Olsbenning Miners’ Village & Lapphyttan

If you travel in northeastern Västmanland and around the border of Dalarna, you will come across several villages with names ending in –benning. Nowhere else do villages have –benning in their names. The word itself means building – a building with a blast furnace.
So, if you find yourself in a village with a name ending in –benning, you can be certain that there was once a blast furnace there. The prefix of the name can even tell you who the furnace belonged to. For instance, Karbenning was Karin’s furnace, and Olsbenning was Olof’s furnace.
 

The first miners lived in small, cramped houses. Like most others, they were farmers who lived near their fields. However, together with their neighbors, they owned a furnace and a mine. After the summer, when the miners had tended to their farms, harvested their crops, and completed their autumn chores, it was time to produce the charcoal needed for the blast furnace. During the winter and early spring, they worked in the furnace, producing the iron their farms required.
This was also the time to mine ore from the ground.
Over time, iron production became increasingly important for them, leading many miners to move their farms closer to the furnace. This is how a miners’ village began to grow.
As mining became more profitable for many, they built grander homes. The houses reflected their status, showing that a miner and his family lived there. However, not all miners’ houses were grand; some still lived in small, simple cottages.
 

The old miners’ village of Olsbenning is located less than two kilometers south of the old furnace site of Lapphyttan, along the medieval country road. Archaeological findings indicate that iron was produced in a blast furnace here during the Middle Ages, with remains of three medieval furnaces discovered in the area. Various blast furnaces were in use here until 1874.
 

Olsbenning is a typical miners’ village, with large timbered farmhouses often flanked by smaller outbuildings. Surrounding the farms are fields and meadows, preserving the open landscape that has existed for nearly a thousand years.
 

LAPPHYTTAN
In the forest a couple of kilometers from the miners’ village of Olsbenning lies a clearing.
Here are traces of one of the oldest furnace sites in Sweden – Lapphyttan – which has been dated to between the late 1100s and the 1300s.
 

At Lapphyttan, miners produced pig iron in a blast furnace powered by a waterwheel. The iron was intended for export to European markets. Lapphyttan was almost like an industrial site. As you walk around, you can see the remains of:
• The blast furnace where iron ore from solid rock was smelted.
• A charcoal storage house where charcoal was kept.
• A roasting pit where ore was placed over an open fire to remove sulfur and other impurities.
• Refining forges where the iron was melted again to reduce the carbon content and other impurities, making it malleable.
• A residential house. While the miners lived in a village some distance away, they stayed here while working at the furnace. When the next group took over, it was their turn to stay in the house.
 

Facts
A miners’ village dating back to the 1100s, along with a medieval furnace site a few kilometers away. Visits are self-guided.
 

Liten bild nr 1: Bisse Falk