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Putovanja
/ Travel
Nije ni Berlin ni Pariz, ali danski gradić Roskilde sa 50.000
duša, glavni je grad jednog velikog severnog carstva. To je,
naime, stara prestonica Skandinavije i, poput Kjota za japansku
civilizaciju, temelj hiljadugodišnje tradicije s kojom se Nordijci
izdvajaju iz evropske istorije. Roskilde je metropola Vikinga.
Kao i Kopenhagen, trideset kilometara udaljeni Roskilde
leži na ostrvu Selandu. Gusto naseljeno, ali bez velikih gradova,
ostrvo obuhvata pola stanovništva današnje Danske. Povezano
je mostovima i trajektima s južnom Švedskom (Skanijom), i kop-
nenom Danskom, a uskoro će biti i sa nemačkim kopnom.
Roskilde se nalazi u dnu divovskog fjorda koji zadire u unu-
trašnjost selandskog ostrva i stvara veliki zaliv, unutrašnje more,
potpuno zaklonjeno od okeana, u koje se može uploviti jedino
kroz tri vrlo tesna moreuza. Dva su u vikinška vremena, radi lakše
odbrane naseobine u fjordu, bila trajno blokirana potopljenim
„dugim brodovima“ napunjenim kamenjem. Ta barijera načinjena
je oko 1070, a zatim su, devet vekova kasnije, arheolozi i inženjeri
izveli neverovatan poduhvat i ostatke vikinških brodova, dobro
očuvane u slanoj, ledenoj vodi, izvukli na površinu. Trebalo im
je dvadeset i pet godina skrupuloznog rada da ih pažljivo sa-
stave kako bi, rekonstruisani, bili izloženi u Vikinškom muzeju
Roskilde. Betonski zastakljen paviljon na samoj obali ledenog,
sad u zimu zaleđenog mora gde fijuče ledeni vetar, smešten je
usred marine sa modernim jahtama – Danci su zauvek ostali po-
morski narod, pa i danas najveća brodarska kompanija na svetu,
Mersk, koja zapošljava više od sto hiljada ljudi u stotinak zemalja,
ima sedište u njihovom glavnom gradu Kopenhagenu.
Rekonstrukcija ostataka pet trgovačkih i ratnih brodova
izloženih u roskildskom muzeju, bila je tek početak uzbudljivog
e
It wasn’t Berlin or Paris,
but rather the modest Danish
town of Roskilde, home to just
50,000 souls, which served as
the capital of the great northern
empire. This is, thus, the ancient
capital of Scandinavia and, like
Kyoto to Japanese civilisation,
represents the foundations of a
thousand-year tradition that sets
the Nordic people apart in the
history of Europe. Roskilde is
the metropolis of the Vikings.
Just like Copenhagen,
Roskilde also lies on the island
of Sjælland (Zealand), thirty
kilometres from the capital.
Densely populated, but without
major cities, this island is home
to half the population of Den-
mark today. It is connected by
bridges and ferries to southern
Sweden (Skåne) and the Dan-
ish mainland, and will soon be
linked to Germany too.
Roskilde is located at the
foot of a giant fjord that stretches
into the interior of the island
of Zealand and creates a large
bay, an inland sea completely
sheltered from the ocean, which
can only be accessed by sail-
ing through three very narrow
channels. In Viking times two
of those channels were perma-
nently blocked with sunken
longboats filled with stones, in
order to ease the defence of the
settlement in the fjord. This bar-
rier was created around 1070AD,
but it was only nine centuries
later that archaeologists and
engineers performed an amazing
feat by raising the remains of the
Viking ships, which had been
well preserved in the freezing,
salty water. They required 25
years of scrupulous work to be
carefully put back together so
that, reconstructed, they could be
exhibited at the Roskilde Viking
Museum. A glazed concrete
pavilion on the very shore of the
icy, and now in winter frozen,
sea, where icy winds whistle,
is situated in the middle of a
marina with modern yachts –
Danes have always remained
seafaring people and even today
the world’s largest shipping com-
pany, Maersk, which employs
more than a hundred thousand
people in a hundred countries,
has its headquarters in the Dan-
ish capital of Copenhagen.
The exposing of the recon-
structed remains of five warships
in Roskilde Museum was just the
start of an exciting ethnographic
enterprise, a genuine scientific
epic, which occupied these heirs
of the Vikings in modern times.
Namely, beside the museum
was developed a proper Viking
shipyard. There they imple-
mented “retro-technology” to
build longboats. The first and
most difficult discipline was
processing the timber structures
from four types of trees used in
the building of these lightweight
vessels. Everything was done by
hand using a unique Viking tool
that was simultaneously used as
terrible weapon - a flat axe with
a long blade, enabling smooth
trimming.
Teams of archaeologists
and ethnographers built an
entire replica fleet, first a small
warship with 13 pairs of oars,
then a cargo boat, a bulky mer-
chant sailing ship and, finally,
a large, proper Viking cruiser,
a “longboat” with 60 oarsmen,
as an identical copy of the
museum original. It took four
years to build and was launched
in 2004, with the Danish Queen
christening it the Sea Stallion.
With a crew of young Danes, the
open boat, resembling a slightly
larger version of an eight-person
rowing boat, made a voyage of a
thousand kilometres across the
North Sea and the Atlantic to
Dublin in Ireland!
This reconstructed the
feat of legendary Norse ruler
Ragnar Hairy Breeches (Ragnar
Lodbrok), hero of poetic sagas,
who first crossed deep seas
without a compass and arrived
in northeast England on 8
th
June
793AD. He robbed a monas-
tery and forced the monks into
slavery, and thus began the
Viking Age. Shortly afterwards,
Ragnar’s fleet entered the River
Seine and set Paris ablaze...
On the hill above Zealand
fjord, where the “Stallion”
stretches lazily on the land, in
expectation of some new sea
Ploveće
autentične
replike
vikinških
brodova na
doku muzeja
e
Authentic
floating
replicas of
Viking ships on
the museum’s
dock
