VSF 2010 Report - Nabo

Descriptions of Sections
Trench 42
The southern part of the boundary wall was clearly resting directly on a podzol with a thin
A horizon and an eluviated E horizon (grey coloured), similar to the soils directly
underlying the Viking Age buildings, which had also been used to construct their turf
walls. As can clearly be seen in Figure 2, this podzol was truncated to the north and south
of the wall, and had been used to construct the earliest phase of the wall (light coloured
layer 7, Figure 2b). Only two courses of this eariest wall were preserved, and there was
second phase of wall construction overlying it, which was made from a more reddish
coloured turf. Although not visible in the section, in the sourthern part of the trench, resting
on this reddish turf, there was a large stone that must have been deliberately placed there in
order to help shore up the southern edge of the wall and keep it from collapsing down the
slope to the south. This reddish turf was only preserved to a maximum thickness of 15 cm,
and was overlain by a third phase of wall construction, this one consisting of a dark brown
andisol that was indistinguishable from the surrounding soils (see Figure 2a). Since the
Hekla-1693 tephra was not visible in this turf, it seems likely that this third phase is
relatively recent in date – perhaps 18th or 19th century – but of course this remains
impossible to prove. Finally, a fence post had been placed on the northern edge of the wall,
and a piece of barbed wire (introduced to Iceland in 1903-4; Broddi 1904) was found in the
topsoil, indicating that this boundary had been in use until at least the early 20th century,
even though the fence line is now considerably further south.
Trench 43
Unlike the southern part of the boundary wall, the western part of the wall buried a very
stoney/gravelly brown soil with no clear evidence for an eluviated horizon; it was wetter in
this immediate area and was apparently not well enough drained for a podzol to develop.
Two different phases of wall construction were clearly in evidence, the earlier of which
was constructed of turves taken from this brown soil, but also contained one turf that was
taken from a podzol (see Figure 3a and the light coloured layer 5 in Figure 3b). At least
three courses of this turf phase were preserved in the section. Overlying it was another
phase of turf construction preserved to at least three courses, which was made up of a
strong brown and dark brown coloured turf, which had been stacked mainly on the eastern
(inner edge) of the older turf. Finally, a post hole was dug directly into the top of the turf
wall, probably in the early 20th century, when farmers were encouraged to use barbed wire
fencing to enclose their homefields (Broddi 1904). This fence post was subsequently
removed, and the current fence line was placed a few meters to the east of the turf
boundary wall.
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