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Was Danish King Harald Bluetooth buried in Poland?

The Local Denmark
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Was Danish King Harald Bluetooth buried in Poland?
Trelleborg, a Viking fortification in Denmark built by King Harald Bluetooth. The location of Bluetooth's grave remains a mystery. File photo: Sofie Mathiassen/Ritzau Scanpix

The grave of Harald Bluetooth, the Danish king who brought Christianity to the Nordic land 1,000 years ago, may have been discovered in Poland.

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Harald Bluetooth – who is said to have been given is name because he had a bluish, dead tooth – is considered one of the great kings of Scandinavia around the Viking era.

It is unclear when exactly he was born, but he fought in several wars with Germany and Norway. When his son, Sweyn Forkbeard, rebelled against him in 980 CE, he was wounded and fled, according to a chronicle by Medieval scholar Adam of Bremen.

He is said to have died of his wounds in the year 986 in what is today Poland.

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According to Adam of Bremen, Bluetooth was brought back to Denmark after his death and buried at Roskilde, the Viking capital of Denmark and now the location of Roskilde Cathedral, where Danish monarchs have been buried throughout the centuries since the country converted from paganism to Christianity.

However, there is uncertainty around whether the Viking king is in fact buried in Roskilde.

Swedish news wire TT reported on Tuesday that Swedish archaeologist Sven Rosborn and Polish journalist Marek Kryda claim Blåtand was actually buried at the community of Wiejkowo in northwestern Poland.

The two do not agree on the exact location of Bluetooth’s grave, however. Kryda says that he has used satellite images to find what could be a Viking grave underneath a 19th-century Catholic church. Meanwhile, Rosborn has postulated that Bluetooth, who was Christian, would have been given a Christian burial somewhere in the cemetery.

Kryda and Rosborn have each written a book on the subject.

Historians at the National Museum of Denmark in Copenhagen told TT in a written comment that they are "aware of the claim" that Bluetooth is buried in Wiejkowo.

The Danish Vikings had strong connections to Poland. Four tombs in the country from the 11th century have been found to contain the remains of Danish Viking warriors.

Harald Bluetooth was one of the last Viking kings, with the Viking age is considered to have ended in 1066.

He also lends his name to modern-day Bluetooth technology, which unifies the telecommunications and computing industries as the Viking leader is credited with uniting Denmark and Norway.

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