Cultural Heritage

The Rå-farms

Situated along Gudbrandsdalsleden
The Rå-farms

This name of the farms dates back to late the Iron Age. The farmland has however been cultivated in approximately 4 000 years. Both samples of pollen and the amount of findings from the Neolithic time period, as well as from the Bronze Age. suggest that this farmland has been cultivated for this long time period. The second farm to the left is Rå northern. There were recovered three skeletons from the Celtic Iron Age in the marsh a few years back.

During the Celtic Iron Age (approximately 500 BC), there was a climate change. The weather became cooler and wtter, a drastic change after the warm period in the Bronze Age. The farmers had problems with cultivation of grain crops, and had to rely more on their livestock. The livestock had to be kept indoors, forcing the farmers to build more winter solid houses and to settle down more like the farm structure as of today. Knowledge of ironworking was introduced from the Celts, resulting in better weapons and tools. This new metal was available for everyone as opposed to the bronze, which was an imported metal only for the upper class.

The Iron Age also has a dark side with human sacrifices. The roman author Tactus tells the story of human sacrifices to the God of Spring among the Germanic tribes. Skeletons discovered at Rå show traces of evidence that all three (one female and two males) of them have been killed before they have been sunk in a pod that later turned into a marsh. There have been done similar findings at the farm Ry in Hamar (Vang).