The Huldremose Woman

Huldremose Woman, or Huldre Fen Woman, is a bog body recovered in 1879 from a peat bog near the village Ramten in Jutland. Analysis by carbon 14 dating revealed the woman had lived during the Iron Age, around 160 BCE to 340 CE. The mummified remains are exhibited at the National Museum of Denmark (in Copenhagen). The elaborate clothing worn by Huldremose Woman has been reconstructed and displayed at several museums.

                                                                                                                                                            

Huldremose dress, front/wikipedia

Over 2000 years ago the body of a woman was put into an old peat bog in Huldremosen at Ramten village on Djursland, Jutland. The special oxygen poor conditions in the bog meant that the woman was preserved as a bog body with skin clothes and stomach contents. She was found in May 1879 by a worker, Niels Hansen, who was digging turf for a schoolteacher in Huldremose. In one meters depth he hit the body with his shovel and cut off its right hand. The schoolteacher was interested in archaeology and stopped the digging, and he kept guard by the body for the next couple of days until the district-medical from Grenaa arrived with a pharmacist and a police chief. The first theory was that the body had been the victim of a crime. At that time there was little knowledge about how to handle a situation like this, and the body of the woman was brought to the nearest farm where she was undressed and got a good bath! In connnection to this cleaning her hair fell off.  The criminal proceedings were given up and the body of the mysterious woman was buried in the church yard by the parish church Ørum nearby.

Huldremose woman, wikipedia

The doctor washed her clothes and dried them in his yard - and he wrote to the National Museum in Copenhagen from where they sent a telegram that they wanted both the body of the woman and her clothes - so the body was dug up and sent with her clothes on steamship to Copenhagen. In spite of the rough treatment of the 2000 year old clothes they hadn't suffered any damage - and they belong to the best preserved Danish textiles from antiquity.   Like most mummies found in Denmark the woman from Huldremose was fully dressed. Her dress is incredibly well preserved although it is 2000 years old.

She was more than 40 years old when she was  placed in the bog which was a high age at that time, in fact an old woman of Iron Age. The find has brought nutrition to various discussions and interpretations during times. A possible interpretation is that she was killed and following this sacrificed in the bog.The body was found with the legs bent behind the back, with a nearly severed right arm. Supposedly the arm was damaged by a shovel during excavation. Apart from this, the corpse was well intact.The dead lay with head west. The body was identified as a grown woman, probably rather slender built. The left thighbone had been broken and grown crookedly. She must have been limping.  

spergula arvensis/ wikipedia

According to science exist many informations about what had happened to people who later became bog bodies. The stomach contents can reveal the person's meal before death. It is known from the Huldremose woman's stomach contents that her last meal was rough grinded ray with a big content of seeds from the weed spergel (spergula arvensis). In her stomach were also animal hairs and rests of animal tissue. This indicated that she also had meat in her dish.

She wore a dress with a checkered skirt and a checkered scarf in sheep wool and two skin capes. The skirt was held around the waist with a narrow leather strap woven into a waistband. The scarf was tied around her head and fastened under the left arm with a needle from a bird's bone. On the upper body she wore outermost a cape made from several dark brown sheep skin with a collar of light sheep skin, the curly fur turning out. Under this she wore another cape with the fur side inwards. This was made from 11 small dark lamb skin. The cape was well used and had 22 sewn on patches. They did not cover a hole but contained a finely made bone comb, a narrow blue hair band and a lether strap, all wrapped in a bladder. This was obviously not a pocket, since the patches had to be cut up to get out the things. The insewen things possibly functioned as  amulets.

Huldremose woman, exhibition, National Museum/ wikipedia

Around the woman's long red hair was bound a woolen strip, winded several times around her neck. around the neck she wore another woolen strip with two amber pearls.  An imprint upon her left hand revealed that she had worn a finger ring, but there is no trace of a ring today - it was probably removed in connection to the finding of the body in 1879. Deep inside she wore a cloth made of plant fibres, maybe nettle or flax. There are only a few traces of this on her skin and the main part of the material was decomposed in the bog. The checker of the skirt and the scarf was alternately light and dark wool, and the long stay in the bog made the fabric brown. Colour analyses have shown that the skirt originally was dyed blue and the scarf dyed red.

