How we created the portrait of Svane

Only a small number of finds of human remains from the final part of the Early Stone Age are known from south‑eastern Norway. So far, no analyses have been carried out that tell us anything directly about the appearance and genetics of these people. When portraying those who lived in south‑eastern Norway in this period, we therefore have to rely on finds from surrounding areas.

The story of Svane and her decorated stone (Norwegian for Swan) is based on a Stone Age settlement investigated at Brunstad in Stokke, Vestfold, in 2014. A grave was also found at the settlement. This grave lay between two rock knolls and contained remains from the burial of an adult individual in a half‑seated position. The grave is dated to around 5900 BC (Reitan and Schülke 2018; Schülke et al. 2019), that is, to the part of the Early Stone Age that archaeologists refer to as the Late Mesolithic. Because of poor conditions for bone preservation at the site, it has not been possible to determine whether the person was a woman or a man.

The portrayal of Svane is therefore modelled on other skeletal finds from the same period in other parts of Scandinavia:

Svane’s genetic background is based on DNA samples from an individual found in a grave at Evensås in Bohuslän, Sweden, dated to 4230–3980 BC (Allentoft et al. 2024); seven individuals from Motala in Östergötland, Sweden, dated to c. 6000–5500 BC (Hallgren et al. 2021); and a younger individual dated to c. 3900 BC found in a cave at Måløya in Steigen, Nordland, Norway. All of these individuals have a mixture of eastern (EHG) and western European (WHG) ancestry in different proportions (Lazaridis et al. 2014; Günther et al. 2018; Allentoft et al. 2024).
The reconstruction of eye, hair and skin colour is based on a study of predicting pigmentation from DNA, using genotype probabilities from the individual (NEO260) from Evensås, which indicated dark hair and dark skin, in line with the majority of the analysed Scandinavian individuals from this period. Eye colour could not be estimated with certainty, but the individual most likely (54%) had brown eyes. The genotype probabilities for the individual from Steigen in Nordland likewise indicated dark hair and dark skin. Eye colour could not be determined. Genotype probability refers to the likelihood that an individual has a particular combination of genetic variants. However, for one of the individuals from Motala (Motala 12), the genotype probabilities indicated blue eyes and light skin (Perretti et al. 2025). This shows that there was considerable variation in appearance in this period.

Sources

Allentoft, M.E., Sikora, M., Refoyo-Martínez, A. et al. 2024. Population genomics of post-glacial western Eurasia. Nature 625: 301–311.

Günther, T., H. Malmström, E. M. Svensson, A. Omrak, F. Sánchez-Quinto, G. M. Kılınç, M. Krzewińska, G. Eriksson, M. Fraser, H. Edlund, A. R. Munters, A. Coutinho, L. G. Simões, M. Vicente, A. Sjölander, B. Jansen Sellevold, R. Jørgensen, P. Claes, M. D. Shriver, C. Valdiosera, M. G. Netea, J. Apel, K. Lidén, B. Skar, J. Storå, A. Götherström og M. Jakobsson 2018 Population genomics of Mesolithic Scandinavia: Investigating early postglacial migration routes and high-latitude adaptation. PLOS Biology 16(1):e2003703.

Hallgren, F., K. Berggren, A. Arnberg, Lisa Hartzell og Birgitta Larsson 2021. Kanaljorden, Motala, Rituella våtmarksdepositioner och boplatslämningar från äldre stenålder, yngre stenålder och järnålder. Arkeologisk förundersökning och särskild arkeologisk undersökning. Stilfelsen Kulturmiljövård. Rapport 2021:12. Västerås.

Jørgensen, R. 2015. Måløyhatten. Undersøkelse av funnsted for menneske-kjeve i grotte på Måløyhatten, Måløya, gnr. 30. Steigen kommune, Nordland fylke

Lazaridis, I., Patterson, N., Mittnik, A. mfl. 2014. Ancient human genomes suggest three ancestral populations for present-day Europeans. Nature 513, 409–413.

Perretti, S., P. Santos, M. T. Vizzari, E. Tassani, A. Benazzo, S. Ghirotto og G. Barbujani 2025 Inference of human pigmentation from ancient DNA by genotype likelihoods. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 122(29):e2502158122.

Reitan, G. og A. Schülke. 2018. Rapport. Arkeologisk utgravning. Brunstad lok. 25, en lokalitet med gravfra eldre steinalder, inkludert sammenfatning av Brunstad-prosjektet. Skjærsnes, 8/6, Sandefjord k., Vestfold. Upublisert rapport. Universitetet i Oslo, Kulturhistorisk museum, Fornminneseksjonen, Oslo.

Schülke, A., K. Eriksen, S. Gummesson og G. Reitan. 2019. The Mesolithic inhumation at Brunstad – A two-step multidisciplinary excavation method enables rare insights into hunter-gatherer mortuary practice in Norway. Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports, 23, 662–673.