Lappone: A visit to Vitlycke museum and the fabulous rock-carvings (Petroglyphs) at Tanum

onsdag 30 juli 2014

A visit to Vitlycke museum and the fabulous rock-carvings (Petroglyphs) at Tanum

Reconstructed Bronze Age clothing

During our week in Grebbestad we got to visit the Vitlycke museum. Of special interest was of course (since we were attending a weaving course) the reconstructed clothing of the people that long ago lived in this part of Sweden.

Lena Hammarlund

Out teacher Lena Hammarlund shared her vast knowledge regarding ancient weaving and how to analyse and reconstruct the weaving process/technique and from that make, as close as possible, replicas of the old fabrics.

Decorated sleeve

If you think that clothes looked like rags during the Bronze Age you are wrong. The weaving was often done with fine threads and great skill. Decorations in embroidery or nalbinding were also sometimes added.

Decorated neckline

The museum also features a Bronze Age Farm which we visited.

The Bronze Age Farm

The Farm has two reconstructed longhouses, from the Early and the Late Bronze Age. These kind of houses were used in Sweden for thousand of years (from the end of the Stone Age until the end of the Iron Age).

Interior with an opstadgogn (warp-weighted loom)

The Bronze Age Farm is built to show some of the every day life. In one of the longhouses we found an opstadgogn with a weave. This loom one had a more authentic look to it compared to the ones that we used in class.

Interior of a longhouse

And then it was time for the rock-carvings. I must admit that they were something that I really had looked forward to see in real life. I was not disappointed.

Tanum: Rock-carvings

The rock-carving area at Tanum is now included in the World Heritage List. This is the World Heritage Committee’s citation: ‘The rock carvings in the Tanum area are a unique example of Bronze Age art of the highest quality. The range of motifs provides rare evidence of many aspects of life in the European Bronze Age. The interplay of continuous settlement and land use, as reflected in the rock carvings, the burial grounds and the landscape, make the Tanum area an outstanding example of uninterrupted settlement for eight thousand years’.