[Bonetools] Potential styli, or other kinds of objects? (Early medieval/medieval Scandinavia)

Lena lenastrid at yahoo.com
Sun Jan 12 22:36:20 CET 2020


Dear all,
I'm researching literacy in medieval Scandinavia, and have a few artefacts from the town Sigtuna (near Stockholm) that I'm not sure about. They are classified as styli, but other such finds have been identified by clearly optimistic archaeologists (they claimed it was a stylus, I said it was a broken bone point that could just as well be a needle or garment pin as a stylus), so I'm not certain. They don't follow the standard types of styli that I recognise from England, Germany, or other Scandinavian medieval towns. Potentially they are tools of some kind, but of what? 
Stylistically, many finds from Sigtuna are similar to east Baltic/Rus artefacts - an area I have very little knowledge of. Finds from other towns nearby such as Uppsala or Stockholm are more similar to those from the Hanseatic area.

I've put up photos of the most strange ones here: https://bonesandartefacts.travel.blog/2020/01/04/writing-artefacts-from-sigtuna/

I hope someone here can give me some ideas on what these artefacts are, whether they are styli or something else.
And if anyone of you have seen so called knifeblade styli (photo on webpage), please let me know.
Best wishes,Lena
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