The Viking Longship; February 1998; Scientific American Magazine; by Hale; 8 Page(s)

In September 1997 Danish archaeologists discovered a Viking longship in the mud of Roskilde harbor, 40 kilometers (25 miles) west of Copenhagen. The discovery was the kind of serendipitous event that earned Viking Leif Eriksson the appellation "Leif the Lucky." Lying unsuspected next to the world-renowned Viking Ship Museum at Roskilde, the longship came to light during dredging operations to expand the harbor for the museum¿s fleet of historic ship replicas.

According to Ole Crumlin-Pedersen, former head of the museum, the longship must have been sunk by a storm centuries ago, then hidden by silt. Tree-ring dating of its oak planks showed that the ship had been built about A.D. 1025 during the reign of King Canute the Great, who united Denmark, Norway, southern Sweden and England in a Viking empire.