English: Silver and steel for the journey to Paradise

The items in the display case are from a woman's grave. She was just over 40 years old, quite old for someone who died during the last decades of the ninth century. Her grave was simple and the shape of her coffin is typical of early Christian burials. Small fragments of fabric show that some parts of her clothes were made of silk. She probably carried the small bronze needle case in a belt or band around her waist. Her garments were fastened with a simple bronze brooch and her gown had a decoration of four glass beads. A quarter of a silver coin among her clothes and an iron knife over her right shoulder prepared the dead woman for her soul's long journey to Paradise. The silver was money for the journey and the steel of the blade would repel all evil along the way.

From the Maritime Museum exhibition