Whats a Stone Age axe doing in an Iron Age tomb?
“If one finds something once, it’s accidental. If it is found twice, it’s puzzling. If found thrice, there is a pattern,” the archaeologists Olle Hemdorff and Eva Thte say. In 2005 the archaeologists investigated a grave at Avaldsnes in Karmy in southwestern Norway, supposed to be from the late Iron Age, i.e. from 600 to 1000 AD. Avaldsnes is rich in archeological finds. They dot an area that has been a seat of power all the way back to around 300. Archaeologist Olle Hemdorff at the University of Stavanger’s Museum of Archaeology was responsible for a series of excavations at Avaldsnes in 1993-94 and 2005-06. “It became clear to us quite early that the grave had been plundered. The material in the grave had been messed up and now contained brick and porcelain fragments from younger layers of soil,” Hemdorff says. Plundering of graves was very common in the 19th century and actually legal. It was not until the Cultural Heritage Act in 1905 made it a criminal offence for lay persons to e
