Free Vikings by Neil Oliver Page A

on account of the artwork, known as petroglyphs, it is now thought to be a memorial for someone who was, at the very least, a great traveller. ‘Just like Ulysses, the Nordic chief that voyaged all the way to the Mediterranean, who saw and understood the new and strange, was already a legend by the time he returned home,’ writes archaeologist Kristian Kristiansen. ‘This status was enhanced if he had with him never before seen curiosities such as chariots, knowledge of new casting techniques, of wagon- and ship-building, perhaps even the foreign crafts people themselves, as well as the stories about far-off settlements and gods . . . One such man was the chief of Kivik.’
    Some experts have speculated that that Bronze Age chief may have journeyed as far as the Mediterranean Sea, to the civilisation of Mycenae; but British archaeologist Sir Barry Cunliffe suggests a voyage into the territory centred around modern-day Hungary would have been enough to provide those Swedish artists with their inspiration. Known to archaeologists asthe Carpathian Basin, the lands there were home to Bronze Age tribes that were already in possession of all the technologies pictured at Kivik: ‘A possible scenario is that in the sixteenth century BC the lord of Kivik led his warriors on an epic journey, sailing south from home via the island of Bornholm to the mouth of the Oder, and thence by river and overland portage to the Carpathian Basin,’ writes Cunliffe. ‘On their return, scenes from the adventure and the mysteries they had witnessed were painted on cloth to adorn the lord’s residence, thereby endowing him with great power in the eyes of all. On his death the scenes were carved on the stones of his burial chamber and a huge mound of boulders – the Bredaror – was piled up over it, dominating the view across the sea to the south and visible to all sailors approaching the coast: a fitting memorial to a great voyager.’
    When that lord of Kivik set out on his travels, it was bronze that was king – in Scandinavia and much of the rest of Europe besides. It is hard for us to imagine how fundamental to society the alloy of tin and copper actually was 3,500 years ago.
    Before the advent of those first metal objects, power had depended upon knowledge. Farmers lived by the seasons, the cycle of the year, and of life itself. It dawned on some of them that the journeys of the sun and the moon were predictable, that they followed regular cycles of their own – and with that realisation came a preoccupation with the movement of the lights in the sky. In the British Isles, the great stone monuments of the Neolithic were built with the sky in mind. Like the stone circles, passage tombs including Maes Howe on Orkney and Newgrange in Ireland were designed to mark significant moments in the passage of the sun through the heavens. Those early astronomers became a theocracy of sorts, a priestly class to whom others looked for wisdom. In those centuries towards the end of the Stone Age, then, the basis for power over people was what you knew.
    Bronze changed all that. Since both copper and tin were hard to come by, obtained from a handful of locations scattered across the globe, most people had no direct access to them. In order to get their hands on those bright, shiny things – or the raw materials from which they might be made – most folk hadto make and maintain contacts with communities far away. The day came when it was accepted a man was nothing and no one without an axe or sword made of bronze. From that moment on, power was based on access to and control of metal and once that notion had crystallised, what mattered was not what you knew – but who.
    Ties between groups separated by distance were made, and then continually reinforced, by the giving and receiving of gifts – gifts made of bronze as well as other materials no doubt. As well as exchanging things , those connections might also be strengthened by providing brides and