Culture  days
at Ulvedal
july 2002

Funeral at the cotter's farm  Rabben
year 1802

Relatives and neighbours gathered at the yard before departure to the church.

They got served food, beer and coffee.  Coffee got after some time more common in use than before.  (Was it by pressure from the priests to reduce the consumption of beer?)
However, still you can hear someplace' that they call it funeral feast 

Under this arrangement, we were told that in older times it was common to use "interchangeable coffin bottoms" on the  sarcophagus when poor people should be placed to rest.  When the coffin was placed in the ground, they removed the top, and it was free for the next one,  A kind of recycling.  
It was not unusual that the top was lend out to other communities along the fjord.  Than it could happen that it was used for other kind of transporting.  For example fish from the coast to the communities along the fjords.

There was a lot of superstitions in older times.  Especial about death and funerals.
The coffin was placed outside the home in another house, (may be in a barn).  People gathered around the coffin and sang hymns.  When the coffin should be taken away, they sent it out  a peep-hole in the wall, (Death gate /- hole ),  not the door.   This was because the spirit of the deceased "not should find it's way back as a ghost".
When they carried /drove him away, they burned his bedstraw at the gate.  They believed that the "nasty smell would scare the soul from coming back".  

Wedding at the1820

We were shown wedding outfit and how a wedding feast could be like

We also got the chance to taste how the food could be like at a wedding in the 1800's.  The food served at "this wedding" was   sour cream porridge, flat bread and cured meat. It was rather heavy stuff so I think all that tasted it was rather pleased.
As drink we were served juice.  In older times it would likely have been home made beer.