A traveller’s end? - a reconsideration of a Viking Age burial at Carronbridge, Dumfriesshire

Abstract

A collection of metalwork – a sword, penannular brooch, and sickle – was found close together in 1989 at Carronbridge in north-central Dumfriesshire and they are thought to have been deposited in the ninth or tenth centuries. In the published report it was suggested that they belonged to a ‘lone traveller’, and a later review of the burial concluded that it should be raised ‘to the category of pagan Norse burials marked as ‘uncertain’’.[1] Having reconsidered the evidence and viewed the location of the Carronbridge burial I suggest that it should be moved to the ‘certain’ category. A short review of the evidence for Scandinavians in Dumfriesshire is also given, including the circumstances that may have led to the burial. [1] Owen and Welander 1995, p. 768; Graham-Campbell 2001a, p. 18 for quote.