Gullgubber

A gullgubbe found at Kongsvik in

Nordland, Norway in 1747

6th7th-century gullgubber from Sorte

Muld, Bornholm
Gullgubber (Norwegian pronunciation: [lb]) or guldgubber, guldgubbar (Swedish, Danish) are
art-objects, amulets, or offerings found in Scandinavia and dating to early medieval times. They
consist of thin pieces of beaten gold (occasionally silver), usually between 1 and 2 sq. cm. in size,
usually stamped with a motif, and are the oldest examples of toreutics in Northern Europe.
The word gullgubbe means "little old man of gold" and is taken from a report published in 1791 by
Nils Henrik Sjborg,[1] in which he said that villagers in Ravlunda, Scania who found them in the
dunes called them guldgubbar.[2]
Approximately 3,000 gullgubber have been found, from approximately 30 sites in Norway, Sweden,
and the greatest number in Denmark. No fewer than 2,350 were found at the settlement of Sorte Muld
on the Danish island of Bornholm, while over 100 were found at Lundeborg, near Gudme on the
Danish island of Funen, and most recently 122 at Uppkra, Scania, Sweden.[3] Relatively few
gullgubber have so far been found in Norway, although 19 were found during excavations at
Vingrom church in Oppland between 2003 and 2005, and the distribution of finds may be affected by
modern circumstances as much as the political situation at the time they were laid down.[4]
They date to the late Iron Age, from the end of the Migration Age to the early Viking Age,
particularly what is referred to in Norway as the Merovingian era, in Sweden as the Vendel era, from
550 to about 800, but can be hard to date because they are often found in contexts that do not
establish date. It seems likely that they replaced bracteates, which require far more metal, after
obtaining gold from the Byzantine Empire became difficult.[5]

Iconography and purpose

Many of the gullgubber that have been found in Norway and Sweden depict a man and a woman
facing each other, sometimes embracing, sometimes with a branch or a tree visible between them.

Sometimes the figures' knees are bent and they may be dancing.[6] They are almost always clothed,
with the clothes generally depicted carefully and more formal than casual. Some have only a single
figure, either male or female, or an animal. A few are unstamped cutouts. Sharon Ratke, in her
dissertation on the gullgubber, has added a further category of "wraiths" and suggests that they may
indicate that some gullgubber were a tribute to the dead or to travellers.[7] She rejects the notion of
dancing, interpreting those figures as static and classing them among the wraiths.[8]
A common interpretation of the motif of the man and woman on the gullgubber is that it symbolises
the sacred marriage between the Vanir-god Freyr and the jtunn Gerr, which we know of from the
Eddic poem Skrnisml.[9] Some have interpreted the tree branch as a reference to the grove, Barri,
where Gerr agrees to meet Freyr; others have noted its resemblance to the Garden Angelica, a plant
associated with fertility. The thinking is that the deposition of the gullgubber was intended to ensure
fertility,[10] or that it was intended as a depiction of the mythical pair who gave rise to a chieftainly
line.[11] From historical sources, for example, we know that the Yngling line traced its ancestry to
Fjlnir, son of Gerr and Freyr.
Recent finds have somewhat changed the view of gullgubber. Almost 2,500 have been found at Sorte
Muld, on the Danish island of Bornholm, by far the highest number at any site.[12] And in 2000-2004,
122, the second highest number, were found not far away at Uppkra, Scania, Sweden (previously
also part of Denmark). Several of those found at the two sites are similar; some were made using the
same dies or patrices, and four dies and part of a fifth were found at Uppkra, which was therefore
presumably the point of manufacture for at least some of the Sorte Muld gullgubber. In addition,
some gullgubber found at some other sites also show strong similarities to some from Uppkra, and
some from Uppkra are unusually sharp in their details.[13][14] At Uppkra they were found in
postholes and wall ditches of a building that is interpreted as a heathen hof partly on the basis of their
presence as votive offerings, which is how they are now generally interpreted.[15]
Recent attempts have been made to interpret the gestures of the couples depicted on gullgubber in
terms of medieval sources such as the Sachsenspiegel, as denoting betrothal, for example.[16][17]
However, at both Uppkra and Sorte Muld, the majority of the gullgubber do not depict couples. At
Uppkra, most depict men, a smaller number depict women, and only a few depict couples.[18][19]
Some iconographic features of the single figures - a thumb to the mouth gesture associated with
being a seer as in representations of the legend of Sigur, a group of figures with clubs and two
others with staffs or sceptres of differing lengths - have been seen as relating to individual Norse
gods.[20]

Locations of finds
Gullgubber have been found at 42 sites in Norway, Sweden, and in greatest numbers in Denmark.[21]
Some of the most notable locations are:

Borg, Lofoten, Norway

Borge, stfold, Norway
Mre church, Nord-Trndelag, Norway - 9th century, found during excavations in 1968[22]
Vingrom church, Lillehammer, Norway - found during excavations between 2003 and 2005
Kongsvik, Tjeldsund, Nordland, Norway - found in the 1740s[23]
Hauge, Klepp, Rogaland, Norway - approx. 700-800 C.E.
Slinge, Halland, Sweden - approx. 690 C.E.
Helg, Uppland, Sweden
Uppkra, near Lund, Scania, Sweden - 111 found

Sorte Muld, Bornholm, Denmark - 2,480 found,[24] dated together with those at Uppkra to
the 6th century[25]
Lundeborg, Gudme, Funen, Denmark - about 100

About 1800 gullgubber are on display in the Bornholm Museum in Rnne. Most of the gullgubber
from Uppkra can be seen at the Historical Museum at Lund University.

