The Vikings also aligned themselves with the age-old tradition of ship-shaped groups of burial stones, for example at Runsa on the shores of Lake Mälaren (not far from where the Buddha statuette was found), which was the site of a Viking fort and cult centre. Upright stones in the shape of boats mark the places of burial both here and elsewhere in Sweden. The discovery of the Oseberg ship and the realisation that it was the centrepiece of a lavish burial site showed the enduring power of the ship as a symbol in the northern psyche.
The Oseberg Ship: A Viking Lady's Pleasure Yacht
Excavation of the Oseberg ship began in summer 1904, under the supervision of Professor Gabriel Gustafson of the University of Oslo. His investigation revealed that, at the time of the burial, the ship was dragged into position and then packed in and covered with a layer of clay. The tight packing of the clay was one of the main reasons for the wonderful state of preservation that greeted the excavators. On top of this layer of clay, heavy stones were placed and the mound built up over the top. The mound would have been at least 5 metres high and 40 metres across (about 16 feet by 130 feet). The purpose of the ship and the mound was very similar to that of Sutton Hoo: to house the body of a dead dignitary of the pagan world.
Oseberg turned out to be a dual burial: two skeletons were found inside and, to the surprise of the excavators, both were female. It is thought that one was a high-born lady and the other her servant or slave, who may have been killed at the time of her mistress's death. (As we have seen, this practice was not uncommon in the Viking world.) One skeleton was that of a woman between twenty and thirty years of age; the other was around fifty, and suffered from arthritis. Archaeologists cannot be sure which was which, but the older one seems the more likely candidate for identifying as the lady.
Unfortunately looters – probably in the Middle Ages – had beaten the archaeologists to the mound and almost certainly removed her jewellery, which is conspicuous by its absence. If there were any weapons buried with her, then they too had been stolen. Nevertheless, a wonderful array of mainly wooden objects accompanied her, among them a finely decorated cart (or wagon as it sometimes referred to), three ornate sleighs and a plain, undecorated, working sled. There were also the skeletons of ten or more horses that were probably from her own stables and slaughtered as a mark of respect at her funeral.
The ship was a large open boat made entirely of oak: 21.58 metres (just over 70 feet) long and 5.1 metres (nearly 17 feet) at its widest part. The depth at midship was 1.58 metres (5 feet) from gunwale to keel, which was itself 19.8 metres (65 feet) long. The oak from which the ship was built has been dated by dendrochronology to the year 820. It has even been possible to say that it was cut in September of that year. The burial has been dated to the year 834, by the age of the timber used to construct the actual burial chamber. The difference in dates shows (again echoing the Sutton Hoo ship) that it was a vessel that had been used for a number of years – something that is corroborated by unmistakable signs of wear and tear.
From a technical point of view, the Oseberg ship has greatly impressed the nautical archaeologists who have studied it; but it is a true work of art as well. It is exquisitely and richly carved in a way that combines its practical features with symbolic designs. There is a snake's head carved on the top of the bow, and its body goes all the way underneath the ship as the keel, terminating at the stern. The Viking ships are noted for their flexibility, and the carving of a serpent seems to be a way of expressing the pliability of the keel.
Although it was extremely well made, it was not designed to endure the rough open seas – this was not a tough working ship used for long-distance trading and raiding by a hardened bunch of Viking seamen. It was a lady's pleasure yacht more suited to sailing up and down the rivers and inlets along the coast. Much skilled craftsmanship had been invested in making sure that it looked the part. The ship is clearly an exceptional vessel and, although its owner is not known, it seems safe to presume it belonged to a female dignitary or her husband. Their status could be that of chiefs, or it may be that she was actually the queen of a regional kingdom, having her grand vessel sailed and rowed on royal business around the fjords. It has been repeatedly suggested that this was the grave of Queen Åsa of the Ynglinge dynasty, the royal house of Vestfold (in the environs of the Oslo fjord), but this cannot be proved.
