Jens Jacob Asmussen Worsaae
Encyclopedia
Jens Jacob Asmussen Worsaae (14 March 1821 – 15 August 1885) was a Danish
archaeologist
, historian and politician, who was the second director of the National Museum of Denmark
(1865-1874). He played a key role in the foundation of scientific archaeology. Worsaae was the first to excavate and use stratigraphy
to prove C.J. Thomsen's
sequence of the Three-age system
: Stone
, Bronze
, Iron
. He was also a pioneer in the development of paleobotany
through his excavation work in the peat bogs of Jutland
. Worsaae served as Kultus Minister of Denmark
(the cultural and education minister) for Christen Andreas Fonnesbech from 1874 to 1875.
, Denmark
in 1821. He was the fifth of eleven children born into a wealthy, educated family. His father was a civil servant (a county treasurer) for the County of Vejle and also a member of the Royal Society of Northern Antiquities.
Worsaae's archaeological interests began in 1832 when his father gave him two stone axes, one which had been found on his land and the other having been found in the dredging of Vejle harbour. Worsaae was inspired; he began to search in on the east coast of Jutland before expanding his search area to include central and southern Jutland as well.
In 1835 whilst at school in Randers Worsaae was invited to participate in an excavation of a grave at Bygholm, outside Horsens
. Worsaae was also included in excavations near Jellinge the following year.
In 1838 he started studies at the University of Copenhagen
, graduating in 1841.
(Needs expansion and content of standard biographies)
, the first director of the National Museum of Denmark. He learned Thomsen's methods of dating artifacts and controlled archaeological excavation.
Not wanting to continue working without pay, he found a patron in King Christian VIII. At the king's request, Worsaae wrote an overview of the antiquarian field: The Primeval Antiquities of Denmark (Danmarks Oldtid oplyst ved Oldsager og Gravhøie), which explicated archaeology and the three-age system, was first published in 1843 in Denmark, and became widely popular. More than Thomsen, Worsaae reacted against the then-prevalent view of prehistory in Denmark. The historian Suhm identified the proto-historic period as the ”legendary age”. He thought it could be studied from the Old Norse
myths and legends. Suhm interpreted Norse gods and mythical figures as the kings and leaders of prehistoric peoples. Worsaae rejected this view of prehistory as euhemerism. He thought that prehistory was a period best studied not by historians, but by archeologists, who dealt with material goods. He believed that the knowledge that can be obtained about prehistory will necessarily be qualitatively different from the knowledge of historic periods, based on written texts.
Worsaae was working in a context of nationalist striving. In the mid-19th century, amid Danish-German political tension, the Norwegian scholar and nationalist Peter Andreas Munch
provided the Germans with arguments for invading Denmark by suggesting that Denmark had originally been settled by Germans. But, Worsaae argued that the prehistoric peoples of the archaeological records could not be identified with any modern peoples because of the sheer timescale involved. Still, his work on Danish antiquities was taken to mean that natives had a long history in the area.
Similarly, when the Haraldskær Woman
, a peat-bog mummy
was found in southern Denmark in 1843, she was exhibited as the legendary Queen Gunhild of the early Mediaeval period. Worsaae disputed this view, arguing that the body was Iron Age
in origin, like most from the bogs, and predated any historical persons of the chronicles by at least 500 years.
King Christian sent him on a research trip to Britain and Ireland in 1846 and 1847, to study evidence of Vikings. He did research into antiquities and histories to develop an account of the culture around the North Sea. Worsaae wrote An Account of the Danes and the Norsemen in England, Scotland and Ireland (1852).
In 1847 Worsaae was appointed the Inspector for the Conservation of Antiquarian Monuments. He worked to preserve areas and directed excavations across the country. By controlled excavation and analysis of stratigraphy
, he found artifacts that supported Thomsen's Three-Age System, formerly based on the museum collection. Using Nilsson's studies of prehistoric subsistence and the Danish geologist Johannes Japetus Steenstrup's studies of changes in prehistoric forestation, Worsaae began to explore the limits of what can be known about prehistory. In that period of scholarship, those who could grasp the concept of prehistory were hard pressed to imagine that cultural developments could be discerned within the three ages. Through excavations of stone-age sites, Worsaae saw that there were distinct trends of coöccurrence: a period with simple tools, signs of hunting and fishing, and with dog bones as the only evidence of domestic animals. This period was associated with the discovery of “kitchen middens”: enormous piles of waste produced by oyster-eating foragers. The middens were sometimes as large as ten meters high and a hundred meters long. Worsaae commented in his diary that ”these enormous piles of oyster shells must represent the remains of meals eaten by stone age people.”
