This edited volume delves into the current state of Iron Age and Early Medieval research in the North. Over the last two decades of archaeological explorations, theoretical vanguards, and introduction of new methodological strategies, together with a growing amount of critical studies in archaeology taking their stance from a multidisciplinary perspective, have dramatically changed our understanding of Northern Iron Age societies. The profound effect of 6th century climatic events on social structures in Northern Europe, a reintegration of written sources and archaeological material, genetic and isotopic studies entirely reinterpreting previously excavated grave material, are but a few examples of such land winnings. The aim of this book is to provide an intense and cohesive focus on the characteristics of contemporary Iron Age research; explored under the subheadings of field and methodology, settlement and spatiality, text and translation, and interaction and impact. Gathering the work of leading, established researchers and field archaeologists based throughout northern Europe and in the frontline of this new emerging image, this volume provides a collective summary of our current understandings of the Iron Age and Early Medieval Era in the North. It also facilitates a renewed interaction between academia and the ever-growing field of infrastructural archaeology, by integrating cutting edge fieldwork and developing field methods in the corpus of Iron Age and Early Medieval studies. In this book, many hypotheses are pushed forward from their expected outcomes, and analytical work is not afraid of taking risks, thus advancing the field of Iron Age research, and also, hopefully, inspiring to a continued creation of new knowledge.

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• Re-imagining periphery – Sketching out new fairways for researching the Iron Age North
• 1. Dream-houses of the Late Iron and Viking Ages – The house and the self: Marianne Hem-Eriksen
• 2. Sticky structures and opportunistic builders – The construction and social role of longhouses in northern Norway: Marte Spangen and Johan Arntzen
• 3. A tale of three Tuna-sites – A classic scholarly problem enlightened by new archaeological material: Susanna Eklund and Anneli Sundkvist
• 4. Ultuna – A Late Iron Age gateway to Uppsala: Helena Hulth
• 5. The digital future of the past – Research potential with increasingly FAIR archaeological data: Åsa M. Larsson and Daniel Löwenborg
• 6. Searching for new central places – An experiment: Anders Andrén
• 7. Striking a blow for the plough layer – Exploring the importance of plough-zone finds for the interpretation of a Late Iron Age site: Kristin Ilves and Kim Darmark
• 8. The dating of Ottarshögen and the emergence of monumental burial mounds in Middle Sweden: John Ljungkvist and Andreas Hennius
• 9. What was a cooking-pit called in the Iron Age?: Stefan Brink?
• 10. Poetry and picturing in deep historical time: Lotte Hedeager
• 11. Kumbl and stafR in runic texts: Anne-Sofie Gräslund
• 12. Beowulf – The Scandinavian background. A summary: Bo Gräslund
• 13. Rebooting the Gospel for a Germanic audience – The case of Heliand: Jhonny Therus
• 14. Female cultic leaders and religious (ritual) specialists in Germanic and ancient Scandinavian sources: Olof Sundqvist
• 15. Negotiating narrative – An emic perspective on Norse reuse of ancient monuments on the Northern Isles of Scotland: Charlotta Hillerdal
• 16. Some thoughts about the early medieval settlement on Åland, from a western European perspective: Jan-Henrik Fallgren
• 17. The solidus from Slättäng: Svante Fischer