Sune Lindqvist's two-volume book Gotlands Bildsteine (1941/1942) has been - and still is - a landmark publication for the study of the Gotlandic picture stones.

It was published in German, a major drawback as English has become the lingua franca of archaeological research. To make Lindqvist's work more accessible, a translation into English was made by Dirk H. Steinforth in 2023/2024. The translation (text only) of volume II is available for download here. It is intended to have the first volume translated as well. This translation focussed on consistency and accuracy of terms. See the translator's preface for explanations. 

The typewritten manuscripts for Gotlands Bildsteine and the extensive collection of material on which it is based, can be downloaded here:  

part 1

part 2

How ‘Gotlands Bildsteine’ came about

The first systematic study of Gotland’s picture stones was carried out in the 1840s and 1850s by the brothers Carl and Per Arvid Säve, who were born on the island and are referred to as the ‘first generation of picture stone researchers’ and ‘picture stone pioneers’ (Lamm 2012, p. 26). Carl (1812-1876) was a professor of Nordic language in Uppsala and Per Arvid (1811-1887) a teacher in Visby. The brothers were the first to begin systematically tracking down and documenting picture stones and collecting them in Gotland’s museum, which was founded by Per Arvid Säve. The collected material was to be included in a monograph on the picture stones, but this was never realised. 

After the death of the Säve brothers, three experts continued the project to produce an edition of the picture stones: Fredrik Nordin (1852-1920), a Gotland-born teacher who was well acquainted with Per Arvid Säve and who had already made a name for himself with several excavations on the island; Gabriel Gustafson (1853-1915), an archaeologist who was also born on Gotland and director of Oldsakssamlingen in Oslo; and Olof Sörling (1852-1927), the draughtsman of Kungliga Vitterhetsakademien. By 1907, work on the pictorial stone book had progressed so far that Nordin was able to apply for a grant, which was also approved by the Swedish king and government. Despite this approval, the large work was not completed by the time Gustafson (16 April 1915) and Nordin (8 April 1920) died, as all those involved were only able to work on the publication to a limited extent due to other commitments.

After the death of Olof Sörling (13.7.1927), Vitterhetsakademien entrusted the archaeologist Sune Lindqvist (20.3.1887-23.3.1976) with completing the work. Due to his duties as assistant at the Historical Museum in Stockholm and professor of archaeology at the University of Uppsala, Lindqvist would need a good fifteen years to fulfil this task. It also proved to be more demanding than Lindqvist initially expected.

The drawings by Olof Sörling, which were based on observations of the stone surfaces in daylight, often seemed inadequate to Lindqvist. By closely examining the picture stones in the dark (possibly with an artificial cover) and in the light of an electric lamp, Lindqvist believed that he could elicit more details from the stones and achieve better results than his predecessors. These details were to be captured not only in drawings but also in photographs. Photographer and draughtsman Harald Faith-Ell from Kungliga Vitterhetsakademien was recruited for this task. However, as photographic images were only able to reliably depict parts of the confirmed image details, even under optimal lighting conditions, Lindqvist decided to trace the incised and chiselled areas directly on the stone with water-soluble paint, as was customary in the publication of rune stones at the time.

Lindqvist's edition of the Gotlandic picture stones was published in two volumes in 1941/1942. In the first volume, which contains the photographs of the more important monuments (mostly with secondary painted surfaces) (183 illustrations on 72 plates), Lindqvist discusses the forms, motifs and ornamentation of the picture stones on almost 140 pages and establishes a group classification and rough chronology of the picture stone types. He also addresses the question of the meaning of the images and formulates some important interpretations, some of which are still valid today.

The second volume contains a catalogue of all the stones discovered up to and including 1940, with details of the circumstances of their discovery, descriptions, interpretative perspectives and illustrations. The latter are photographs of the (partly painted, partly unpainted) stones and a series of drawings, mainly by Sörling. Lindqvist also published over a dozen important articles on the subject (Lindqvist 1933; 1940; 1941; 1945; 1948; 1949; 1955; 1956; 1962; 1964; 1968a; 1968b; 1970), in which he mainly presented new finds, but in some cases also presented new interpretations of the imagery (e.g. Lindqvist 1940; 1948; 1968a, 1970).

DHS / MH / SO