Viking Blades

In 2005, I visited L'Anse aux Meadows and the Viking Festival in St. Johns, both in Newfoundland, Canada.

L'Anse aux Meadows is the only authenticated site of a Viking settlement in North America. It is now a reconstructed Viking museum with living history interpreters.

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LAnse_aux_Meadows

These are some of the photos from that visit.

Display of blade artifacts

 

The site has a reconstructed Viking settlement where a demonstration forge is set up.

The demonstrators actually gather bog ore from a nearby stream to smelt into iron. Bog ore is an accumulation of rust nodules that slowly form beneath the surface of  streams and seeps in iron-rich bogs and marshes. It is an ancient method of obtaining iron.

Reproduction of a Viking Sword
Note the bone hilt

Interpreter holding sword and wearing a belt knife

War Axe and Tools

Reproduced belt knife
The handle is carved wood
The blade is smelted from bog ore and forged to shape

At the 2005 Viking Festival in St. Johns, participants from Iceland and other Scandanavian countries demonstrated some of the weapons and martial skills of their area.

Viking re-enactors

More re-enactors

Viking war chest and axes

Flink Knapping is a skill originally practiced at that time period.