Previous research projects

In 1982, the Viking Ship Museum embarked upon its first full-scalereconstruction of a Viking ship. The vessel in question was based on the remains of Skuldelev 3, an 11th-century coastal transportand trading vessel, which had been excavated 20 years previously. The reconstruction, Roar Ege, was launched in 1984 and retired from service in 2016, providing a complete data set over the lifespan of a reconstructed Viking ship. This article will present an object biography of Roar Ege, from the perspective of both the boatbuilder and archaeologist, detailing the manner in which the hull has deteriorated, and the components involved in its decline.

Outcome: Peer-reviewed  scientific article: Proceedings of the Fifteenth International Symposium on Boat and Ship Archaeology, Marseilles 2018: 295-301. Archaeonautica 21. Paris,  

Project responsible: Curator Tríona Sørensen and boatbuilder Martin Rodevad Dael   

In 2012, a mechanical excavator unearthed the remains of a 14th-century boat while restoring the moat at Vordingborg Castle, Denmark. The boat-find was documented and both dendrochronological and metallurgical investigations were conducted. The trees that were used to build the boat were felled 1355–1366 in the region around Gdańsk, Poland. However, the building of the boat was probably conducted near Vordingborg Castle in the second half of the 14th century. It is suggested that the boat was built, mainly using imported leftover materials originally intended for crafting the castle’s interior features. Concluding the article, we discuss 14th-century Baltic timber trade.

External collaboration: Aoife Daly (Research Project TIMBER, University of Copenhagen), Arne Jouttijärvi (Heimdal-archaeometry, Virum, Denmark), Lars Meldgaard Sass Jensen (Department for Archaeology and Heritage Studies, Aarhus University)

Outcome: Peer-reviewed  scientific article: International Journal of Nautical Archaeology, Vol. 50, 1: 97-115.  

Project responsible: Curator Morten Ravn and boatbuilder Tom Nicolajsen    

Paper (Danish language) published in the Danish scientific journal Gefion in 2020.      

English abstract: 

This paper presents two finds of glass bottles – some of similar type – from two shipwrecks located less than 15 km apart in the Kriegers Flak area of the Danish sector of the Baltic Sea. The significance of inscriptions and marks on two of the bottles as well as a possible Estonian origin for the bottles are explored and tendencies in the Baltic bottle trade, as revealed in the Sound Toll Registers, are presented.  

Publication by: curator Morten Johansen, curator Mikkel Thomsen and reseach coordinator Morten Ravn    

Microwear analysis of lithic debris offers an aid to field archaeologists in need of focusing excavation activity at the parts of Stone Age sites that are least disturbed bypost-depositional processes. In this progress report we describe the ridge-wear approach and report on its application to the submerged Mesolithic settlement ofOrehoved, Denmark. Test-pitting had provided worked flints from two distinctive layers within an area of ca. 2.8 ha, located 4–7m below present sea level. Throughanalysis of wear on dorsal ridges on flint flakes we demonstrate that the assemblages of artefacts from both strata spanned the whole range from minimally-roundedto extremely-rounded. Spatial and statistical analyses indicate that both layers contain redeposited artefacts. Major parts of higher ground areas were thereforeconsidered so disturbed by sea-level rise that further excavation should be avoided here. Follow-up excavation in a more low lying area located a third andstratigraphically deeper layer with numerous artefacts in stone, bone, and plant material in situ.

External collaboration: Randolph E. Donahuea (Lithic Microwear Research Laboratory, UK), Anders Fischer and Torben Malm (Agency for Culture and Palaces, Denmark) and Daniela B. Burronic (Leeds Beckett University, UK)

Outcome: Peer-reviewed  scientific article: Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports 23, 540-548

Project responsible: curator Morten Johansen 

The project description is only in Danish:

To kvinder og seks mænd foretog i 2016 en sørejse langs Grønlands sydvestlige kyst om bord på Vikingeskibsmuseets Skuldelev 6-rekonstruktion, Skjoldungen. Sørejsen har givet et nyt maritimt blik på det grønlandske landskab samt en øget forståelse af nogle af de sejladsmæssige udfordringer som mødte vikingetidens og middelalderens nordboere i de grønlandske fjordsystemer.

