SCHEDULED DANISH MONUMENTS AT RISK OF COASTAL EROSION – MAPPING AND ACTIONS
Channel: European Association of Archaeologists
Date: 2020-12-31

For the first time ever, the official government heritage agency in Denmark, The Danish Agency for Culture and Palaces, has mapped all national scheduled monuments in threat of coastal erosion. Denmark is a lowland country with a coastline of more than 7000 km, and has about 32.000 scheduled ancient monuments. No location in the country is further from the coast than 52 km. Prognoses made by the Danish coastal authority show that rising sea levels and extreme weather conditions in the future will result in a great risk of severe coastal erosion. The prognoses urgently call for new strategies in terms of monitoring the effects of climate inflicted damages on tangible cultural heritage. In order to monitor the decay, The Danish Agency for Culture and Palaces just finished mapping all scheduled monuments in threat of coastal erosion. The national mapping shows that 711 scheduled monuments are in risk of coastal erosion, and that 92 of these monuments already are decaying due to erosion damages. Most of the scheduled monuments affected are Bronze Age barrows, megalithic graves from Stone Age, castle mounds and churches from Middle Ages, and fortifications from the seventeenth to nineteenth centuries. The completed mapping helps the national heritage administration to understand when and where future actions need to take place. Previous actions have taken place sporadically, and without an overall strategy. These actions have ranged from: 1) “Letting nature take its course”, 2) Ongoing monitoring and field inspections, 3) Archaeological excavation or registration 4) Moving or restoring monuments, 5) Coastal protection. Future actions need to be applied according to a national strategy in order to prevent a loss of valuable knowledge.


Author(s): Frederiksen, Pernille (Danish Agency for Culture and Palaces)