Green Building Design Principles Inspired by Pre-Historic ... - PLEA

Green Building Design Principles Inspired by Pre-
Historic Scandinavian Architecture
Dr. Ing. David Benjamin, Arkitekt MNAL, LEED Accredited Professional
Environmental Design Partners, Inc., Ft. Lauderdale, U.S.A.
ABSTRACT: A PhD dissertation done by the author at the Norwegian Institute of Science and
Technology in 1993, and subsequent building design experience, seems to indicate that principles
gleaned from pre-historic Scandinavian dwelling architecture provides useful design principles and
inspirational ideas for the contemporary practice of architecture.
From the European Bronze age through the Iron Age, the design of dwellings and their surrounding
landscapes had to deal with the following difficult trends: A harsh climate, an increasing lack of
heating fuel, an increasing de-mineralization of the soil, and an increasing lack of tree cover.
House and village design, along with the general landscape design of the era, shows that many
inhabitants of the region found relatively successful strategies for environmental design, apparently
by thinking of the design problem as an integration of the elements of the contemporary life-ways of
the society, with first, building and landscape design, and secondly, with symbols such as the
home.
Through diagrams and text, the presentation will propose ways of thinking about modern green
building from a holistic landscape perspective and make suggestions concerning methodology,
drawing from archaeology, the anthropological study of buildings in non-literate societies, and the
phenomenology of how we interpret the value and order of settlement landscapes.
Conference Topic: 8 Traditional solutions in sustainable perspective
Category: pre-history, landscape
INTRODUCTION
For Europe, the contemporary view of pre-historic
Architecture as either the predecessor of the urban
environment or the relics of primitive peoples
beneath our consideration is only a small part of the
story and an unfortunate waste of both existing
museum intellectual capacity and the cultural
memory of the European sub-continent.
Thus, when we look back in time, we compare
what we know of our own lives and the
environmental performance of buildings familiar to
us, and we think that the wattle and daub or wood
and stone buildings of the medieval or pre-Christian
north were uncomfortable, temporary, rugged, and
lacking in aesthetic finesse, [1], [2], [3], cf. [4]. On
the other hand, modern society makes a broad and
definitive distinction between pre-historic Northern
European building traditions and the high-style fine
cultural traditions of Architecture in the
Mediterranean and the Fertile Crescent.
However, we know from recent 20 th Century
scholarly studies of building performance [5] that
definitive measures of physical performance can be
tested for and these same measures may be
applied to any building or shelter design. Hawkes,
McDonald, and Steemers recent work shows that
architecture must be, “…illuminated by a historical
sense, that solutions in architecture cannot be
fashioned only by the application of pragmatic,
analytical processes,” and should, realize, ”…the
possibility of making a return to a rich relationship
between climate and comfort in which a building is
understood as a complex system of interrelated
uses, spaces, materials, components and sources
of energy.” [6]
Recent work in ecological anthropology and
geography have shown that many long-lived
traditional societies integrate not only the
components of the building, but also the design and
awareness of the surrounding landscape into their
architecture. We also know from the study of
anthropology, archaeology, and general culture
studies, that all societies have created objects,
artificial environments, and symbolic stories of not
only profound meaning but very often of valuable
practical consequence for daily life. Thus, besides
shelter from the cold and protection from intruders,
it is apparent that a unique capacity of the built
environment of all societies and of all eras is to “…
order space and organize human contact.” [7], cf.
[8], [9]. Traditional cultures tend to use symbolic
stories, artifacts and the built environment in a

dynamic and reflexive relationship [10] to inspire
their own life and settlement, as both a fitting legacy
to their ancestors and as a continuous refinement of
design and the adaptation to climate, geography,
historical circumstance, and their changing culture
and social mores. Should it not be also important
for the vague constellation of ‘Western’ society to
critically examine how the guiding myths of our own
society interact with the production of built space,
and especially the influence on energy use, natural
resources use, and our tacit ideas of efficiency and
phronesis? This would require a more
thoroughgoing examination of the development of
Occidental settlement traditions from the earliest
times, also the early traditions of Northern Europe.
Finally, the developing study of pre-historic
European settlement as a design and research
activity will engender a more critical and broad
based dialogue with the environmentally sensitive
settlement traditions of more traditional or
indigenous societies. The ‘Western’ development
of the theory and methodology of relating guiding
myths and socio-historic injunctions to building
design will assist with the general development of
theory and methodology for such studies, and this
will be useful in examining how Occidental society
interprets the environmental knowledge of ‘other’
cultures.