External colloboration: Forlaget Gyldendal, The Skjoldungen Boat Guild and The National Museum of Greenland

Outcome: Book  published by Gyldendal: Nielsen, I. og Sand, O. 2017: Skjoldungen - en moderne vikingesejlads. Gyldendal. Furthermore, a scientific peer-reviewed article focussing on trial voyages as a scientific method: Madsen, C. K., Ravn, M. og Sand, O. 2019: Grønlandstogtet – et rekonstrueret skibsfund fra vikingetiden og den eksperimentelle arkæologis muligheder og begrænsninger. Arkæologisk Forum.

Project responsible: Research coordinator Morten Ravn

During the summers from 2005 to 2007, the Viking Ship Museum reconstructed and built three boat-finds from the Iron Age and Viking Age. Common to all three boats is that they all have a thin, hollowed-out log boat as their basic component, which is then heated and softened over fire and then expanded out into a new hull form. In this book, archaeologist Ole Crumlin-Pedersen presents the archaeological background of expanded boats, while boatbuilder Hanus Jensen describes how the three reconstructions were built. Both authors communicate their knowledge and experience with such passion, that we as readers get entirely swept up in their enthusiasm for this part of the Nordic clinker-built boat’s history.

Outcome: Theme book from the Viking Ship Museum: Crumlin-Pedersen, O. og Jensen, H. 2018: Viking and Iron Age expanded boats. Roskilde.

Project responsible: Research coordinator Morten Ravn      

The military operations of Scandinavian societies in the Viking Age depended on their ships. Different types of ships were used in order to transport troops and war supplies. Some ships were designed to conduct the speedy transport of large numbers of troops; others were specialised cargo vessels used in military operations as carriers of supplies, and in some cases also troops. Not only were different types of ships involved in naval transport, the size of the fleets were also varied: some fleets consisted of only a few ships, others of several hundred. Using the immense amount of empirical data resulting from building full-scale ship reconstructions at the Viking Ship Museum in Roskilde, it is possible to compare the amount of resources necessary for building and maintaining the different ship types with the different fleet sizes. 

Finally, this experimental archaeological insight is compared and discussed with the written evidence for Viking Age military organisation.

Publication: Peer-reviewed paper to the proceedings of the seminar: International Symposium on Boat and Ship Archaeology 14, Gdansk 2015.  

Project leader: Curator, Morten Ravn 

During 2015, the Viking Ship Museum is reconstructing the Gislinge Boat – a 7.7m long working boat dated to 1130. In July, iron smelter Mads Jylov carried out four smelting experiments at the boatyard. The resulting iron was then used by Jonas Bigler to produce rivets for the Gislinge Boat. The project addresses a number of research questions:

- How was iron produced in Scandinavia during the 12th century?

- How does the iron we produced compare with archaeological material?

- How quickly does bog iron corrode?

- How long can bog iron rivets sit in the hull before they have to be replaced?

Each rivet has been documented from the initial smelt to its position in the boat. This documentation will continue over the coming years and constitutes the first long-term study of bog iron nails in a maritime experimental archaeological context.       

Fondsstøtte fra: Kraks Fond

Eksternt samarbejde: Smed Jonas Bigler og jernudvinder Mads Jylov

Publiceringskanal: Peer-reviewed and popular scientific articles

Projektansvarlige: Teamleder Martin Dael og museumsinspektør Tríona Sørensen

Since 2008, the Viking Ship Museum in Roskilde (DK) has carried out the archaeological assessment and survey required prior to the installation of the trans-Baltic Nord Stream gas pipeline through Danish waters. The project has involved desk-based screening of the data collected as well as archaeological activities in the field. Coast to coast, the 1220 km long twin pipeline crosses Russian, Finnish, Swedish, Danish and German waters. 137.6 km of this is though Danish territorial waters and EEZ. Including an alternative route design approximately 250 km of pipeline corridor has been surveyed in the Danish sector at a width of up to 2 km. Though only a small fraction of the vast seabed, the result is an overwhelming collection of hitherto unknown shipwrecks and other objects dating from the 17th century to the present day: 25 wrecks, seven possible wrecks, and five single objects - to which should be added seven presumed dump sites, the identification and dating of which are inherently problematic.

