An 8-year-old Swedish girl swimming in a lake pulled out what she thought was a stick from the bottom — only to find out it was actually an ancient, pre-Viking sword.
“I was outside in the water, throwing sticks and stones and stuff to see how far they skip, and then I found some kind of stick,” said Saga Vanacek, who found the weapon recently at the Vidöstern lake in Tånnö, Småland, The Local reported.
“I picked it up and was going to drop it back in the water, but it had a handle, and I saw that it was a little bit pointy at the end and all rusty,” Saga, whose family moved to Sweden from Minnesota last year, told the news outlet.
“I held it up in the air and I said, ‘Daddy, I found a sword!’ When he saw that it bent and was rusty, he came running up and took it,” she said.
“The cool thing is that I’m a huge Minnesota Vikings fan, and this looks just like a Viking sword!” she added.
The water in the lake by her family’s summer house was shallow because of a drought — allowing her to reach the sword.
Her father, Andy Vanacek, was putting a buoy in the water to warn boaters of an underwater slab of concrete lurking below the surface.
The pre-Viking sword in Jonkopings, SwedenAP“I asked Saga to bring the buoy, but she was taking her time like a kid does, playing in the water,” he recalled. “I was getting impatient because the World Cup game was about to start.”
Andy asked one of his colleagues, a history and archaeology buff, about the find and he said it was likely an authentic sword and urged the family to report it to authorities.
It was initially reported that the sword is at least 1,000 years old, but the Jönköpings Läns Museum later told The Local that it may date back to the 5th or 6th century AD, pre-Viking Age.
“It’s not every day that one steps on a sword in the lake,” said Mikael Nordström, from the Jönköpings Läns Museum.
“It’s about 85 centimeters [2.8 feet] long, and there is also preserved wood and metal around it,” he said. “We are very keen to see the conservation staff do their work and see more of the details of the sword.”
He added: “Why it has come to be there, we don’t know. When we searched a couple of weeks ago, we found another prehistoric object, a brooch from around the same period as the sword, so that means — we don’t know yet — but perhaps it’s a place of sacrifice.”
Saga said her teacher threw a party to celebrate the find, handing out ice cream and sharing Saga’s media interviews with the class.
“They thought that it was very fun and interesting to know about my story,” Saga said.
