Hoards from the Early Viking Period

The Nordic Design of the Iron Age
Introduction Jewellery as Form of Personal Expression
Hoards from the Roman Iron Age – Early Viking Age Coinage
Hoards from the Early Viking Period Hoards from the Medieval Period and Later
Hoards from the Late Viking Period Silver on the Gotlandic Farms
The Dragon’s Gold Treasures on the Sea Floor
The Objects Tell a Story More Recent Treasure Tales
 

During the 9th century, the vikings’ trading journeys to the vast Russian market underwent an expansion. The Early Viking Age silver hoards contained almost exclusively Arabic silver coins, so-called dirhams. They flowed in great quantities from the Islamic Empire to the towns along the Russian rivers and out towards the Baltic Sea Coast.

For each decade that passed, the number of coins in

 
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the hoards increased. The Gotlandic yields account    
for almost half of all the the 9th century dirhams found in Sweden. Of the total number of 689 000 Arabic, Volga-Bulgarian and Byzantine coins unearthed in Sweden, 51 300 come from Gotland. "Stavar’s treasure" is one of the most legendary hoards on Gotland. The first part of the legend is connected with the Icelandic kings’ sagas. There the tale is told of how the Norwegian Viking chieftain Erik Jarl and his band set sail for Gotland with a view to plunder.

At that time a powerful Viking chief called Stavar the Great was said to own a farm at Bandlunde Bay in the south of Gotland. When the Norsemen were sighted off the coast, he buried an enormous treasure, and then set off to meet the enemy. In the ensuing battle Stavar and his men were mortally wounded.

The second part of the legend takes place in the first half of the 1880s. The yeoman from Häffinds, Göran Andersson, was on his way home after a Christening party. He was blind drunk, and apparently he was given a lift home by none other than Stavar the Great himself.

Stavar had shown him the hoard, which he wanted to bestow on Göran, who was a descendant of Stavar. Göran knew that such hoards never boded well for anyone, and declined the offer. But in order to avoid Stavar’s wrath, he requested that the hoard should be a bequest to his great-great-grandchildren. Stavar acquiesced, and as ratification of their agreement he gave Göran some coins from the hoard.

Göran Andersson’s great-great-grandchildren were very much aware of the legend of Stavar, and of their rightful claim. In the 1950s some of them got in touch with the archaeologist Erik Nylén, in order to stake their claim, despite the fact that the family farm had fallen into other hands in the meantime.

However, the prediction in the legend didn’t come true. The descendants didn’t find the hoard, but a school class from the neighbouring village of Hemse did. In 1975, they were playfully engaged in living-prehistory activities at the legendary site. In the sand around a rabbit hole they found a dozen ancient coins. They turned out to be part of a hoard comprising a total of 1 452 Arabic dirhams and a number of silver spiral rings.

The tale, along with the fact that the treasure was actually found, makes Stavar’s hoard one of the most remarkable hoards ever unearthed in the North.