Amazingly, a whole set of thirty oars – fifteen a side – have been preserved without loss but, although they were clearly buried with the ship, they were not the ones that would have been used to row it in its owner's lifetime. They are simply too short, and might have belonged to another ship of lighter construction. The lack of wear implies that they may rather have been made especially for the burial and in fact be a dummy set, especially as some appear to be unfinished.
The Symbolism of the Oseberg Ship Burial
If we approach the symbolism of ship burials as Martin Carver has done with Sutton Hoo, then the whole Oseberg phenomenon was a grand means of expression, like a poem or a play but using the medium of material culture to get across its message. A play does not need to be realistic in a literal and prosaic sense in order to ring true. Therefore the fact that these oars belonged to another vessel altogether, or may have been a dummy set, is acceptable as poetic licence. The mast and the anchor are likewise too small. Furthermore, the array of objects that were placed in the ship hardly reflect the type of goods that would have been found on board even a pleasure yacht. The Oseberg finds are an expression of the lady's position and place in the world and not merely an inventory of goods.
The land vehicles – the cart, three sleighs and the sled – were all stowed in the funeral boat. The cart is about 5.5 metres (18 feet) long, 1.5 metres (5 feet) wide and 1.2 metres (4 feet) high. The Oseberg cart is the only complete example of its kind to be found in Norway, while elsewhere, as in Denmark and northern Germany, only fragments have been discovered. Interestingly, these fragmentary examples were also found in the graves of women, so clearly it was a kind of transport associated with females in particular. It was previously thought that the cart was just for show, the front axle firmly attached to the chassis thus stopping it from turning. Recent reinspection of the cart has shown that this was not the case. What the cart was used for is unclear. It could certainly have been drawn by horses (there were enough horses in the burial to pull not only the cart but also the sleighs and sled too) but would have made for a very uncomfortable ride as the Viking Age 'roads' were designed more for riders than drawn vehicles.
Its ornate decoration suggests that it might have had a ceremonial role, perhaps loaded with the lady's treasures on important civil or religious occasions – including perhaps her funeral procession. The cart was adorned with four heads, which depict Viking men with neatly combed hair and beards. Such largely realistic portrayals are rather unusual in Viking art. The main body of decoration on the cart is very different from the other items that make up the Oseberg equipment, although it has been suggested that the cart and the ship decoration may be the work of the same craftsman.
All three of the sleighs are made of beech wood and consist of two main parts: an undercarriage and a body. All of them also seem to have got inexplicably mixed up at the time of the burial, as they were found lashed together with ropes but none of the undercarriages were tied to the right bodies! The runners and the bodies are richly decorated and display some of the most bizarre imagery of the whole barbarian period – monstrous animal heads that bear no resemblance to any natural creature.
Another group of extraordinary carvings adorn five animal-headed posts, the function of which is not known. They were made from hard maple wood ideally suited for carving in incredibly fine detail, and are among the most magnificent pieces of Viking Age art to have survived. The difference in the decorative styles has made people think that they were the work of more than one carver – some being described as 'baroque' in style while others are not. While their purpose is unknown, they were certainly not prow f
igureheads. The Oseberg ship shows that the snake was used as such a figurehead, and written sources tell us that there were other animal heads that were used on the Viking ships. Yet these sources also record the necessity of removing them when the ship lands and taking the head ashore. The reason for this seems to be that the animal head is a means of averting evil influences, and therefore should accompany the crew on land as well as at sea.
It is an on-going policy of the Viking Ship Museum to make faithful copies of all the wooden artefacts in its collection. This work began in 1904, and the staff are now halfway through this monumental task. It is not a question of quantity but quality that makes this such a protracted project. The animal head wood carvings in particular have proved to be nearly impossible to copy. They display a mastery of wood that is seldom seen today – the museum relies on the skill of a Norwegian carver who is probably the only person in the whole of the country able to do work of this standard. A single animal head is a year's work for a craftsman with thirty years' experience.
