The Galloway Hoard is one of the most important archaeological finds this century.  It is the richest and most varied group of Viking-age objects ever found in Britain or Ireland. Discovered in the southwest Scottish county of Galloway in 2014, it had lain buried for over a thousand years. Now, it is rewriting our understanding of the early medieval world. 

This critically acclaimed exhibition is now available to host for a once in a generation international tour.

Visitors to this exhibition are transported back to a critical moment in history: the formation of the political entities we now know as Scotland, England, and Ireland, in a time of Viking raids. The treasures found in the Hoard, including silver, gold, glass beads, pendants, brooches, bracelets and other curios, many strung or wrapped with silk, offer an enticing glimpse into an interconnected medieval world where cultural identities were in flux and material objects spoke of power, wealth, spirituality and heritage.  

Since 2017, painstaking research into these objects has taken place behind the scenes at National Museums Scotland. Conservation of the metal objects has revealed decorations, inscriptions and other details that were not previously visible. Many of the objects are types that have never been seen before in Britain and Ireland and proved challenging to identify. Some had travelled thousands of miles to reach Scotland, from across Europe and beyond into Central Asia.

This touring exhibition has been newly updated to present the results of five years of this research and analysis, revealing a series of amazing discoveries which have attracted world-wide attention, and bringing us closer than ever to those who made, traded, treasured, and buried the Galloway Hoard.