The Secondary State in South Scandinavia

Chapter Summary

This chapter outlined the problems and approaches to the study of unification during the Late Iron Age in south Scandinavia. Locational analyses and cultural geographic methodologies on three scales of analysis—local, provincial, and regional—can resolve the problematic nature of the archaeological record of central authority, while sparse but important documents can contextualize the transition to a state. Research questions and methods are summarized, and a summary describes how different parts of Denmark underwent widely divergent courses of integration and that a clear set of strategies was employed by rulers during the period of unification in order to accomplish their goals of fully controlling and exploiting all their territories. The following chapter will detail the problems and solutions for studying the transition to state-level society in Denmark.