A reconstruction of the big Viking ship SKULDELEV 2 will be launched by the Viking Museum in Roskilde this year (2004) and Post Denmark is marking the occasion with four special stamps.
The find at Skuldelev.
Towards the end of the Viking era, in the late 11th century, the people of Roskilde built a system of barriers at one of the narrows parts of Roskilde Fjord, 16 km north of the town at the spot know today as Skuldelev Beach.
The barriers were designed to protect Roskilde, the capital of Denmark at the time, from attack from the sea. Five old ships were holed, filled with stones and sunk at Peberrenden.
The underseas piles of stones have been known ever since to local fishermen as a place where great care has to be taken. Local legend said that the ships were sunk by Queen Margrete I (1353-1412). However when archaeologists from the National Museum came to Skuldelev and surveyed the site from 1957-1959, their studies revealed that the barrier was from the Viking era.
By 1962, enough money had been collected to begin an actual excavation of the undersea cairns. Iron sheet piling was drilled into the seabed around each cairn, after which the area was drained.
It took less than four months to dig the sunken ships out of the cairns and transport the thousand of parts of the vessel, large and small to the conservation site.
At first it was thought that six ships had been uncovered, hence the names SKULDELEV 1 to 6. Later, it was discovered that SKULDELEV 2 and SKULDELEV 4 were one big longship – almost 30 meters in length – and not two ships, so there is no SKULDELEV 4 at the Viking Ship Museum.
What is so unique about the find from the bed of the fjord is that the five ships were all built for different purposes, in three different countries and for sailing in different types of waters. Together, the five ships provided much in-depth knowledge of Viking craftsmanship, trade, fishing and warfare.
Viking ships:
The designation Viking ship does not just refer to a single type of vessel. It is used as a generic term for all vessels built according to the common Nordic shipbuilding tradition that flourished from the late 8th until the early 12th century.
If you find a Viking ship today, analysis of the rings in the wood will determine where and when it was built.
Viking ships are open, clinker-built vessels with oars on each side and a single mast. The narrow and rapid warships are propelled by oars or by the wind in the square sail, while the broader and more full-bodied merchant ships relied mainly on wind power.
The rudder also named the steer oar, was always on the right of the direction in which a Viking ship was sailing, a fact that explains the etymological root of ‘starboard’ (steer board in old English.)
Viking ships were light, flexible and elegant. As a rule they did not have a particularly deep draught and could, therefore, sail very close to land. The construction also allowed them to penetrate far inland along rivers, a quality the Vikings put to good use on peaceful trade missions as well as more warlike raids.
However, the construction also made it possible for some of the vessels to sail the oceans, a fact that was brought to the attention of the rest of Europe, North America and the nearest parts of Asia from the late 8th century until the end of the Viking era in the mid-11th century.
The dreaded Vikings.
At home the Vikings were peaceful craftsmen, peasants, fishermen and clever merchants.
On their trips abroad, they took with them goods like amber, arctic hides, walrus ivory, falcons, salted fish, live cattle and horses, slaves, ironware, timber, coloured glass beads, ceramics and wool.
In exchange they took home gold and silver jewelry, leather goods, silk tin and processed woolen goods.
The Vikings also built up a reputation as a fiercely warlike people though.
All over Europe it had gradually become the custom to bury your most expensive possessions and flee as quickly as possible whenever the characteristic Viking ships were spotted.
At the start of the Viking era, the main target for their raids were monasteries because great riches were stored there and the monks put up little or no resistance.
In time the Vikings began to meet more organized resistance and actual fighting took place. The Vikings were made of stern stuff, however, and defeated most of their foes.
Around 1000 AD there were Viking settlements in Russia, Denmark, Great Britain, Ireland, Normandy, North Germany, Norway, Sweden, Iceland and Greenland, and Vikings were also employed as a special unit in the army of the Emperor in Constantinople.
In the 1020s the Danish King Canute ruled Denmark, England, Norway and parts of Sweden.
The Vikings today.
Whatever happened to the Viking people when the actual Viking era came to an end in the mid-11th century?
There is no exact answer because they did not die out as such. It would be most accurate to say that the Vikings developed.
King Harald Bluetooth (died 986) converted the Danes but Christianity was not properly introduced until the reign of King Svend Estridsen around 1050. Over 500 churches were built in Denmark at the time and more were added in the next few decades.
The warrior religion of the Vikings was replaced by Christianity, quietly and without fuss, and the new religion considered raiding, pillaging and plundering as immoral activities.
Christianity and increasingly organized resistance both helped bring the Viking era to an end in the mid-11th century.
Nowadays the descendants of the Vikings are just ordinary Christians in Denmark and everywhere else the Viking settled.
Visiting the Viking Ship Museum.
A visit to the Viking Ship Museum can easily turn into a whole day out once your attention has been grabbed.
The Viking Ship Museum offers a unique opportunity to be a Viking for a day, sail Viking ships and experience Viking life.
The main feature in the Viking Ship Hall is the five original Viking ships dug up at Skuldelev in 1962 but there are several other permanent and temporary exhibitions.
The Museum Island is home to living workshops where full-sized reproductions of original Viking ships have been produced.
The Skuldelev 2 warship
The newest, an almost 4.50-long reconstruction of SKUDELEV 2, is to be launched amid great festivities on Saturday 4 September 2004.
Only materials of very high quality were used, not only to make the vessel look right but also to guarantee the strength of the ship.
It is made as in Viking times, of freshly felled timber. The long planks are cleaved out of long straight oaks, while the curved timber is chipped out of the bent wood from the crowns of oak trees.
A total of 150m³ of timber and 400 kg of pure iron (corresponding to approx. 30 tons of bog iron ore) was used to build the ship. Horsehair hemp and lime bast were used for the 2.000 meters of ropes and flax as well as the 118m² sail.
The large sail propelled SKULDELEV 2 at great speed whenever the wind blew. If the wind was weak, 60 Vikings used to man the oars, 30 on each side. SKULDELEV 2 must have been a formidable warship, the naval thoroughbred of its day.
The large number of Viking ships and other Nordic boats are kept in the harbour on Museum Island. The collection is not only for decoration. During the summer season, they sail several times a day, so visitors get the chance to man the oars and/or hoist the sail on a Viking boat or one of the traditional Nordic vessels.
Three star attraction
The French Guide Michelin has rightly categorized the Viking Ship Museum as a three-star attraction, the same as the Roskilde Cathedral.
Michelin grants a single star whenever an attraction is deemed worth looking at if you happen to be in the area. Two stars means that the attraction is worth making a detour to visit and three stars means it is worth a special trip on its own.
More than 130.000 people visit the Viking Ship Museum every year, many of them more than once. They return when they find out just how much there is to see and do, and experience the exciting way in which the Viking story is presented in the museum.
http://www.vikingeskibsmuseet.dk
The original SKULDELEV 2 is a longship with dimensions of ca. 29 x 4m. which was built ca 930, with a wooden hull.
The wreck is the least well-preserved of the ships that have been found at Roskilde.
She was built of very thin planking, and the bottom planks were worn down from being repeatedly run ashore when she landed on the beaches. She is the largest vessel found.
Carried a crew between 50 and 100 men.
Denmark 2004 4.50/12.50kr. sg?, scott
Source: downloaded from the Denmark Post website. Ships of the world by Lincoln P Paine.