remained in use until c. ad 1000. Mixed stone/earth cairns also appear in Häme until the
end of the pagan period. Level-ground cremation cemeteries are a pronouncedly Finnish
phenomenon. They have extensive pavings of stone consisting of one to three layers
but rarely visible on the present surface. In between, under and on top of the stones lay
strewn the remnants of the pyres of the dead: burnt bones, ashes and grave goods. It has
been presumed that the large cremation cemeteries were used by whole villages. Many
villages, however, had several cemeteries; therefore these apparently belonged to indi-
vidual farms. Cremation cemeteries sometimes contain boat graves, burials in which the
deceased were burned in their boats – as can be seen from large amounts of rivets. This
parallels the Scandinavian boat graves, although the latter were not cremations.
CLOTHING AND JEWELLERYThe parishes of Eura and Köyliö in the province of Satakunta were exceptions as far as
burial customs were concerned. In Eura and Köyliö the dead were buried in inhumation
graves, a custom that did not spread to other parts of the country before the early
eleventh century. The Luistari cemetery in Eura is the largest Viking Age cemetery in
Finland with more than 1 , 300 excavated graves. The dead were interred dressed in their
best clothes and finest jewellery (Figures 35. 1 and 35. 2 ). Organic materials such as cloth
are rarely preserved in graves, but thanks to the custom of decorating women’s garments
with spiral tubes of bronze wire that eventually oxidised and preserved the surrounding
cloth, it has been possible through painstaking studies in the field and laboratory to
reconstruct a number of women’s costumes. The most reliable reconstructions are based
on grave finds from the Luistari cemetery mentioned above. The Eura costume dates
from the early eleventh century and thus represents dress fashions around the end of the
Viking Age.
The pieces of jewellery that appear in grave finds from the ninth and tenth centuries
are predominantly heavy and massive bronze objects, while silver jewellery remains
relatively rare until the eleventh century. Bronze seems to have been the period’s pre-
cious metal of choice and was imported from central Europe in the form of ingots. In
addition to imported raw bronze, recycled jewellery also provided an important source
of metal. Certain mass finds of scrap-bronze jewellery show fire patina. This probably
indicates that they came from a cremation cemetery, where the grave goods might lay
completely in the open. These finds, in other words, constitute evidence of grave robbery
from the prehistoric period.
The population increase that took place during the Viking Age led to a notable boom
in jewellery production, which had a detrimental effect on quality. Viking Age jewellery
was typically made by backyard businesses. The pieces were mostly cast by village
blacksmiths; large Viking Age caches of jewellery-making equipment such as found in
the other Nordic countries are missing from Finland. The jewellery was cast in clay
moulds using the á cire perdue or ‘lost wax’ technique, which may explain why finds
that illustrate the actual casting process are so rare. Another method suited for mass
production and used by village blacksmiths up to modern times was sand casting, which
also made it possible to copy existing designs.
As noted above, silver was rare during the ninth and tenth centuries with the
exception of Åland, which has produced a few early silver hoards. The situation changed
over the following centuries when silver, as a result of the flood of silver coins that
–– chapter 35: The Viking Age in Finland––