The Gokstadboat Project

We know the Vikings must have been very skilled sailors. The theories of Leiv Ericssons discovery of the Vinlands does give us an idea of how it must have been to sail for several weeks in the open Viking ships, crossing the Atlantic with very primitive conditions on board. The crew had to sleep and eat on the open deck, with only the sail to protect them from strong winds and icing cold from the rough ocean. Were the Vikings just plain fishermen and farmers who lived a harsh life in the cold of the Northern Europe - and who therefore were looking for a better place to live? Or were they warriors and imperialists driven by extreme needs?

But they managed to reach lands far away from home by way of their boats - and by way of their sailing skills. What practices and understandings of navigation, wind, geography and sailingtechniques did the Vikings have - and how did they come to them?

The Gokstad discovery, the Gokstadship and the three wooden færingboats that was found broken in pieces along the ship - is together with the Osebergship and the Thuneship our main archeological sources for understanding the sailing skills of the norwegian Vikings. The Gokstadship was reconstructed by Fredrik Johansen in 1930, as well as the biggest and the smallest of the boats. The Vikingshipmuseum at Bygdøy was built for presenting the new heritage that was so importasnt for the building of the norwegian national identity at the time.

But the third boat remained in 250 bits and pieces in the museums storeroom.

In the years from 2002 to 2005, ending 125 years after the excavation of the Gokstadship in 1880, the Gokstadboatproject was developed. This project reconstructed the third Gokstadboat - by way of reconstructing the process of boatbuilding. The Gokstadboatproject put emphasis on understanding of the sailingskills of the Vikings as one of several approaches. By focusing on the boat and the artifact - and by trying to understand the skills, knowledges and the understandings that the Vikings build on when they built and sailed the boats - new understanding of the Vikings is seeked.