Our
guidebook only gave a cursory mention of Ladbyskibet, a Viking ship burial
north east of Odense but, for us, it was a ‘must see’ site. In 1934 a farmer,
Erik Eriksen (a great Viking name!) found a skeleton in his field and told Paol
Mikkelson, a pharmacist and amateur archaeologist from Odense. He excavated a
number of graves in the area but when Erik took him to see some iron objects, close
to a low mound, he knew that there was something important there. After some
initial investigations, he brought in Svend Larsen from the local museum. It
was Svend who realised that the position of metal objects (in two parallel
lines bowing outwards) could be from a ship. They contacted the National Museum
and excavation uncovered a 10th century Viking ship burial, the
first to be found in Denmark. Although all the wood had rotted away, with very careful
excavation, which took until 1937, they were able to expose the details of the
22m long ship that contained 11 sacrificed horses together with 3 or 4 dogs. The
ship was a fast warship, capable of travel in rough water and with 30-32 rowers
and had probably been used as a warship before being hauled on land and used
for the burial, probably about 900 - 925 AD. The tomb had been plundered so
there were few valuable grave goods but what was left is of huge archaeological
value. Paol Mikkelson worked on the excavation alongside the professionals and
paid for a concrete dome to be placed over the ship and the ship itself was
enclosed in a huge glass case. Another option that was considered was moving
the remains to the National Museum in Copenhagen but it is now the only ship
burial that can be seen in its original position – so much better than in a
large museum where it has to compete with many other exhibits. The small museum
was also very good and it was lunchtime before we emerged.
We
set off to Zealand, Denmark’s largest and most populated island. This involved
crossing on two bridges over the Storebaelt (Great Belt), a total of 8.5 miles,
a huge construction project that took 12 years to complete, opening in 1998. We
had plenty of time to admire the engineering and to understand why we had to
pay the eye-watering 360 DKK (approx. £45) toll. The weather was very poor,
which meant that we were unable to appreciate the views that there must be from
the bridges.
We
plotted a pretty route, leaving the motorway soon after reaching Zealand and
passing by Tisso Lake. Unfortunately, the weather was still bad and rather
spoilt any nice views that we might have had, but we did spot a beautiful hare
in a field very close to the van. We joined a different motorway to travel east
to Roskilde past the remnants of the Roskilde Festival (similar to the Glastonbury
Festival) that finished yesterday. Like Glastonbury, there were huge amounts of
rubbish and abandoned tents covering the camping fields, all being cleared up
by a gang of workers.
Travelling
around the southern end of the city, we headed up the eastern side before
heading west onto a small peninsular where Roskilde Camping is located. It is
in a lovely position on the opposite side of the fjord from Roskilde with a
lovely view of the city.
Photos:
These carriages were very popular with the children until they got bored!; Our
first view of the Ladby Ship in the extreme gloom inside the mound – looking from
the stern (where the body had been laid) to the prow at the far end; Some of
the bones of the 11 horses, towards the front of the ship – if you look
closely, you will be able to make out legs and jaws; The prow with its bronze
spirals; The earliest known iron anchor in Denmark and the very rare iron
anchor chain (11m in length, 78 links) and rope; The Ladby ship reconstruction
completed in May 2016 – the prow and stern decorations are detachable and only
used on special occasions; The museum ship model rigged for sailing –
experimental archaeology suggests that it would have had approx. 60 sq. m of
sail.
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