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a cultural network with contacts from the Caspian Sea to the North Atlantic, and from the Arctic Circle to the Mediterranean. The Vikings will be viewed in a global context that will highlight the multi- faceted influences arising from extensive cultural contacts. The exhibition will capitalise on new research and thousands of recent discoveries by both archaeologists and metal-detectorists, to set the developments of the Viking Age in context. These new finds have changed our understanding of the nature of Viking identity, trade, magic and belief and the role of the warrior in Viking society. Above all, it was the maritime character of Viking society and their extraordinary shipbuilding skills that were key to their achievements. At the centre of the exhibition will be the surviving timbers of a 37-metre-long Viking warship, the longest ever found and never seen before in the UK. Due to its scale and fragility it would not have been possible to display this ship at the British Museum without the new facilities of the Sainsbury Exhibitions Gallery. The ship, known as Roskilde 6 , was excavated from the banks of Roskilde fjord in Denmark during the course of work undertaken to develop the Roskilde Viking Ship Museum in 1997. Since the excavation, the timbers have been painstakingly conserved and analysed by the National Museum of Denmark. The surviving timbers –approximately 20% of the original ship- have now been re-assembled for display in a specially made stainless steel frame that reconstructs the full size and shape of the original ship. The construction of the ship has been dated to around AD 1025, the high point of the Viking Age when England, Denmark, Norway and possibly parts of Sweden were united under the rule of Cnut the Great. The size of the ship and the amount of resources required to build it suggest that it was almost certainly a royal warship, possibly connected with the wars fought by Cnut to assert his authority over this short-lived North Sea Empire. Weapons and looted treasures demonstrate the central role of warfare to the identity of the Vikings. Recently excavated skeletons from a mass grave of executed Vikings near Weymouth in Dorset, will provide a close-up encounter with ‘real’ Vikings and illustrate what happened when things went wrong for Viking warriors on British soil. The Vale of York Hoard will be shown in its entirety at the British Museum for the first time since it was discovered by metal detectorists near Harrogate in 2007 and jointly acquired by the British Museum and York Museums Trust. Consisting of 617 coins, 6 arm rings and a quantity of bullion and hack-silver the Vale of York Hoard is the largest and most important Viking hoard since the Cuerdale Hoard was found in Lancashire in 1840, part of which will also be included in the exhibition. With coins and silver from places as far vikingos de un modo contextualizado: su magia, sus creencias, su modo de vida y el extraordinario papel de la figura del guerrero dentro de su sociedad. La mayor parte de sus logros se basaban en su gran pericia como marineros y experiencia en la construcción de naves. La gran nave vikinga –pieza central de toda la exposición–, llevaba el nombre de Roskilde 6 , y fue localizada en unas excavaciones a orillas del fiordo danés conocido como Roskilde, en 1997. Tras la excavación, las maderas fueron cuidadosamente recuperadas y analizadas por el Museo Nacional de Dinamarca. Las piezas de madera rescatadas –aproximadamente un 20% de las que estructuraban el barco original–, han sido ahora nuevamente ensambladas sobre un soporte especialmente diseñado para ello y realizado en acero inoxidable, que permitemostrar una perfecta reconstrucción del barco a tamaño original. Se ha datado su construcción del año 1025 d. C., el momento álgido de la Era Vikinga, cuando Inglaterra, Dinamarca, Noruega y, posiblemente, algunas zonas de Suecia, estaban unidas bajo el gobierno de Cnut el Grande. El tamaño de la nave y la enorme cantidad de Recursos que se suponen necesarios para una construcción de tal envergadura sugieren que pudiera tratarse de un barco de guerra real, posiblemente destinado a entablar batallas que reivindicasen la hegemonía de Cnut en el que fuera su breve imperio en el Mar del Norte. El hallazgo de armas y tesoros robados demuestra el papel central que las contiendas desempeñaban en la identidad del pueblo vikingo. Esqueletos recientemente localizados en una fosa común de vikingos ejecutados, localizada cerca de Weymouth, en Dorset, evidencian de modo bastante claro lo que bien pudo suceder cuando las cosas se torcieron para el pueblo vikingo una vez que éstos Espada. Finales del siglo VIII-Principios del siglo IX. Kalundborg o Holbæk, Zelanda, Dinamarca. Foto: John Lee. Museo Nacional de Dinamarca/ Sword, late 8th–early 9th century. Kalundborg or Holbæk, Zealand, Denmark. Photo: John Lee. © The National Museum of Denmark. 102