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The first thing most people picture when they think of Greenland is unlikely to be lush green pastures and grazing sheep, but the UNESCO Kujataa area in south Greenland has a rich heritage of sheep farming that began over a thousand years ago with the Norse and continues with Inuit farming communities today. Greenland RESPONSE is a short documentary film which explores this farming heritage through the lens of archaeology, following an international team of researchers racing to excavate organic remains from Norse sites rapidly degrading due to rising global temperatures.

I joined the team relatively last minute – in May 2022 I had a phone call with lead archaeologist Konrad Smiarowski and a month later in June I arrived in Narsarsuaq with my camera gear and instructions on how to find my way to the harbour in Igaliku where the team would pick me up and take me back to camp in Vatnahverfi. Two boat journeys, a short hike and an ATV ride later and I arrived at Qorlortukasik – better known as ‘Andala’s farm’ – where the rest of the team had been set up for a week already. That first summer was spent getting to know the team and familiarising myself with the archaeology. I often find it hard to describe what I do in a single job title because working in science communication means I need to be a ‘jack of all trades’ to some extent. It is perhaps simplest to start at the beginning – I studied archaeology at university and from there specialised as a reconstruction artist and illustrator which has seen me working with animation, 3D modelling, interaction design, painting, drawing – and now filmmaking. Having this background in archaeology helps me quickly embed into projects and, particularly when I’m working on architectural reconstructions, being able to jump in and dig with the team is an invaluable part of the process.

In Vatnahverfi however, the story wasn’t so much in understanding the buildings. Instead, the aim of this project was to excavate middens from two significant Norse farm sites at Qorlortukasik and Tasilikulooq. These sites were identified as being at a higher risk from a combination of erosion (Qorlortukasik) and drying out of previously waterlogged soil (Tasilikulooq) risking the continued preservation of organic remains. Early in the fieldwork I sat down for a chat with project leaders Konrad Smiarowski (University of Bergen Museum) and Michael Nielsen (Greenland National Museum & Archives) to discuss what story we wanted to tell. It became apparent that there was an interesting parallel narrative emerging in the relationship between the Norse farmers in the past and the modern Inuit farming community in the area today.

In making the film we wanted to bring a together a balance of specialist insights from archaeologists alongside perspectives from local voices and to make clear the tangible connection between farming in the past and present. To begin with we spoke with local farmers Andala Lund and Magnus Hansen. Both are good friends of the project and have a keen interest in the Norse farms which shaped the landscape they continue to farm on today. For the archaeologists too, this is a mutual interest as the farmers often share insights into their local knowledge of the landscape and the challenges of farming in this unique environment.

For archaeologist Michael Nielsen these connections to place are especially meaningful. Michael is a Greenlander and grew up in the town of Narsaq, one fjord over from where we are working now. Over the course of the project the two of us formed an effective team not just because he was able to lead the interviews in his first language of Kalaallisut, but his knowledge of the character and identity of the region helped to define the story we wanted to tell. Michael also seems to know absolutely everybody in south Greenland and it’s impossible to go anywhere without stopping to chat – an ideal situation for a filmmaker arriving to south Greenland for the first time and getting a feel for the place and people.

Back onsite the conversation often reflected on how much these sites were changing since the early excavations when it was not uncommon to find leather artefacts and even feathers. Today there are fewer and fewer surviving organic remains across these sites and frequently the faunal material from the midden are described as ‘butter bone’ – bone so degraded it smears like butter when touched. Almost entirely useless when it comes to diagnostics and further analysis.  Of course, not all sites are in such poor condition, the midden at Tasilikulooq is waterlogged enough that the material is still well preserved – a contrast that gives pause for thought to just how much we have certainly lost to the past 30 or so years of rapid anthropogenic global warming.

The changing climate and increasingly uncharacteristically unpredictable weather is a topic the locals bring up frequently also. I rejoined the team in the field again in 2023 to wrap up filming and help with some excavation. Rising global temperatures compounded by a strong El Niño phase that year made for an especially dry summer in the inner fjords. The farmers were worried about their fodder crops for the coming winter, while the archaeologists were being toasted alive in the field. I messaged the crew to see if I could pick up anything from town on my way in and received a one-word response – “suncream!”.

Working in archaeology might not seem like an obvious place from which to contribute to narratives around climate change, but in certain circumstances it can present a unique perspective on how people adapted (or not) to changes in the past. In some ways it is an opportunity to consider what it means to be resilient when we are faced with an uncertain future. What we can be certain of is that in the coming years the urgency to excavate these increasingly fragile sites and rescue what remains is only going to increase.

 

The film is an outcome of the NSF grant “Coproduction of knowledge and the building of local archaeological capacity in Greenland” by Hunter College CUNY with principal investigators Tom McGovern (IHOPE SSC), Jette Arneborg, Konrad Smiarowski, Christian Koch Madsen, and Ian Simpson. The project was funded by the National Science Foundation with support from the Greenland National Museum, UNESCO Bridges, NABO and the University of Iceland.

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