Hulbjerg Passage Grave
Stone Age life, burial customs and early surgical methods was found in Langeland's finest passage grave.
Discover ancient monuments and hidden stories on Langeland. Visit impressive stone dolmens, passage graves or the lost city in picturesque surroundings.
The first inhabitants on Langeland
When the last Ice Age ended about 11,700 years ago, the first hunter-gatherers followed the reindeer north. There are only a few known settlements from the earliest Mesolithic Age in Denmark, but there were two on Langeland.
→ Walk in the footsteps of the island’s first inhabitants
For thousands of years, Langeland was populated by small groups of hunter-gatherers who lived off the land.
The hunter-gatherer culture gradually mixed with immigrant peoples from Anatolia (the Asian part of Turkey) who cultivated the land and kept livestock. The burial customs evolved into large stone tombs.
Bronze arrived from distant parts of Europe, replacing stone and flint. And grave mounds were built to bury the elite of the time.
Iron began to be mined, so people were no longer dependent on bronze. Farmers increasingly lived together in small villages. A large Iron Age cemetery with several burial mounds has been found at Stengade.
In the Viking Age power was centralised and the Danes gradually became more Christian. Many well-preserved graves from the Viking Age have been found on Langeland. Viking sailing barriers have been found in several of the Inlets.
In the Middle Ages, around the 11th and 12th centuries, Denmark was unified as a Christian kingdom where the king ruled in cooperation with the nobility and the church.
The Renaissance saw a revival of interest in classical Greek and Roman antiquity.
The project Langelands Hidden Stories is supported by the Danish Outdoor Council and developed by VisitLangeland and Langelands Museum.
Photo:Friluftsrådet