Huldremose, Djursland, photo:gb

When the Huldremose Woman was killed more than 2000 years ago and was put into a bog/moor at Djursland, the moors were important ressources for people of Iron Age. In the moors were dug turf which was used as a building material and as fuel. Some moors contained bog iron ore, a raw material, which after processing could be made into iron.  The moors had a great importance for the daily life,  but the moors and wet areas were also a gate between two worlds -  the world of humans and the world of the gods. Humans sacrificed to the gods by putting gifts down into the water. The gifts were killed livestock, clothes, jewelry, tools and clay pots filled with food. The sacrifical gifts were meant to secure a good and abundant harvest. The greatest sacrifice was another human.

Tollund man, photo: stigbachmannnielsen, Naturplan foto

It is not known what happened in connection to the death of the Huldremose woman. She was fully dressed, had a ring on her finger, amulettes in one skin cape and two amber pearls around her neck, so she was not robbed of her possesions by her killers. Across her breast was a staff of willow wood. These features more reminds about care for the dead like in a funeral and not about a simple getting rid of a body after a crime. Maybe she died as the part of a ritual and was then placed in a sacred moor. Or she had abused the laws and had to fine for this with her life. But her burial was not a usual burial like a funeral pyre or a burial service of the Iron Age people. 

Forensic analyses have shown that the Huldremose woman had got a violent cut in her right upper arm. The theory was earlier that the cut of the arm was the reason for her death, and that she died from blood loss. Later investigations could not verify this theory, and it is possible that the damage might have happened later, fx in the turf digging of the bog. While she was alive she broke her right leg, but this fracture healed before her death. Her hair was bound with a long woolen cord laid several times around her neck. There are no marks on the neck which might indicate strangulation. Maybe the cord had a symbolic meaning. Strangulated people are known from other Danish bog bodies, like the bodies from Elling and Borremose and the famous Tollund Man.

About one hundred Danish bog bodies are preserved up till today because of the special good preservation conditions in the peat bogs. The mummified bog bodies where skin, hair and stomach contents are preserved count about a fourth, while the rest of the bog bodies are only skeletal parts. The most well preserved bodies like the Huldremose woman,  the Grauballe man and the Tollund man are found in raised bogs, where the necessary sour and oxygen poor condition is present.


source: National Museum, museumsinspektør Flemming Kaul
source: wikipedia

photo: grethe bachmann/ stig bachmann nielsen, Naturplan foto.
photo: wikipedia

Nørre Snede Village and Rørbæk Sø, Mid Jutland.

The sky was black and the rain was heavy. This really did not look good! We were on our way to pass the newly inaugurated highway bridge in Gudenå River valley at Funder, a bridge which had been discussed politically and among everyone years before they started the building.

Before we reached the bridge we passed a fauna bridge. There are various types, some lead above the road, others under the road, some are dry or wet passages. The highways are dangerous to animals, there are investigations of how the fauna passages work in Denmark and abroad. Some animal species avoid completely the open areas of roads and railways, other species try to cross the roads with risch of being hit. Putting up fences can prevent the large animals in getting on the road, but this also increase the barrier. It's not easy. Many areas, which earlier functioned as a habitat and a spreading corridor for wild animals, are reduced or have disappeared.

It's a long bridge, the longest bridge across land in Denmark, about 740 meters. ( the photo of the bridge seen from a hill is from 2010) There was not much to see this of the landscape below because of the rain - so we went on to Nørre Snede where we wanted to see how things were going with the "Heart Path" (Hjertestien). It's a path which runs around the village in Nørre Snede.

here was once an Iron Age village.

relief dog, Nørre Snede church.

