First Confirmed Iron Age Whale Bones in Scania Reveal Hidden Trade and Craft Networks in Ancient Sweden

A handful of forgotten whale bones, stored for decades in museum archives, has opened a new window onto Iron Age life in southern Sweden.

A new study published in Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports identifies the first confirmed finds of baleen whale remains from Iron Age Scania, a region better known for settlements, craft production and its position within the wider Scandinavian exchange world. The bones, originally excavated in the 1960s and 1970s at Västra Karaby and Stockholmsgården, were rediscovered in the collections of the Historical Museum at Lund University during recent inventory work.

The discovery does not simply add whales to the map of ancient Scandinavian fauna. It points to something more archaeologically revealing: the movement of whale bone as a valued raw material through long-distance networks during the Iron Age and Viking Age.

Using Zooarchaeology by Mass Spectrometry, known as ZooMS, researchers identified remains belonging to humpback whale, fin whale and either North Atlantic right whale or bowhead whale. The method analyses collagen peptide markers in bone, allowing scientists to identify species even when skeletal fragments are difficult to classify by shape alone.

For Scania, the result is significant. Until now, confirmed baleen whale finds from Iron Age contexts in the region were unknown.

Museum archives held the evidence for decades

The four whale bones examined in the study came from two Iron Age settlements in southern Sweden. Three were recovered from Västra Karaby, where excavations revealed a large Late Iron Age settlement with numerous pit houses. The fourth came from Stockholmsgården, a site in Valleberga parish partly excavated under the direction of Swedish archaeologist Märta Strömberg.

The bones were not new field discoveries. They had already been unearthed decades ago, then preserved in museum storage. Their scientific importance emerged only after researchers revisited old archaeological collections with modern analytical tools.

That detail matters. Archaeological archives often contain material that could not be fully studied at the time of excavation. In this case, the combination of careful curation and new biochemical methods turned overlooked animal bones into evidence for wider economic and craft practices in Iron Age Scandinavia.

Three whale taxa identified

The study identified one specimen from Västra Karaby as either North Atlantic right whale or bowhead whale. ZooMS cannot separate these two closely related taxa because they share the same peptide markers. Another specimen from the same site was identified as fin whale, making it the first confirmed find of this species in Scania.

Two other specimens, one from Västra Karaby and one from Stockholmsgården, were identified as humpback whale. The Stockholmsgården bone is particularly intriguing. It is an atlas vertebra, the uppermost vertebra of the spine, and it had three drilled holes. It also showed wear marks, but the researchers note that no clear parallel for the object is currently known.

The modifications suggest the bone had been worked by people before deposition. At Västra Karaby, one whale bone fragment was heavily partitioned and abraded, exposing the spongy internal bone tissue. Another bore chop marks from being separated from the vertebral body. These traces point toward craft activity rather than simple food waste.

Whale bone as a craft material

The strongest interpretation is that these bones were part of a craft economy. Whale bone was large, dense and workable. In northern Europe, it could be used for specialised objects, including gaming pieces, tools or other crafted items.

Västra Karaby appears to fit this pattern. The whale bones were found in features such as pit houses and wells, within an area that may have functioned as a workshop zone. The settlement is also associated with other craft activities, including bronze casting. This makes the whale bones less likely to be random debris and more likely to represent raw material brought into a production environment.

This conclusion also changes how the finds should be understood. The bones do not necessarily prove that fin whales, humpback whales or right whales were swimming off the Scanian coast at the moment these objects entered the settlement. They may have come from stranded whales, hunted whales or traded material that travelled from another region.

The authors caution against treating archaeological whale bones from Late Iron Age settlements as straightforward evidence for local whale populations. In a world of active exchange, the bone itself may have moved a long distance before it was cut, drilled, used or deposited.

Scania’s place in Iron Age exchange

The study places the Scanian finds within a broader southern Scandinavian pattern. The Viking Age trading centre of Haithabu, in present-day Germany, has produced the largest number of Iron Age baleen whale specimens in the region. Haithabu was a major nodal point for trade, craft and redistribution.

Västra Karaby was much smaller, but the new evidence suggests that even modest settlements could take part in wider resource networks. Whale bone was not confined to elite centres or great emporia. It could circulate through more local craft communities, where imported or redistributed materials were transformed into useful or symbolic objects.

That makes the discovery important beyond marine archaeology. It adds another layer to the economic life of Iron Age Scandinavia, showing how inland or coastal settlements could be connected to maritime resources through trade, craft and social networks.

A rare glimpse of lost whale histories

The findings also contribute to the deeper history of whales in northern Europe. Before large-scale commercial whaling, baleen whales were more common in European waters than they are today. Species such as the North Atlantic right whale, now critically endangered, once had a much wider historical presence.

Still, the Scanian bones must be read carefully. They may help reconstruct human engagement with whales, but they are less secure as direct evidence for where those whales lived or died. The archaeology is clearer than the biogeography: Iron Age people valued whale bone, worked it and moved it through exchange systems.

The most striking lesson may be methodological. These bones were not discovered by a dramatic new excavation, but by returning to old collections with new questions. In museum drawers and storage rooms, other overlooked fragments may still hold evidence of ancient trade, vanished animals and forgotten crafts.

For Iron Age Scania, the whale bones now show that the region was not isolated from the maritime economies of northern Europe. Even a small settlement could contain traces of distant seas.

Macheridis, S., Rosengren, E., Greeves, S., Eklöv Pettersson, P., & Rundgren, M. (2026). First confirmed finds of baleen whale from Iron Age Scania, Sweden, and their archaeological implications. Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports, 71, 105720. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jasrep.2026.105720

Cover Image Credit: AI-generated illustration created by the author for visual representation of the Iron Age baleen whale bone findings in Scania