Was grandma's cottage built before the Russian fire in 1719?
In the summer of 1719 Russian troops burnt down towns, houses and forests along the Swedish Baltic coast. Few houses were left. Today, old houses of this region are almost never from the time before 1719. - The "Dalarö skans" fortification - today a museum - was never approached by the Russian troops. So question was, might it be that grandma's old cottage at Jutholmen near Dalarö Skans survived the Russian fire?
I got the slice above from Jesper Steen. It was cut when the house at Jutholmen was rebuilt and the slice had been laying for some years. I measured seven radii of various length from the slice. The measurements are available here as JH001.rwl The size of the slice is 5 * 11 inches.
An analysis was run in CDendro with a collection of several members, each representing a mean value curve from an area in Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Estonia and Finland. The sample was selected as the reference and the analysis done as a Test Towards UNDATED Reference ("With condensed report" checked!) which gave these best matches:
T- Over Corr Test lap Year all... 0.30 3.82 150 1725 based on 37 members se_005Go 0.39 5.14 150 1725 Gotland, Lunds univ. (EXTRATERR) SWED302N 0.39 4.97 143 1725 Nämdö, Stockholm archipelago 3EP281AV 0.33 4.28 150 1725 Estonia Est002 (EXTRATERR) _ Bettna_M 0.31 3.98 150 1984 Bettna, Eastern middle-Sweden, west of Stockholm SE006-La 0.30 3.84 150 643 Lappland, Lund (EXTRATERR) EXFin002 0.30 3.82 150 1787 Fin002 N.Finland (EXTRATERR) ..... Year numbers occurring more than once: 1725 4 1611 3 1984 3 1946 2
With the reference dated to 1725 and a Test towards (dated) reference:
T- Over Corr Test lap all... 0.30 3.82 150 based on 37 members se_005Go 0.39 5.14 150 Gotland, Lunds univ. (EXTRATERR) (1125-1987) SWED302N 0.39 4.97 143 Nämdö, Stockholm archipelago (1583-1995) 3EP281AV 0.33 4.28 150 Estonia Est002 (EXTRATERR) (1516-1998) gud14 0.28 1.77 38 Gudbrandsdalen, Norway (1687-1950) NKarelia 0.24 3.04 150 North Karelia, Finland (1472-2001) Bettna_M 0.24 1.58 42 Bettna, Eastern middle-Sweden, west of Stockholm (1683-1997) Gagnef-s 0.23 2.93 150 Gagnef-Djura (1362-1831) FINL2_4_ 0.23 2.82 150 SouthEast Finland (536-2002) East Sve 0.22 1.80 64 East Svealand Aneby+Askersu+Bettna+Sissham+Saltsjöba (1662-2005) DALARNA 0.21 2.61 150 Dalarna, Lunds universitet (EXTRATERR) (932-1888) BratPIr 0.19 1.51 62 Mälardalen (Bråthen), questionable segments removed (1153-1904) SödraDal 0.19 2.36 150 SDalar 1 Södra Dalarna _
With only the three best matching members:
T- Over Corr Test lap all... 0.43 5.74 150 based on 3 members se_005Go 0.39 5.14 150 Gotland, Lunds univ. (EXTRATERR) (1125-1987) SWED302N 0.39 4.97 143 Nämdö, Stockholm archipelago (1583-1995) 3EP281AV 0.33 4.28 150 Estonia Est002 (EXTRATERR) (1516-1998)
I.e. the sample matches best (and with quite sufficient probability) to the year 1725 towards references from the nearby island of Nämdö and from Gotland - quite distant. Probably the tree has grown neither on Nämdö nor on Gotland. Currently we do not have more references that might reveal from where the tree came.
There are probably a few outermost year rings which were cut away when the house was built. It is reasonable to state that the tree was cut sometime in the interval 1725-1750. I.e. that log out of grandma's cottage was certainly cut quite a long time after the Russian fire of 1719!