a real contrast

[kareina]

I knew that Birka was big. I have read the bit about 6000 graves. But... Until today I hadn't really grocked it. I was playing around with the Swedish government map wep page, and looked at the island in the "Terrängskugning" (LIDAR image) view. and was truly blown away by just how many burial mounds there are.

For comparison, here is the burial mound at Anundshög, where we joined the Shire of Lögdehammar for a picknic on our way to Drachenwald 30-Year.

While the one at Anundshög is huge, and it isn't alone, and it does have that cool stone ship, by comparison to Birka there really aren't (m)any graves there!

And then there is the one in Umea, which we visited just over a week ago., which is just a couple of mounds

Comments

[stitchwhich]

Wow. I had not given a thought to the size of Birka - just noted that this or that was "from Birka" and went on with my research. That is a hella lot of land dedicated to the dead.