I wanted first to see the church which is being renovated. There are some funny reliefs on the wall, especially the dog is fine. The heart path has a view point on a hill in a pasture area from where you can overlook a fine landscape. Downside the hill was in ancient times a village, a so-called classical Iron Age village, which via the excavations has told much about people's lives in Iron Age.

Upon the hill is a low viewing-place with planches and drawings of animals, birds, insects, plants which are seen here, and a description of the Iron Age village etc. It is also meant for school children when they are out on tour. (if you enlarge you can see the raindrops on the planche). The "heart path" leads to many other places on the tour through the village of Nørre Snede, which actually is a big village, but the signs with the heart had not been placed yet along the road. They will probably be there before next season.

It was as if the sky was a little lighter somewhere up there, the sun made a fresh attempt to shine through the clouds - but not yet. Maybe later.  It's necessary to be an optimist when it's about the weather in autumn, and now we are soon close to winter! Now coffee break at Rørbæk Sø (lake). The water was like a mirror. Literally. It was not a cliché.  Not a movement in the water, except if a bird came by. And the sun began shining through and the light became golden like it is in a summer's late afternoon. It was worth gettting out that day just to see this.

         

photos: 14 October 2012: grethe bachmann
drawings on planches: stig bachmann nielsen. naturplan.dk.

Alternative Building - Living Houses

Nørre Snede

cedar

built in cedar wood

clay

blue mussels on the roof.

the round corners show the use of straw.

                                                                                                                    

In a parcelling in the southern outskirt of the town Nørre Snede in Mid Jutland is an interesting building project of sustainable houses. Living houses. Materials like straw, clay, cedar, blue mussels etc.

blue mussels on roof

In the local plan for the parcelling "Skovdalen" is  determined that the buildings must be built according to sustainable principles. The building must in material-production, establishment and daily use affect the environment as little as possible, evaluated from a comprehensive accounting.

It is not allowed to use impregnate wood, glass fiber- or rockwool products and other materials, which can affect the environment.

The heating must be CO2 neutral, like: passive solar heating, non-polluting heating with straw, wood etc. Primary heating sources must not be based on fossil fuels or electricity from the public net.

Local sustainable sanitation must be established by the help of root zone systems, sand filter, willow-cleansing systems or alike effective cleansing systems, which comply the existing environment requirements. The amounts of wastewater, which have to be cleansed, can be  minimized by the use of composting toilet and/or WC, which use grey wastewater. WC can also be established by using collected rainwater.

Several property owners can join in establishing a common solution.

The Grundejerforeningen (property owner union) establishes local sorting and collecting of waste and a possibility for local recycling.

The starting point is that pesticides, insecticides and fungicides must not be used in the area.

The present town Nørre Snede lies upon a large hillside, but the Iron Age people built their village downside the hills. 
  
From the new building area in Skovdalen you've got a view to the place where an Iron Age village was found in an excavation some years ago. The longhouses in Nørre Snede were a little smaller than the wellknown houses from the Iron Age village in Vorbasse. ( the biggest was 36 meter long)  Each longhouse stood in the middle of a square fencing together with one or two small buildings, and the farms were placed in long rows. The stables were in the west end of the house, the living section to the east, which is contrary to the usual Iron Age house There are six building stages of this village, where they have moved the village to the next place,close to the previous - and the houses are the same from ab. year 400 until the 600s.




photo: grethe bachmann

Moesgård Park and Skovmøllen...........

south wing corner of Moesgård.

The large area around Moesgård and Skovmøllen is one of the most popular places to go in the Århus district. Here is the high beech forest, the beach, the park with lots of birds, here is the popular prehistoric museum.  They are now building a new museum upon a piece of land north of the old buildings. They need more space.

old avenue

The park is still the same with the same lovely old trees, the small lakes, the birds, the old houses, the old orchards.  It's a place where I have come very often. This day was a rather cold day, the warmth from last week had disappeared to a place I don't know where, and the north wind was sweeping around the face and through the bones. The winter clothes were in use again.

When we came to the old avenue in the park, two great tits were fighting violently, while a third was watching them. It really looked serious. They can kill each other, but when we approached they discovered us and flew up in the tree tops. I hope they forgot what they were doing and didn't start the fight again.