These three points contribute to the notion
among scholars of culture and the built environment
that the field of pre-historic Architecture is an
interesting subject of study because of 1. the
disputed contemporary interpretations of what we
know of the subject, 2. what information may be
useful to contemporary society to learn about the
making of environmentally sensitive buildings and
settlements that integrate the guiding myths of
society, familial goals, and economic needs from a
full cost accounting perspective, 3. the interest in
testing different theory schemata about the past
and the methodologies used to study it, and 4. the
apparent lacunae in the knowledge. Indeed, many
archaeologists and other students of culture look to
settlement design to understand relationships within
society, such as between form and size and
economic level or between geographical location
and status. [11], [12], [13], [14].
2. THE CASE STUDIES
In order to illustrate some of the methodology of
studying ancient dwellings as architecture and to
summarize some of the findings, I will here focus on
two of the five case studies of the original PhD
dissertation, Groentoft and Gervide.
Each case study was originally studied by
examining excavation reports, the archaeologist’s
interpretations, and evaluating 1:1 reconstructions
as livable dwelling house museum reconstructions.
The case studies represented here are based on
complex reconstructions however. In other words,
Groentoft and Gervide are not simple reproductions
of the excavator’s findings. The reconstructed
house at the Lejre Historical - Archaeological
Research Centre by Hansen and Draiby [15], is a
combination of different houses from Groentoft and
some speculation from the museum staff. The
Gervide landscape is based on the Iron Age
settlement of that name, while Naesman’s [16],
house reconstruction for Gervide is based on a
nearby in space and time excavation called
Vallhager, which had similiar soil conditions,
geology, climate and building traditions.
3. GROENTOFT
The 60 M 2 (5M x 12M), Groentoft house XVII
pictured in Figures 1 and 2 was built within a walled
village of 5 dwelling/byre houses and associated
barns, being one stage of a continuous settlement
of an area of Jutland heath from about 500 to 200
B.C. [17].
Figure 1: Groentoft House XVII plan.
Figure 2: Long section of Grontoft
House XVII.
Figure 3 shows the village excavation plan from
Becker, and Figure 4 is a composite plan of the
excavated landscape showing the successive
settlements in the apparent socio-historical territory
of the continuous Groentoft. According to the
excavator Becker [18], and Jensen writing later [19],
every 1 or 2 generations of villagers would burn
down the settlement and move to another site

within their territory. Archaeologists surmise that
this process along with the phosphorous from the
midden, provided much needed minerals to the soil,
as the old sites themselves were apparently used
as cultivated fields long after their abandonment as
dwelling sites. But I think the cultural memory of
the village was not lost. Their economic life was
dependent on knowing the relative fecundity of the
soil, and thus it was imperative that each generation
know where the previous generations’ villages had
been to know where those life-giving minerals were
buried, and how long ago they had been buried.
These villagers would likely have highly valued this
knowledge of the past in order to live the present.
Likewise, the placement of the present village was
also a tacit determination of the farming practices of
their own offspring. Each generation remembered
the past, used this knowledge for their own grasscattle-dung-corn-grass
cyclic cultivation, and thus
greatly influenced the future placement of fields and
thus acceptable distances to the dwelling/byres.
Figure 3: Groentoft Village A excavation plan.
Herschend’s [20], definition of archaeology as
really the study of the past in order to interpret our
own present shows that perhaps the Groentoft
villagers were actually both ‘archaeologists’ of the
past and the future. This strategy seems to have
been 1. a cultural survival technique, 2. a way of
valuing and interpreting the lives of their ancestors
and offspring, and 3. perhaps a way of validating
their own present existence as being that group that
can carry on the legacy of the past and steward the
land for future generations.
In terms of the dwelling itself, it was also
apparently a component of the economic life of the
family and the village as the byre was located in the
eastern wing of the house. In a very direct way, the
length of the byre thus expressed the economic
level and thus perhaps the status of this family.
Figure 4: Groentoft Villages from 500-200 B.C.
This was important not only in terms of the
individual houses’ production of meat, milk, urine for
dye, skins for clothing, or sinew for thread, but more
importantly for the village as a whole, as what
amount of fertilizer that family could contribute to
the common fields of cultivation. Thus, perhaps
architecture indicated status by how much one
could contribute to the collective.