Worsaae determined that a second subset of the Stone Age deposits, associated with dolmen
burials, showed signs of animal husbandry and agriculture. Following Nilsson's analyses of prehistoric subsistence, Worsaae proposed that the Stone Age had a foraging period and an agricultural period, which could be demonstrated from artifacts. He also recognized that finds from caves in France predated even the Danish foraging stone-age period. He was perhaps the first to envision what became the division between Paleolithic
, Mesolithic
and Neolithic
periods. These were classified and named by the British researcher John Lubbock, 1st Baron Avebury
in 1865.
As director of the National Museum of Denmark
(1865-1874), Worsaae became the mentor of a new generation of archaeologists: including Sophus Müller
in Denmark. He was also a professor at the university. He supported archaeology as a science and influenced its study and excavation practices. He also influenced archaeologists in Sweden, where Nils G. Bruzelius, Hans Hildebrand
and Oscar Montelius
followed his lead. They further developed methods for establishing chronologies through controlled excavations.
Worsaae's early work, The Primeval Antiquities of Denmark (Danmarks Oldtid oplyst ved Oldsager og Gravhøie), which explicated the three-age system, was first published in 1843 in Denmark, and in English in 1849. It strongly influenced researchers in Great Britain and the United States. For instance, Lewis Henry Morgan, a pioneering American ethnologist, developed his own three-stage system of prehistory in his book, Ancient Society (1877). He theorized that prehistoric peoples went through progressive stages of "savagery", "barbarism" and "civilization", to be traced by several criteria, including their kinship
and social structures, as well as tools and cultivation.
Denmark
Denmark is a Scandinavian country in Northern Europe. The countries of Denmark and Greenland, as well as the Faroe Islands, constitute the Kingdom of Denmark . It is the southernmost of the Nordic countries, southwest of Sweden and south of Norway, and bordered to the south by Germany. Denmark...
archaeologist
Archaeology
Archaeology, or archeology , is the study of human society, primarily through the recovery and analysis of the material culture and environmental data that they have left behind, which includes artifacts, architecture, biofacts and cultural landscapes...
, historian and politician, who was the second director of the National Museum of Denmark
National Museum of Denmark
The National Museum of Denmark in Copenhagen is Denmark’s largest museum of cultural history, comprising the histories of Danish and foreign cultures, alike. The museum's main domicile is located a short distance from Strøget at the center of Copenhagen. It contains exhibits from around the world,...
(1865-1874). He played a key role in the foundation of scientific archaeology. Worsaae was the first to excavate and use stratigraphy
Stratigraphy
Stratigraphy, a branch of geology, studies rock layers and layering . It is primarily used in the study of sedimentary and layered volcanic rocks....
to prove C.J. Thomsen's
Christian Jürgensen Thomsen
Christian Jürgensen Thomsen was a Danish archaeologist.In 1816 he was appointed head of 'antiquarian' collections which later developed into the National Museum of Denmark in Copenhagen. While organizing and classifying the antiquities for exhibition, he decided to present them chronologically...
sequence of the Three-age system
Three-age system
The three-age system in archaeology and physical anthropology is the periodization of human prehistory into three consecutive time periods, named for their respective tool-making technologies:* The Stone Age* The Bronze Age* The Iron Age-Origin:...
: Stone
Stone Age
The Stone Age is a broad prehistoric period, lasting about 2.5 million years , during which humans and their predecessor species in the genus Homo, as well as the earlier partly contemporary genera Australopithecus and Paranthropus, widely used exclusively stone as their hard material in the...
, Bronze
Bronze Age
The Bronze Age is a period characterized by the use of copper and its alloy bronze as the chief hard materials in the manufacture of some implements and weapons. Chronologically, it stands between the Stone Age and Iron Age...
