The Sørøya Survey
This survey and documentation project focus on the Southwestern part of Sørøy, Hasvik municipality. It is part over the larger Stone Age Demographics project. The aim of the project is modern documentation of the known Stone Age sites and an up-to date survey of the areas. While a few stone age house floors in the area were excavated in 1956 and 1963, most of Povl Simonsens campaigns in the 1960's and -70's focussed on the northeastern part of Sørøya. Since then several major development-led excavations have taken place in the Hammerfest region (Slettnes, Melkøya, Skjærvika, Fjellvika). The project will provide modern information on a region adjacent to these excavations for comparative purposes.
An initial visit to the area was conducted in August 2015, and the first field work season took place in June 2016.
The project have now been integrated into the Stone Age Demographics proejct.
Project leaders: Charlotte Damm, Marianne Skandfer, Peter Jordan
September 2016
Funding obtained from the Dpt of Archaeology and antrhopology and the Faculty will now allow us to date around 25 samples from earler excavations on the southern part of Sørøya.
Drone Photos from Sandvika 2016
Erlend Kirkeng Jørgensen operated the drone over Sandvika to document the many dwelling pits on the beach ridge at the site.
From April 2017 the Sørøya survey has become an integral part of the proejct: Stone Age Demograophics.
2016 Campaign
In the course of 6 days the team re-documented the sites Risvåg, Hasvåg, Sørvær fotballbane and Sandvika in full detail (60 dwelings). Several new sites were found and recorded: Markeila 1 and 2 (4 and 6 dwellings respectively), Lille Djupvåg A and B (1 and 6 houses), Mollvika (2 mesolithic tent rings), Store Sandbukt (6 houses), Rottvågen (7 houses), Risvåg R1 (6 houses), Hasvåg (1), and Lauksletta Nordre (3 houses and a cairn), making this a total of 42 new dwellings. A quartz quarry was also discovered.In addition we point-recorded the Årvika and Sarset sites.
All sites were recorded using C-POS in addition to textual description and photographs. We used a drone to photograph Sandvika, which was also photographed using a telescope pole for the ordinary camera. More details on the region and potential sites was obtained from local informants.
The team consisted of Charlotte Damm, Marianne Skandfer, Peter Jordan, Erlend Kirkeng Jørgensen and Kenneth Webb Vollan.
