Museum at Hedeby

The village of Hedeby used to be the biggest city in Scandinavia when it was founded. It was the main trading town in Denmark for about three hundred years before it was destroyed during a raid in 1066. After this the town was left behind and the people moved to the town of Schleswig which were only a few kilometers away.

The area the town used to occupy was left idle with no new development for the following thousand years and till this day there is no development on the location. The lack of modern development mean all which were buried in the ground during the life of Hedeby has been left intact in the ground to be found at a later date. And there has been many excavation of the old historic sight during the last couple of hundred years.

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Many of the finds has been put at display at the Hedeby Museum which is located a little away from the old settlement and close to the old church of Hedeby. The museum form is inspired by the shape of a Viking ship upside down to commemorate the town was the main town of the Viking Denmark.

The museum tells the story of the town using a bit of an interactive display you can watch and see the development of the town. The museum also tells about the Norse religion.

Some of the main items at the museum is the original Hedeby Stones which is some stones with runic inscription found around the location of Hedeby. There is also an old Viking longship which is in a pretty bad condition since it has been partly burned.