Christian Thomsen and Danish Artifacts

In 1807 the Danish Royal commission for the Preservation and Collection of Antiquities was established. It began to gather together a collection of antiquities (objects from the ancient past) from all over Denmark that soon became one of the largest and most representative in Europe. In 1816 the commission invited the scholar Christian Thomsen to classify and prepare this collection for exhibition. The main problem that Thomsen faced was how the diverse assortment of prehistoric material in the collection could be exhibited most effectively. He decided to proceed chronologically by subdividing the prehistoric period into successive ages of stone, bronze, and iron. The notion of successive ages of stone, bronze and iron was not merely speculation but a hypothesis for which there was already some evidence.

In attempting to sort the prehistoric material in the collection into three successive technological stages or eras, Thomsen faced a daunting task. He recognized that even for the stone and metal objects, automatic classification would not work. Bronze and stone artifacts had continued to be made in the Iron Age, just as stone tools had been used in the Bronze Age. The challenge was therefore to distinguish bronze artifacts made during the Iron Age from those made during the Bronze Age and to differentiate which stone tools had been made in each era. There also was the problem of assigning objects made of gold, silver, glass, and other substances to each period. Individual artifacts were no help in beginning this work. Yet the Danish national collection contained sets of artifacts that had been found in the same grave, collection, or other contexts and that could safely be assumed to have been buried at the same time. Thomsen called these “closed finds”and believed that, by comparing the various items from each such discovery and noting which types of artifacts occurred together and which never did, it would be possible for him to determine the sorts of artifacts that were characteristic of different periods.

Thomsen sorted and classified his artifacts into various use categories, such as knives, adzes, cooking vessels, safety pins, and necklaces. He further refined each category by distinguishing the artifacts according to the material from which they were made and their various shapes. Having in this way established a set of informal artifact types, he began to examine closed finds in order to determine which types did and did not occur together. He also examined the decorations on artifacts and found that these, too varied consistently from one closed find to another. On the basis of shape and decoration, it became possible for Thomsen to distinguish types of bronze artifacts that never occurred together with iron artifacts from ones that did occur with them. He also was able to demonstrate that large flint knives and spearpoints that had similar shapes to bronze ones had been made at the same time as bronze artifacts. Eventually, he succeeded in dividing the prehistoric artifacts in the collection into five distinct groups. Once these groups were established, he could assign single artifacts to each group on the basis of similarities in outward form and structure. Thomsen also studied the contexts in which artifacts had been found and discovered that these varied consistently from one group to another.

Thomsen then proceeded to order his groups into a historical sequence. He identified the simplest assemblages, which contained only chipped stone artifacts, as the remains of an early Stone Age. This material came invariably from small, simple sites. Next was a later Stone Age, which he described as the period when polished as well as chipped stone tools were manufactured and the first use was made of metal. At this time, the dead were buried, uncremated, in prehistoric tombs, accompanied by crude pottery vessels with incised decoration. In the full Bronze Age, both weapons and cutting tools were made of bronze, the dead were cremated and buried in urns under small tumulimounds), and artifacts were decorated with ring patterns. In the Iron Age, tools and weapons were made of tempered iron, whereas bronze continued to be used to manufacture ornaments and luxury goods. Thomsen divided the Iron Age into two stages, the earlier characterized by curvilinear serpent motifs and the later by more elaborate dragons and other fantastic animals.?

1.In 1807 the Danish Royal commission for the Preservation and Collection of Antiquities was established. It began to gather together a collection of antiquities (objects from the ancient past) from all over Denmark that soon became one of the largest and most representative in Europe. In 1816 the commission invited the scholar Christian Thomsen to classify and prepare this collection for exhibition. The main problem that Thomsen faced was how the diverse assortment of prehistoric material in the collection could be exhibited most effectively. He decided to proceed?chronologically?by subdividing the prehistoric period into successive ages of stone, bronze, and iron. The notion of successive ages of stone, bronze and iron was not merely speculation but a hypothesis for which there was already some evidence.