ilkjær (1990) and/or Bemmann & Hahne (1994), while the rest are taken from the ca-talogue of the University Museum of Cultural History’s collection in Oslo.

Taken as a whole, graves with one weapon type comprise 41 % of the total number of graves. This numerical dominance of single-weapon gra-ves fi ts well with Hedeager’s results based on the material from Denmark. However, graves with two weapon types comprise 27 %, and graves with three comprise 32 %. Thus, it seems that graves with a ’full’ set of weapons are over- represented in SE Norway vis-à-vis Denmark. The ratio of graves with three weapon types from the Ejsbøl fi nd is slightly over 20 %, thus somewhat higher than the grave material in Denmark, but still less than the number for SE Norway.

Looking at the material from the perspective suggested by Ilkjær, we fi nd that 12 % of the weapon graves can be attributed to his level 2, against 88 % in level 3. For Illerup ’A’, the comparable ratios would be 9 % and 89 %, re-spectively. Only one burial in the study area belongs to level 1 – the C3 grave from Sætrang in Ringerike, Buskerud, with a bandoleer with silver fi ttings (Ilkjær cat. no. 735, cf. Fett 1937; Slomann 1959). This single burial defi es any statistics (it equals 0,7 %; just one more fi nd would bring the percentage up to 1,3, and thus very close to Illerup’s 1,5 %). Thus, there is a great degree of correspondence between the SE Norwegian weapon graves and the Illerup fi nd. When it comes to riding gear, 10 of the burials in SE Norway have spurs, equal to 7 %. The number for Illerup is 3 %, as it is for Ejsbøl.

If we look at the weapon combinations within each of the two groups (levels 2 and 3), we notice some striking differences between the two of them. In level 2, distinguished by shields, belts, and riding gear decorated with bronze fi ttings, 62 % of the fi nds (i.e. 13 fi nds) have a sword, lance, javelin, and shield (and, in some instances, spur(s)). This seems to be the prescribed weapon combination for level 2, as the remaining 38 % of the fi nds consist of accidental ’combinati-ons’ each found in one instance. All level 2 graves have a sword (except one fi nd that consists of a shield boss only). Spur(s) occur in 29 % of the level 2 burials.


As for level 3, three different combinations stand out. By far the most com-mon one, represented by 39 % of the fi nds (i.e. 47 fi nds) in this group, consists of a singular lance or javelin (and sometimes including a shield). Two other combinations – one with a sword, lance, and javelin (and often including a shield) and one with a lance and javelin (and sometimes including a shield) are represented by 22 % (27 fi nds) and 19 % (23 fi nds) respectively. The remai-ning ’combinations’ seem to be accidental and due to either bad preservation or the context of recovery, as none of them occur in more than three instances. Only four burials belonging to Ilkjær’s level 3 contain one or two spurs. Three of these have a ’full’ set of weapons, while one contains only a lance.

To put it simply: Level 2 consists of two combinations: a full weapon set either 1) with or 2) without spur(s). Level 3 has three combinations: 1) a singular lance or javelin (and sometimes including a shield), 2) sword, lance, and javelin (and sometimes including a shield), and 3) lance and javelin (and sometimes including a shield).

In the Illerup ’A’ fi nd, most level 2 sets consisted of ’full’ weapon sets, while the most common combination in level 3 was a spear and javelin (and shield). As for level 2, our fi ndings again correspond to the Illerup material. In level 3, the share of burials containing a sword is comparable to the Illerup situation (22 % in SE Norway; 28% in Illerup). Only one aspect of the SE Norwegian ma-terial associated with level 3 seems to diverge from the Illerup pattern, namely the dominance of fi nds with only one weapon type, either a lance or a javelin.

Some notes on source criticism are in order here. First, only a small fragment of the material stems from archaeological investigations. Most fi nds result from either accidental discovery by people ploughing, digging, building roads etc, or come from barrows excavated by local farmers or other non-professionals. This is a general problem with Roman graves in Norway (cf. Ilkjær 2001a:2-4). Strictly speaking, only c. 10 % of the 150 fi nds in our material result from scientifi c investigations. About half of these had a ’full’ weapon set, while the other half consisted of burials with either a lance and javelin or a singular lance or javelin. Thus, the three main com-binations (and only these) are represented in the material resulting from professional excavations.