There were numerous other finds at Oseberg – enough to have cleared out the dead lady's house: five beds carved with animal heads, on one of which her body lay; down-filled bedding; tents (which seem to have been a standard piece of kit when travelling by ship); three oak chests with iron mounts; leather shoes; three large examples of those ubiquitous Germanic personal items – combs; oil-lamps, a frying pan, pot chain, two cauldrons and other kitchen items. A woven tapestry has also survived in part and depicts scenes including a procession of armed warriors (of both sexes) and horse-drawn carts.
Another particularly striking object is the so-called 'Buddha bucket', a yew wood pail with brass bands and rim. The two 'ears' that link the handle to the pail are identical – small bronze human figures. It is because of these that the object is called the 'Buddha bucket', as each figure's legs are crossed in a way very like the lotus posture. Yet it seems that rather than seeking the origin of this image in Buddhist art (which as we have seen was known from at least the actual statuette of the Buddha from Helgö), it has a more likely origin in the traditions of Irish art with which the Vikings were very familiar.
The practice of boat burial was not just for the rich – certainly by Viking times ordinary farmers might be buried in their boats. Presumably this had a religious connotation, but it could also have been because such craft made ready-to-hand coffins. Among both the west Germanic peoples and the Vikings, the ship seems to have played an important symbolic role as the means by which the buried person travels to the land of the dead. In the various cases of boat burial – whether the marshland Saxon chieftain from Fallward, King Raedwald at Sutton Hoo or the present Viking lady – the presence of the dead person's worldly possessions seems to strengthen the idea that they may also have had otherworldly uses.
However, a curious discovery concerning the Oseberg ship may suggest otherwise. A rope that was tied to a stone held the boat fast in its mound. The message seems to be that the mound itself is the final resting place, with its occupant moored here for eternity. The presence of the mooring rope can be interpreted in one of two ways. Firstly, it can be seen to contradict the generally held view that the ship was the symbolic means of travelling over the water to the realm of the dead. If it was moored and therefore secured in the mound, how could it travel anywhere? In this interpretation the worldly goods that surround the deceased are just that – worldly – and have no further role to play in the afterlife. They are buried with the body as a mark of respect and as a message to the living who witness the funeral that the deceased was a man (or in this case woman) of power and prestige.
Yet we can also revive the idea that the ship did play a symbolic role in the drama of an afterlife. In this way of looking at it, the mooring rope and stone announce that the lady has already arrived in the land of the dead. In the process of dying she travelled to the other world, which is now symbolised by the mound in which she, her possessions and her ship reside. The mound was a part of the other world visible in our own.
Gokstad: Ship of a Warrior Chief
The Gokstad ship was buried in a mound that was probably slightly bigger than its Oseberg counterpart. Its dimensions have been estimated at 5 metres (16 feet) high and 43-50 metres (140-65 feet) across. Like the Oseberg ship, this too had been packed with clay which thankfully resulted in much of the wood being preserved. A skeleton was found in the partially preserved timber burial chamber in the ship; it was of a tall man thought to be a chieftain, and about sixty when he died. Robbers had looted any weaponry or other precious metalwork from the chamber, leaving behind what must have been to them less valuable objects.
While there is nothing to really compare with the ornate woodworking of the Oseberg finds, there were nevertheless items of interest. Many of the same items recur in both ships – textile fragments, a sleigh, a number of broken beds, cauldrons and so on – but there are also novel features of the Gokstad burial. The skeleton of a peacock was found in the ship, and a number of skeletons of both dogs and horses were discovered outside the vessel. Substantial fragments of sixty-four shields remained where they had been placed down the sides of the ship (two between each pair of oar-holes). Their preservation was good enough for archaeologists to see that they had all been painted alternately in black and yellow. Three smaller boats also accompanied the main Gokstad vessel. They were equally well made and almost indistinguishable from similar craft still being built in western Norway in modern times. Clearly their construction had been perfected by Viking times and required no further improvements.