This paper briefly presents the huge research potential of the wrecks and objects discovered; the methodology employed and patterns in the chronological and spatial distribution of the finds will be discussed. Are all these wrecks, of these particular dates, really representative of the entire surrounding seabed? Or are there circumstances in space and time that explain the apparent abundance of wrecks right along the pipeline and the apparent absence of wrecks of Medieval and earlier date?     

Publication: Peer-reviewed paper to the proceedings of the seminar: International Symposium on Boat and Ship Archaeology 13, Amsterdam 2012

Project leader: Curator, Mikkel Thomsen  

We will present the results of a preliminary study on the potential of stereoscopic video recording as both a means of disseminating and making accessible maritime archaeological sites and methods to museum visitors, as well as a foundation for photogrammetric documentation. In order to test the method on an object of both historical interest and with a significant three-dimensional extent, stereoscopic footage was captured on the site of the Danish man-of-war Dannebroge, wrecked 1710 and now lying about 12 meters below the surface of Køge Bugt. This footage has been processed into a short sample for 3d projection. 

The study is primarily concerned with the possibility to offer an immersive experience of an exciting and captivating field – which otherwise remains mostly inaccessible to the public – through a traditional, one-way installation. However, the study at the same time explores the feasibility of exploiting the photogrammetric potential of such footage, since further processing the video into digital models could generate nigh effortless archaeological documentation, as well as provide input for museum installations where visitors might engage more interactively with the material. Conclusions are thus drawn on the practical potential, technical and physical requirements and compatibility of the two methods.       

Outcome: Hyttel, Frederik & Andreas Bloch 2016: Bringing the Mountain to Muhammad: Documentation af archaeological sites under water. In Larsen, N. & Pilati, M. (eds.), Why 3D?. Faaborg.     

The military operations of Scandinavian societies in the Viking Age depended on their ships. Different types of ships were used in order to transport troops and war supplies. Some ships were designed to conduct the speedy transport of large numbers of troops, while others were specialised cargo vessels used in military operations as carriers of supplies and sometimes troops as well. This project examines the building and use of ships for warfare in 11th century Denmark. The subjects are addressed through detailed analyses of aspects such as resources, organisational structures and naval warfare. The outcomes are a more informed understanding of 11th century Scandinavian military organisation, shipbuilding and resource management. 

External funding: Dronning Margrethes & Prins Henriks Fond, Frimodt-Heineke Fonden, Landsdommer V. Gieses legat and Konsul George Jorck og Hustru Emma Jorck's Fond.       

Publication: Peer-reviewed monograph in the Viking Ship Museums series Maritime Culture of the North.

Project leader: <link internal-link internal link in current>Curator, Morten Ravn 

The Viking Ship Museum has applied several 3-D methodologies for working with Viking-Age archaeological ship finds. The remains of Roskilde 6 were documented using a FaroArm, and the data were used for a physical reconstruction model of the original hull form, itself recorded with a FaroArm. A 3-D wireframe model, lines drawings and working drawings were then made in the program Rhinoceros. The working drawings were necessary for making moulds for freeze-drying the wreck’s original timbers, later re-assembled for the exhibition ‘Viking’. Another example is a virtual construction of Skuldelev 2 made on the basis of the 3-D wireframe model of the ship’s reconstructed form.

In the case of the Oseberg ship, a 3-D photo scan was made of the exhibited vessel, and resulting data were used for a new and more correct reconstruction of the hull form. A 3-D wireframe model was used for making hydrostatic measurements, and a solid surface model formed the basis for a 1:10 scale epoxy model that tested the ship’s possible performance in a hydrodynamic laboratory. 

In this paper, the various methodologies applied in these examples are presented in detail and their advantages in all stages of research are discussed.

Outcome: Bischoff, Vibeke 2016: Application of 3-D digital methods in the documentation, reconstruction and dissemination of archaeological ship finds. In Larsen, N. & Pilati, M. (eds.), Why 3D?. Faaborg.      

