kareina

 Back in 2018 I did a field trip with my cousin Carola to as many soapstone quarries and outcrops in southern Sweden as we could do over the course of several days driving it was a fun trip, and I enjoyed it, and analysing the samples collected have kept me busy for years thereafter.

Alas, some of the stops didn't yield any soapstone samples--sometimes because too much plant cover hid the stone, one time because the quarry is now just a lake, the shores of which are NOT soapstone. Today, while looking in the Swedish national archaeological artefact database for everything made of soapstone, I stumbled on an entry of a forest service location--a long abandoned place on the Swedish-Norwegian border, about 9 km from the above mentioned quarry lake where there had been an active soapstone quarry in the 1800's. The sons of last person living there emigrated to America in 1909.

When using that web page to find soapstone artefacts (or, in this case, an unexpected quarry) I normally open GoogleMaps to the same location, and copy the decimal form of the latitude and longitude from there, as that is faster and easier than converting from the SWEREF 99 TM N,E coordinate system. (I am keeping the lat-long in a csv file, and importing them all into google earth to plot locations on a map without bothering with a GIS program.)

This time, when I looked at the place on the googlemap there was one of those tourist info symbols on it, which led me to a cool web page describing the destination, and showing photos of the faces one or more of the miners carved into the cliffs, presumably in the 1800's given the dates it was open, and the style of the art. Here is one of them:



If only I had known about this place when I did that trip--here it would have been easy to find a small loose scrap of soapstone to take home to analyse! 

The Summer job at Lofotr Viking Museum that I am interested in applying for is the one for craftspeople The have a two-page application form, and ask for a CV. I have filled in the form, and wrote the below paragraphs for the section labelled "Write your application text here. Background, skills, etc:" This much text makes the application just exactly fill the two pages of their form. If anyone has any feedback for me on it, I would really appreciate it.

The application text:

I am excited to apply for the Viking Age Crafts position, with a speciality in Soapstone carving because ties in so well with my second PhD research (see CV) and my introduction to soapstone carving from the Nidaros Cathedral Restoration Project. I truly enjoy the soapstone carving, but, due to other commitments, I haven’t had the time available to complete my large cooking pot. Therefore, a summer job wherein I am able to devote my time to the craft of stone carving sounds absolutely perfect.

In addition to carving soapstone, I would like to undertake experimental archaeology and learn to cook in soapstone vessels. I have heard from Eva Stavsøien at Nidaros that a soapstone pot of the size I am carving has enough heat capacity to keep a pot of water boiling for fully 10 minutes after the pot has been removed from the fire, which sounds perfect for making porridge without burning it.

However, I am very curious: How dependent that boiling time after removal from the fire is on the size of the pot? A smaller pot would presumably cool faster than a large one, but it also contains less liquid. Does that mean that the smaller heat-sink can keep the smaller amount of water boiling for the same amount of time? How does the relationship between the thickness of the pot walls and the diameter of the pot (T-D ratio) effect the overall heat capacity of the pot (and thus how long the liquid will continue to boil)? Assuming that changing the T-D ratio changes how long the liquid continues to boil, are different pots better suited to making porridge from different grains (with different cooking times)? If so, can any inferences be made as to preferred local porridge grains based on differences in the T-D ratio of the pot? While I expect that the final question is beyond the scope of a single summer’s experimental archaeology, doing tests measuring the boiling times after removal from the fire for pots with different T-D ratios would be an interesting start towards that understanding.

I recently finished a tiny soapstone pot for fjorlief's rag doll Nadina, and sent it over. Given how long the last letter I sent to the states took, I expected it to take ages to get there. Much to my delight, the package arrived today. She will be posting about it later, after she has breakfast, but I can't resist sharing the photo she sent:

I tend to be one of those people who keep using the same computer for at least 8 years. ( lots of issues related to changing computers slowly over the course of months behind the cut ) Again something that he will be able to solve when he gets home, but that won't be till tomorrow, at which point he may or may not have time/energy. However, his not being available gave me time to type up this, for your entertainment.

Since I am here I may as well include an update of the past few days, too. When last I posted it was Wednesday of last week, and I had no plans as of yet. How quickly our days fill up.

Thursday I did my workout in the morning, biked to the office to water my plant in the afternoon (this time my key opened the door no problem, unlike the time I tried a week or two before), went straight back home, curled up with a e-book and audio book in Norwegian for a few hours, helped David re-arrange stuff in the shed so that we can fix the back wall next, and enjoyed hanging out with him a bit afterwards.