The results from initial wind pressure studies of
the village are indicated by paleo-climate records of
what would likely have been the prevailing surface
winds at the time of the pre-Christian Iron Age, [21].
The wind seems to be diverted around the village
wall without causing undue turbulence. The
turbulence would have caused either more
convective heat loss and/or sudden drops in
pressure causing snow to fall in drifts, necessitating
snow removal. The apparent streamlining of the
village at the brow of a hill, facing the SSW wind,
seems to have succeeded in achieving this
integration. Within the village, the east-west
orientation and the hipped gable roofs of the
dwellings and the barns seems to have achieved a
similar effect, low turbulence and little snow drifting
because the wind was not losing velocity suddenly.
4. VALLHAGER
This Naesman reconstruction of a combination of
Vallhager houses in Figures 5, 6, 7, and 8 provides
an example of a nomothetic reconstruction, or a
model of reality that illustrates the best speculation

on what actual houses from the relevant time period
looked like, but made up of evidence from several
different contemporary houses of the local sociohistorically
relevant territory, [22]. We are thus not
looking at a ‘real’ or idiographic dwelling that
someone actually lived in. However, these houses
may actually form useful frameworks for testing
certain attributes of these houses and the theory
and methodology of reconstruction itself. The
reconstructed house is 132 M 2 of interior space
(5.5M x 24M), and is made of precisely these same
local materials, stone from the nearby area for the
structure of the exterior walls, grasses for the
roofing, wood for the column and beam framing,
and clay from the surrounding terrain.
Figure 5: Vallhager house
reconstruction at Gervide
Figure 6: Cross sections of Vallhager
house reconstruction at Gervide
Figure 7: Long section of Vallhager
house reconstruction at Gervide
This direct translation of materials from the
environment to dwelling would reasonably establish
an aesthetic and functional relationship to the
landscape, in terms of material, color, texture, and
shape. Further, the house would thus be itself a
didactic artifact for the villages’ children, literally
revealing the meaning for dwelling of these
materials, their proximity in space, and perhaps why
these resources should be well husbanded.
Figure 8: Elevations of Vallhager house.
Wind studies of this village reveals again that
turbulence and drifting was kept to a minimum in
the paleo-climatic prevailing winds of the era. This
would have been very helpful with the complex
network of folds, houses, and the haystacks that
would have been present.
Figure 9: Landscape of Gervide in Iron Age.
The landscape illustrated in Figure 9 in the
drawing of the terrain, sheep fold walls, and house
walls, overlaid on the bog (in light grey), indicate a
relatively flat yet complex form for how these

villagers controlled the activities of humans, sheep,
cattle, and quite possibly other intruders, such as
other humans and wild animals. The bog,
according to excavator Dan Carlsson [23] was quite
likely an important source of natural resources,
such as wood, mud or clay, and certain species of
grass, as well as being perhaps the waste pit for the
village, although there is evidence that this was
further afield. As well, the proximity to a surface
rock outcropping likely had other meanings,
possibly having to do with the demarcation of
territory to other villages or some spiritual character.
The approximate axial symmetry of the village
plan, with seemingly two butterfly wings about a SW
to NE line, surrounding the bog, is an interesting
feature of this settlement. Of course we cannot
now know what the meaning of this figure might
have been, but it seems reasonable to think that
such obvious figures were intended. Thus, the plan
of the village in shape may have meant something
about the villager’s relationship to the local
environment, other cosmological relationships, or
differential ownership of resources.
5. CONCLUSION
It may be that the continuity of cultural memory is
assisted by constructing settlements with such a
figural character, as such figures are likely more
memorable than perceived chaos. This memorable
character of a settlement would thus assist the local
village in reproducing their society into the future as
a continual adaptation of the meaningful present
and a legacy for their ancestors.
Archaeologists often look for such regularity,
figural character, and continuity in ‘style’ in other
artifiacts in the ‘primitive’ north or in settlements in
the ancient Mediterranean. It is however rather
recent for students of culture studies to find this sort
of meaningful regularity in the ancient northern
archaeological record.
