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Founded: 500-1000 ADCategory: Cemeteries, mausoleums and burial places in Sweden
Historical period: Migration Period (Sweden)
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Valsgärde or Vallsgärde is the ancient centre of the Swedish kings and of the pagan faith in Sweden. The present farm dates from the 16th century. The farm's notability derives from the presence of a burial site from the Swedish Vendel Age. The first ship burial is from the 6th century and the last graves are from the 11th century.
The site was found and excavated by archaeologists in the 1920s, and before this similar graves had only been found at Vendel, which gave its name to this period of the Scandinavian Iron Age. The graves are princely, and are almost identical to ones found later in England, at Sutton Hoo in East Anglia. There are several theories about the identities of those buried, ranging from the Ynglings (Scylfings) to powerful warriors within the Leidang system, or local strongmen who had enriched themselves through trade due to the area's strategic position between the fjord of Mälaren and the important region of Tiundaland. There are so many rich graves that it is unlikely that most of them were royalty.
References:The Pilgrimage Church of Wies (Wieskirche) is an oval rococo church, designed in the late 1740s by Dominikus Zimmermann. It is located in the foothills of the Alps in the municipality of Steingaden.
The sanctuary of Wies is a pilgrimage church extraordinarily well-preserved in the beautiful setting of an Alpine valley, and is a perfect masterpiece of Rococo art and creative genius, as well as an exceptional testimony to a civilization that has disappeared.
The hamlet of Wies, in 1738, is said to have been the setting of a miracle in which tears were seen on a simple wooden figure of Christ mounted on a column that was no longer venerated by the Premonstratensian monks of the Abbey. A wooden chapel constructed in the fields housed the miraculous statue for some time. However, pilgrims from Germany, Austria, Bohemia, and even Italy became so numerous that the Abbot of the Premonstratensians of Steingaden decided to construct a splendid sanctuary.