Friday I helped out my friend Louise and her mom, both of whom needed to go grocery shopping, but neither of whom has a driver's licence. Normally her dad takes them, but he is out of town, so she asked me if I would. She also said we could use their car, so I biked over there, we drove out to the big grocery store, and each got our own cart and agreed to meet at the bench by the door when done. They warned me that they would take a while, so I wandered slowly through the store and picked up the few things I needed, and stopped to chat with my friend Siv, whom I ran into in the dairy section. Eventually I paid for my things and went and sat on the bench with my e-book and audio book for a little while till her mom joined me. I had just enough time to eat the croissant and pear I had bought specifically to eat while I waited before she arrived (she was convinced that she would be the last one to the bench, but she beat Louise by about a minute and a half).

After that I had dinner and then helped David with some yard work, did some things around the house, and got in a couple hours reading in prep for my interview. That night I enjoyed visiting with a friend on line, and it was really good to catch up and connect like that. Sleep is clearly optional.

Saturday during the day I was productive, with some uni work, some harvesting red currants, some cooking, a workout, etc. In the evening I got in three hours of soapstone carving, and decided that the outside is now done enough to start on the inside.

Sunday morning I baked a yummy carrot-red currant crumble (with an oat and almond topping). During the day we went to "Grundet", the island on the Luleå river where the local SCA now has its home (and storage of stuff). There were about 30 of us from Frostheim there, some doing archery, some (including me) sitting in the shade with sewing project or just talking or playing with the baby, some in the smithy making stuff, etc. We were there some hours, and then I came home and relaxed for about an hour before some of my friends from Phire came over. We did some music, some acryoga, ate some of that crumble, and played games (cards and Quirkle). After they went home I did my yoga, then got some cuddles from a friend who dropped by for a bit. He went home at 23:30, and I expected to go straight to sleep, but another friend was feeling down, so instead I spent a couple hours chatting with him (and doing duolingo lessons in between typing), and finally got to sleep at 00:55.

today (Monday)Much to my surprise I woke up full of energy at 05:15, so I got up, packed my computer and some food, and biked in to the office, arriving well before 07:00. I worked till 08:30, and then I biked to town to take my dance shoes to the shoe repair shop, which has just re-opened after their summer holidays. I got there just after 09:00, and showed him where I have worn through the outer sole of the shoe, and explained that I am heading to Norway at 05:00 on Thursday for another folk music/dance festival, and asked if it would be possible to have them fixed before then, or if I should keep them and bring them to him after the trip? Luckily, he said he can have them done by Wednesday afternoon, so I left them there and enjoyed a pretty ride back to the office, where I worked for another couple of hours, then went and took a nap in the massage chair in the next corridor while it ran the "recover" program, and then, when it stopped 20 minutes later (and woke me), I pressed the "refresh" button and sat through another 8 minutes of that massage before I was ready to return to the office for another two hours of work. Not a bad first day back after holidays!

Inspired by frualeydis's post about her challenge, I have finally made the time to post the below suggestion to the Golden Egg Web page:

I propose the following as a Golden Egg Challenge:

Make and cook with a soapstone pot and then use it for science.

I am somewhat late in getting around to posting this, I have been thinking of this on and off since January, and begun real steps towards this goal in May. Is it still allowed to be a Golden Egg challenge anyway?

I begun researching Viking Age cooking vessels in soapstone in January, as part of my 2nd PhD project, which seeks to determine the source quarries for various archaeological soapstone objects based on the composition of the objects.

The first thing I noticed when I started researching this topic was the contrast between the fact that most Viking Age families were cooking with soapstone, and most Viking Age reenactors I have met aren’t, and I thought it would be cool to give it a try.

Then I wondered if cooking with soapstone would cause any changes in the composition of the stone (either due to the repeated heating and cooling, or due to the food, or some combination thereof) that might complicate my goal to figure out where the stone was quarried? This also inspired me to try it: Make a pot, measure its composition, cook with it for a year or two, measure its composition again. Has it changed? If so, is there a pattern to the change?

