Theoretical concepts and an easy practical tool for working with prehistoric wealth and inequality
Friday lecture by postdoc Mikkel Nørtoft, Saxo Institute.
In this talk, I will touch upon a few theoretical concepts and mechanisms for understanding different types of wealth accumulation today and in the past. I will also show how wealth display can be quantified in practice from grave data, or house size data, and what these can (and cannot) tell us about wealth and (in)equality in prehistory.
I will also give a few tips to make inequality measures (such as the popular, but debated, Gini coefficient, ranging 0 to 1) more useful in archaeology. Finally, I will show my new online wealth/inequality app “QuantWealth” in which anyone can input their grave and/or house size data, applying some of the above tips, and how this app can help build our empirical understanding of prehistoric wealth and inequality.
No registration required, everyone is welcome. Questions? Contact Henriette Lyngstrøm at lyngst@hum.ku.dk.
About the series
See all Friday lectures in the series
-
6 February 2026: A world without images: Why did Neolithic societies stop making figurines? by Valeska Becker (in Danish)
-
13 February 2026: Osseous industries in southern Scandinavia before and after Neolithisation (5400–2600 BC): Traditions, ruptures, & interactions by Solveig Chaudesaigues-Clausen
-
20 February 2026: Money and/or coins by Helle Horsnæs (in Danish)
-
27 February 2026: Theoretical concepts and an easy practical tool for working with prehistoric wealth and inequality by Mikkel Nørtoft
-
6 March 2026: Coins – the archaeologist's best friend by Gitte Ingvardson (in Danish)
-
13 March 2026: We'll put on our back marks and become archaeologists. But how? by Henriette Lyngstrøm and more (in Danish)
-
20 March 2026: Societal development in Jutland in the pre-Roman Iron Age (500-1 BC) by Per Ole Rindel (in Danish)
-
27 March 2026: Hairstyles from the Iron Age by Charlotte Rimstad (in Danish)
-
10 April 2026: FORTIS – a project on Iron Age fortifications on Bornholm by Laurine Albris (in Danish)
-
17 April 2026: Moss bodies – men, women and unisex by Ulla Mannering (in Danish)
-
24 April 2026: In saxo simul et in fonte: Hellenistic-Roman constellations of nature, visual arts and architecture by Wolfgang Filser (in Danish)
-
1 May 2026: All quiet on the Western front? The Late Bronze Age and Early Iron Age of Greece as seen from its Western mainland by Joos Melander
-
8 May 2026: Haithabu as a national project by Carsten Jahnke (in Danish)
Map of South Campus
View directions.
View on map of the Faculty of Humanities - South Campus.
View map of South Campus (pdf).