Scholars have divided Viking-Age shipbuilding into traditions such as Nordic and Slavic. This is done well knowing that the validity of concepts is challenged by the variety of empirical evidence. Hence, defining features should only be seen as general guidelines. Essential pivots, such as the defining features for specific shipbuilding traditions and the conceptual approaches to shipbuilding, have been, and still are, debated. But in this paper I will investigate Viking Age shipbuilding with a different approach. I will address issues related to the fundamental processes that constitute a tradition. The purpose is to identify the essential components in shipbuilding communities of the Viking Age and focus on shipbuilding as something conducted by individuals constantly negotiating meaning and thus creating communities of practice and identities.      

Outcome: Ravn, M. 2015. Tradition as process. Reflections on Viking Age Shipbuilding. Olgierd Felczak (ed.), The Baltic Sea – a Mediterranean of North Europe. In the Light of Archaeological, Historical and Natural Science Research from Ancient to Early Medieval Times: 63-68. Gdansk

Project responsible: Curator Morten Ravn

Scholars have divided Viking-Age shipbuilding into traditions such as Nordic and Slavic. This is done well knowing that the validity of concepts is challenged by the variety of empirical evidence. Hence, defining features should only be seen as general guidelines. Essential pivots, such as the defining features for specific shipbuilding traditions and the conceptual approaches to shipbuilding, have been, and still are, debated. But in this paper I will investigate Viking Age shipbuilding with a different approach. I will address issues related to the fundamental processes that constitute a tradition. The purpose is to identify the essential components in shipbuilding communities of the Viking Age and focus on shipbuilding as something conducted by individuals constantly negotiating meaning and thus creating communities of practice and identities.      

Outcome: Ravn, M. 2015. Tradition as process. Reflections on Viking Age Shipbuilding. Olgierd Felczak (ed.), The Baltic Sea – a Mediterranean of North Europe. In the Light of Archaeological, Historical and Natural Science Research from Ancient to Early Medieval Times: 63-68. Gdansk

Project responsible: Curator Morten Ravn

Between 2010- 2012, the Viking Ship Museum built Skjoldungen, a reconstruction of Skuldelev 6. We had previously built a reconstruction of Skuldelev 6 (Kraka Fyr launched in 1998), but this time we were trying to apply new knowledge and experience to the reconstruction. Furthermore, building a new reconstruction of Skuldelev 6 stressed the fact that a reconstruction does not represent the definite truth in terms of how the original looked or functioned. Rather, it presents a picture which acts as a catalyst and a tool for a process which highlights new issues and correlations, and allows us to see and interpret the source material afresh.

Det har været livligt diskuteret, om skibs- og bådebyggeriet i middelalderen ved Østersøens sydkyst har sit udspring i germanske, skandinaviske, eller slaviske skibsbygningstraditioner. Målet med dette projekt var at undersøge, hvor vidt etnicitet kan bruges som grundlag for en videnskabelig analyse, eller om funktionelle krav og udveksling af ideer imellem kystzoner på begge sider af Østersøen kan give et bedre svar på udviklingen af lokale fartøjstyper i perioden 400-1400 e.Kr. 

Projektets resultater blev publiceret i 2004 i bogen ’Man, Ship, Landscape. Ships and seafaring in the Oder Mouth Area AD 400-1400. A casestudy of an ideological context’, forfattet af George Indruszewski. 

Arkæologen Jens Ulriksens bog 'Anløbspladser. Besejling og bebyggelse i Danmark mellem 200 og 1100 e. Kr'. blev udgivet af Vikingeskibsmuseet i 1998.

» Bogen er udsolgt fra forlaget, men kan downloades vederlagsfrit her 

Bogen er baseret på et forskningsprojekt, hvor talrige lokaliteter langs Roskilde Fjords kyster blev undersøgt og analyseret. Det følgende er et uddrag fra bogens konklusion: 

'Anløbspladserne i Sydskandinavien udviser for størstedelens vedkommende et temmelig ensartet indtryk fra 6. årh. til 11. årh. Eventuelle ændringer i deres anvendelse, og mulige passive perioder, kan kun påvises i begrænset omfang, og med stor dateringsmæssig usikkerhed.   

