Ship of the Sun or Ship of the Dead? Stone Ships

Stone ship settings or Skeppssättning are amongst the most remarkable Viking age monuments in Scandinavia, but what were they for? They were built over a period of 2000 years from the Nordic bronze age until the end of the Viking age, mainly in grave fields but they weren’t just associated with burials and cremations as they were also used for a kind of meeting called a ‘Thing’. This video explains how the stone ships may relate first to a Bronze age cult of the sun in Gotland, and later to a Viking belief that the dead would need a vehicle for a journey to and from the underworld. The stone ship settings included in this film are Tjelvars grave in Gotland, Anundshög in Västmanland, Åsa domaresäte in Södermanland, Ängakåsen and Ale’s stones in Scania and the Jelling stone ship in Denmark.

 

Art

Original works created for this video

Robert Molyneaux - CGI reconstruction of the Jelling stone ship in Denmark

Other art work used in the video

Christian Sloan Hall - Odin / First blood / Eastre dawn goddess

Roy Douglas - Vendel helmet cgi
Christopher Steininger - Ship to the otherworld animation
Stella Spente - Freyja in her chariot

Ryan Murray - Treudd ritual

Gemini Science - CGI ship burial

Graman - Sutton hoo burial
Eva Gjerde - Storhaug ship burial

Sources

• Bonde, N & Stylegar, F. A., ‘Between Sutton Hoo and Oseberg – dendrochronology and the origins of the ship burial tradition’, Danish Journal of Archaeology (2016), 5:1-2, 19-33
• Davidson, H.E., The Road to Hel: A Study of the Conception of the Dead in Old Norse Literature, Cambridge University, (1943). 
• Elliott, R. N. ‘Håga in context – An analysis of the Håga complex in the Bronze Age landscape of the Mälar Valley region’ (Uppsala: 2020)  
• Jackson, E. “Not Simply Lists”: An Eddic Perspective on Short-Item Lists in Old English Poems. Speculum, 73(2), 338–371. (1998) 
• Shenk, Peter, To Valhalla by Horseback? Horse Burial in Scandinavia during the Viking Age, (Oslo: The Centre for Viking and Medieval Studies, University of Oslo, 2002). 
• Skoglund, P., ‘Stone ships: continuity and change in Scandinavian prehistory, World Archaeology, 40:3, 390-406, (2008) 
• Rowsell, T., “Riding to the Afterlife:The Role of Horses in Early Medieval North-Western Europe,” MA Thesis, University College of London, (2012). 
• Rowsell, T., "Religious Continuity in Northern European Boat Burial Practices of the Vendel Period" Research proposal, (2015)
• Vikinge skibs museet website 

MUSIC: 

The whole other - Ether oar 

Wolcensmen - Sunne (remix by Eternal Rik) 

Saichaika - Musica aeterna 

Halindir - Hedelandet II 

Bark sound productions - My 

Aaron Kenny - yonder hill and dale 

Patrick Patrikios - away 

Kevin MacLeod - Rites 

Stark von Oben - Praetorian Germanicus 

Stark von Oben - Winter Soulstice 

Ormgård - Séta 

Borg - Death of Winter 

Myling - Töcken 

Halindir - Hummocks in fog 

Rishi Shah - From Runes to Ruins 

Xurious - Steppe expansion