CHAPTER XVIII. 



VARIOUS FORMS OF GRAVES. 



Different forms of graves Picturesque situation Various shapes of mounds 

 Bautastones The Hjortehammar burial-ground Stone-set graves Ship- 

 form graves Triangular graves Anund's mound. 



MOULDERING bones and ashes of mightv heroes and noble 



O / 



women now forgotten under the mounds, or in the graves 

 made hoary by the centuries that shroud you by their oblivion, 

 I salute you ! We also shall be forgotten. 



The thousands of mounds, cairns, bautasteinar (memorial 

 stones) and graves found to this day all over the North show 

 the high veneration the earlier English-speaking tribes had 

 for their dead ; these mounds or cairns are always situated on 

 some conspicuous place by the coast, from which a magnificent 

 view can often be had. 



We have already treated of graves at some length with special 

 reference to the age stone, bronze, or iron to which they 

 belonged, and also with relation to the objects found in them. 

 Before, however, proceeding to speak of the burial customs of 

 the Norsemen it may be well to give some further idea of the 

 various classes of graves. 



Sweden is particularly rich in these mementoes of the past, 

 in the midst of which the high roads not unfrequently pass, 

 forming a most impressive scene. What emotion have I felt 

 when standing upon many of these graves, deeply impressed 

 by the beauty or loneliness of the site chosen and of its 

 surroundings ; perhaps never more so than on the coast of 

 Bohuslan the Viken of yore. 1 There the cairns have been 



1 In Tanum parish, Bohuslan, alone 

 there are more than 2,000 mounds, the 

 largest being about 300 feet in circum- 

 fi-rriiee ; near Upsala nearly 600; at 

 Ultuna, 700. 



The greatest number of mounds found 



in any one spot is east of the ancient 



liirka Bjorko, where there are over 1, > 



of them ; while seven graves, as will 

 be seen in the course of the narrative-, 

 are found close together. 



