Visitor's guides about Lund

Tourist Information • This is Lund
• Our greeters On this page, you will find more visitor's guides about Lund than anywhere else! Those guides present a large range of tourist information about Lund, the oldest city in nowadays Sweden, founded by the Danish Viking royals in the second half of the 10th century. Lund is one of the most interesting cities when it comes to culture and history. It is also a student city with one of the largest universities in the Nordic region, which contributes to making Lund a research and humor city.

Lund was an important Danish city during viking and medieval ages but has been a part of Sweden since 1658 when Scania became Swedish after a peace settlement in Roskilde. During the first 700 years, Lund was the unofficial capital of Denmark due to its importance as archbishopric. The mix of Danish and Swedish culture and history makes the city an interesting destination. Even though Lund has around 100,000 inhabitants today, the viking and medieval city center is quite small, cozy, and walkable, with old architecture and many restaurants.

Tourist information about the oldest city in nowadays Sweden

The visitor experiences are framed like attractions, walks and biking tours. The information about the time given for the various visitor experiences are approximate. You guide yourself by using the tour guide, developed as mobile friendly web pages. The guides are an important part of the experience since some of what is described are not easily visible if you do not know about it. All visitor's guides are free of charge and contain no commercial.

We also offer greeter service in English for smaller groups up to six persons, totally free of charge. Our tourist information is voluntary nonprofit driven by people living in Lund. You are welcome to contact us about our visitor guides or if there are other questions about visiting Lund. Normally, we have short response times.

Experience the viking age in Lund

Information from the chronicle "Gesta Wulinensis ecclesiae pontificum", which can be translated as the history of the Wolin bishops, has rewritten Lund's oldest viking age history in a way which never happened before. This has given us completely new and unique knowledge about Lund's oldest viking age history and imply that Lund is Sweden's oldest city. It also means that we can now tell much more about what it was like in Lund during the oldest time.

• Experience the viking age Lund

Visitor's guides

• Lund's viking age center, walk 3 hours
  A walk that tells you about all the places where Lund's history took place during the first 150 years of the viking age. You will learn about the persons who ruled Lund at that time, the first churches, the viking age fortress, the royal estate and the viking age town center that was established around 987.
• Drotten church ruin, attraction ½ hour
  Drotten church ruin is an unmanned basement museum where you can see the preserved ruin of Lund's first cathedral Drotten, which also became the first archbishopric church in Scandinavia. In the museum, there is also information about three other churches located at Kattesund, built of wood.

Additional information

• Lund's oldest viking age history
  This page provides in a detailed chronological order what we now know, thanks to the chronicle "Gesta Wulinensis ecclesiae pontificum", about Lund's earliest viking history from the period before Lund and Lund in the 960s until around 989.
• The sources to the new information about the viking age Lund
  Many people question the new information from the Chronicle and believe it to be false. We are also accused of making up what we tell. That is why we have created this page where the sources for the new information about Lund's oldest history are presented. We also present some strong evidence that the information must come from a genuine source.

Runestones in Lund

Runes were the Northerners’ first alphabet. The letters, or rather the runes, were carved in wood, bone or stone. Learn about the runic alphabet and its different runic characters. Then, you can try to read the text on some of the runestones in Lund.

• Runestones in Lund

Visitor's guides

• The Runestone hillock, attraction ½ hour
  The Runestone hillock is a monument created in 1868 as a gift to Lund University 200th anniversary. The six runestones standing around the small hillock were carved during the viking age, in the late 900s and early thousands. This visitor's guide tells about the short messages that are left on the stones.

Experience the medieval Lund

During the Viking and Middle Ages was Lund an important town for the Church. At the end of the Viking era, around year 1060, there were nine wooden churches and two churches made of stone, and some sort of monastic activity in the city. In 1103, when Lund became an archbishopric for a governorate which included the whole Christianized Scandinavia, even more churches were built. Almost 200 years later, there were 22 churches and four monasteries in Lund. After the reformation, which took place 1536 in Denmark and is seen as the end of the Middle Ages, most of the churches and all monasteries were teared down. Today, only two of those churches still remains, the Cathedral and the Cloister church.

Visitor's guides

• The Lund Cathedral, attraction 1 hour
  The Cathedral was of course the most important church and dominated the medieval city of Lund. Today, it is the most visited Cathedral in Sweden. In this visitor's guide you will find some pictures that help you experience the beautiful Cathedral.
• The Cloister church, attraction 1 hour
  The only remining church from the medieval time, except the Cathedral, is the small but lovely Cloister church. It was a monastery for Benedictine nuns. In this visitor's guide you will find some pictures and description about it.
• The medieval City Wall, walk 2-4 hours
  In the 1130s, a city wall was built around the 84-hectare urban area which constituted the whole city of Lund for almost 900 years. An interesting way to see Lund as a tourist or visitor is to walk alongside the city wall that surrounded Lund in the medieval. There are many interesting places to see along the way.

