More of Interest

The old-style farm museum is actually a collection of several old buildings that Zorn purchased as folk in the Mora area decided to upgrade. The eldest house was from 1237; the newest was from the 18th century. Our guide told us that there were some important manners to help people who lived in such close quarters. If you look at the next picture, you'll see a suspended beam. There were two of these, one decorated and one not (at about the position where I was standing to take the picture).

Apparently, when you entered someone's house, you could only go as far as the un-decorated beam until a family-member invited you further. Also, the rule of the house generally stood that peace must be maintained on the family side of the decorated beam. Please note that the table and both bed chambers (one with a curtain shows on the right side of the photo) are on the peaceful side of the beam--I don't know how successful they were at keeping children from fighting at the table, but this seems like a great start!

On our way out of Dalarna, we made another stop to check out the world's largest Dala horse:

In case you aren't suitably impressed, know that that fellow in the foreground is about six feet tall. When he moved closer to it, he barely reached the knee of the horse. We also stopped at a very refreshing lake to let the kids have a swim before lunch and met up with this lovely Swedish family:

Having greatly enjoyed our time in Dalarna, we returned to Uppsala where we relaxed, did laundry and such mundane matters before having one more day of cultural activity before heading out to a week on a farm in Eastern Norway. Our cultural treat this time was a visit to the royal burial mounds in Gamla Uppsala (Old Uppsala) and the museum there. Unlike Jelling, most of the burial finds at Gamla Uppsala are from cremated remains, so most grave gifts, although originally impressive, have been severely damaged by fire. An exception was a find of a viking-age (or slightly before?) find from near, but not within the mounds, of some impressively preserved silver artifacts including bowls and chains of daily-use items that would hang from broaches as part of the standard (we think) clothing of a person of good social standing:

All the finds displayed an amazing complexity of workmanship with delicate carvings on many pieces.

On Tuesday, July 17th, we took the train across Sweden into Norway to visit friends who became as family many years ago, when I was an exchange student living at their farm. Thankfully, they were very understanding as I proceeded to sleep through the first several days of our visit.