The ship dates from the late ninth century and so is some eighty or so years younger than the Oseberg ship. The Gokstad ship is only slightly bigger: 23.24 metres (76 feet) in length, with a maximum width of 5.2 metres (17 feet) and a depth from keel to gunwale midship of 2.02 metres (6 feet 6 inches). It is of really heavy construction – 3 tons of oak designed to endure any conditions and even a transatlantic crossing. An estimated 350 kilos of iron nails were used to strengthen it. It is robust enough to have carried large loads and cargoes, including cattle and other animals that were required to colonise new lands. A crew of thirty-two oarsmen and a few men for sailing could have been accompanied by up to sixty or seventy more people and animals to boot. What the Oseberg ship was for pleasure, the Gokstad ship was for the serious business of long-distance raiding, trading and colonising.
Several replicas of the Gokstad ship have been built and all of them have undertaken long voyages (some with animals on board); more than one of these has crossed the Atlantic without any problem. The first of such voyages was undertaken in 1893 when its captain, Magnus Andersen, was able to proudly display it at the World Exhibition in Chicago. The making of replica ships is still very useful in helping us to understand the craft skills and technology that were used in Viking times.
A number of replicas are being made at the Ship Museum at Roskilde to the west of Copenhagen in Denmark, including a full-scale Viking ship. This major project of experimental archaeology has shown the boat-builders there that the most important person in the making of a Viking ship was the man who designed the stern post and the keel. If this was right, everything else followed smoothly – provided the level of workmanship was maintained. He was as important to the outcome as an architect is for a house.
The Borre find is the most modest of all the exhibits in the Viking Ship Museum in Oslo. It is a ghostly ship, its presence marked only by rivets and nails. Yet this is not its only similarity to Sutton Hoo. As with the other three ship burials from the Oslo fjord, this vessel too was buried in a mound. It was not a solitary mound but one of a number that may have housed other members of its occupants' lineage. It is thought probable that this group of mounds belongs to the northern branch of the Ynglinge dynasty (which included Queen Åsa), but the assigning of particular mounds to particular members of this pagan lineage has proved as difficult as in the case of Sutton Hoo.
In this shadow ship of Borre, however, there was a sm
all but important find: a single rock crystal. Rock crystal is one of the prized items of the Viking Age. There were a few areas in Norway and on mainland Sweden producing it, but the industry was centred on the island of Gotland in the Baltic Sea. This was, in Viking times, a centre of commerce and a thriving crossroads of trade. It was to be my next port of call.
Chapter Twenty One
GOTLAND: A BARBARIAN BANK
Gotland has aptly been called the world's largest treasury. From the Viking Age alone, over 700 hoards have been discovered. In proportion to its area, the island has the greatest abundance of treasure hoards in the world.
Maria Domeij, Treasures of Gotland
There were a number of trading towns in Scandinavia that grew up as the Viking merchants expanded their horizons. Hedeby in Jutland (Schleswig, northern Germany) and Birka on an island in Lake Mälaren, Sweden, are among the most well known. There were no towns in Scandinavia until around the beginning of the eighth century, and even after that the settlements that arose were not towns as we might understand them. Few had any stone buildings, and their wooden houses were very much like those built in villages – there were simply more of them.
At Hedeby (which has been studied by archaeologists for a century) there are clear indications that a local trading network had been set up to allow the townspeople more time to concentrate on trade and production. Rural villages would supply the town with food from their farms in exchange for items such as combs and jewellery made in workshops in the town. At its height in the tenth century, it probably had a population of about 1,500. Freedom from the daily toil of farming allowed some of the townspeople the chance to develop their longer-distance trading opportunities.
Barbarians- Secrets of the Dark Ages Page 23