, Iron
Iron Age
The Iron Age is the archaeological period generally occurring after the Bronze Age, marked by the prevalent use of iron. The early period of the age is characterized by the widespread use of iron or steel. The adoption of such material coincided with other changes in society, including differing...
. He was also a pioneer in the development of paleobotany
Paleobotany
Paleobotany, also spelled as palaeobotany , is the branch of paleontology or paleobiology dealing with the recovery and identification of plant remains from geological contexts, and their use for the biological reconstruction of past environments , and both the evolutionary history of plants, with a...
through his excavation work in the peat bogs of Jutland
Jutland
Jutland , historically also called Cimbria, is the name of the peninsula that juts out in Northern Europe toward the rest of Scandinavia, forming the mainland part of Denmark. It has the North Sea to its west, Kattegat and Skagerrak to its north, the Baltic Sea to its east, and the Danish–German...
. Worsaae served as Kultus Minister of Denmark
Kultus Minister of Denmark
The Kultus Minister of Denmark was a Danish minister office. The responsibilities of the minister was the church, culture and education. The word kultus is Latin for adoration, from which the words culture and cult are derived....
(the cultural and education minister) for Christen Andreas Fonnesbech from 1874 to 1875.
Early life and education
Jens Jacob Asmussen Worsaae was born in VejleVejle
Vejle is a town in Denmark, in the southeast of the Jutland Peninsula at the head of Vejle Fjord, where the Vejle and Grejs Rivers and their valleys converge. It is the site of the councils of Vejle Municipality and the Region of Southern Denmark...
, Denmark
Denmark
Denmark is a Scandinavian country in Northern Europe. The countries of Denmark and Greenland, as well as the Faroe Islands, constitute the Kingdom of Denmark . It is the southernmost of the Nordic countries, southwest of Sweden and south of Norway, and bordered to the south by Germany. Denmark...
in 1821. He was the fifth of eleven children born into a wealthy, educated family. His father was a civil servant (a county treasurer) for the County of Vejle and also a member of the Royal Society of Northern Antiquities.
Worsaae's archaeological interests began in 1832 when his father gave him two stone axes, one which had been found on his land and the other having been found in the dredging of Vejle harbour. Worsaae was inspired; he began to search in on the east coast of Jutland before expanding his search area to include central and southern Jutland as well.
In 1835 whilst at school in Randers Worsaae was invited to participate in an excavation of a grave at Bygholm, outside Horsens
Horsens
Horsens is a Danish city in east Jutland. It is the site of the council of Horsens municipality. The city's population is 53,807 and the Horsens municipality's population is 82,835 ....
. Worsaae was also included in excavations near Jellinge the following year.
In 1838 he started studies at the University of Copenhagen
University of Copenhagen
The University of Copenhagen is the oldest and largest university and research institution in Denmark. Founded in 1479, it has more than 37,000 students, the majority of whom are female , and more than 7,000 employees. The university has several campuses located in and around Copenhagen, with the...
, graduating in 1841.
(Needs expansion and content of standard biographies)
Career and contributions
While in Copenhagen for college, Worsaae began to work as a volunteer with Christian Jürgensen ThomsenChristian Jürgensen Thomsen
Christian Jürgensen Thomsen was a Danish archaeologist.In 1816 he was appointed head of 'antiquarian' collections which later developed into the National Museum of Denmark in Copenhagen. While organizing and classifying the antiquities for exhibition, he decided to present them chronologically...
, the first director of the National Museum of Denmark. He learned Thomsen's methods of dating artifacts and controlled archaeological excavation.
Not wanting to continue working without pay, he found a patron in King Christian VIII. At the king's request, Worsaae wrote an overview of the antiquarian field: The Primeval Antiquities of Denmark (Danmarks Oldtid oplyst ved Oldsager og Gravhøie), which explicated archaeology and the three-age system, was first published in 1843 in Denmark, and became widely popular. More than Thomsen, Worsaae reacted against the then-prevalent view of prehistory in Denmark. The historian Suhm identified the proto-historic period as the ”legendary age”. He thought it could be studied from the Old Norse
Old Norse
Old Norse is a North Germanic language that was spoken by inhabitants of Scandinavia and inhabitants of their overseas settlements during the Viking Age, until about 1300....
myths and legends. Suhm interpreted Norse gods and mythical figures as the kings and leaders of prehistoric peoples. Worsaae rejected this view of prehistory as euhemerism. He thought that prehistory was a period best studied not by historians, but by archeologists, who dealt with material goods. He believed that the knowledge that can be obtained about prehistory will necessarily be qualitatively different from the knowledge of historic periods, based on written texts.
