\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Ornate medieval ring discovered in Norway’s oldest town

admin

2026年1月12日
3 min read
Discovered medieval News Norways oldest Ornate Ring town

Ornate medieval ring discovered in Norway’s oldest town

Last summer, Linda Åsheim found a ring so beautiful it looks like it could have been made yesterday. But Åsheim is an archaeologist, and she found the rare artifact while excavating in a Norwegian town believed to be the oldest in the country. The gorgeous golden ring is decorated with a gemstone and filigree décor—and is over 800 years old.

“When I first saw the ring when I was digging, I couldn’t believe that it was gold, but it immediately had the shine that gold has even if it has been in the ground for hundreds of years,” Åsheim, who works at the Norwegian Institute for Cultural Heritage, tells Popular Science.

She unearthed it while on a dig in Tønsberg, a town in southeastern Norway dating back to about 871 CE.

“I was the only archaeologist out on the dig that day, so there wasn’t anybody to confer with,” she explains “I was a bit uncertain if it was a genuine medieval ring, but the more I looked at it, the more certain I became.”

a woman holds up a medieval ring while standing in front of a bookshelf — Archeologist Linda Åsheim found the ring in a town believed to be the oldest in Norway. Image: Johanne Torheim, NIKU.

While it’s difficult to understand the ring’s age from its decoration, the layer that Åsheim found the artifact in is directly beneath one that dates back to 1167-1269 CE, according to radiocarbon dating.. As such, the ring must be older than that date range. If the layer above that of the ring had had any “disruptions,” the question of the ring’s age might have been uncertain, Åsheim explains.

“The ring is quite little in size, and is a ring worn by a woman of high social status,” she continues. “Rings of this type [are] not at all common, so it is natural to assume it had to be a person of some wealth that owned it.”

The ring’s discovery is important because it sheds major light on early Tønsberg’s social structure, Åsheim adds. While researchers presume that the wealthy class stayed elsewhere, the ring indicates that they also frequented the region of the excavation. Archeologists believe that this region is where commoners such as tradesmen lived. Åsheim says it is also possible that someone from the upper class was “just passing through.”

Because the ring may have been imported, it could also provide insight into ties with Europe . Researchers are unsure if the jewelry’s stone is colored glass or a sapphire, so Åsheim and her team will continue investigating the ring’s ocean-colored centerpiece.