In the sleepy-eyed subject area of Østfold County in Norway , archaeologists have found a vast Viking cemetery , complete with a traditional Viking ship burial just centimeters beneath the topsoil .
The burial ground is home to at least seven burying mounds , historically used by culture across the world to cover a grave . Beneath one of these pitcher , researchers from theNorwegian Institute for Cultural Heritage Research(NIKU ) used high - firmness of purpose georadar to reveal the presence of a 20 - meter - long ( 65 foot ) Viking ship . Much to their surprise , the ship was lay to rest just 50 centimetre ( 20 inches ) late in the inhumation mound and is likely in signally proficient condition .
“ This breakthrough is fantastically exciting as we only hump three well - keep Viking ship finds in Norway excavated long time ago , ” Dr Knut Paasche , Head of the Department of Digital Archaeology at NIKU and an expert on Viking ships , tell ina assertion . “ This new ship will sure enough be of great historic significance as it can be investigated with all forward-looking way of archaeology . ”
Morten Hanisch , the county conservator in Østfold , sum : “ We are certain that there is a ship there , but how much is preserved is operose to say before further investigation . ”
But that was n’t all they line up . The radar data also testify the remains of at least five longhouses , some described as “ unusually large ” by the researchers . These were huge timber - framed halls made of woodwind , Harlan Fisk Stone , and dirt used by the Vikings as communal house .
The Vikings were a group of Norse pagan who sailed the seas of Europe and beyond between the 8th and 11th centuries . Although they uprise in present - day Norway , Denmark , and Sweden , they manage to voyage as far as the Mediterranean , Central Asia , andeven North America – all thanks to their beloved ship .
“ The ship burial does not exist in isolation , but constitute part of a cemetery which is understandably design to expose power and influence , ” add archaeologist Lars Gustavsen , projection drawing card from NIKU .
This type of ground - click radar used by the squad is still a very untried technology , nevertheless , it ’s already leaven to get results . Now come the challenge of using other non - invasive investigative tool to digitally map the singular breakthrough . If the situation fits , then the research worker might even resort to physically excavating the ship from the land .
