“Land of Legends” is a historical park near Lejre, dedicated recreating ancient forms of life as well as experimental archaeology. Huge project aims to recreate the Great Lejre Hall, which was found in Gl. Lejre a few years back.
Currently the Land of Legends invite guests to time-travel to a number of periods in the Danish history – ranging from the Stone Age to 19th century life in the countryside. Although the main feature is the reconstructed Iron Age village Lethra, the site also offers a Viking market as one of its attractions.
For some time, however, the management has worked to enlarge and renovate this “Viking Part”. This resulted a few years back in the reconstruction of the large stone ship known from the historical landscape at Gl. Lejre.
Last year, AP Møller and Chastine Mc-Kinney Møller Foundation donated the historical park 65 mill. Danish kroner (€ 8.7 mill) in order to begin the reconstruction of the so-called Great Hall from Lejre from the beginning of the 10th century. Although the full financing has not yet been found, the plan is to begin sourcing the oaks soon. Prices have gone up on this kind of timber as the Chinese are apparently mad about using oak for the modern take of their traditional architecture. It is estimated that between 200 – 250 full grown oaks will have to be found in Denmark in order to get the main material for the reconstruction.
Covering more than 600 m2 the hall will tell the story of the life in the Viking Mead-Hall as it is known from archaeology, poetry and sagas.
However, the plan is also to find the money for recreating a walk-in burial mound with virtual content such as those, which litter the landscape around Gl. Lejre.
“We will not only show how the Vikings lived, how they dressed and what they ate, we will also show how they viewed the world,” tells Lars Holten, an archaeologist who is a member of the Sagnlandet Lejre board. “The Vikings believed in guardian spirits in the form of animalsas well as shape-shifting. A warrior could be a bear and a peasant could be a pig. Using smartphones and iPads, we are going to invite visitors to choose an identity and though this experience the social environment of their “specific animal” in the community.”
Finally, the plan is also to build a Viking House of slightly smaller proportions, which will be used to house school-camps visiting the region, which was recently given the status of a National Park – The Land of the Scyldings.
Partly mimicking the landscape around Gl. Lejre, the reconstructed Viking hall will be posited with a view to the stone-ship across the central vale, which runs through the museum.
SOURCE:
Historisk vikingehal bliver genskabt i Lejre
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‘Medieval News’ from May 2016 brings you stories about Lejre in the land of the Scyldings and Beowulf, which is about to be unlocked. But it also shares a lot of notices about upcoming conferences, new books etc….