Et bedre kronologisk grundlag kunne være medvirkende til at få fastlagt pladsernes indre udvikling i form af fysiske forskydninger af aktivitetsområdet eller en eventuel tidsmæssig forskel i udøvelsen af de påviste håndværk. Et eksempel er tekstilfremstillingen, der kan dokumenteres på adskillige af de specialiserede anløbspladser. Accepteres tolkningen af vævehytterne som udtryk for sejlfremstilling, ville det af hensyn til sejlets introduktion på det nordiske skib, være interessant at få fastslået, om der eventuelt var en sådan aktivitet allerede i 6.-7. årh. 

Sammenfattende må det konstateres, at de gennemgående – og arkæologisk påviselige – ændringer skete i 6.-7. årh., hvor de små specialiserede anløbspladser dukkede op, og i 11.-12. årh., hvor de reorganiseredes eller blev opgivet.'

Det første skibsfund som Vikingeskibsmuseet byggede en rekonstruktion af var Skuldelev 3. Rekonstruktionen blev navngivet Roar Ege. Formålet med at bygge rekonstruktionen var at øge kendskabet til den teknologi, der lå bag bygningen og brugen af vikingetidens skibe. 

Projektets resultater blev publiceret i 1997 i bogen ’Roar Ege. Skuldelev 3 skibet som arkæologisk eksperiment’, forfattet af Erik Andersen, Ole Crumlin-Pedersen, Søren Vadstrup og Max Vinner. Bogen udforsker de maritime håndværk og ressourceforbruget involveret i bygningen og udrustningen af et skib fra vikingetiden, og den færdige rekonstruktions sejladsegenskaber analyseres detaljeret gennem omfattende testsejladser og forsøgsrejser.                 

Udgravningen af Hedebys havneområde i 1979-1980 blev begyndelsen på et langstrakt tysk-dansk forskningsprojekt omhandlende vikingetidens skibsfund og skibsbygning med et særligt fokus på vikingetidens Hedeby og Slesvig. 

De involverede institutioner var fortrinsvis Archäologisches Landesmuseum der Stiftung Schleswig-Holsteinische Landesmuseen fra tysk side og Nationalmuseet fra dansk side. Senere, i forbindelse med publiceringen af projektets resultater, deltog også Vikingeskibsmuseet i Roskilde. Projektets resultater er blandt andet publiceret i bogen ’Viking-Age Ships and Shipbuilding in Hedeby/Haithabu and Schleswig’, med Ole Crumlin-Pedersen som hovedforfatter. 

I dette projekt videreførtes Vikingeskibsmuseets eksperimentalarkæologiske sejladsforsøg, der var blevet påbegyndt om bord på nordlandsbåden Rana. Hensigten var at belyse samspillet mellem det nordiske skibs klinkbyggede skrog og skibets råsejl. 

Gennem omfattende analyser af skibsfund fra vikingetiden, testsejladser og forsøgsrejser med rekonstruerede vikingeskibe samt sammenlignende analyser af traditionelle norske råsejlsbåde blev det muligt at sandsynliggøre, hvordan Skuldelevskibene var blevet rigget op i den sidste del af vikingetiden. Resultaterne blev publiceret i bogen ’Råsejlet – Dragens Vinge’, forfattet af Bent og Erik Andersen. 

Formålet med dette projekt var at foretage marinarkæologiske undersøgelser af en tidligere erkendt stenspærring i Fotevik ved roden af Skåneøret i Sydvestsverige. Projektet var et dansk-svensk samarbejde, der udover Vikingeskibsmuseet også talte Nationalmuseets Skibshistoriske Laboratorium på dansk side, mens de svenske institutioner var Statens Sjöhistorika Museum, Lunds Universitets Historiska Museum, Malmö Museum og Länsstyrelsen i Malmöhus län.

Projektet kunne påvise at spærringen havde flere faser, og at spærringen bestod af sten og udtjente skibe, der var blevet anvendt til at blokere for indsejlingen til Foteviken. Spærringens første fase var sandsynligvis etableret i 1000-tallet, mens en betydelig forstærkning sandsynligvis fandt sted i løbet af første halvdel af det 12. århundrede. Projektets resultater blev blandt andet publiceret i bogen ’Pugna Forensis -? Arkeologiska Undersökningar kring Foteviken, Skåne 1981-83’, forfattet af Ole Crumlin-Pedersen, Birgitta Hårdh og Sven Rosborn.