Still, the dominance of single weapons might call for caution. It is not that it is unheard of in the Roman period material; in B1 Jutland and Funen, for example, a combination of a lance and a shield is very widespread indeed (Watt 2003:184-186). But if we look at Late Roman graves from SE Norway in Bemmann/Hahne’s catalogue, single weapons account for almost 70 % of the fi nds from unknown contexts or not explicitly said to come from bar-rows or other grave contexts. Most of the remaining 30 % is taken up by a lance and a javelin found together. It does not seem unlikely that a portion of the single weapons actually represents specimens lost during hunting etc.


In some instances this interpretation is self-evident, and the fi nds in ques-tion are not included in this study. However, a look at Bemman/Hahne’s catalogue for Western Norway (i.e. the counties Rogaland, Hordaland, Sogn og Fjordane, and Møre og Romsdal) indicates that single weapons do actu-ally form a separate weapon grave group.

There are relatively fewer Late Roman fi nds in this region than in SE Norway, but a seemingly clear pattern emerges when one looks at the fi nds from more or less certain burial contexts: the combination lance and javelin is much more common in the Western districts, with twice as many fi nds as those represented by solitary lances or javelins. The situation is different with the stray fi nds, and here there is a 50:50 relationship between the two groups. Thus, is seems likely that a proportion of the single weapons either represents partially recovered burials, most likely of a lance and a javelin, or deposition contexts other than burials. But both these relative numbers are different from the SE Norwegian ones, and this further suggests to us that the combination lance and javelin is in fact more widespread in the Western districts than in the Oslofjord area, and that a substantial number of single weapons in SE Norway actually represent graves with one weapon only (un-less one wants to suggest that people in the latter region lost their weapons more often than their western counterparts).

Some of the single weapon fi nds in SE Norway probably represent only partially recovered graves, most likely graves with a lance and javelin (and shield) combined. But it is not possible to state with any certainty the real re-lative size of the single weapon group versus the group consisting of graves with a lance and a javelin (Solberg states that lance and javelin is the most common combination in Norway, but this may be based primarily on the material from Western Norway, see Solberg 2003:81). Suffi ce it to say that the level 3 graves in SE Norway consist of three major combinations. The ’full’ weapon set accounts for 22 % of the fi nds, while the two other main groups are made up of single lances or javelins, and lances and javelins found to-gether. The relative weight of the latter two is uncertain, although together they account for approximately 60 % of the total number of graves in level 3.

Let us have a closer look at one sub-region in SE Norway, and see how the different hierarchical levels and different weapon combinations appear on the ground, so to speak. Let us focus on the Upland districts.

THE ’OPPLANDENE’ REGIONMost of the weapon graves are in fact from this area, i.e. from the districts centred at the great lakes of Eastern Norway: Randsfjorden, Tyrifjorden, and Mjøsa. Indeed, in Ilkjær’s catalogue (1990) of 202 Late Roman fi nds from the whole of Norway, 62 are from the present region of Oppland – more than twice as many as the second region. This remarkable distribution pattern


was commented upon by Shetelig as early asat the Nordic archaeologists’ meeting in Copenhagen in 1919 (Shetelig 1920). In 1925, he wrote:

’Cremation burials with a rich equipment of weapons and of-ten with imported bronze vessels appear sporadically, one and one, from the beginning of the Roman Iron Age on both sides of the Oslofjord, and in the lake districts in the Uplands, at Ty-rifjorden and Randsfjorden. … It is the older fi nds, from the 1st-3rd centuries, that have this rather widespread and even distribution across Eastern Norway. But during the 3rd, and even stronger in the 4th century, the burials of this type cluster very clearly in one single, limited area, in Hadeland with Toten and Valdres, the old historical Hadeland, while they gradually disappear elsewhere’ (1925:136).

