Vikings: Life and Legend

Lego Museums visited the British Museum and its temporary exhibit Vikings: Life and Legend on 23th May 2014. This exhibit is dedicated to the lives of the Viking and looking past the myth of horned helmet savages. This exhibit shows that they were more than raiders from the east to still from the west. They are portrayed in the galleries show that they were patrons of art and religion. Rather than the blood thirsty heathens we hear of today.

Will is a fan of the Vikings. 

Throughout the galleries there are shown weapons that tell you they are more than just used for war but also used for status, showing loyalty and even used after death as ritual offerings. They were men of fashion with clothespins which also show off their love of art. As well as this they show that they were very religious with pendants to Thor, Odin, etc. With this they believe they also believed in the use of magic. Having teeth and plaster paw prints pendants to gain the power and abilities of the animal they come from. Almost like Shamanic beliefs.

Moving though to case to case you have a flood of information that is given to you by linking the objects that you see in there with the information that is given, rather than taking about the individual artefacts in turn they almost use them all as one.

 Oh Will might change his mind about them.

Going into the main hall of the exhibit you will found the overwhelming Roskilde 6, an 11th century Viking ship. This is the centrepiece of the show and quite right to. Even though there is not much of the real timbers left you still get that intimidation of the size with the modern metal frame that they are placed in, which are there to show the visitor the original size and shape of this monster of a ship.  

Although this is a great exhibit, it has had some bad reviews, such as "the cattle crush of this exhibition" by the Museums Association Journal. Yes this exhibit was crowded but in my opinion it was just because it was so popular. So you can't really blame the exhibit at all really with that one. I did have a lot of people complaining around me to their friends and family the business of the galleries but most of the people I saw around were enjoying the lush of information they had before them and getting real stuck in with all the interesting stuff the galleries had to offer.