WHAT A "STONEHOLE ROCK" SAYS ABOUT THE AGE OF THE KENSINGTON RUNESTONE

 

 

 

It appears that a very important "stonehole rock" now adorns the top of Runestone Hill.  The fractured and badly misshaped rock was not originally where it now sits, based on information at hand.  Apparently, the disfigured boulder was moved to its present location about thirty-five years ago to show visitors to Runestone Park what a mooring stone looks like.  However, most people now know that the many Scandinavian-made, medieval-era stoneholes in this area of Minnesota were not chiseled out for mooring ships--nor for blasting rocks apart, either, for that matter.

 

In his 1946 book, "America: 1355--1364," on page 144, early Kensington Runestone enthusiast Hjalmar R. Holand tells about finding the strange rock during a search of the Runestone Hill area, in 1937:

 

“This time I went straight to the steepest part of the hill, which is immediately below the spot where the rune stone was found.  Here lies a large pile of stones which have tumbled down from the hillside and been gathered together by the owner of the land.  The largest of these is a huge boulder, which at some time must have met with a severe collision, because several large fragments have been knocked off its rounded surface.  In the obtuse angle left by one of these detached parts is a chiseled hole about one inch deep, and somewhat smaller in diameter.”

 

He goes on to say, "If this angular cavity were filled by a piece which approximately conformed to the rounded contour of the boulder, and if a hole were drilled through this missing fragment in line with the inch-deep hole that now is there, the hole would be seven or eight inches deep and would correspond to the chiseled holes already described."  

I hope it may suffice to say that there are many perfectly good comparison stonehole examples back in Scandinavia, showing the same shape and approximate aging as those in this area of Minnesota.  Also, some of these  stonehole rocks in Minnesota have shown up in close proximity to other apparent Norse sites and evidences, such as along the Whetstone River just across the border in South Dakota...so that the KRS isn't alone in having stonehole rocks in close proximity to where it was found. 

I don't believe that the stonehole rocks around Runestone Hill must stand on their own, but instead, that they are intrinsically linked to the KRS and what went on in Minnesota in the general timeframe of the KRS--or even earlier.  

There is importance in contrasting some of the past fracturing to the boulder, in order to help prove--if possible--that the KRS is authentic.  Foremost, the characteristics of the fractures seem to point out vastly different times of fracturing.  For instance, it can be seen in the accompanying photos that a large fracture is much "fresher" than the hole chiseling and subsequent fracturing around the stonehole. 

 

As is seen, there is an obvious difference in the fresher-appearing pinkish/brown colorization of a large fractured area, as opposed to the greyish colorization exhibited by most of the rock--but which also includes the fractured area where a chunk of rock was cracked off from a stonehole.  Please note that the color of the stonehole and the fracturing around the stonehole is about the same as the color of the rock itself.  This necessarily denotes that the stonehole and the fractured area around it are very old, especially in comparison to the large, fresh fracture, which is likely more than a hundred years old, since Hjalmar Holand described the fracturing from when he visited the rock back in 1937. 

I'm speculating that the chunk of missing rock may have been purposely cracked off, leaving the unusually shallow 1" hole.  I know about two other sites near the Minnesota/South Dakota border where it appears that a chunk of rock was purposely cracked off from a stonehole...I think to get the attention of returning Norsemen, who might possibly know what the arrangement of stoneholes was meant to confide. 

 

Ultimately, there has to be a reason why the many stoneholes were made around Runestone Hill.  The answer isn't readily apparent, but I speculate that the patterned arrangement must have something to do with encoding the spot where something is perhaps buried.  In other words, find the design laid out upon the ground by the use of stonehole rocks, and perhaps find something buried.  However, the problem around Runestone Hill is that some stonehole rocks have been moved around, so that only "educated guesses" can be made about where something may be buried.