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STOCKHOLM (AFP) - Archeologists have already established that Viking explorers beat Christopher Columbus to America by about 500 years, but experts in Sweden now hope to determine whether another group of Scandinavians landed in the New World in 1362, 130 years before Columbus. A 90-kilo (200-pound) rune stone, a block of stone featuring symbolic engravings common during the Viking era, has been sent from the United States to Sweden's Museum of National Antiquities to establish whether it really dates from 1362, as its markings claim, or is just a hoax. If confirmed as an authentic relic, the so-called Kensington stone...

June Goodhue says she’s known about the rock since she and her late husband moved to North Kingstown’s Pojac Point in 1952. Sitting in shallow water, the 8-foot-long boulder sported unusual markings that were typically visible only at extreme low tide. Goodhue said she heard people say the markings might be ancient runic characters left by Viking or Nordic explorers. Even so, Goodhue, who is now 89, says she didn’t give much thought to the significance of what people call the Narragansett Rune Stone or Quidnessett Rock. That is, until a week or so before Christmas 2011 when her neighbor...

When Minneapolis artist Janey Westin first came across the runes near the town of Kensington, she assumed they were left behind by the same Norse explorers who created the so-called Kensington Runestone, found nearby in 1898. The infamous 200-pound rock is covered with runes that describe the travails of a party of Scandinavians beset by Indians in 1362. Though most scholars doubt the stone's authenticity, it continues to fuel debate about a Norse presence in the Midwest. Excited by the new find, the Kensington Runestone Museum paid for archaeological testing at the site, which yielded only a few Native American...

An archaeologist says a rock used to mark a parking lot at a church in Sweden is actually a 1,000-year-old runestone. Stockholm County Museum runic expert Lars Andersson said a rock used to help mark the lot's boundaries is thought to date back to the Viking Age in Sweden, The Local said Friday. Andersson said in a museum statement the discovery of runic inscriptions on the rock thanks to rainy weather was akin to a "religious experience." "To read something that nobody else has read for 1,000 years is almost a religious experience," he said. The rock was found last...

It's one of Minnesota's greatest mysteries. It's something that puts settlers in America well before Columbus. A Minnesota geologist thinks the controversial Kensington Runestone is the real thing and there is evidence that he says backs up the theory. The Kensington Runestone is a rock found near Alexandria a century ago. It's inscription speaking of Norwegians here in 1362. It begs the question. Were Vikings exploring our land more than 100 years before Columbus? Or is it just an elaborate hoax? New research shows that the stone is genuine and there's hidden code that may prove it. It contains carved...

The Kensington Rune Stone: Compelling New Evidence. That is the title of a new book published by Scott Wolter and Richard Nielsen. Wolter is a geologist and petrographer from St. Paul who has been working on the mysterious stone for the past several years. Nielsen is linguistic expert who has also been studying the Kensington Runestone (KRS). Nielsen said the 574-page book is quite comprehensive and provides information about the Ohman family in detail. Olof Ohman is the Swedish farmer who reportedly found the stone wrapped in the roots of an aspen tree on his farm near Kensington in the...

The Kensington Runestone, one of Minnesota’s most debated artifacts is not a hoax — according to geologist Scott Wolter. Wolter spoke to a Minnesota History class at Anoka Ramsey Community College - Cambridge Campus Monday, Sept. 12. He has been researching the Runestone for five years along with Richard Nielsen, an engineer from Houston. Wolter, a geologist by education and profession works for Twin Cities Testing, performing detailed examinations on concrete and rock to determine if there are flaws in concrete projects. Wolter explained the Runestone was found by Olof Ohman in 1898 while clearing trees off his land in...

Scholars who believe the Kensington Runestone is a 19th-century prank — and not concrete evidence that Norsemen beat Columbus to America by 100-plus years — say they have found the smoking gun to prove it. The latest in the century-old Minnesota controversy came in documents written in 1885 by an 18-year-old Swedish tailor named Edward Larsson. He sometimes wrote in runes — an ancient Scandinavian language that differs from the English alphabet. But Larsson's runes were not the usual runes used over the centuries. The scholars contend that parts of his documents seem to be written in a secret runic...

Posted on Fri, Oct. 03, 2003 ALEXANDRIA, MINN.Norse stone authenticity put to the test BY TRAVIS REED Associated Press Its authenticity may forever be in question, but the Kensington Runestone is on its way to Sweden, where a group of scientists will study it and lend their opinion to the question of whether the rock is really a centuries-old artifact or a 200-pound hoax. Scientists working with the Runestone Museum in Alexandria, Minn., are traveling with the stone and say they have new geologic findings that suggest it was buried far longer than anyone was settled in western Minnesota. The...

Subject: The Kensington Runestone; verified as proof of Scandinavians inMinnesota in 1362 <http://www.ripsawnews.com/2001.08.15/cover.jpg> Verified at LastThe Strange and Terrible Storyof the Kensington RunestoneBy Jim Richardson andAllen Richardson The comfortable scientific and scholarly worlds of history, archeology,runology and Scandinavian linguistics have all been rocked by recentdevelopments surrounding a single stone in west centralMinnesota. The Kensington Runestone, thought for over 100 years to be a hoax, nowstands verified as a genuine artifact commemorating the deaths of 10medireview Scandinavians in Minnesota in the year 1362. A recent piece of linguistic scholarship by Dr. Richard Nielsen has hit thescene, which seems to demonstrate conclusively...