Skandfer et al./Archaeological Perspectives on Hunter-Gatherer Landscapes, 5. Modern Ecological Structure and Lithic Resources of Northern Norway

Archaeological and anthropological discussions of human relationships with the environment in northern Norway are usually based on a fundamental dichotomy between the coast and the inland. This crude folk classification does capture the significant differences between maritime and terrestrial environments, but it glides over the important variations found in each zone. Furthermore, with respect to our focus – the archaeology of the inland – the dichotomy is not informative as to what constitutes the boundary of the ‘inland’ relative to the ‘coast’. Such bounding, of course, is primarily a matter of cultural perception, so we need to address how we have drawn our imaginary limits to our study area. In this chapter we first outline the primary physical and climatic parameters of the region, which underlie the common perceptions of coast/inland contrasts. We then focus in on the two areas which have framed the research of the LARM project (Landscape and Resource Management in Interior Arctic Norway 2500 BC-AD 1000 – see Chapter 1, this volume): Troms and Finnmark counties. For each county we consider important local variations in topography and ecosystems, the current vegetation and faunal distributions, and the availability of lithic raw materials of relevance to prehistoric peoples. This overview provides a general orientation for the reader, relevant to early modern times and at least as far back as the Middle Ages.