History of Danish royal castle 'to be rewritten'

Denmark's biggest royal castle, Vordingborg, is set for an updated history after an archaeological dig shed new light on a key figure in its past.

The castle, located on the southern coast of Zealand facing across the Baltic Sea towards Germany, was originally built in the 12th century by King Valdemar the Great. 

 

Valdemar used it as a base for raids on Germany and, later under Valdemar's son Valdemar II the Victorious, Estonia.

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A ghoulish tour of medieval punishments

Is there anything quite as chillingly middle-English as a head swinging mournfully from a set of gallows, silhouetted over some rugged and desolate moorland?

The Oxfordshire town of Thame has announced it is considering bringing back stocks as a tourist attraction, but which other settlements have kept their instruments of medieval correction?

Stocks date back to at least the time of the Black Death in the 14th Century. Labourers were banned from leaving their homes to find better wages elsewhere and those who broke the law were put in stocks.

Every town or village was required by law to have a set. But being put in the stocks was a fairly minor punishment. Many places had whipping posts, pillories and even gallows.

Here's a ghoulish tour of England's harsh past.

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