2010-2016

Goal of the project and modifications of goals during the course of the Project

The purpose of the project as stated in the application was to further future research on the early history of Sweden in general and the Viking Age and Birka in particular. This was to be achieved in two ways. First through the development and implementation of a digital research platform, "The Birka portal", in which material in the form of maps, images and contextual information was to be made available for, in the first place, the research community, enabling the exploration, use, communication, improvement, downloading and sharing of material. Second, through the presentation on this platform of crucial, digital research material from Birka, and most important the exstensive material of finds from the archaeological excavations in the black earth on Birka in 1990-1995, but also earlier materials kept by the Swedish History Museum (SHM) as well as relevant literature and research reports.
The goal to make available central, digitized research materials from Birka in a digital platform has been unaltered throughout the project period and has been fully achieved though the resulting platform to be published in early April 2016 (see below). Some more specific goals regarding the projected possible uses of the platform in terms of interactive solutions, in which the researcher was supposed to be able to "enhance" and "upload" material on the platform, were altered during the cause of the project and beginning when the development of the platform started in 2013. The economic frames did not enable the development of such solutions and the platform has been designed to present and make freely available a wealth of Birka material possible to "explore" and "use".

Results of the project and a discussion of the results

The vast majority of the about 73 000 finds from the 1990-1995 excavation in the black earth in Birka has been digitized and registered in the SHM database and are now published through the Birka portal as well as through the regular collections search of the museum. Large parts of the material have also been photographed and the photos added to the database. The quality of the information on objects has to a varying degree been strengthened in the context of digitization: classifications have been added and some key information has been translated into English. The purpose of this is to enhance the possibility for foreign researchers to use the database. Except for the archaeological finds, extensive other materials such as maps, images and texts have also been digitized, which is described in what follows.
The digital research platform"Birkaportalen" is finished by the end of the project and will be publicly launched in April 2016. The portal has been developed as a free-standing but integrated part of the website of SHM. The visitor to the portal finds a wealth of information on Viking Age Birka on Björkö and Hovgården on Adelsö. The content has been structured under four main headlines which can be reached from a top-menu. The headlines are: "The site", "What is Birka and Hovgården?", "Archaeology and research" and "Digital resources". The texts collected under the first two headlines synthesize current knowledge of the sites and are intended to be available to and understood by a wide audience. The material under the last two headlines is rather intended as a raw material for research directed at students, doctorate students and researchers in (primarily) archaeology.
Under the headlines "The site" and "What is Birka and Hovgården", the different parts of the complex are presented in text and images. Some significant features such as trade and crafts, the meeting of religions and social conditions are also presented. Texts and images have been produced within the project.
The content of "Digital resources" is primairly directed at the research community as tools for exploring the Viking Age Birka and Hovgården complex. Under the headings "Literature", "Archival material", "Search the database" and "Photos" central research material is collected that was previously only available in analogue form in the Antikvariks-topografiska arkivet in Stockholm. The material comprises archival photographs from excavations, object information, previously unpublished reports and primary sources such as the 20 excavation notebooks of Hjalmar Stolpe from his excavations in Birka. Finally, some of the most important major, older academic works on Birka and Hovgården have been OCR-scanned and thus possible to search and download in pdf-format.
Under "Digital resources" is also a Webb-GIS application that presents geographical information on Birka and Hovgården. The application enables general as well as detailed studies of the sites and earlier archaeological excavations by presenting archaeological documentation as well as different types of maps. The 1990-1995 excavations in the black earth have been divided into phases which are also possible to explore. By selecting a specific context, such as a grave or an excavated layer, the user is linked to contextual information and further options to continue to the objects database or the digital register of prehistoric monuments of the National Heritage Board ("FMIS").
The GIS-information has been collected from several organizations and institutions and is of variable quality. Some data was digitally born while other has been digitized from analogue drawings of graves or other features. The variations are relatively slight but obvious when comparing older cemetery maps with the recent lidar-scanning which is also presented.
Project work was initially conducted parallel to the research project "Birka, Rus and Nordic Gentes" (RJ 2011-2014), which created some synergy-effects in the development of the digital platform. During 2011 and 2012 the two projects organized several workshops and seminars in common. One of the seminars, organized in cooperation with the National Heritage Board, led to the anthology "Birka nu" (Birka now), published by SHM.

Unforseen technical and methodological problems

The development of the Birka portal started as a cooperation with a technological company that was engaged by the project. In this cooperation sketches for a platform structure were made and basic solutions concerning what data should be presented and how it should be presented were developed. The original idea was that the platform was to be completed in cooperation with the company, while the practical organization of the long term management was somewhat unclear. When the SHM in 2014 started working with the development of an entirely new museum website the possibility arose to construct the platform in the new system used by the museum and in cooperation with the development process of the museum. This was the applied solution and the advantages consist of the simplified long term management and support of the platform. The sketches and solutions previously developed in cooperation with the company could now be applied in the museum system. Slight problems arising as a consequence of this solution were due to the termination of the cooperation with the company earlier than first projected.
A slight methodological problem was also encountered in the work with registrating the finds. Some of the iron finds from the 1990s excavations in Birka turned out to be in so poor condition that they had to be discarded. Routines for the process of de-accessioning them had to be created and applied within the project.

The integration of project work in the museum

The project and those working with it have been well integrated in the work of the museum throughout the project period. For example accession processes followed and developed standard routines. Some developments in registration that were first applied in the project have been transferred to the work process of the institution.

How the work will be carried on

The continued work with managing, developing and updating the platform will be carried out by the project team members but within the frames of their employments at the SHM after the termination of the project. The portal is intended to be dynamic and a tool for presenting new material.

New research questions generated by the Project

The improvement of the quality of the information on Birka objects in combination with the contextual information generated in the GIS environment enable new combinations of data, not previously possible and this potentially widens the perspective on objects as well as contexts in Birka. The general images now generated by previous excavations in the monuments complex also generate a new general understanding of the previous exploration of the sites raising questions of priorities for the future.

Links to webbsites

The Birka portal: www.historiska.se/birka