Worsaae was working in a context of nationalist striving. In the mid-19th century, amid Danish-German political tension, the Norwegian scholar and nationalist Peter Andreas Munch
Peter Andreas Munch
Peter Andreas Munch , usually known as P. A. Munch, was a Norwegian historian, known for his work on the medieval history of Norway. Munch’s scholarship included Norwegian archaeology, geography, ethnography, linguistics, and jurisprudence...
provided the Germans with arguments for invading Denmark by suggesting that Denmark had originally been settled by Germans. But, Worsaae argued that the prehistoric peoples of the archaeological records could not be identified with any modern peoples because of the sheer timescale involved. Still, his work on Danish antiquities was taken to mean that natives had a long history in the area.
Similarly, when the Haraldskær Woman
Haraldskær Woman
The Haraldskær Woman is an Iron Age bog body found naturally preserved in a bog in Jutland, Denmark. Labourers discovered the body in 1835 while excavating peat on the Haraldskær Estate...
, a peat-bog mummy
Bog body
Bog bodies, which are also known as bog people, are the naturally preserved human corpses found in the sphagnum bogs in Northern Europe. Unlike most ancient human remains, bog bodies have retained their skin and internal organs due to the unusual conditions of the surrounding area...
was found in southern Denmark in 1843, she was exhibited as the legendary Queen Gunhild of the early Mediaeval period. Worsaae disputed this view, arguing that the body was Iron Age
Iron Age
The Iron Age is the archaeological period generally occurring after the Bronze Age, marked by the prevalent use of iron. The early period of the age is characterized by the widespread use of iron or steel. The adoption of such material coincided with other changes in society, including differing...
in origin, like most from the bogs, and predated any historical persons of the chronicles by at least 500 years.
King Christian sent him on a research trip to Britain and Ireland in 1846 and 1847, to study evidence of Vikings. He did research into antiquities and histories to develop an account of the culture around the North Sea. Worsaae wrote An Account of the Danes and the Norsemen in England, Scotland and Ireland (1852).
In 1847 Worsaae was appointed the Inspector for the Conservation of Antiquarian Monuments. He worked to preserve areas and directed excavations across the country. By controlled excavation and analysis of stratigraphy
Stratigraphy
Stratigraphy, a branch of geology, studies rock layers and layering . It is primarily used in the study of sedimentary and layered volcanic rocks....
, he found artifacts that supported Thomsen's Three-Age System, formerly based on the museum collection. Using Nilsson's studies of prehistoric subsistence and the Danish geologist Johannes Japetus Steenstrup's studies of changes in prehistoric forestation, Worsaae began to explore the limits of what can be known about prehistory. In that period of scholarship, those who could grasp the concept of prehistory were hard pressed to imagine that cultural developments could be discerned within the three ages. Through excavations of stone-age sites, Worsaae saw that there were distinct trends of coöccurrence: a period with simple tools, signs of hunting and fishing, and with dog bones as the only evidence of domestic animals. This period was associated with the discovery of “kitchen middens”: enormous piles of waste produced by oyster-eating foragers. The middens were sometimes as large as ten meters high and a hundred meters long. Worsaae commented in his diary that ”these enormous piles of oyster shells must represent the remains of meals eaten by stone age people.”
