Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
however, restricted to itinerant, seasonal camps and there remained few human footholds
in an otherwise empty land dominated by glaciers and frozen wastes.
Over the millennia that followed, settled cultures began to take root, to the extent that
during the later years of the Roman Empire, Rome provided Norway with fabric, iron im-
plements and pottery. The iron tools allowed farmland to be cleared of trees, larger boats
were built with the aid of iron axes and a cooling climate saw the establishment of more
permanent structures built from stone and turf. By the 5th century Norwegians had learned
how to smelt their own iron from ore found in the southern Norwegian bogs. Norway's
endless struggle to tame its wild landscape had begun.
The History of Norway - From the Ice Age to Today,
by Oivind Stenersen and Ivar Libæk,
provides more than enough historical detail for most travellers and is available at larger
bookshops in Norway.
Here Come the Vikings
Few historical people have captured the imagination quite like the Vikings. Immortalised
in modern cartoons (
Asterix
and
Hägar the Horrible,
to name just two) and considered to
be the most feared predators of ancient Europe, the Vikings may have disappeared from
history, but as a seafaring nation with its face turned towards distant lands, they remain
very much the forerunners of modern Norway. But who were these ancient warriors who
took to their longboats and dominated Europe for five centuries?
Archaeological Museums
Bryggens Museum
,
Bergen
Arkeologisk Museum
, Stavanger
Historisk Museet
,
Oslo
Museum of Natural History & Archaeology
, Trondheim
Alta Museum
, Alta
Conquest & Expansion
Under pressure from shrinking agricultural land caused by a growing population, settlers
from Norway began arriving along the coast of the British Isles in the 780s. When the
