The archaeology of genocide, war crimes, and mass death has become a growing sub-discipline in recent decades, with the most attention given to the locations of National Socialist ‘terror and mass death’. Within genocide research, the porajmos, or genocide of Romani people, is not a well-known topic, especially in Slovenia. Contrary to popular belief, the mistreatment of Romani and violence against them was not inflicted only by the Nazis and their allies, but by pro-communist-orientated Slovenian partisans as well. Archaeological traces of three mass executions have provided us with evidence of serious and poignant crimes committed against the Romani ethnic minority. The remains might have a significant role in determining whether these crimes are a part of porajmos or not and represent a unique material testimony of crimes against the Romani population in the Slovenian and the wider European context.

In much of Europe, the advent of low-input cereal farming regimes between c.ad 800 and 1200 enabled landowners—lords—to amass wealth by greatly expanding the amount of land under cultivation and exploiting the labour of others. Scientific analysis of plant remains and animal bones from archaeological contexts is generating the first direct evidence for the development of such low-input regimes. This article outlines the methods used by the FeedSax project to resolve key questions regarding the ‘cerealization’ of the medieval countryside and presents preliminary results using the town of Stafford as a worked example. These indicate an increase in the scale of cultivation in the Mid-Saxon period, while the Late Saxon period saw a shift to a low-input cultivation regime and probably an expansion onto heavier soils. Crop rotation appears to have been practised from at least the mid-tenth century.

This article presents the findings of the minimally destructive biomolecular species identification method known as ZooMS (zooarchaeology by mass spectrometry) to identify the use and choices of resources for manufacturing leather shoes in urban contexts in Viking and medieval Denmark. Whereas parchment and historical skin samples have been previously analysed by ZooMS, the potential of the method is demonstrated here for archaeological, vegetable-tanned, and waterlogged leather from the eleventh to thirteenth-century Danish cities of Ribe, Odense, and Viborg. Sheep, goat, and cattle were used to produce shoes, with explicit choices of species for specific purposes. The selection seems to be largely based on the skins’ material properties, suggesting that functionality was more important than signalling. The urban environment is seen as promoting synergy among providers of resources, crafts, and customers.

In 2017, eight runestones on Bornholm were scanned in 3D and the microtopography of the grooves was analysed by multivariate statistical methods. One of the stones was previously not known to runological research. The aim of this paper is to compare the carving technique of the Bornholm runestones with runestones from Swedish regions to shed light on old issues concerning Bornholm's links with other regions in and around the Baltic Sea. The rune carvers are important agents in this, as the runestones are often related to issues including landholding, Christianization, possible Swedish influences, and the inclusion of Bornholm into the Danish realm. In addition, rune carvers as native writers were intimately connected to the introduction of literacy. The results of this study indicate that the rune carvers did not cooperate much with carvers from the islands of Öland and Gotland, whereas Södermanland, among the Swedish mainland provinces, was their first choice.

The importance of fish for the medieval and early modern economy in the Baltic Sea is known through separate studies by historians and archaeologists. This article aims to combine zooarchaeological data with account books from castles in Kastelholm (Åland Islands) and Raseborg (south-western coast of Finland) in order to understand the processing and transport of fish in the area. Fish was paid as tax by the peasants but was also fished by the castle fishermen and brought to the castles to be consumed there. Here, the preserved fish products are primarily studied through pike and cod, which represent the main economically important larger fish species in the Baltic Sea. The study reveals some differences between the castles studied and the importance of fish for the castle economy.

Hobby metal detecting is a controversial subject. Legal and policy approaches differ widely across national and regional contexts, and the attitudes of archaeologists and heritage professionals towards detectorists are often polarized and based on ethical or emotive arguments. We, the European Public Finds Recording Network (EPFRN), have implemented collaborative approaches towards detectorist communities in our respective contexts (Denmark, England and Wales, Finland, Flanders, and the Netherlands). Although our motivations are affected by our national circumstances, we base our work on an agreed set of goals, practices, and visions. This article presents the EPFRN's vision statement and provides insight into its underlying thoughts. We hope to create a debate on how to develop best practice approaches that acknowledge the inherent challenges of hobby metal detecting while realizing its potential.

Far from being a simple annual round determined by the calendar, seasonality in human societies is a complex system of interdependence between humans and non-humans. It requires close attentiveness to the variability of soils, weather, topography, plants, and animals across both time and space. In this article, the author investigates mobile systems of interdependence that take advantage of topographical and seasonal variation. He uses a range of case studies from early modern Scotland and Cyprus, focusing on summer grazing in the uplands and lowland agriculture carried out by mountain communities. After a comparative discussion of seasonality, the article examines the role of topography and movement, and then puts the ‘margins at the centre’ in order to highlight the central role played by seasonal activity and movement in rural society.