GJELLESTAD, NORWAY—Live Science reports that a ground-penetrating radar survey of the area surrounding a poorly preserved Viking ship burial discovered in 2018 has revealed the remains of an additional 13 burial mounds. The mounds are thought to predate the ship burial, and may have held buildings such as a cult temple and a feast hall. “We believe that the inclusion of a ship burial in what was probably an already existing—and long-lived—mound cemetery was an effort to associate oneself with an already existing power structure,” said Lars Gustavsen of the Norwegian Institute for Cultural Heritage Research. The burial of the 66-foot-long ship in the ancient cemetery may have been a display of wealth and power, Gustavsen explained, or it may have been understood as a way to transport the dead from the land of the living to the realm of the dead. The team continues to investigate the site, he added. To read about another Viking ship burial unearthed in Norway, go to "Sailing the Viking Seas."
