Archaeology • History • Literature • Mythology
Harvard University Summer School
(open to students from all schools)
June and July 2022
Based in Århus, Denmark, this 8-week Harvard Summer School program, in cooperation with Aarhus University and Moesgaard Museum, offers a comprehensive, hands-on exploration of the Viking Age and its legacy throughout the Middle Ages.
Specialists from Harvard and Aarhus universities lead students through the great legacy literature of the Viking Age—its skaldic poetry, runic inscriptions, eddas, and sagas—and teach the critical approaches necessary to understand this most famous medieval literary corpus during the weeks we spend in Denmark’s second largest city, the 2017 European Capital of Culture. From Århus, we will also explore the key sites which gave rise to the early Scandinavian kingdom of Denmark.
The 2022 field school will again offer students the opportunity to participate in exploring a Viking Age site and learn a variety of techniques archaeologists use in excavating and analyzing materials, providing students with hands-on experience with Viking Age material culture and archaeological research methods.
With lectures and workshops by teams of specialists, an archaeological field school, and curated excursions throughout the Viking World, this program, now well into its second decade, is designed to provide participants with an in-depth examination and experience of one of the most momentous periods in Western history.
