The Vasa was a mighty Swedish warship that sank in Stockholm in 1628. 333 years later, the Vasa was rediscovered on the harbor floor and today it has its own museum. The Vasa Museum is Stockholm and Scandinavia’s most visited museum with about 1.2 million visitors per year. They said that the Vasa was the world’s only preserved 17th century ship. It was quite fascinating and I will eventually say why I think it was so fascinating.

In 1625 the Swedish king decided to develop an incredibly powerful fleet of ships. The king signed a contract with the Dutch master shipwright, Henrik Hybertsson to build four new ships, one of them the Vasa, said to be the most powerful warship in the Baltic, if not the world. The Vasa was 226 feet long and more than 164 feet tall from the keel to the top of the main mast. The ship weighed over 1,200 tons. It had ten sails, 64 cannons and hundreds of sculptures. It was a giant of its time.

The museum guide said that the Vasa was designed to be both an awesome ship and an intimidating warship. Our guide said it had a new double-hull design and that it was built on a tight timeline, on orders of the king. Hybertsson had died and a couple of people had taken his place. The tight timeline most likely was also problematic.

The Vasa cast off on its maiden voyage and got about eight-tenths of a mile before it got hit by several gusts of wind and sank. It never even got out of the harbor where it was built. It sank in 105 feet of water. Some work was done to try and retrieve the 64 canons but after that, the Vasa was lost and forgotten for over 300 years.

It turned out that the slightly saline water plus the lack of bacteria due to all the sewage in the water kept the Vasa in pristine condition for all those years. When it was finally rediscovered in something like 1961 and eventually raised in the 1980’s, it was the beautiful ship that we can see today in almost perfect condition, with well over 90 percent of the ship original. It really was a remarkable sight to see.

You can peruse the photos that I took. No flashes were allowed and lighting was minimal, so the photos are not so good but you can get the idea. The masts had to be cut short to fit inside the building. There were also lots of other areas and exhibits with lifeboats, anchors, sculptures, and other things salvaged with the ship. The ship really was impressive from the standpoint of all the fancy carving on it and all the gun ports. It was a combination of beauty and beast.

The museum guide and other tourists made lots of comments about the wonderful craftsmanship, the phenomenal work done in the 1600’s, the beauty of the work, and how great the salvage operation to allow us to see it today.

I say okay to all that BUT….the Vasa sailed less than a mile and sank when it got hit by a breeze. It was supposed to be an ocean-going warship. It never even made it out of the harbor. How does that equate to “craftsmanship”? I don’t know if they have really studied all the height to weight numbers to try and determine what the problem was, but if a gust of wind brought it down, the craftsmanship had problems.