Developer-Led Excavations, Geoarchaelogy & Bayesian Modelled Chronology of a Guild House and the Main Street at Medieval Odense
Federica Sulas, Cristiano Nicosia, Kirstine Haase, Mikael Manøe Bjerregaard, Søren Munch Kristiansen · Norwegian Archaeological Review · 2025
In Scandinavia, archaeological investigations have made much progress in detailing the characteristics of the earliest towns. Yet, understanding of urban stratigraphies remains limited, and this gap hampers our ability to define site formation processes and develop contextual palimpsests of town life at a formative time of urban development. This paper presents the results of a multi-scale analytical program applied to developer-led excavations of a medieval guild house and a paved street in the centre of Odense, Denmark, using soil micromorphology, trace elemental geochemistry (ICPMS) and radiocarbon-based Bayesian modelling. By integrating excavation and microstratigraphic data, our analysis shows that: (1) the use of space in the early medieval city was more dynamic than hitherto expected; (2) the guild house had separate spaces with floors that were maintained and re-laid several times; and (3) domestic waste was used to raise street levels in 1078–1162. This study also demonstrates the viability of integrating geoarchaeological methods, especially soil micromorphology and geochemistry, in developer-led excavations to aid and enhance the interpretation of complex urban stratigraphies.