30 CUP-SHAPED AND OTHER LAPIDAEIAN SCULPTURES. 



fara slab and on the chamber-stones of the well-known monument at Kivik, 

 in Christian stad Lan, Scania, which, according to his view, was erected 

 by Baal-worshiping Phoenicians, who, he thinks, had colonies in the North 

 of Europe, and introduced there the use of bronze. The Kivik sculptures, 

 executed on seven unground granite slabs, four feet high and three feet 

 wide, exhibit a variety of figures, among them a man standing on a two- 

 wheeled chariot drawn by two horses, several unharnessed horses, ships, 

 groups of men (supposed to represent warriors, musicians, prisoners, and 

 priests), various ornamental (perhaps symbolical) designs, four wheel-shaped 

 figures, a cone or obelisk (the emblem of Baal or the sun-god, according 

 to Nilsson), and two handled axes, evidently representing weapons of metal 

 (see Fig. 24). Cup-cuttings are entirely wanting on the Kivik slabs. The 

 sculptures on them, as interpreted by Nilsson, commemorate a victory, 

 probably a naval one. and the succeeding sacrifice of prisoners of war.* 



Dr. Petersen claims, as it were, the Kivik and similar Scanian sculptures 

 for Denmark, not only because Scania formed a part of that country until the 

 year 16 'JO, but also for the reason that the Scanian monuments of the ages 

 of stone and bronze partake more of a Danish than a Swedish character.! 



Lastly, I must refer to the sculptures which are often seen on nat- 

 ural rock-surfaces in diff'erent parts of the Scandinavian Peninsula, but are 

 particularly abundant in the Lan of Bohus. They represent scenes of war 

 and hunting, manned and empty ships, etc., and some of these groups seem 

 to be executed in a quite spirited manner. There appear among the figures 

 warriors armed with weapons resembling the leaf-shaped swords peculiar to 

 the bronze age, to which, indeed, these rock-engravings have been referred by 

 several authors. Professor Nilsson, however, believes that they originated 

 during the age of iron, ascribing them to the Vikings of the eighth and ninth 

 centuries.J A. E. Holmberg's work on the subject, entitled " Scandinaviens 

 Hallristningar " (Stockholm, 1848), is not within my reach; but I am able 

 to give in Fig. 25 a specimen illustration of this kind of sculpture, which I 



* The subject is treated quite in detail by Nilsson in his work on the bronze age. His illustrations 

 of the Kivik slabs have been copied by Simpson in his "Archaic Sculptures," where also a r6sum6 of 

 Nilsson's interpretation is given. 



tLoc. cit., p. 330. 



t Nilsson: Das Bronzealter; S. 90. 