References
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^ Margrethe Watt, "The Gold-Figure Foils (Guldgubbar) from Uppkra," in Lars Larsson, ed. Continuity for Centuries: A ceremonial
building and its context at Uppkra, southern Sweden. Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell, 2004, ISBN 9122021078, pp. 167-221, p. 167.
^ Topographia paroeci Raflunda et monumentorum qu circa sunt: quam publico examini offerunt praeses Nicolaus H. Sjborg et
respondens Gustavus Sjborg (dissertation, University of Lund, 1791, Latin), OCLC 248443661; later account in Swedish in Nils Henrik
Sjborg, Frsk till en nomenklatur fr nordiska fornlemningar, Stockholm: Deln, 1815, p. 112.
^ Watt, pp. 168 (map), 169 (Uppkra).
^ Martin Rundkvist, "stergtland's First Gold Foil Figure Die Found at Sttuna in Kaga Parish," Fornvnnen 102 (2007) 119-22, p. 120
makes this point with respect to the dies used to make gullgubber: unlike the foils themselves, they register on metal detectors, and the fact
that they have so far been found concentrated in southern Scandinavia likely reflects the relative prevalence of metal detectorists.
^ Rundqvist, p. 119.
^ Hilda Roderick Ellis Davidson, Myths and Symbols in Pagan Europe: Early Scandinavian and Celtic Religions, Manchester University
Press, 1988, ISBN 071902207X, p. 121.
^ Sharon Ratke, "Guldgubber - Einblicke in die Vlkerwanderungszeit," PhD dissertation, University of Bonn 2009 (German), category D,
Schemen in German: pp. 79-95. For memorials or thoughts of travelers (her suggested third purpose for gullgubber), see the summary
(German and English).
^ Sharon Ratke and Rudolf Simek, "Guldgubber: Relics of Pre-Christian law rituals?" in Anders Andrn, Kristin Jennbert, Catharina
Raudvere, eds., Old Norse Religion in Long-Term Perspectives: Origins, Changes, and Interactions: an international conference in Lund,
Sweden, June 3-7, 2004, Lund: Nordic Academic Press, 2006, ISBN 918911681X, pp. 259-66, p. 262. See also Ann-Britt Falk, "My home is
my castle: Protection against evil in medieval times" in Andrn, Jennbert and Raudvere, pp. 200-05, p. 202: Ratke and Simek instead
propose an interpretation of their body positions as being of refusal or incapability, they might even be dead".
^ E.O.G. Turville-Petre, Myth and Religion of the North: The Religion of Ancient Scandinavia, London: Weidenfeld, 1964, OCLC
460550410, Caption, Fig. 43.
^ Ellis Davidson, pp. 31-32: "It has been thought that they symbolise the marriage of god and goddess and that they may have been used at
weddings, or to bless a new home".
^ Watt, p. 217, citing this as a more modern view espoused by Gro Steinsland.
^ John McKinnell, "On Heir," Saga-Book 25 (2001), 394-417, p. 409 refers to the painstaking methods of the Sorte Muld excavation and
suggests that there may have been far more gullgubber at other sites than were found.
^ Lars Larsson, "The Iron Age ritual building at Uppkra, southern Sweden," Antiquity 81 (2007), p. 16; pictures p. 18.
^ Watt, pp. 169, 170, 214.
^ For example McKinnell, p. 409 simply refers to "the custom of using goldgubber as temple offerings".
^ Watt, p. 208, citing Rudolf Simek.
^ Sharon Ratke makes a detailed case for such interpretations on the "Interpretations" page of her site at http://www.guldgubber.de. See also
Ratke and Simek in Andrn, Jennbert and Raudvere.
^ Larsson, p. 16.
^ Watt, p. 216: "the gold-foil figures from both Uppkra and Bornholm form the core of [a] southeastern Scandinavian group of mainly
single figures".
^ Watt, pp. 206, 208-11, citing Karl Hauck and on the thumb gesture, Hilda Ellis Davidson. The "seer" figures Hauck relates to Odin, the
long-staffed figures to Thor. The few naked, ithyphallic figures may plausibly be related to Freyr.
^ Ratke, p. 21; Fig. 3.5, p. 22, reproduces a map from Jan Peder Lamm's 2004 article, "Figural Gold Foils Found in Sweden".
^ Andreas Haugdahl, Gullgubber from Mre church, Steinkjer Kunnskapsportal, retrieved 4 May 2010 (Norwegian): 22 gullgubber were
found.
^ Gullfunnet i Kongsvik, Tjeldsund lokalhistorielag, 2004, retrieved 4 May 2010 (Norwegian): at least 11 gullgubber were found, likely
more.
^ Ratke, p. 24.
^ Watt, p. 216.

Sources

Jan Peder Lamm. "Figural Gold Foils Found in Sweden". In Helen Clarke and Kristina Lamm (ed.) Excavations at Helg XVI: Exotic and
Sacral Finds from Helg. Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell, 2004. ISBN 91-7402-339-X
Margrethe Watt. "Die Goldblechfiguren ('guldgubber') aus Sorte Muld, Bornholm". In Karl Hauck (ed.) Der historische Horizont der
Gtterbild-Amulette aus der bergangsepoche von der Sptantike zum Frhmittelalter: Bericht ber das Colloquium vom 28.11.-1.12.1988
in der Werner-Reimers-Stiftung, Bad Homburg. Gttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1992. ISBN 3525825870. pp. 195227.
Margrethe Watt. "Guldgubber". In Christian Adamsen, Ulla Lund Hansen, Finn Ole Nielsen, Margrethe Watt (ed.) Sorte Muld. Rnne:
Bornholms Museum og Kulturarvstyrelsen, 2008, ISBN 8788179117. pp. 42-53.