Sometime around the year 550, the largest man-made mound in the Nordic region was built in Romerike in south-eastern Norway.
It was 95 metres long and 19 metres high. And it was built during a time of great unrest.
"An absolutely extraordinary mound"
A volcanic eruption in 536 had exposed the world to a climate shock. In Norway, many petty kings were competing for power.
The people who built the mound created three distinct layers of timber with several-metre-thick layers of clay, sand, and soil in between.
Archaeologists have estimated that there were 25,000 logs in the top layer of the mound alone, and that between 400 and 600 people must have been involved in its construction. The construction is said to have been quite fast – they finished it within a single summer.
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