A short history of research

A brief, handwritten note in the archives of the Finnish National Board of Antiquities in Helsinki records a phone call by the composer Jean Sibelius (1865-1957). The note, originally written in Swedish² and archived in 1911, reads as follows:

An old inscription on a rock cliff by artist Parviainen’s villa at Masaby, Vitrräsk.

Parviainen has a telephone and can show the site. TT etc. [Reported by] Composer Sibelius by telephone 25/1 11.

Sibelius’ chance discovery of the painting of Vitträsk, located some 20 km west of Helsinki, was the first authentic find of prehistoric rock art in Finland. As we shall see, it was a rather

2 “Äldre inskrift i en klippa vid artisten Parviainens villa i Masaby i Hvitträsk. P. har telefon och kan visa stället.

TT etc. Kompositören Sibelius i telefon 25/11 11.”

F^igure 12. Examples of birds, lizards and non-cervid mammals: a) a fox (?) from the painting at Uutelanvuori II (Miettinen 2000); b) two water-birds (swans?) from Rapakko (Kivikäs 2000); c) two lizards (?) from Värikallio (Taavitsainen 1979); d) a non-cervid mammal (bear?) from Vesitorninmäki (Miettinen 2000); e) a non-cervid mammal from Leveälahti (drawn by the author based on a photograph).

extraordinary find: even today, no parallels have been found in Finland to the rug-like net-figures of Vitträsk, but an astonishingly similar figure has been found on the shores of the Arctic Sea at Alta in Northern Norway (Helskog 1988: 101), more than a thousand kilometres north-west of Vitträsk (cf. section 2.5.2 below).

It seems a little odd that the first recorded discovery of rock art in Finland took place as late as the beginning of the 20^th century. After all, Finland was until 1809 a part of the Swed-ish kingdom – a country where the first antiquarian records of rock art were already made in the 17^th century (Hallström 1960: ix). A bit later but still early on, the first report of prehistoric rock art in Norway was made in 1788 (Hallström 1938: 22) and in Russian Karelia in 1848 (Ravdonikas 1936). As a consequence, Finnish antiquarians were likely to have been aware of rock art for several centuries, but to the best of my knowledge, the first reports concerning rock art in Finland were made only in mid-19^th century. Among these early antiquarian reports, the name of the patriot and humanist Carl Axel Gottlund (1796-1875) turns up often (e.g., Gottlund 1857; 1858; 1859; 1864). The writings of Gottlund and others (e.g., Killinen 1890: 101), who described supposed ‘rock carvings’ in the parishes of Kitee, Padasjoki, Lammi, Sortavala and elsewhere, testify to an awareness of rock art and runic inscriptions as well as to serious efforts to find such ‘monuments’ in Finland also. Yet it seems probable that none of these early reports actually described prehistoric rock carvings. In all likelihood they recorded either recent graffiti or geological rock formations mistakenly thought to be made by humans, but unfortunately many of these early discoveries were so poorly documented that later researchers have not been able relocate and study them.

Despite this lack of success, efforts to find rock art continued in the early 20^th century, as evidenced, e.g., by a small note published by the distinguished Finnish archaeologist Aarne Tallgren (1911). Tallgren ‘passionately’ urged the inhabitants of South-Western Finland to search for Scandinavian-style Bronze Age rock carvings in their surroundings. Reporting such finds would, according to Tallgren, be a “great patriotic accomplishment” (Tallgren 1911: 236). A little later, he widened the area where rock carvings might be found to the region of the Vuoksi river in Eastern Finland, the areas around the towns of Kuopio and Jyväskylä and the rivers of Northern Ostrobothnia – regions that, according to him, appeared to have contacts with the

‘Ural-Altaic world’ (Tallgren 1920).