Worsaae determined that a second subset of the Stone Age deposits, associated with dolmen
Dolmen
A dolmen—also known as a portal tomb, portal grave, dolmain , cromlech , anta , Hünengrab/Hünenbett , Adamra , Ispun , Hunebed , dös , goindol or quoit—is a type of single-chamber megalithic tomb, usually consisting of...
burials, showed signs of animal husbandry and agriculture. Following Nilsson's analyses of prehistoric subsistence, Worsaae proposed that the Stone Age had a foraging period and an agricultural period, which could be demonstrated from artifacts. He also recognized that finds from caves in France predated even the Danish foraging stone-age period. He was perhaps the first to envision what became the division between Paleolithic
Paleolithic
The Paleolithic Age, Era or Period, is a prehistoric period of human history distinguished by the development of the most primitive stone tools discovered , and covers roughly 99% of human technological prehistory...
, Mesolithic
Mesolithic
The Mesolithic is an archaeological concept used to refer to certain groups of archaeological cultures defined as falling between the Paleolithic and the Neolithic....
and Neolithic
Neolithic
The Neolithic Age, Era, or Period, or New Stone Age, was a period in the development of human technology, beginning about 9500 BC in some parts of the Middle East, and later in other parts of the world. It is traditionally considered as the last part of the Stone Age...
periods. These were classified and named by the British researcher John Lubbock, 1st Baron Avebury
John Lubbock, 1st Baron Avebury
John Lubbock, 1st Baron Avebury PC , FRS , known as Sir John Lubbock, 4th Baronet from 1865 until 1900, was a polymath and Liberal Member of Parliament....
in 1865.
As director of the National Museum of Denmark
National Museum of Denmark
The National Museum of Denmark in Copenhagen is Denmark’s largest museum of cultural history, comprising the histories of Danish and foreign cultures, alike. The museum's main domicile is located a short distance from Strøget at the center of Copenhagen. It contains exhibits from around the world,...
(1865-1874), Worsaae became the mentor of a new generation of archaeologists: including Sophus Müller
Sophus Müller
Sophus Otto Müller was a Danish paleontologist.He was born in Copenhagen, Denmark, the son of C. Louis Müller. Sophus studied classical philology at Copenhagen University, graduating with a masters in 1871. He became a teacher up until 1876, while assisting at the Museum of Northern Antiquities...
in Denmark. He was also a professor at the university. He supported archaeology as a science and influenced its study and excavation practices. He also influenced archaeologists in Sweden, where Nils G. Bruzelius, Hans Hildebrand
Hans Hildebrand
Hans Olof Hildebrand Hildebrand was a Swedish archeologist. Born in Stockholm, he was the son of Bror Emil Hildebrand and Anna Mathilda Ekecrantz...
and Oscar Montelius
Oscar Montelius
Oscar Montelius was a Swedish archaeologist who refined the concept of seriation, a relative chronological dating method...
followed his lead. They further developed methods for establishing chronologies through controlled excavations.
Worsaae's early work, The Primeval Antiquities of Denmark (Danmarks Oldtid oplyst ved Oldsager og Gravhøie), which explicated the three-age system, was first published in 1843 in Denmark, and in English in 1849. It strongly influenced researchers in Great Britain and the United States. For instance, Lewis Henry Morgan, a pioneering American ethnologist, developed his own three-stage system of prehistory in his book, Ancient Society (1877). He theorized that prehistoric peoples went through progressive stages of "savagery", "barbarism" and "civilization", to be traced by several criteria, including their kinship
Kinship
Kinship is a relationship between any entities that share a genealogical origin, through either biological, cultural, or historical descent. And descent groups, lineages, etc. are treated in their own subsections....
and social structures, as well as tools and cultivation.
Sources
- Gjerløff, Anne Katrine. (1999) "Syn for sagn: Dansk Arkæologi og Historie i 1800-tallet", Historisk Tidsskrift 99:2
- Gräslund, Bo. (1987) The Birth of Prehistoric Chronology. Dating Methods and Dating Systems in Nineteenth-Century Scandinavian Archeology, Cambridge University Press.
- Hermansen, V. (1934) En Oldgranskers Erindringer, København.
- Rowley-Conwy, Peter. (2006) "The Concept of Prehistory and the Invention of the Terms `Prehistoric' and `Prehistorian': the Scandinavian Origin, 1833—1850", European Journal of Archaeology 9:1 pp. 103–130
See also
- Stratification (archeology)Stratification (archeology)Stratification is a paramount and base concept in archaeology, especially in the course of excavation. It is largely based on the Law of Superposition...