EXPLORING THE VIKING AGE THROUGH AR: LANDSCAPE, LIFE, AND SEAFOOD
Through this project, a mobile AR app is being developed in which landscapes, buildings, and artefacts are connected, right where history took place. Using your phone’s camera as a window into the past, you can experience reconstructions of houses, burial mounds, people, and animals in the outdoor areas of Lofotr Viking Museum. This makes the past both visible and easier to understand, in real time.
But did you know that food, and especially maritime resources, plays a key role in this experience?
In coastal areas of Northern Norway, the sea was the very foundation of life during the Viking Age. The Vikings in Lofoten relied heavily on seafood, with fish forming a central part of their diet. Stockfish was particularly important, not only as food, but also as a trade commodity that connected local communities to wider economic and cultural networks.
With AR, we can not only display artefacts such as fishing tools and cooking vessels, but also show how fish was caught, hung to dry in the landscape, and later prepared and eaten. This makes the connection between natural resources, technology, and everyday life much clearer.
This makes history more vivid, more tangible, and easier to relate to.
Watch one of the videos featured as an information stop in the app, focusing on stockfish.