Therefore I have started the first steps towards this goal:

* reading about Viking Age Soapstone Vessels (see below)
* reading about Viking Age food stuff
* searching the Swedish Historical Museum’s database for soapstone objects
* travel to the Nidaros Cathedral Restoration workshop to learn the basis of soapstone and obtain a piece to make a pot
* started carving (see profile photo)

It will take time (realistically months, given how little time I have available for the carving) to make the pot. Once it is done I need to learn to cook with it (the woman who taught me says that once one gets water to a boil in her pot one can take it off the fire and it will keep boiling for 10 minutes more).

What more do I need to do for the “Golden Egg” part of this project? Is this even an appropriate sort of project for this group?

Partial reading list for Soapstone artifacts and the composition thereof:

Allen, R.O., and Pennell, S.E., 1978, Rare Earth Element Distribution Patterns to Characterize Soapstone Artifacts, in Archaeological Chemistry—II, AMERICAN CHEMICAL SOCIETY, Advances in Chemistry 171, v. 171, p. 230–257, doi: 10.1021/ba-1978-0171.ch014.

Torsten DuRietz (1935) Peridotites, Serpentines, and Soapstones of Northern Sweden, with special reference to some occurences in Northern Jämtland, Geologiska Föreningen I Stockholm Förhandlingar, 57:2, 133-260, DOI: 10.1080/11035893509445975

Erwin, J.C., 2001, A prehistoric soapstone quarry in Fleur de Lys, Newfoundland: PhD Thesis, University of Calgary.

Forster 2005, The Soapstone trade in the North Atlantic: Preliminary research of Viking and Norse period soapstone imports in Iceland In: Current Issues in Nordic Archaeology: Proceedings of the 21st Conference of Nordic Archaeologist 6-9 September 2001, Akureyri Iceland Ed: Garðar Guðmundsson • 2005 Publisher: Society of Icelandic Archaeologists. ISBN: 9789979609445

Forster, A., Jones, R., 2017. From Homeland to Home; Using Soapstone to Map Migration and Settlement in the North Atlantic, In: Hansen, G., Storemyr, P. (Eds.), Soapstone in the North. Quarries, Products and People 7000 BC - AD 1700. University of Bergen, pp. 225-248.

Forster, A. K. and Turner, V. E. (Eds.). Kleber: Shetland's Oldest Industry. Shetland Soapstone Since Prehistory. Lerwick: Shetland Amenity Trust, 133 pages ISBN-10: 0954324692

Hansen et al 2017, Soapstone in the North. Quarries, Products and People 7000 BC - AD 1700. University of Bergen.

Hubbard, M.J., 2006, Soapstone vessels in the Ohio River Valley and determining their source of origin using visible/near-infrared reflectance spectrometry [PhD Thesis]: Kent State University.

Rogers, M., Allen, R., Nagle, C., and Fitzhugh, W., 1983, The Utilization of Rare Earth Element Concentrations for the Characterization of Soapstone Quarries: Archaeometry, v. 25, p. 186–195, doi: 10.1111/j.1475-4754.1983.tb00675.x.

Stavsøien 2012, Fra fast fjell til gryte: Å arbeide med kleberstein, - hva skjuler seg i prosessen? (From solid rock to cooking pot: Working with soapstone, - what is hiding in the process?). Bachelor's thesis, BACHELOROPPGAVE BYG819T
Prosjektnr. 13-2012 Eva Stavsøien.

Val G. Steele, Report on the analysis of residues from steatite and ceramic vessels from the site of Belmont, Shetland

Turnbaugh, W., Turnbaugh, S., and Keifer, T., 1984, Characterization of selected soapstone sources in southern New England (Chapter 12) - Prehistoric Quarries and Lithic Production, in Prehistoric Quarries and Lithic Production (New Directions in Archaeology), Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. doi:10.1017/CBO9780511753244.013, p. 129–138.

Edward W. Wells III, Sarah C. Sherwood, and Kandace D. Hollenbach. Soapstone Vessel Chronology and Function in the Southern Appalachians of Eastern Tennessee: The Apple Barn Site (40bt90) Assemblage. Southeastern Archaeology 33:153–167

Wikki, H.B., 1953. Composition and origin of soapstone: , Bulletin de la Commission Geologique de Finland. Geologinen Tutkimuslaitos, p. 57.

Food Additives and Contaminants Volume 19, Issue 2, 2002, Pages 134-143 Soapstone (steatite) cookware as a source of minerals(Article) Quintaes, K.D., Amaya-Farfan, J., Morgano, M.A., Mantovani, D.M.B.