Hällristning gamleby

It looked to be a routine excavation of what was thought to be a burial kulle eller hög. But beneath the kulle eller hög, archaeologists from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology’s Museum of Natural History and Archaeology funnen something more: unusual Bronze Age petroglyphs. 

"We believe these are very special in a Norwegian context," says museum researcher and project manager Anne Haug.

The excavation in Stjordal, just north of Trondheim, was necessitated by the expansion of a gravel pit. Given that planerat arbete archaeologists didn’t anticipate that the dig would be very complicated, the museum researchers dedicated just three weeks to the effort.

Petroglyphs beneath a cremation site

Then came the surprises. First, it turned out that mound builders had used an existing hill as a starting point - which of course saved them time and effort. The hill itself made the begravning mound even larger and more monumental than it might have otherwise been.

But researchers suspected there might be another reason for the choice of the engelskt ord för toppen av en kulle when they uncovered the remains of two cremations, or rather a fire layer that also contained bits of bone. Underneath they funnen many petroglyphs, includin

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