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New Viking fortress found near Køge
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September 5th, 2014
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This article is more than 11 years old.
As the fifth construction of its kind in Denmark, this Viking Age fortess is a fantastic archeological discovery
Found in a field belonging to the Vallo Diocese estate, a Viking Age circular fortress rewrites the Danish history books. It is the fifth construction of its kind found in Denmark, but the first such discovery in sixty years, reports Politiken.
“It’s great news!” Lasse CA Sonne, a Viking Age historian from the Saxo Institute at the University of Copenhagen, told the newspaper.
“Although, there were Vikings in other countries, these circular fortresses are unique to Denmark. Many have given up hope that there were many of them left.”
The third largest
Early archaeological excavations show that on the field close to the noisy south highway lies a fortification with a 10 to 11 meter-wide palisade – a stockade with pointed wooden poles.
At 145 meters in diameter, the Vallo ring-fortress (Vallø Borgring), as it has been named, is the third largest of the five found in Denmark.
The four other circular fortresses have been dated to the reign of Harald Bluetooth in the late 900s. The construction of this fortress is very similar to the one found in Hobro, and thus it is likely that Harald Bluetooth was the builder too, the Danish Castle Centre believes .
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