Stockholm, Sweden - Pt 2

We had been told by a ship employee that the Vasa Museum was a "must see" so we took the ship shuttle to the drop off point and then started to navigate our way from there. It was actually much further than we thought, but after wandering around a bit, we finally found it. Every map and street sign is in Swedish (except for STOP signs), and finding one's way around can definitely be challenging! I'm personally not into ships or Vikings, but I must admit that the Vasa Museum is truly amazing! 

which way to the Vasa Museum?

The Vasa Museum is one of the most famous of Stockholm's many museums. It is located on Djurgården, an island in central Stockholm. The building it's housed in was built around the Vasa, a 17th century Viking ship which is the most fully intact salvaged ship of its kind. In 1628, the 64 gun warship sank on her maiden voyage, before it even left the harbor of the city!

The 226 foot long ship was discovered on the bottom of the harbor in the 1950s. It was salvaged 333 years after it sank. Unbelievable! Under water for that many years, yet 98% of the ship is original. Of course it is a darker color after lying on the bottom of the sea for 333 years.

Let me say up front that it is impossible to get a decent photo of the entire ship at once. The 4 story museum allows visitors to view it at 4 different levels and from all sides, front and back. The Vasa's story is sad yet amazing, and even more so given that it is still in this condition several hundred years after it was built. I'll post a lot of photos I took so you can hopefully get an idea of the incredible detail.

get some idea of its scale from the size of the museum visitors below

original paint colors

 

 

model of what the newly built Vasa would have looked like

a different view

cut away model of Vasa

line drawing of Vasa

The skeletal remains of about half of the 30 persons who died were found after all those years below water. Of these, all were trapped inside the ship. Most were found on gun decks, a few were farther down in the ship and one was found in the quarter galleries. Some were still at their post while others were trying to escape.  Some still had on shoes; some still had on fragments of clothing. Copper coins were found in some pockets and others had weapons or tools nearby that may have indicated what they were doing when they drowned. Other items of clothing were found. It's hard to believe these things remained intact after 333 years, especially considering they were under water!

1 of 15 skeletal remains found

shoes and other personal remains

From human skulls that were found, forensic anthropologists were able to recreate models of what some of the passengers may have looked like. They also used fragments of cloth and period clothing to dress the models. Most were typical seaman's garments. One skeleton was wearing a finely woven dark blue wool twill suggesting he was not an ordinary seaman.

Of course I took many more photos than I'm posting here, but hopefully one can get the idea of just how huge this ship is. But just think - after years of planning and building, the Vasa didn't even make it one mile! She was top heavy and a strong wind caused her to keel over, water pouring in through the open gun ports. Supposedly there were about 150 persons on board; about 30 of them were drowned.