History on Display
History on Display: The Vinland Map
On October 11, 1965, just a few hours before Columbus Day,* Yale University announced that it owned a newly discovered map of the world, dating from approximately 1440 AD, that showed an island named Vinland, the Vinilandia insula of the Icelandic sagas, off the coast of North America. The timing was not accidental: if the…
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History on Display: The Vikings Begin
While we were at Mystic Seaport, we were lucky enough to see an exhibit titled The Vikings Begin: Treasures from Uppsala University, Sweden. Curated by the Gustavianum Museum at Uppsala University, the exhibit is based on a ten-year research project that began in 2016. Known as “The Viking Phenomenon”, the project is designed to study…
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Road Trip Through History: The Bayeux “Tapestry”
I played hooky from the tour on the second day devoted to D-Day because I wanted to visit the Bayeux Tapestry,(1) (Which is actually a work of embroidery. Just saying.) The group was scheduled to see the tapestry several days later, but I was sure I would want to spend more time than was officially…
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