Moa Råhlander
About me
Researching beads from Gotland during the period 300-1100 with a focus on their manufacture and how they are used to articulate and communicate identity and gender in the Vendel and Viking Period cultural spheres.
About
Bachelor's degree in laboratory archaeology focused on glass manufacturing waste from Birka.
Master's degree in archaeology at Stockholm University with a thesis comparing bead assemblages from sites in southern England and central Sweden, focused on how the beads were selected and used. Doctoral student in archaeology since January 2018.
Before university, a varied career in crafts and art schools: bronze casting and stonemasonry in Skinnskatteberg, blacksmithing at Nyckelviken, tannery and leather sewing at Bäckedal, glass bead making at, among others, Kosta Boda, and has held courses in Sculptural flamework in Sweden and the USA.
Proud recipient of the International Society of Glass Beadmakers Student Scholarship 2020 and the Svea Order's Scholarship for research in Swedish culture and history in the period 500-1500.
Research
In my project, The Attributes of Beads, I study glass and stone beads in the Scandinavian cultural sphere during the first millennium AD. I am working on developing a technotypological system to classify glass beads based on the techniques used in their manufacture.
My main material is the beads from the burial field of Ire (traditionally spelled ‘Ihre’) on Gotland, approximately 3717 beads distributed across 362 graves from the Roman Iron Age to the early Middle Ages.
The study aims to achieve new understanding of the position of beads in a social, cultural and economic context during the period in question. Beads are valuable, long-lived objects with connections to gender roles, mythology and superstition as well as to trans-European trade during prehistoric and early historical times in Scandinavia.
Supervisors
Main supervisor - Associate Professor Jan Apel
Supervisor Dr. Alison Klevnäs, Department of Archaeology and Ancient History, Uppsla University.
Supervisor Professor Emeritus, Johan Callmer, Lund
Selection of Publikations:
The Långön pouch is not made from lizard skin (2017)
How Beads come Together : Late Iron Age glass beads as past possessions and present sources (2017)
(PDF) Råhlander, 2020, A chaine operatoire of concentric circles (2020)
Researching beads from Gotland during the period 300-1100 with a focus on their manufacture and how they are used to articulate and communicate identity and gender in the Vendel and Viking Period cultural spheres.