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The Viking Ship Museum in Roskilde is focused on ships, seafaring and boatbuilding culture in ancient and medieval times. The Viking Ship Hall is designed as a large showcase to display the five Viking ships found at Skuldelev. Besides the five original ships the hall also houses special temporary exhibitions in the West Room. In the East Room at the' Harbour bridge' is to copies placed - a trading vessel and a war ship equipped with barrels, trading goods and weapons as an active part of the exhibition.
The cinema shows a film about the excavation and reconstruction of the Viking ships.
The exhibitions are communicated all over the Museum grounds.
The large collection of tradtional nordic wooden boats and Viking ship reconstructions berthed at the Museum Harbour gives an perspective to the exhibition at the Hall and helps create a image of what the Viking ships looked like a thousand years ago.
At the Boat yard the boat building tradition and culture of the Viking age are communicated through working boat builders and exhibitions showing the historical background.
As an active part of the museum you will find craftsmen working at the Museum Island and at the Archaeological Workshop, where ship finds from throughout Denmark are measured and recorded, maritime archaeology is communicated in the summer season.
The architectural style and the exhibitions expresses a definite attitude to the historical perspective. Visitors are not led back in time - the cultural history is brought in to the present.
The Viking Ship Museum’s boatyard The boatyard is on the Museum Lake and the work is carried out so that the public can follow the work closely.
The boatyard builds clinker-built boats and its purpose is to preserve the maritime crafts that are associated with these boats.
The boatyard specialises in reconstructions of prehistoric boats in full scale using the methods of the time. But we also build new boats based on old traditions and we restore and repair old boats. We accept building assignments from private sources and from other museums.
Maritime archaeology – archaeology under the sea
Stone Age settlements, shipwrecks, defence systems, jetties, harbour installations and aircraft wrecks are artefacts of great historical importance and are therefore protected under the Danish Museum Act.
Submerged relics can easily be destroyed when current and wave patterns are altered by construction works. Sites can also be damaged by ferry and ship traffic. Such threatened sites are investigated and excavated by the underwater archaeological museums.
On behalf of the National Museum the Viking Ship Museum is responsible for archaeology in those parts of the Danish waters not covered by other museums.
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