It took six years before Sibelius’ discovery at Vitträsk was finally studied and documented by a professional archaeologist, Aarne Europaeus (1917; 1922). Europaeus recognised the importance of the find and contacted the leading Nordic authority of the time, the Swede Gustaf Hallström. Hallström took an interest in the discovery and visited Vitträsk in 1939. He produced a tracing and, thirteen years later, published a paper on the find where he pointed out the similarity between the figures of Vitträsk and certain geometric figures of North Scandi-navian rock carvings, such as Bardal in Western Norway (Hallström 1952). A few years later, moreover, he devoted an entire chapter to Finnish rock art in his influential book Monumental Art of Northern Sweden from the Stone Age (Hallström 1960: 333-36). This amount of atten-tion is surprising given the fact that ‘Finnish rock art’ at the time only consisted of a single rock painting, a somewhat dubious rock carving at the Marraskoski rapids in Northern Finland and a few carved stone items. The carving at Marraskoski, so far the only serious candidate for prehistoric carved rock art in Finland, has subsequently been destroyed. It consisted of a single figure (for photographs, see Taskinen 2000) that in fact probably dated to the historical period. Additional ‘figures’ from the site, reported by Aarni Erä-Esko (1954), were evidently geological in origin, and a recent survey of the banks of the river failed to bring to light any more rock carvings from the site (Forsberg & Walderhaug 2004).

2.4.2 The decades of professional research (1960s and 70)

It took five more decades before the next discovery of rock art was made in Finland (Luho 1964). The painting at Juusjärvi, located rather close to Vitträsk, was found by Veikko Lehtisalo in a routine archaeological survey conducted in the summer of 1963. Apparently, the painting had been known to the locals for a long time, but it was thought to be recent graffiti made by children or workmen who had been building a nearby power-line. Following this discovery, both archaeologists and amateurs began to show an increasing interest in rock art. Significantly, the next site (Valkeisaari; see Paper II) was found in 1966 by a layman who – inspired by a newspaper article about the Juusjärvi find – had spent several summers searching for rock art around his hometown of Lappeenranta on Lake Saimaa (Luho 1968a; 1968b). These dedicated efforts by laymen have proven to be very beneficial for Finnish rock art research.

In the following decade or so, many of the most significant sites were found, foremost among them the discoveries of Astuvansalmi in 1968, Verla in 1974, Saraakallio in 1975 and Värikallio in 1977 (see fig. 2 in Poutiainen & Lahelma 2004). Although the two first-mentioned sites were found by professional archaeologists, it is characteristic of this era that many if not most discoveries were reported by amateurs, who as of yet had few scientific ambitions.

The amateurs typically acted as informants for the professionals, who in most cases promptly published the finds in a series of articles (Sarvas 1969; 1970a; 1970b; Ojonen 1973; Sarvas

& Taavitsainen 1975; 1976; Taavitsainen 1977 a & b; 1979; 1981; Taavitsainen & Kinnunen 1979; Rauhala 1976; Pohjakallio 1976; 1977; Miettinen 1977). These papers reveal an enthu-siasm for a new and fascinating type of archaeological remains in the country. Although most of the papers were mainly descriptive in nature, they were complemented by a series of more reflective papers (e.g., Taavitsainen 1978; Luho 1970; 1971; Siikala 1980; 1981; Núñez 1981;

Sarvas 1975), where the meaning of the paintings was given serious consideration.

For some reason, the enthusiasm of the 1960s and 70s waned among archaeologists towards the end of the 70s and came to an almost complete standstill in the 1980s and 90s. Only a hand-ful of archaeologists – among them Timo Miettinen (e.g., 1982; 1986; 1990a; 1992), Juhani Grönhagen (1991; 1994), Milton Núñez (1994; 1995) and the Dane Jens Ipsen (1993; 1995) – continued to show any interest in Finnish rock art. The reasons for this loss of interest are unclear, since the amateurs still kept on reporting new sites, but a somewhat delayed influence from the positivist currents of New Archaeology may have played a role. Rock art apparently came to be viewed as too speculative a subject for “serious” archaeology (J.-P. Taavitsainen pers. comm). The fact that some important sites – most importantly Saraakallio – were never scientifically published may also have been a factor impeding serious research.

2.4.3 The amateurs take over (1980s and 90s)

Whatever the reasons behind the neglect of rock art shown by professional archaeologists, the fact is that in the 1980s and 90s, the study of Finnish rock art was taken over by amateurs.

Until the late 1980s, amateur enthusiasts had been content to search for rock painting sites, leaving the scientific recording and publication of the sites to the professionals. But when the interests of the professionals shifted elsewhere, amateurs began to publish their documentations and interpretations on their own. This is not to say that the development has been negative.