Experience the Lund University city

Without the University, Lund will not be this cozy city. The University is one of the largest in the Nordic countries with about 47 000 students and more than 8 800 employees. The probably best way to explore the university city of Lund is to visit the activities during April Last and May First.

• Experience Lund University city

Visitor's guides

• The University’s History, stroll 1 hour
  A walk describing how Lund became a university city and where the teaching was taken place during the first 200 years.
• The University Main Building, attraction ½ hour
  The magnificent white University Main Building is one of Lund's most photographed buildings. It is is closed for renovation right now but this visitor's guide shows pictures of what it looks like inside.

Events

• April Last and May First, event 2 days
  The best way to explore some traditional university activities is to spend April Last and May First in Lund. During those days there are a lot of activities like the improvised pick-nick in Lund's City Park, the donning of the Caps ceremony, honouring the Vice-Chancellor on University Plaza, and listening to the Lund’s Student-Singers greeting springtime from the stairs at the University main building.

The humor city of Lund

Comedy and parodies have a long tradition in Lund, mainly thanks to Lund University and all the students. Not least all the different student spex (burlesque theater) performed in Lund every year, and the Lund Carnival every four years have functioned as a nursery for many of Sweden's most well-known humorists. Here we tell about how you as a visitor can experience the humor city of Lund.

• Experience the humor city of Lund

Visitor's guides

• Lund’s Most Amusing Attractions, stroll 1 hour
  Humor, parody, satire, and absurd comedy have a long tradition in Lund thanks to its university and all students. This is a walk passing a number of humoristic installations made by the Lund University students.

Events

• The Lund Carnival, event 3 days
  You almost have to experience the Lund Carnival, the absolute largest event in Lund. The carnival is organized by about 7,000 students at Lund University in mid-May every four years. Use our visitor's guide to plan your visit.

Experience the Battle of Lund Lund

After 700 years as a Danish city, Lund became a Swedish in 1658, but it was a troubled time with many wars. The event that perhaps affected Lund the most was the Battle of Lund. About 3,000 soldiers were killed on the battlefield north of Lund, and a lot of people died in the weeks before the battle, due to bad conditions.

Visitor's guides

• The Battle of Lund, biking tour 5-6 hours
  A full-day excursion passing 14 places where different parts of the Battle of Lund took place on December 4, 1676. On the tour you pass lots of beautiful countryside along the sparse traffic cycle paths.

Further ways to discover Lund

Today, there is almost 100 000 inhabitants in Lund city, still it is cozy walking around in the small medieval city center with its old blocks, mixed architecture and a lot of cafes and restaurants.

Visitor's guides

• The student murder of 1829, attraction ½ hour
  There is a house in Lund called Locus Peccatorum, which means "The House of Sin". It got its name because a student murdered his room mate in that house one night in 1829. This visitor's guide tells what happened.
• All Saints' Church in Lund, attraction ½ hour
  The beautiful All Saints' Church, which was inaugurated on All Saints' Day, November 1, 1891. The church is a very beautiful and worthwhile masterpiece by the Lund Cathedral architect Helgo Zettervall.
• The old blocks of Lund, stroll 1-3 hours
  A walk along some of the old and picturesque houses and blocks, with paving stones and blooming hollyhocks, lavender and roses during the summertime.
• Market Places in Lund, attraction 1 hour
  There have been various kinds of market trade in Lund for more than a thousand years. This visitor's guide tell about places in Lund where trading has been conducted in the past, and where there are trade and markets today to visit in Lund. Reading this visitor's guide will take you on a time journey through Lund as a trading city.
• The Lund Market Hall, attraction ½ hour
  The more than 100-year-old Market Hall is one of the coziest places in Lund. In this visitor's guide you find information about the history and some of the shops located there nowadays. It also tells about Lund's two famous sausages, Knake and Lunna Melle.
• Lilacs in Lund, stroll 1 hour
  A walk in the park Lundagård and the old university area when the lilacs is blooming as its best.
• Allotment areas in Lund, biking tour 2 hours or more
  Between first of April and last of September all of the allotments in Lund are opened for visitors every day between 08.00 and 20.00. There are lovely small cottages, and during summertime, a lot of plants and blossoms. The allotments are also historically interesting, four of them more than one hundred years old.
• Filming locations in Lund, strolls 2-4 hours
  Several films and series have been filmed in Lund. There are so many varied and beautiful environments here in Lund, from the beautiful old city center with the old blocks to all the different environments of the university. Here you will find visitor's guides about the places you can see in some movies that have been filmed in Lund.