New focus on retrospective methods : resuming methodological discussions: case studies from Northern Europe

230 pages : maps ; 24 cm. Articles based on papers presented at a conference held in Sept. 27-8 2010 at the University of Bergen. The articles featured in this volume concern folkloristics, philology, comparative linguistics, cultural geography, iconagraphy, Old Norse studies and the history of religion in Scandinavia, but in particular they concern the questions of whether, how and to what extent late-recorded material can be used to shed light on historically much earlier periods. It is a fact that our sources for the study of pre-Christian times in Northern Europe are few, fragmentary and immensely limited. It is possible to obtain new and relevant information if we broaden our spectrum of sources to include not only contemporary or near-comtemporary material, but also material from subsequent, even much later, periods. Showcasting that and how this may be done is the aim of the present volume.