Shetelig’s great idea was that the weapon graves in ’Opplandene’ were due to an infl ux of military specialists returning home from service in Roman or Germanic armies in Continental Europe, especially after the end of the Second Marcomannian War in AD 180. He especially linked this return to the name Hadeland, i.e. ’land of the warriors’ (Shetelig 1920; for the possi-ble meaning of the landscape name, see Sandnes & Stemshaug 1997). After Shetelig, the Roman burials in the area have been dealt with by others, pri-marily by Grieg (1926) and Herteig (1955), both of whom suggested different explanations than Shetelig for the predominance of weapon graves, as they argued that most weapon graves in the area stem from what today are wealt-hy farms, and thus that the weapon burial custom refl ected the upper strata of a farming society. At least for Hadeland, a more recent study confi rms that the weapon graves are indeed concentrated in areas that in medieval times were occupied by bigger than average farms (Skre 1998:228).

Eketuft Rygh has recently argued that a new political structure was coming into being in ’Opplandene’ in the Late Roman Period, one that in the Early Merovingian Period is refl ected in the so-called Åker complex (2007:98f). This is a likely background for the important part played by wea-pon graves in the former period. Thus, there is probably some truth in both traditional interpretations, i.e. both the military and the social one, to the extent that social hierarchy is refl ected in military hierarchy, or vice versa.

I now refer the reader to the map, fi gure 2. On it are marked all wea-pon fi nds from the periods B2 to D1 in the main settlement areas between Randsfjorden and Mjøsa, approximately 100 fi nds altogether. The solid black circles signify inventories that include a sword, and the open circles invento-ries with lance and/or javelin as the only weapon(s). The farm names speci-fi ed on the map are fi nd spots for burials belonging to Ilkjær’s level 2.


The weapon graves have a relatively even distribution across the region, but still with clear clusters in Gran (Hadeland) and Østre Toten. Together, these two districts account for almost half of the weapon graves in the region. But there are other interesting facts about the distribution of weapon graves in this area.

First of all, there is a tendency for graves with swords to cluster in the vicinity of level 2 graves. This is particularly clear in Gran and in Østre Toten. A similar

Figure 2: Topographical distribution of weapon graves (B2-D1) in the central part of ’Opplandene’. Filled circles: graves containing swords; open circles: other wea-pon graves. Map: Frans-Arne Stylegar.


picture seems to emerge in Ringsaker, the peninsula to the north of Lake Mjøsa, but no level 2 grave is discovered there as yet. These same clusters seem to exist through the whole period in question. Within the clusters are some farms with a number of graves with sword, often spanning several generations. In some instances, more than one level 2 grave is discovered from the same farm. This is the case with Stabu in Toten and Egge in Hadeland. Thus, there must have been at least some stability and continuity in the recruitment of offi cers, as they seem to have been recruited from the same farms through generations.

Secondly, graves with a lance and/or javelin (and sometimes shield) as the only weapon(s) also occur in more peripheral areas, and thus have a much more widespread distribution than the sword graves. This is evident in Jevnaker, Gjøvik, Furnes, and northern parts of Ringsaker, as well as in Land. Over large tracts of land, lance/javelin seems to be the only weapons accompanying the dead.

How are we to interpret this rather striking pattern? Let us look at the clusters again. While it is true that they encompass some of the best farming land in the region, and thus represent people of relatively high social stan-ding, there are other areas which are similarly well suited for agriculture but which don’t have any clusters. So while there is obviously some correlation between clusters of weapon graves and the leading social strata, the rela-tionship is not straight forward – at least not if ’leading strata’ means free odal farmers, as in Grieg’s and Herteig’s argument against Shetelig’s military hypothesis. There is, however, one kind of military organisation which se-ems to fi t the pattern: aristocratic retinues could be the raison d’etre for the clustering of weapon graves in certain areas.

