Wednesday 30 July 2014

'Hammer of Thor' unearthed on the Danish Island


Danish archaeologists have solved the mystery over the significance of the Mjöllnir amulets worn by the Vikings. Indeed, they represented Thor’s hammer, the researchers said. 


The rune-inscribed Mjöllnir amulet [Credit: National Museum of Denmark] 

More than 1,000 intricately carved pendants shaped like hammers have been found across Northern Europe since the first millennium A.D. 

Although it was widely believed these amulets were hammers, a debate remained over their true meaning. The objects’s unusual shape, featuring a short handle and a symmetrical head, raised doubts whether they represented something else entirely. 

Now a 10th-century Viking amulet unearthed in Købelev, on the Danish island of Lolland, has provided a definitive answer.

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