Published on
25/08/2026 - 15:27 GMT+2
Students and lecturers from the UK’s National School of Blacksmithing travelled to Aggersborg in northern Denmark, one of the country’s largest Viking Age ring fortresses, to take part in an experimental archaeology project.
Working beside roaring furnaces, the team is forging an anchor from bloomery iron, a material produced by smelting iron ore in a small furnace rather than through modern industrial steelmaking.
The design is based on X-ray analysis of early medieval anchors. Researchers can identify weld lines and different types of iron within the original objects, allowing the blacksmiths to reproduce the techniques used to make them.
