Database
The database is currently undergoing maintenance, but will soon be available for everyone to use again.
Our database is free to use for all history and archaeology enthusiasts. If you use our database, please do not forget to cite correctly:
Mägi, Marika; Palm, Piia Sandra. Archaeological Artefacts of Saaremaa. Foundation Osiliana / Tallinn University. Accessed: date.
The Osiliana Archaeological Database presents artefacts from Saaremaa and the surrounding small islands.
The database contains mainly Iron Age and Medieval finds that can be classified.
Undated metal or other pieces were generally excluded from the database.
Ceramics are represented by isolated examples.
The database is a work in progress and is constantly being updated.
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Dress pin, copper alloy Ornament of parallel lines, the upper edge decorated with two animal figures facing opposite directions. Most of similar pins have been found in stone graves with cremations in Saaremaa, sometimes also in West-Estonia (Mägi 2002, 104). Pins with precisely the same shape do not occur in inhumations dated after the very beginning of the 13th century.
Mägi, M. 2002. At the Crossroads of Space and Time. Graves, Changing Society and Ideology on Saaremaa (Ösel), 9th–13th Centuries AD. (CCC Papers, 6.) Tallinn.
Dress pin, copper alloy. Triangular-headed. The majority of such pins have been found in stone graves with cremations in Saaremaa, sometimes also in West-Estonia (Mägi 2002, 104). They do not occur in inhumation graves after the very beginning of the 13th century. Some such pins are also known from the Livic area in Latvia, where they probably mark graves of Saaremaa women (e.g. Zariņa 2006, Pl. 209: 2).
Mägi, M. 2002. At the Crossroads of Space and Time. Graves, Changing Society and Ideology on Saaremaa (Ösel), 9th–13th Centuries AD. (CCC Papers, 6.) Tallinn.
Zariņa, A. 2006. Salaspils Laukskolas kapulauks 10.–13. gadsimts. Rīga: Latvijas Vēstures Institūta Apgāds.
Dress pin, copper alloy. The majority of such pins have been found in stone graves with cremations in Saaremaa, sometimes also in West-Estonia (Mägi 2002, 104). They do not occur in inhumation graves after the very beginning of the 13th century. Some such pins are also known from the Livic area in Latvia, where they probably mark graves of Saaremaa women (e.g. Zariņa 2006, Pl. 209: 2).
Mägi, M. 2002. At the Crossroads of Space and Time. Graves, Changing Society and Ideology on Saaremaa (Ösel), 9th–13th Centuries AD. (CCC Papers, 6.) Tallinn.
Zariņa, A. 2006. Salaspils Laukskolas kapulauks 10.–13. gadsimts. Rīga: Latvijas Vēstures Institūta Apgāds.
Dress pin, copper alloy. Triangular-headed. The majority of such pins have been found in stone graves with cremations in Saaremaa, sometimes also in West-Estonia (Mägi 2002, 104). They do not occur in inhumation graves after the very beginning of the 13th century. Some such pins are also known from the Livic area in Latvia, where they probably mark graves of Saaremaa women (e.g. Zariņa 2006, Pl. 209: 2).
Mägi, M. 2002. At the Crossroads of Space and Time. Graves, Changing Society and Ideology on Saaremaa (Ösel), 9th–13th Centuries AD. (CCC Papers, 6.) Tallinn.
Zariņa, A. 2006. Salaspils Laukskolas kapulauks 10.–13. gadsimts. Rīga: Latvijas Vēstures Institūta Apgāds.
Pin shaft, copper alloy. According to the shape of the loop from the end of the 12th century or from the 13th century.
Viltina
Pin shaft, copper alloy.
Viltina
Double cross-headed pin with connected terminals, copper alloy.
Double cross-headed pin with connected terminals, copper alloy. Such pins are mainly found in inhumations from the 13th-century but were possibly taken into use as early as in the end of the 12th century (see also Mägi et al. 2018, 94, Fig. 14: 1).
Mägi, M.; Malve, M. & Toome, T. 2019. Early Christian burials at Valjala churchyard, Saaremaa. – Archaeological Fieldwork in Estonia 2018, 93−118.
Scales, copper alloy. In both Estonian and Latvian archaeological material scales of this type appeared in the end of the 10th century and were used until the 13th century (Berga 2017, 62). Scales were used mainly to weigh silver (Laul & Tamla 2014, 39).
Berga, T. 2017. The distribution and chronology of trading equipment in present-day Latvia in the tenth to thirteenth centuries. – Archaeologica Baltica, 24: 59–77.
Laul, S. & Tamla, Ü. 2014. Peitleid Lõhavere linnamäelt: Käsitöö- ja ehtevakk 13. sajandi algusest. (Õpetatud Eesti Seltsi Kirjad 10). Õpetatud Eesti Selts, Tartu–Tallinn.
Viltina
Spherical weight, copper alloy and iron.
