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Åse is on the run. She must find a place to hide. She got a head start on the warrior when he took a wrong step up by the waterfall, but he will soon catch up. She sneaks around the tree trunk to see if she can spot an escape route. He’s snuck up behind her....

On a crisp May morning in the mid-800s, a fleet of longships glide quietly up the River Shannon in the heart of Ireland. A powerful figure stands at the prow, guiding the ships up the wide waterway. The Viking ship keels are quite flat, allowing them to sail or row in the shallowest of waters,...

Burials took place at this site over a period of several hundred years approaching the 11th century A.D. In retrospect, many have wondered what actually happened. They understood that the more than 800 mounds had to contain graves. But it was unclear how old they were, and why they were so plentiful. A theory arose...

Burials during the Viking Age were public events in which everyone participated. The social standing of the living, the dead, and the family as a whole was expressed through rituals and the placement of the grave in the landscape. The tombs were supposed to remain visible, and can be found on heights, near settlements or...

Everything has been prepared for the great reindeer hunt. For several weeks, people from the village have cleaned and prepared the large trapping pits on the mountains and hillsides, covering them with twigs, leaves and peat. It had been a substantial task, and everyone, regardless of gender, age or size, had done their share of...

The leather-clad hunter moves with quiet purposeful steps through the vast mountainous area opposite the small mountain village of Oppdal. He has spotted a herd of reindeer on top of a snowdrift. Cautiously he slips within shooting range, places the arrow on the bow, draws, aims and shoots. It misses completely, with the arrow piercing...

The large coastal cairns at Slakken are memorials to friends and loved ones buried during the Early Iron Age, more than 1,500 years ago. The cairns are particularly visible from the sea, and to seafarers they signalled that people lived on this land. The dead residing in the mounds could gaze across both land and...

Sometime during the Early Iron Age, more than 1500 years ago, a woman was buried in a mound on a Refsnes hillside. Some of her belongings were placed in the grave with her, and on top of the tomb, friends and family assembled a cairn of rocks as a monument to her. Over time, the...

Out here on the Refsnes cape there is a burial ground from the Iron Age. The ground consists of several circular mounds plus one that stands out; a very rare grave, quite unique in Norwegian context. The grave is a square mound, large and rectangular, almost like a land lot, constructed as a barrow of...

In 1773, during his journey through Norway with the aim of writing a grand work on Norwegian history, historian Gerhard Schøning looks out across the landscape of Stadbygda in Rissa. He is overwhelmed by the amount of burial mounds placed one after the other alongside the fjord, as far as the eye can see. He...