Ships and shipbuilding were important elements of Viking culture and a precondition for trade, warfare and conquest. The important excavations at the Viking towns of Hedeby and Schleswig-Holstein revealed a rich body of finds of wrecks and parts of ships. This is a report on this material and also examines the role of the towns as ports and the role of trading in their development.

The craftsmanship of longboat-building is not something we can draw on today, so when the Viking Ship Museum, Roskilde wanted to look into this ancient skill, they needed to track down people who still had the tradition of boat-building in their culture. This book looks at the boat-building and culture of the Punan Bah people of Borneo and then puts the longboat in its wider cultural-historical perspective.