There is extensive literature concerning the retinue or comitatus described by Tacitus and said to be widespread among the Germans (Germania, ch. 13-15; see for instance von Carnap-Bornheim 1992). The comites would consist of both cavalry and infantry (Kristensen 1983). They had taken a special oath which obliged them to assist their leader (princeps) in war as well as peace. In return they received maintenance, gifts and a part of the spoils in case of raids or other war-like activities. The princeps’ reputation depended on the num-ber of brave warriors in his retinue, which again depended on his generosity and luck in war. In peace time the retinue was a heavy burden, economically speaking (Hedeager & Tvarnø 2001:105). Skre argues that ’the aristocracy in the Nordic countries had warriors attached to their persons and households from the Roman Period and well into the Middle Ages’ (Skre 1998:261).

A few words need to be said regarding the level 1 graves, that is, graves associated with the princeps. As mentioned before, there is only one level 1 grave in SE Norway. This grave, from Sætrang in Ringerike, belongs to a weapon grave milieu similar to the clusters in our study area. A comparable situation exists for one of the two other level 1 graves in Norway, namely


the grave from Erga in Klepp, Rogaland. Of the fi ve Swedish fi nds, it seems to be the case with at least two. Therefore, there is a case for arguing that level 1 burials too belong to the clusters, even if we don’t have any level 1 burials (yet) in Hadeland, Toten, or Hedmark. I would argue that we ought to expect level 1 graves within each of the clusters that have yielded level 2 and level 3 graves in these areas, i.e. in Gran in Hadeland, in Østre Toten in Toten, in Vang/Løten in Hedemarken, and perhaps also in Ringsaker, since there is a cluster of weapon graves containing swords in this district, even if no level 2 grave is known there. Looking at Eastern Norway as a whole, there are two more clusters of this kind: Valdres and Southern Østfold, but only the latter has yielded level 2 graves (fi gure 3).

Thus, it doesn’t seem far-fetched to suggest that what we have before us in the distribution of weapon graves in the ’Opplandene’, is a topographical expression of the difference between the sword-possessing aristocracy and their fol-lowings on the one hand, and ’ordinary’ warriors on the other. The members of the comitatus were based on the princeps’ hall. The reason for the clustering of weapon graves in smaller districts, i.e. not solely on the farm containing the princeps’ hall, could be that the comites were granted farms that were part of the princeps’ estate for their maintenance. The princeps and his retinue, the

Figure 3: Clusters (circles) with graves contai-ning swords in SE Norway. Map: Frans-Arne Stylegar.


sword users focused on the former’s hall, that is, were warriors in Sander’s sense, their vocation was war. We still have to account for the division bet-ween level 2 graves and other graves containing swords, and it is likely that level 2 equipment was associated with a special function within the retinue, for instance with standard bearers (cfr for instance Rygge 1970 on swords with fi gure inlays), or with leadership positions within the retinue.

With this in mind, then, how were big armies such as the one defeated at Illerup recruited? They were probably made up of several chieftains’ reti-nues, with each level 1 warrior commanding a retinue including both level 2 and level 3 men. It is interesting to compare with the situation in the Viking Age, where for instance Knut the Great’s thingmannalid was constructed in a similar way (Lindkvist 1990; cf. Andræ 1960). Heerhufen is the term used by Kuhn to denote armies put together for a major military campaign or other particular purpose (Kuhn 1956). If the Late Roman Period Heerhufen were made up of several chieftains’ retinues put together for particular purposes in this way, the widely diverging size estimates of contemporary and near contemporary armies extracted from written sources, become more under-standable (see for instance Hines 1989; Reuter 1997; Wallace-Hadrill 1975). It follows from the arguments presented in the preceding paragraphs, that 10 to 12 clusters of the same kind as the 3 to 5 found in the ’Opplandene’ would be enough to gather an army 1000 men strong.

But how do we account for the relative dominance of swords within the clusters. The similarities between the relative distribution of weapon types in Norwegian graves and in the Illerup fi nd seem at odds with the weapon combinations dominant within the clusters in ’Opplandene’. This might in-dicate that Late Roman Period Scandinavian armies consisted not only of several chiefs and their personal retinues, but that a considerable number of pedites, mainly armed with lance and/or javelin, and shield were added. Many of these seem to have been recruited from a much wider geographical area than the comites. The foot-soldiers were probably recruited from the large and diverse group of free men, including independent farmers, loyal to the chief. The pedites were probably soldiers in Sander’s sense.

