Slagelse, Ladbyskibbet. Viking Construction: Thatch on Top. Dug Out Below. Culture. Slagelse; Ladbyskibbet

You have to admire thatch.  It can last 30 years, and in Denmark is anchored at the top with oak cappings.  The technique is still used, and on large structures.  It developed early, see ://home.golden.net/~wareham/worldnorse/wntown.html/; and ://www.darkcompany.ca/fullcirc/fulcirc2.php/  Saxons also used the sunken floor idea, see ://www.regia.org/houses.htm - borders were fluid, much go-between, but the Germanic Saxons had some linguistic and cultural differences from the Norse, evolved from their greater exposure to the more southern tribes?

Some thatch is topped with sod, turf and the resulting grass.  Put your goat to work.

Viking house, sod roof, Trelleborg at Slagelse DK

The sunken floor adds warmth.

See them on Viking Village reconstructions, particularly structures at Trelleborg on Zealand (see also Ladbyskibet, where the outline of a buried Viking ship is found under the mound, near Kerteminde, Funen -  see://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/sarahindenmark/denmark/1189800060/tpod.html).

The advantage:  ready materials; and a good hiding place, just tuck your necklace up there, except for the disadvantage.  The disadvantage:  Fire, that spreads fast; and bugs and creepies in residence up there, and falling down.  s paltry as they are.

We wished for more explanations for the whimsical carvings. Are these from originals?  Whimsy looks part of the cultural landscape even then.

Horse carving reproduced, Trelleborg at Slagelse, DK

The cult of the horse.  Read Horse Burial in Scandinavia in the Viking Age, by Peter Shenk of the University of Oslo at ://www.bahumuth.chaosnet.org/fantasy/writings/​Valhalla.doc.  Is that a horse burial at Roskilde Cathedral. 

Trelleborg, Slagelse, Denmark. Viking settlement park

Roof capping with shingling, for thatch, Viking reconstruction, Trelleborg at Slagelse, Denmark

Sunken floor, living area, Viking house, Trelleborg, Slagelse,  DK

Burial mound, Ladbyskibbet, DK (enter and find outline of buried Viking ship)

Get to the mound on time.  We rely on pictures of the inside for this.

Viking-type carving (premodern minimalism) Trelleborg DK

These look like Easter Island.

Smoke down here goes up there, Viking house smokehole, reproduced at Trelleborg, near Slagelse,  DK

Were these Viking-type carvings intended as seriously spiritual, evocative; or just casual?

In some (many) burial sites, the buried ships hold women, and there is other evidence of their holding positions of status, holding substantial purse-strings and managing the community.

Viking theology.  Does this help explain the female figure the same size, if not bigger, than the male.  Or is it?

Culture.  The pre-Christian religious structure suggests that there were three basic areas for the deities to manage:  Odin, in charge of warfare, inspiration for poets, courage for battle, and wind-thunder-storm, and a concept of "the hanged man" that appears still in Tarot;  to whom the more well-to-do responded; Thor, for farmers and the common person; and Freyja for sorcery, incantation, bringing things about, and female sexual power.  Her brother, Frey, stood for male potency but not on the same power scale as the other 3, Odin, Thor and Freya.  This is rough, but go to The Vikings, A History by Robert Ferguson, Penguin Group 2009, at pages around 23.  

Look up the Oseberg ship from Norway at the Ferguson book at about 12.

Reviews of Mr. Ferguson's book highlight scholarly disagreements with his conclusions, see for example, ://www.openlettersmonthly.com/ranvaik-owns-this-box/ .    Our concern is different, and so far not picked up.  Why are pre-Christian people (say, women) who are effective community leaders, able to get things done, heal, "know" how to do things, get dismissed as sorcerers, while the boys are out knocking heads and proud of it.

Next reviewer:  analyze Mr. Ferguson's bias toward the "Christian" fear of women's abilities that reflect in his very characterization of them in that culture -- otherwise unsupported -- in referring to skills that many men simply do not have, or understand.

Is it sorcery, or a way of knowing?  Who ran the show at home anyway, while the guys were off, like the Crusaders or the Vikings.  The women, stupid. Is that so?  Or is this just late at night and we are fed up with surface dismissals by label of one culture smacked on another, like the Church does? Rather routinely?

Trelleborg - Near Slagelse. Ring Fortress. Viking

Trelleborg - Ring Fortress from the Viking Age

Slagelse, DK

This is still on Zealand, the large Danish island where Copenhagen is located. It is on the west coastal area. First, see a model of what the circular fort area could have looked like, with the protected area elevated, and surrounding grouped longhouses. Find longer descriptions at http://www.copenhagenpictures.dk/trlborg.html/  This area dates from 980 or so AD.  They used the dating method of analyzing rings on wood found there.

Model, Viking Ring Fort at Trelleborg, Denmark

The longhouses are bigger than expected. A central smoke hole in a curved roof beam kept air circulating, some. This size could have accommodated some 35-50 people. See video at http://www.youtube.com/watch?gl=US&hl=iw&v=sdYLWObhhY4

That site ties in the construction with the conversion of Harald Bluetooth, a matter not agreed at http://www.denmark.dk/en/menu/About-Denmark/History/The-Viking-Age/TheIntroductionOfChristianity/

Harald and his predecessors had been under political and military pressure from the German side, Otto, and did not on their own see the "merit" of the new religion from the south.

Longhouse, Viking reconstruction, Trelleborg, Denmark

Find a series of photos and other sites at http://www.vikingdenmark.com/trelleborg-viking-fortress-slagelse-denmark.html/  If you arrive here late, and the visitor center is closed, you still have access to the grounds.

Ruin, grassy raised plateau, Viking Ring Fort, Trelleborg DK

Low doors, access to Long House, Trelleborg DK

Were the people small in stature, or was this small door for warmth and protection, much as castles had some very little doors leading to passageways and little staircases for escape. A fully armed and armored fighter could not enter.

In The Vikings, A History, by Robert Ferguson, Penguin Group 2009 at page 10 notes the examination of a Viking-Age man in a grave mound (the buried Tune Ship) in Norway.  There were thigh bones thirty percent heavier than those of modern men, perhaps from extensive horseback riding.  There was also evidence of a pituitary tumor, however, that could have resulted in some gigantism.

How much is really known about the culture, and how do we know it.  I am still reading The Vikings, and am surprised at how late it was before an era of Vikings was seriously identified -- the 19th Century.  Issues of how to weigh the old sagas, and how much did the recorders of the sagas, acting centuries later, press their own families' agendas in them.  Like now. Text criticism applies to any ancient and modern material.

Recreation of a rune stone, Trelleborg DK

The circular fortresses of Vikings are known as trelleborgs.  There are several of them in Denmark and Sweden.