Archaeologists digging on Lækjargata in central Reykjavik were looking for traces of a farm cottage built in 1799 – and found a Viking longhouse from some 900 years earlier.
The longhouse is at least 20 m long at 5.5m wide at it widest point. The ‘long fire’ in the centre of the hut is one of the largest ever found in Iceland, which visible traces suggesting it was over 5.2 m long.
“This find came as a great surprise for everybody,” says Þorsteinn Bergsson, Managing Director of Minjavernd, an independent association working for the preservation of old buildings in Iceland. “This rewrites the history of Reykjavik.”
Read the rest of this article...