CONCLUSIONThe excavation of the Illerup ’A’ war-booty offering and the subsequent publication of the fi nds, have yielded new insights into Late Roman military organisation. But only few studies have so far tried to utilise these insights to (re-)study other types of source material that can cast new light upon how Late Roman period armies were organised and recruited.

The present paper has dealt with weapon graves from SE Norway. Altogether, some 150 grave fi nds and stray fi nds with weapons that can be dated to C1-C3 are known from this rather extensive area. Taken as a whole,


graves with one weapon type comprise 41 % of the total number of graves. Graves with two weapon types comprise 27 %, and graves with three com-prise 32 %. Thus, it seems that graves with a ’full’ set of weapons is over- rep-resented in SE Norway vis-à-vis Denmark. 12 % of the weapon graves can be attributed to Ilkjær’s level 2, against 88 % in level 3. For Illerup the comparable ratios would be 9 % and 89 %, respectively. Thus, there is a great degree of cor-respondence between the SE Norwegian weapon graves and the Illerup fi nd. In SE Norway, graves associated with level 2 consist of two combinations: a full weapon set either 1) with or 2) without spur(s). Level 3 has three combinations: 1) a singular lance or javelin (and sometimes including a shield), 2) sword, lance, and javelin (and sometimes including a shield), and 3) lance and javelin (and sometimes including a shield). Only one aspect of the SE Norwegian ma-terial associated with level 3 seems to diverge from the Illerup pattern, namely the dominance of fi nds with only one weapon type, either a lance or a javelin.

Most of the weapon graves in the present study are from the ’Opplandene’ area, i.e. from the districts centred at the great lakes of Eastern Norway, Randsfjorden, Tyrifjorden, and Mjøsa. The dominance of weapon graves in this region has been dicussed within Norwegian archaeology since the 1920s, with researchers at times arguing for a military interpretion, and at times for a social or economic one. In the ’Opplandene’, there is a tendency for graves with swords, either belonging to level 2 or level 3, to form large, marked clusters. There is one such cluster in each of the old ’folkland’ Ringerike, Hadeland, and Toten. Graves with lance and/or javelin (and sometimes shield) as the only weapon(s) also occur in more peripheral areas, and thus have a much more widespread distribution than the sword graves. In the Illerup fi nd, swords are associated with the upper and middle level of the military hierarchy, as well as with a minority within the lower level. In Late Roman burials in ’Opplandene’ the numerical distribution of weapon types is similar to the one from Illerup. But topographically speaking there seem to be clear differences between wea-pon graves with or without swords, as graves with swords are found fi rst and foremost in clusters which also contain level 2 graves, i.e. graves associated with the middle level of the Illerup hierarchy. There is only one kind of mili-tary organisation which seem to fi t this pattern: aristocratic retinues.

The distribution of weapon graves in the ’Opplandene’ is a topographi-cal expression of the difference between the sword-possessing aristocracy and their followers on the one hand, and ’ordinary’ warriors on the other. The members of the retinue were based on the chieftain’s hall. The reason for the clustering of weapon graves in smaller districts, i.e. not solely on the farm containing the chieftain’s hall, could be that the comites were granted farms that were part of the chieftain’s estate for their maintenance. The spear and/or javelin carrying foot-soldiers were probably recruited from the large and di-verse group of free men, including independent farmers, loyal to the chief. Big


Late Roman armies like the one defeated at Illerup were probably made up of several chieftains’ retinues, with each level 1 warrior commanding a retinue including both level 2 and level 3 men. 10 to 12 clusters of the same kind as the 3 to 5 found in the ’Opplandene’ would be enough to gather an army of a thousand men. It cannot be a coincidence that there is one cluster of wea-pon graves with swords in each of the old landscapes of Ringerike, Hadeland, Hedemarken and Toten, i.e. all of the central districts in the ’Opplandene’. One can hardly avoid the conclusion that these ’folklands’ were in existence already by the 3rd century AD, at least as distinct social and military hierarchies.

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