ABSTRACT
I have spoken in the above chapter about the impossibility of sounding the depths of water off the Norwegian shores where there are high mountains. Now I must show how those who sail among these winding, rocky abysses can, in good safety and without anchors, find secure places to moor. This is why you may see there, at various places along the fjords, iron rings, bigger than a soldier’s round shield, fastened with melted lead to the sides of many of the mountains. 1 These were set there in times past through the magnanimity and at the expense of virtuous kings, chiefly on the way to the wealthy city of Bergen, so that, when sailors were hard pressed by swell or tempest, they might instantly pass hawsers through the rings; in this way great vessels would be held steady, just as though they were in secluded recesses.
Iron rings fastened to mountains
Ships are moored