The demarcation of a socio-historical and
ecologically relevant territory (here, the home), [24],
in relation to ‘other’ settlements and in relation to
the collective of the village itself with such figures
thus may have assisted with the settlement’s ability
to reproduce their economy over a long time period,
or in other words, achieve relatively long-lived
sustainability. As such, sustainability that
establishes relations
of ecological significance within the settlement
and relationships to other settlements would have
very likely attained a strong, long-lasting positive
interpretation among the local villagers. This
positive interpretation of the landscape design and
its processes would likely have been associated
with this particular shape, having been relevant to
that particular place in space and time. Such
interpretations might be translated into modern
understanding as beauty.
Our own concept of beauty and ecologically
sensitive design may thus be re-examined in this
light, which may provide benefit in terms of the
popularity and interest in green architecture and
urban design.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
I would like to dedicate this paper to the North
European archaeologist Albert Bantelmann.
[1] T. Paulsson, Scandinavian
Architecture, Leanard Hill Books, London,
1958, 18.
[2] J. Chapelot, and R. Fossier, The
Village and the House in the Middle Ages,
B.T. Batsford, London, 1985, 15.
[3] N.J.G. Pounds, Hearth & Home
A History of Material Culture, Indiana
University Press, Bloomington, 1989, 14.
[4] E. Guidoni, Primitive Architecture,
History of World Architecture Series, Harry
N. Abrams, Inc., New York, 1978, in toto.
[5] Victor Olgyay, Design with
Climate Bioclimatic Approach to
Architectural Regionalism, Princeton
University Press, Princeton, 1963, in toto.
[6] Dean Hawkes, Jane McDonald,
andLoen Steemers, The Selective
Environment, Spon Press, London, 2002,
6 – 7.
[7] Ross Samson, The Social
Archaeology of Houses, Edinburgh
University Press, Edinburgh, 1990, 6.
[8] Martin Locock, Meaningful
Architecture: Social Interpretations of
Buildings, Avebury, Aldershot, 1994, 9.
[9] Mike Parker Pearson and Colin
Richards, Ordering the World: Perceptions
of Architecture, Space, and Time, in
Architecture & Order Approaches to
Social Space, Routledge, London, 1994,
2-3.
[10] Ibid, 2.
[11] Amos Rapoport, House Form and
Culture, Prentice-Hall Inc., Englewood
Cliffs, 1969, in toto.

[12] Bjarne Stoklund, Houses and
Culture in the Northern Atlantic Isles,
Etnologia Scandinavica, 1980, 122.
[13] Steen Hvass, Jernalderens
Bebyggelse, in Fra Stamme til Stat I
Danmark, Volume 1, Jysk Arkeaologisk
Selskabs Skrifter no. 22, Aarhus
Universitetsforlag, Aarhus, 1988, 55.
[14] Roderick Lawrence, Housing,
Dwellings, and Homes, John Wiley &
Sons, Chichester, 1987, in toto.
[15] Bente Draiby, Studier in
Jernalderens Husbygning, Eksperimental
Arkaeologi, Historisk-Arkaeologisk
Forsoegscenter, Lejre, 1991, in toto, and
H.O. Hansen, Lerhusene I Lejre,
Gyldendal, Copenhagen, 1959, in toto.
[16] Ulf Naesman, personal
communication with author, 1989.
[17] C. J. Becker, Eine
Fruheiesenzeitliches Dorf bei Groentoft,
Westjutland, Acta Archaeologica, XXXVI,
209-230.
[18] C. J. Becker, To Landsbyer fra
Tidlig Jernalder I Vestjylland,
Nationalmuseets Arbejdsmark, 1966:39-
50, 50.
[19] Joergen Jensen, I begyndelsen.
Fra de aeldste tider til ca. aar 200 f. Kr.,
Volume 1 of Danmarks Historie,
Gyldendal, Copenhagen, 1988, 349.
[20] Frands Herschend, personal
communication with author, 1995.
[21] David Benjamin, The ancient
Scandinavian dwelling: Interpretations of
the home concept from case study
reconstructions, Volume I, PhD
dissertation, 1993:109, 393-399.
[22] Ulf Naesman, personal
communication with author concerning
unpublished reconstruction of June 2,
1988.
[23] Dan Carlsson, Kulturlandskapets
Utvekling paa Gotland En studie av
Jordbruks- og Bebyggelseforandringer
under jarnaalderen, Press Forlag, Visby,
1979, in toto.
[24] David Benjamin, ed., The Home:
Words, Interpretations, Meanings, and
Environments, Avebury, Aldershot, 1996,
in toto.