In Search of the Vikings

In thinking of the Vikings, the first image we often conjure up is of men in horned hats in long ships on their way to pillage and plunder the coasts of Southern Europe. We don't often study Denmark, a country of only 5 million people, in school. Over the course of my first few days in Denmark, I got a chance to travel around the country and see sites in museums that date not only from the Viking Era, but even as far back as the Iron Age.

I'm staying in Århus, the second largest city in the country, but the population is only 300,00. You don't have to drive far before you hit the countryside. My cousins have been kind enough to take me around Jyland and I've encountered mile upon mile of green fields with cows and horses. The ruins from the past are often undisturbed. Urbanization, violent revolution, and the two world wars, which have destroyed so much in the past in other parts of Europe, have left much of Denmark undisturbed.

This picture is of a recreation of an Iron Age hut. I visited the Moesgård Museum where the exhibits go all the way back to Stone Age tools. Their chief attraction is the Bog Man, the perfectly preserved remains of a 2000 year old man. Today, he lies in a glass case, twisted, with blackened skin, a slightly eerie sight to see. Cynthia, it reminded me of the Ice Man from sixth grade. The museum also had an exhibit on ancient runes. Although the runes were often used for identification purposes, they could also have love poems and one even had a dirty message.

The following day, I visited Sønderborg Castle, which is a museum of the history of Southern Jutland, the border area between Germany and Denmark. The castle also has a tower where the Danish king, Christian II, was imprisoned. This picture was taken from a window of the castle. I found the port city quite lovely. When I looked in the water, I was surprised to see jellyfish lazily floating. I suppose the water here is much cleaner.

On the way back, we went by the ruins of this castle. It once belonged to a nobleman who had a falling out with a Danish king.

My explorations of the Danish countryside continued the following day. My cousins took me to an inn where I had smørrebrød for the first time. The open-faced sandwich is one of the tradional foods of Denmark. They take a piece of rye bread and then add meat, vegetables, and other sandwich toppings. For example, one of the ones I had was topped with ham, cold asparagus, onions, peppers, and Italian salad, which is just peas and carrots in mayonnaise. There are a limitless number of snørrebrød. Apparently, the cook didn't know what he would put on ours until he started making them.

As we drove along, my cousins directed my attention to little bumps by the side of the road that were Viking burial mounds. Although not nearly as impressive, they're the Danish versions of the pyramids. They also stopped to show me the following view. Moments before I took this picture, I managed to shock myself on the fence designed to keep the sheep from running away.