Six-year-old Norwegian boy finds 1,300-year-old sword during school outing

©Vlad Markov via Unsplash

A six-year-old boy from Norway made a miraculous discovery during a school trip. His childlike curiosity has provided an important historical discovery.

On a school outing to a farmyard near Tingelstad in the Norwegian municipality of Gran, six-year-old Henrik Refsnes Mørtvedt discovered something unexpected. A piece of rusty metal was sticking out of the ground a little, and the curious boy decided to pull at it. The little boy used all his strength and suddenly pulled a long sword out of the ground, which archaeologists later dated to be about 1,300 years old. His classmates and teachers reacted dumbfounded. Even the owner of the farm had never seen anything like it. The weapon was said to date from just before the Viking Age. After the find, the teachers contacted local archaeologists as well as the municipality. This was reported by the Norwegian newspaper Hadeland.

The discovery was reported to local authorities and archaeologists, who raved about the child's surprising discovery. They confirm that the sword is an important historical find that can tell a lot about the region's history.

The approximately one-meter sword is now in the Museum of Cultural History in Oslo. It's sharpened only on one side ; the blade is placed in the Merovingian period in Scandinavia (about 550-800 A.D.), the phase immediately preceding the Viking Age. And six-year-old "viking" Henrik saw his curiosity rewarded with a wonderful discovery. A find he probably won't forget for his entire life.

©Vlad Markov via Unsplash - illustration image of a sword