An exiting and dramatic lecture
by Anni Brøgger
Who was The Egtved Girl? Was her string skirt a ritual dance skirt and not as
earlier presumed an everyday skirt? Did we in the Danish Bronze Age have
ceremonies to worship the sun along with fertility rites?
The lecture is mainly based on well established knowledge about The Egtved Girl
and the Bronze Age; but it is also based on a peculiar dream, which strangely
became rea-lity and has led to a new way of thinking about The Egtved Girl.
The lecture closes with The Egtved Girl wearing a precise copy of the clothes
and she dances her ritual sun honoring dance and fertility dance, in a way she
might have done it 3000 years ago.
The National Museum and The Egtved Museum have been very positive with regards
to this new way of thinking about The Egtved Girl and now support the theory
about the famous string skirt actually being a dance skirt.
Flemming Kaul, the Bronze Age expert and the inspector of The National Museum,
has shown his approval. He has accepted the theory and says: “Because of this dream we must revise our thinking about The Egtved Girl”.
Television news, radio and several newspapers have shown a great deal of
interest in these new theories about The Egtved Girl.
The lecture and/or the dance has now been shown at The National Museum, The
Egtved Museum, The Moesgaard Museum, The Prehistoric Park Hvolris, The Museum
of Silkeborg, The Experiment Center of Lejre, The Museum of Skjern Egvad, along
with a series of evening classes, associations in Jutland, folk high schools in
England and Germany. The dance have also been performed in front of The Queen
Margrethe of Denmark, Prince Henrik of Denmark and the minister of cultural
affairs. Meet “The Egtved Girl” live.
Book and DVD:
A story about a dream becoming reality
“I had a dream about you Egtved Girl. You woke up from your 3000 years of beauty
sleep and you danced for me a ceremonial and beautiful sun worshipping
fertility dance. Your string skirt at once concealing and enticing, swayed
smoothly over your dancing hips.
Your symbolic sun belt buckle shined on your stomach as if your fertility
circle-movements were connected to the life existent circles of the universe
itself. In your hand you carried a yarrov.”
In honour of you and with the greatest respect this dance is delicated you,
Egtved Girl.”
This is the story of how a strange and wonderful dream, through a number of
droll circumstances, revolutionised our conception of “The Egtved Girl.”
Flemming Kaul, inspector of The National Museum writes:
“The book The Dance of The Egtved Girl is a mixture of Science and Art. It blends expeimental
archeology with scientific journalism giving new perspectives for our knowledge
of the Nordic Bronze Age and its rich culture.”
Kirsten Rykind – Eriksen, inspector of The Egtved Museum writes:
“The book is exiting and well written. The reader will be entranced by Anni Brøgger’s research and the hard work she put into making her theoretical assumptions,
that The Egtved Girl was actually a religious dancer, a living reality. At the
same time the investigations have a scientific value, leading both readers and
professional historians/ anthropologists deeper into Anni Brøgger’s assumptions.”