This is the time for frogs. In one of the small lakes were lots of frogs, and this was the common frog. (European Common Frog). They make a strange sound, such a deep roar - first I thought it was a faraway train I could hear, but it was the frogs. All those thousands of eggs! When the tadpoles come out most of them are eaten by fish, dragonfly larvae and birds, so most tadpoles will disappear I guess - or else the park would be swarming with frogs in summer! The number of frogs are being kept at a level, they are eaten by birds of prey, crows, ducks, herons etc.. Nature is smart.

frog eggs

bark of the biggest oak

At the corner just before we reach the Iron Age house are a couple of old oaks, one of the side-branches has been cut off, probably because it was broken by itself, and we counted the year rings. 150 years. The trunk itself is much thicker. The trees are probably 3-400 years old. Lovely old trees. Their old trunk is like stone. 

The Iron Age house lies on the socalled prehistoric hiking path, which is a part of the prehistoric museum of Moesgård. I usually don't think much about it, I have been here so often, but it's actually a 4 km hiking path, which tells a lot about prehistoric history. I'm sure you know this. If you live in a place with something special, it has become just a part of what you see.

The hiking path goes through the manor park, down across open pastures, through a high forest and swamps along the river Giberå down to Moesgård beach and back to the manor Moesgård through an evocative forest. On the path people will be passing  Skovmøllen, and some reconstructed prehistoric houses, memorials and dolmens. The tour ends at the reconstructed Viking church.

And here is the Iron Age house, which is reconstructed from a settlement in southern Schleswig. The house shows how people and cattle lived under the same roof. In the west-end lived the family around the fire place, and the east-end was for the livestock, they stood in boxes divided by intertwined walls. During the excavation of the house in Schleswig was found a wooden trough with the skeleton of a 10 months old baby. The settlement in Schleswig was developed ab. 100 A.C. and inhabited through 4-500 years.   

Opposite is a field I call  "Hestemarken",  the horse field, there are always some sweet Icelandic ponies here,  they are so friendly, and they love a little talk. I only saw two horses today, and they were in the other part of the field. It's freezing cold, but they've got a thick woolen fur, those cute Icelanders. Nature is smart!! ´ )

The Giberå river runs through the forest on this part of the hiking path, and here lies Skovmøllen, also a popular place for people to go. Here's a cosy restaurant decorated with old Danish antiques, and I love to go here and have hot cocoa and buns with butter. What you see on the photo is the mill itself, where we can buy flour. The restaurant is to the left and behind.

old orchard

I was not interested in walking further down to the beach, it was so cold, and my left knee was feeling bad.  So we turned and went back up along the road to the park, beside the park is a big field with lots of sheep. They looked like they had a conference on top of the hill. In the park is an old orchard from the time when a family lived on the manor. Still apples in autumn, they are sour, but they can be used in an apple cake with extra sugar! In a fine glade with a flowering mirabelle stands the pretty Thai house.

The rests of trees and branches are left all over the park, they form good places for birds, insects and reptiles.

   

The Thai house came to Denmark as a gift from the Thailand state in 1975 in connection to a great exhibition about Thailand. It's about 100 years old and stood originally in Siam's old capital Ayutthaya ab. 200 km north of Bangkok. You'll enter the house by using a staircase up to the veranda in front of the house. The inhabitants probably used a ladder, which could be drawn up at night and prevent intruders from entering. Upon the veranda was kitchen and fireplace, and the family stayed here most of the time. The higher placed main room with sleeping places, storage furniture and altar was their private area.

Under the house the family stored various large tools like plough, rice grinder and fish traps. There was a fireplace too, and the place was especially used as a workshop. But when the monsun rain came from July till September, they had to clear the place and move the things elsewhere. 

Too cold for comfort. I feel like an icicle. Now it's back home................

the narrow road...

Spring signs:

buds on chestnut

yellow anemones

forsythia

photo Moesgård 31 March 2012: grethe bachmann