On the contrary, much of the amateur work has been characterised by a high level of scholarly ambition and dedication to the subject. The work of Pekka Kivikäs (b. 1932), an elementary school art teacher from Jyväskylä, deserves a special mention. Aided by a handful of dedicated rock art enthusiasts such as Risto Kupiainen and Seppo Kinos, his tireless efforts over the past twenty years have finally brought the Finnish rock art tradition the attention and appreciation it deserves.

During the 1990s and the early 21^st century, Kivikäs’ drawings and photographs have been extensively published in a series of excellent books (Kivikäs 1990; 1995; 1997; 1999; 2000;

2003 and 2005), which have made the art accessible to both researchers and the general public alike. Aside from Kivikäs, other prolific amateur researchers involved in similar projects include a second elementary school teacher, Eero Autio (1924-2002), whose publications (e.g., Autio 1983; 1988; 1989; 1991; 1993a & b; 1995; 1998) have mainly dealt with interpretation, the contemporary artist Antero Kare (2001b; 2002) and Eero Siljander, who has made his impact mainly through lectures and excursions. The role of the eminent Estonian rock art researcher Väino Poikalainen, who has been instrumental in organising amateur rock art research in Finland, must also be mentioned. Thus, even as professional archaeologists lost their interest in rock art, these and other amateur researchers managed to bring Finnish rock paintings back into public interest and have attracted a considerable number of followers – a fact that in 1998 resulted in the founding of the Finnish Society for Prehistoric Art (Suomen muinaistaideseura ry., http://www.rockart.fi/).

2.4.4 Recent developments

At the beginning of the millennium, professional archaeologists have again begun to work with rock art – a development no doubt partly inspired by the efforts of the amateurs (this dis-sertation is no exception). Studies have recently been published concerning the dating of the art (Jussila 1999; Seitsonen 2005a & b; in press), its history of research (Saavalainen 1999b;

Taskinen 2000; Lahelma 2007a), methods of study (Poutiainen & Sepänmaa 2000; Taskinen 2005; 2007a & b) and interpretation (Carpelan 2000; Lahelma 2001; 2003; 2005; Pentikäinen

& Miettinen 2003; Taskinen 2006; as well as the papers included in this dissertation). Some fieldwork projects have also been carried out, including surveys (Poutiainen & Lahelma 2004;

Forsberg & Walderhaug 2004; Poutiainen 2007) and a few small-scale excavations (see Task-inen 2006b for a review, and cf. Lahelma 2007b and Paper II in this thesis) at rock art sites.

Moreover, in addition to the present dissertation, one licentiate thesis (Saavalainen 2001) and two MA theses (Saavalainen 1999a; Lahelma 2000) have been written on Finnish rock art.

Figure 13. The interest shown by the archaeological community towards rock art in the 1970s was shared by the general public, as evidenced by the 1975 competition ‘Find your own rock painting’ arranged by the popular magazine Viikkosanomat, which resulted in the discovery of nine previously unknown rock painting sites.

From the personal archives of prof. Jussi-Pekka Taavitsainen.

One of the most encouraging developments in recent years involves the Finnish National of Board Antiquities (Finn. Museovirasto, Swe. Museiverket), which has become more active in recording, conserving and popularising rock art. These efforts have been organised mainly by the archaeologist Helena Taskinen, and their funding has been granted by two Nordic EU projects, called RockCare and Rock Art in Northern Europe (RANE) that took place between 1999 and 2005 (Taskinen 2007a: 131-6). Perhaps the most important achievement resulting from this activity has been the systematic photographic documentation of nearly all of Fin-land’s over one hundred rock painting sites. The projects also included the study and removal of lichen growing at some rock art sites. However, apart from a few rather general papers on recording and conserving rock art (Taskinen 2000; 2005; 2007) and on the types of lichen growing at rock painting sites (Vänskä 2000; 2002), the results and experiences acquired from these projects are still unpublished.

Figure 14. Kaj Borg chalks the paintings of Astuvansalmi before tracing on a hot summer day in 1968. Photo:

Pekka Sarvas/Finnish National Board of Antiquities.