The Museum of Foteviken with The Viking Reserve

This house is built in Wattle and Daub technique and with a framework of oak. The roof is made of turf. The house is situated directly outside of the defence earthworks of the village. This simple and sturdy house is open for all visiting Vikings on their pilgrimage, seeking the famous Scanian hospitality.

This is a pit house. These kinds of houses were common during the Viking Age. The house has a length of 5 metres and a width of 4 metres. Half of the house is situated under the ground level. The archaeologists often discover weights, made of clay in the pit houses. These weights belonged to the upright Viking Age looms. This indicates that the pit houses were used as handicraft workshops. Hearths are not common in the pit houses and it is therefore likely that the houses were used only during the warmer season. The houses were perhaps used for storage during the winter.

Inside this pit house there is a long bench fixed to the wall. This was probably used as a bed or for sitting in during work. Fragments of such long benches have been found in the Parish of Fosie, near the City of Malmoe. This kind of bench was made of earth and wood. They were constructed with earth filling material and there was a wooden framework on the side.

This is a reconstruction of a late Viking Age house, discovered at an archaeological excavation in the City of Ystad, in Scania. The house is a blacksmith's workshop. The outer room of this house was used as a workshop with the forge and the pair of bellows. The inner room is situated about half a metre under the ground level and it was probably used as a dwelling room for the blacksmith. The room is simply furnished with a bed, a table and a bench.

All our animals need tending and care. This is a simple house build in Wattle and Daub technique with a turf roof. The roof rafters reach all the way down into the ground, a typical Viking Age construction. It was built for our poultry and it was one of the first houses to be built in the Viking Reserve. The Vikings need the eggs for cooking the old traditional food of Scania.