The early settlement of south Norway after the last deglaciation: a diasporic perspective

This is an electronic version of an article published in the Norwegian Archaeological Review © 2012 Copyright Taylor & Francis; Norwegian Archaeological Review is available online at http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00293650307293.Based on a theoretical approach of diaspora theory and the use of ethnographical comparative analysis, it is argued that the early settlement of South Norway probably brought about diasporic conditions. Archaeological and natural science records are applied to discuss the migrations of mobile hunter-gatherers with a shamanistic reindeer culture from the Continent, after deglaciation of the Weichselian ice cap. This paper discusses the diasporic people's identity, their survival as a group, their adaptation to the new environment and the development of an independent reindeer culture characterized by relics and meeting places, after the break in the regular contact between people in the area of origin and South Norway