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Jorvik was the Viking name for the English city of York. York had been founded as the Roman legionary fortress of Eboracum and revived as the Anglo-Saxon trading port of Eoforwic. It was first captured by Swedish-led Danish Vikings in AD 866 and became the capital of a flourishing small kingdom. The area of the palace built by the Viking rulers was known as the Konungsgårthr and is today known as King's Square. By ca 1000, the urban boom brought Viking Jorvik to a population total second only to that of London within the British Isles. William the Conqueror brought the independence of Jorvik to an end and established garrisoned castles in the city.
From 1976 to 1981, the York Archaeological Trust conducted a five-year excavation in and around the street of Coppergate, which uncovered well-preserved remains Jorvik's timber buildings, workshops, fences, animal pens, privies, pits and wells together with artefacts of the time, preserved in anoxic wet clay. The state of preservation of thousands of everyday objects is breath-taking: A shoemaker's wooden last, and even a minter's die for striking coinage were recovered. The lack of oxygen in the dense mud meant that decay bacteria were unable to break down embedded materials. Up to 9m of stratified deposits were encountered. Wood, leather, textiles, and plant and animal remains, which do not always survive for long periods underground, were recovered in large quantities, supplementing the more durable pottery, metalwork and bones.
In the 10th century, Jorvik's trading connections reached to the Byzantine Empire and beyond: a cap made of silk survives, and coins from Samarkand were familiar enough and respected enough for a counterfeit to have passed in trade. Both these items were famously recovered a millennium later as well as a large human coprolite popularly known as the Lloyds Bank turd. Amber from the Baltic is often expected at a Viking site and at Jorvik an impractical and presumably symbolic axehead of amber was found. A cowrie shell indicates contact with the Red Sea or the Persian Gulf. Christian and pagan objects have survived side-by-side, usually taken as a sign that Christians were not in positions of authority.
The York Archaeological Trust took the decision to recreate the excavated part of Jorvik on the site, peopled with figures and sounds as well as pigsties, fish market and latrines to bring it fully to life using innovative interpretative methods. The Jorvik Viking Centre opened in April 1984 and proved to be a major visitor attraction. In 2001, the centre was refurbished and enlarged.
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