Four thousand years ago, a 25-year-old man died on the island of Hitra on the Trøndelag coast. Researchers at the NTNU University Museum have recreated the man, based on the skeletal remains that were found 110 years ago, in 1916. The blond and blue-eyed “Hitra Man” is also based on DNA analyses of a number of other individuals from the same period, with the same DNA composition.

Blond and blue-eyed 4000 years ago

That the Norwegian was blond, blue-eyed and light-skinned 4000 years ago corresponds well with many Norwegians in today’s Norway. It is, to be sure, entirely typical, even though many are darker in the hair.

The University Museum has recreated the Hitra Man as he presumably looked 4000 years ago. The skeleton found on Hitra in 1916 comes from a man who was approximately 169 cm tall and around 25 years old. He was found by chance when a local farm was fetching gravel in the foreshore to improve a road. Among sand and stones they found bones, which turned out to belong to a man who had lived right at the end of the Stone Age.

May have been a warrior

Along with the skeletal remains, a dagger and a wrist guard were found. The latter is an oblong piece of bone with two holes. It was fastened to the wrist of the hand holding the bow, to protect against the impact of the bowstring when shooting with bow and arrow.

“This is equipment that may indicate that he was a warrior,” archaeologist Birgitte Skar at the University Museum told the research magazine Gemini in 2024, when the “Hitra Man” was first presented.

The lifelike Hitra Man has been recreated by Thomas Foldberg, an award-winning Danish make-up designer who works especially for film and television, in collaboration with researchers at the University Museum. He has also made “Tora” for them, a woman from the Middle Ages.

Now he is back for a visit to Hitra, where the Coastal Museum in Sør-Trøndelag opened an exhibition with the Hitra Man on 16 June this year. In this connection the University Museum has published a video about the ancient Trønder. There archaeologist Ellen Grav tells that the Hitra Man lived in a turbulent time when new people arrived to acquire land.

Immigration and violent clashes

“Until then they had lived as hunters and gatherers, but at the end of the Stone Age agriculture comes to Central Norway. We believe that agriculture came with people who immigrated to acquire land. And they were willing to use weapons to obtain it. We must therefore expect that violent clashes arose between those who already lived here and those who came from outside,” says Ellen Grav in the video.

Archaeologist Ellen Grav tells about the 4000-year-old Hitra Man in several videos from the NTNU University Museum. Photo: Still images.

She goes on to say that the new people brought knowledge of agriculture and animal husbandry, but that they also had a different way of organising their society. In addition, they had a different worldview and religion. And this led to major upheavals here at home.

There is much that researchers still do not know about that period, and about the Hitra Man, but he forms part of the research, and further research is being carried out on his DNA, as with remains of others found from the corresponding period. They already know a little, for example that the Hitra Man did not live on seafood, even though there must have been sea where he was found after 4000 years. He had lived on food from the land. But perhaps that was not a preference at a time when one did not go to the shop to obtain food.