The Vessel of Gundestrup

The greek historian Strabo tells that the Cimbri held in high esteern magnificent chariots and enormous metal cauldrons preferably made of silver. The discovery in 1891 of a magnificient silver cauldron in a bog near Aars is thus hardly a coincidence. The Gundestrup cauldron is one of the central finds from European Iron Age, measuring two metres in circumference and adorned with thirteen puzzling plates depicting gods and myths. Close by was found another caldron made of bronze. Both cauldrons orginated in distant southeastern Himmerland, but were sacrificed in the bog by the Iron Age people. The exhibition gives an account of the archaeological attempts for more than a hundred years to decode the ornaments of the great silver cauldron and shows the impressive silver technology that existed 2100 years ago.