Photo. Stone Age people in the Kierikki Stone Age village, Finland. © Travel Explorations.
They weared clothes in animal skin and furs. Mysterious figures guarded the village. Long log houses stood around. Smoke rose up. Someone cooked food and kept the warm from a bonfire. It was a quite day, but after a while I heard laughing and talking inside the village. The Stone Age in Finland had still not gone!
It was a little bit quite that day, but I had to blame the weather. In the village there were opportunities for experience the Stone Age life by eating food, drinks, work with skin, bone willow, stone, wood, clay and fire, and make stone jewellery! First and foremost I find it exciting to test my hunting skills with archery.
In the beginning my shooting didn’t go so well. I searched for the shaman to get help, but I could not find him. I really hoped he could help me to get in contact with the forest spirits so I could succeed better in my hunting efforts. Just little bit support from witchcraft was all I needed. I could observe strange figures around in the village, and I guessed they where the spirits who protected the dwellers. In the end I had to trust my own power in shooting.
| Photo. Stone Age people in the Kierikki Stone Age village, Finland. © Travel Explorations. |
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The spirits were everywhere in the village. Some was small, and other big. The all looked scary to me.
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Photo. A kind of totem spirit in the Kierikki Stone Age village, Finland.
© Travel Explorations.
A circle of stones were laying around the big mysterious forest spirit.
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Walking in this reconstructed Stone Age village, and participating in activities gave me a fascinating impression of how it was like the past. I looked around and continued walking on a path at the other side of the village. On this path I become familiar with several kind of traps used for catching bears, foxes and other animals.
Photo. Spirits in the Kierikki Stone Age village, Finland.
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Discoveries at the site
On the excavation Thursday 12th July 2007 it was found a part of an amber ring, according to information on the centre’s website. I spoke to the leader of the excavation who also told me about the find. Someone had made a hole in the ring so it could still be used as jewellery. The amber ring was transported from the Baltic coast around 5500-6000 years ago as payment for seal skins that were produced in the Kierikki area in the Neolithic Period. The excavators were really very happy about find, and it encouraged them to dig for more interesting finds.
Photo. Excavation near the Kierikki Stone Age village, Finland.
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The excavation leader also told me about that the level of sea water has sunken from the top many metres since the Stone Age. The seashore receded so much that the houses where no longer on the shore, and the distance to hunting grounds and water routes grew. The people lived at that time moved the village to a new site closer to the shoreline.
The excavation leader didn’t think UNESCO wouldn’t consider approving this area as a World Heritage site because there were no spectacular discoveries of big size.
At the Kierikki Stone Age Centre, I really was really amazed to find boomerangs displayed in the exhibition. Since I mostly associate boomerangs with the Australian Aborigines, I didn’t expect to find boomerangs here, but it made me aware of that boomerangs and other similar items have used other places on our globe.
Between the 1960's and 2000, hundreds of dwellings were found and nearly twenty were excavated producing thousands of finds from the Neolithic period (5000-3000 BC). In 1993, important remains of a few dozen Stone Age Kuuselankangas dwellings were discovered.
Photo. Stone circles in the Kierikki Stone Age village, Finland.
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About two km from where Kierikki Centre is located, almost by the road, there is a 64 m long depression of ancient rowhouse. At this site there are 7 houses connected together with wide doorway, which is visible even today (source: Kierikki Stone Age Centre www.kierikki.fi).
Excavation has been made in 1998 when only a small area was excavated. New information was found of "Kierikki" type rowhouses and slight remains on walls were also found. Several amber buttons was also found, which was a sign of high level of living in Stone Age.
Prehistoric fishing methods
It was also interesting for me to study ancient fishing methods. I took my way up along the river Iijoki, about a kilometre to the east of Kierikki Stone Age Centre. There it was a prehistoric fishing camp located in a beautiful area with green forest.
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Photo. A fishing site near the Stone Age Village.
At the Stone Age time the river was a rich source of food year around.
© Travel Explorations.
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The history of fishing, beginning from the Stone Age, is depicted at the camp. The camp's trapping tackle was made based on Kierikki's archaeological finds and ethnological models. A lean-to has been built in the area, as well as a fish weir, wooden splint fish trap and fish chest.
The earliest stage of occupation is called the Stone Age (c. 8000-1300BC). During that time tools, weapons and ornaments were made of stone or other organic materials like bone and wood. The population lived by hunting and fishing and the animals most important to them were the elk, the seal and the beaver. At the very end of the Stone Age agriculture and cattle breeding made their first appearance in Finland.
The nature has changed much since the hey days of the Stone Age in the area. The water has pulled back and now the highest spots, where the Stone Age people lived, are surrounded by forest. Anyway the forest can not hide the past from eager explorers and archaeologists. They are continuously putting the life in the past together piece for piece. For me it was a great lesson for life getting a realistic experience of a lifestyle and culture existing for many thousand years ago.
Stein Morten Lund, 15 August 2007
Additional information
Read more about the Finnish Stone Age on our website www.TravelExplorations.com.
……at the Kierikki Stone Age Centre in Finland, I really was really amazed to find boomerangs displayed in a museum….
General information about the Stone Age in Finland:
The earliest stage of occupation is called the Stone Age (c. 8000-1300BC). During that time tools, weapons and ornaments were made of stone or other organic materials like bone and wood. The population lived by hunting and fishing and the animals most important to them were the elk, the seal and the beaver. At the very end of the Stone Age agriculture and cattle breeding made their first appearance in Finland.
Finland has the oldest bedrock in EU. It was found in the Siuruankangas heath in the village of Siurua. The rather modest looking rock dates back 3,5 billion years.
Kierikki Stone Age Centre, Yli-Ii, Finland.
Kierikkicenter, Pahkalantie 447, 91200 Yli-Ii.
Phone Customer service: +358-8-8170 490
E-mail: asiakaspalvelu@kierikki.fi
Website: www.kierikki.fi
Recommended book about Heritages and Cultures in Finland:
By the Rivers – The Cultural and Nature Route pf Oulu Arc, Kierikki Stone Age Centra, Sini Annala & Sami Viljanmaa.
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