Silver rings and marten skins: Contacts between the Volga Region and the Baltic in the early Viking Age

Viking Age silver is a useful tool for tracing various aspects of the society. Contact networks, trade organization, society structure, economic variation etc. This paper concentrates on the so-called Permian rings, which appear in Scandinavian silver hoards from Early Viking Age. Their main concentration is, however, in the regions west of the Ural Mountains in Russia.
As the rings found in Russia and in Scandinavia are similar or even almost identical, the current hypothesis has been that the Scandinavian items were imported from the East. In this article I scrutinise rings from museum collections in Russia, Scandinavia and the Baltic Region, in all xx . Some details, especially stamped decoration, only occur on rings found in Scandinavia and around the Baltic sea, indicate that some rings were actually made in that region.
Characteristic for this type of rings is, that they were made according to settled weights, usually around 200 100 grams. This is probably an indication that the rings are not only ornaments but also some kind of money in large units. There are many indications that Scandinavians took part in activities in the East in Early Viking Age. The region northeast of Volga and around the Kama river fur trade to Sassanian, Abbasid and Byzantine realms seems to have played an important role. For example exquisite silver vessels from these areas are quite abundant in the north.
The organization for purchasing furs in the north may be visualised as fur animals were hunted by many small groups of trappers and brought to centres along the rivers. The abundant traces of metal handicraft at these sites might have been aiming at producing commodities to pay them. Furs were collected and concentrated at the centres. Furs were then traded towards the South at big scale probably with silver involved. Weight adjusted silver rings would have been a convenient means of payment than coins in this large-scale trade. The rings of Perm type found in Scandinavia and the Baltic region indicate that Scandinavians took part in the activities, probably some kind of middlemen and brought so of their profit back home.
The Eastern rings, however, also inspired to production in their new surroundings. The Baltic/Scandinavian rings with stamped decoration show that besides coins and hack-silver there was also a need for large unit means of payment. Interesting is, that while Eastern rings are well known in the West, that western, stamped decorated rings are not known from the Eastern regions.
That the rings, besides being ornaments, also had an economic function is indicated by their weights. Their weights is in accordance to the Carolingian pound, Scandinavian medieval mark weight, then old Russian pound with roots in Sassanian drachms, Arab dirhams and ultimately in Byzantine and Roman weight systems.
The importance of pure silver was of outmost importance when used as means of payment. Silver items were tested, probably to scrutinize the quality. There are also various examples of purifying silver in late Viking Age Scandinavia. When larger amounts of silver were handled it was more secure to use big rings, where the silver easily could be tested, than a great number of small items.