#oland

Man Discovers Rare Viking Arm Ring in Sweden

Archaeologists say the iron armlet could also have been buried deliberately in a sacrificial bog.

Last fall, a Swedish man spotted something in a marsh on Oland, Sweden’s second-largest island. At first, he thought the circular object—found lying on the ground near a construction pit—might be a tool. But it turned out to be a Viking Age iron arm bracelet that could be more than 1,000 years old.

After the anonymous man discovered the artifact, he contacted a local archaeologist, who advised him to bring it to the government of Kalmar, the southeastern county where Oland is located. He did so earlier this month. Experts analyzed the ring, comparing it to similar objects from the Swedish History Museum in Stockholm.

The C-shaped artifact is decorated ornately. Rows of raised dots grace its length, and its ends are shaped into animal heads, according to a statement posted on Facebook. “From the ornamentation, we were able to date it to the Swedish Viking Age, somewhere between 800 and 1050 C.E.,” Karl-Oskar Erlandsson, an archaeologist at the Kalmar County Administrative Board, tells the Viking Herald’s Jonathan Bennett.

The Vikings were a group of Scandinavian warriors who violently colonized coastal Europe between the 9th and 11th centuries. Viking men and women of all classes wore jewelry, including necklaces, brooches and arm rings (also known as armlets). Powerful men commonly gave armlets to their followers to both secure loyalty and demonstrate wealth. According to the statement, most surviving Viking armlets are crafted out of silver or bronze.

“What is unusual is that this one is made of iron,” Erlandsson tells radio station P4 Kalmar, per a translation by Sweden Herald. Of the more than 1,000 arm rings in the Swedish History Museum’s collection, only three are made of iron.

This doesn’t mean that iron jewelry was uncommon during the Viking Age. Iron accessories may just be more difficult to find today, as the metal is particularly susceptible to corrosion. When it’s exposed to water and oxygen, iron rusts and degrades. Luckily, the soils and sediments of wetlands lack oxygen. The newly discovered ring’s marsh burial may therefore have helped preserve it through the centuries, per the statement.

Swedish laws may also account for the lack of rediscovered iron Viking jewelry. Unlike with artifacts made of silver or gold, Swedes are under “no obligation to contact authorities when [they] find an object made of iron,” Erlandsson tells the Viking Herald.

The island of Oland has a long anthropological history. Hunter-gatherers first settled there more than 6,000 years ago. The area is home to at least 15 Iron Age ring forts—circular, fortified settlements built up from the fourth century onward. Several Viking graves have been found on Oland.

As for how the iron armlet got into the marsh, Erlandsson tells P4 Kalmar that it probably wasn’t part of a grave, as the Vikings wouldn’t have buried someone in a wetland. The marsh also rules out a Viking settlement as a source.

“It could be a sacrificial bog, that they have sacrificed to the gods or higher powers,” Erlandsson says. “So then there may be more objects in this wetland.”

If the armlet’s finder chooses to donate the artifact to the county, it will be preserved and further studied, according to the statement. Hoping the marsh is hiding more Viking objects, experts will soon search the area with metal detectors.

By Sonja Anderson.

Moodboard: Oland Kasporen

"My father always went on about how the Kasporens are a family of discipline, superiority, and perseverance. Well I cant say I've ever been particularly disciplined, and I'd never claim to be superior to anyone, but as for perseverance? I survived everything he put me through and out lived him, in the end... So I've got one out of three going for me."