Vikings

There are numerous burial sites associated with Vikings throughout Europe and their sphere of influence—in Scandinavia, the British Isles, Ireland, Greenland, Iceland, Faeroe Islands, Germany, Latvia, Estonia, Finland, Russia, etc. The burial practices of the Vikings were quite varied, from dug graves in the ground, to

According to written sources, most of the funerals took place at sea. Funerals involved either burial or cremation, depending on local customs. In the area that is now Sweden, cremations were predominant; in Denmark burial was more common; and in Norway both were common.[161] Viking barrows are one of the primary sources of evidence for circumstances in the Viking Age.^[162] The items buried with the dead give some indication as to what was considered important to possess in the afterlife.^[163] It is unknown what mortuary services were given to dead children by the Vikings.^[164] Some of the most important burial sites for understanding the Vikings include:

• Norway: Oseberg; Gokstad; Borrehaugene.
• Sweden: Gettlinge gravfält; the cemeteries of Birka, a World Heritage Site;^[165] Valsgärde; Gamla Uppsala; Hulterstad gravfält, near Alby; Hulterstad, Öland, Gotland.
• Denmark:
  Mammen
  chamber tomb and hoard.
• Estonia: Salme ships – The largest and earliest Viking ship burial ground ever uncovered.
• Scotland:
  Port an Eilean Mhòir ship burial; Scar boat burial
  , Orkney.
• Faroe Islands: Hov.
• Iceland:
  Austur-Húnavatnssýsla.^{[161][168][169]}
• Greenland: Brattahlíð.^[170]
• Germany: Hedeby.
• Latvia: Grobiņa.
• Ukraine: the Black Grave.
• Russia: Gnezdovo, Staraya Ladoga.

Ships

There have been several archaeological finds of Viking ships of all sizes, providing knowledge of the craftsmanship that went into building them. There were many types of Viking ships, built for various uses; the best-known type is probably the longship.^[171] Longships were intended for warfare and exploration, designed for speed and agility, and were equipped with oars to complement the sail, making navigation possible independently of the wind. The longship had a long, narrow hull and shallow draught to facilitate landings and troop deployments in shallow water. Longships were used extensively by the Leidang, the Scandinavian defence fleets. The longship allowed the Norse to go Viking, which might explain why this type of ship has become almost synonymous with the concept of Vikings.^[172][173]

The Vikings built many unique types of watercraft, often used for more peaceful tasks. The knarr was a dedicated merchant vessel designed to carry cargo in bulk. It had a broader hull, a deeper draught, and a small number of oars (used primarily to manoeuvre in harbours and similar situations). One Viking innovation was the 'beitass', a spar mounted to the sail that allowed their ships to sail effectively against the wind.^[174] It was common for seafaring Viking ships to tow or carry a smaller boat to transfer crew and cargo from the ship to shore.

A reconstructed longship

A model of the knarr ship type

Two typical viking ships

In 2019, archaeologists uncovered two Viking boat graves in Gamla Uppsala. They also discovered that one of the boats still holds the remains of a man, a dog, and a horse, along with other items.[177] This has shed light on the death rituals of Viking communities in the region.

Social structure

Viking society was divided into the three socio-economic classes: thralls, karls and jarls. This is described vividly in the

Thralls were the lowest ranking class and were slaves. Slaves comprised as much as a quarter of the population.^[179] Slavery was vital to Viking society – for everyday chores and large-scale construction, and also for trading and for the economy. Thralls were servants and workers on the farms and in larger households of the karls and jarls, and they were used for constructing fortifications, ramps, canals, mounds, roads and similar projects built by hard labour. According to the Rígsþula, thralls were despised and looked down upon.^[180] New thralls were supplied by either the sons and daughters of thralls, or were captured abroad by the Vikings on their raids in Europe. The thralls were brought back to Scandinavia by boat, used on location or in newer settlements to build needed structures, or sold, often to the Arabs in exchange for silver. Other names for thrall were træl and ty.^{[citation needed]}

Karls were free peasants. They owned farms, land and cattle, and engaged in chores like ploughing the fields, milking the cows, and building houses and wagons, but used thralls to make ends meet. Other names for karls were bonde or simply free men. Similar classes were churls and huskarls.

The jarls were the

Other social structures included the communities of félag in both the civil and the military spheres, to which its members (called félagi) were obliged. A félag could be centred around certain trades, a common ownership of a sea vessel or a military obligation under a specific leader. Members of the latter were referred to as drenge, one of the words for warrior. There were also official communities within towns and villages, the overall defence, religion, the legal system and the Things.

Status of women

Like elsewhere in medieval Europe, most women in Viking society were subordinate to their husbands and fathers and had little political power.

Most free Viking women were housewives, and a woman's standing in society was linked to that of her husband.[183] Marriage gave a woman a degree of economic security and social standing encapsulated in the title húsfreyja (lady of the house). Norse laws assert the housewife's authority over the 'indoor household'. She had the important roles of managing the farm's resources, conducting business, as well as child-rearing, although some of this would be shared with her husband.^[185]

After the age of 20, an unmarried woman, referred to as maer and mey, reached legal majority and had the right to decide her place of residence and was regarded as her own person before the law.

Concubinage was also part of Viking society, whereby a woman could live with a man and have children with him without marrying; such a woman was called a frilla.^[187] Usually she would be the mistress of a wealthy and powerful man who also had a wife.^[182] The wife had authority over the mistresses if they lived in her household.^[183] Through her relationship to a man of higher social standing, a concubine and her family could advance socially; although her position was less secure than that of a wife.^[182] There was little distinction made between children born inside or outside marriage: both had the right to inherit property from their parents, and there were no "legitimate" or "illegitimate" children.^[187] However, children born in wedlock had more inheritance rights than those born out of wedlock.^[185]

A woman had the right to inherit part of her husband's property upon his death,^[185] and widows enjoyed the same independent status as unmarried women.^[187] The paternal aunt, paternal niece and paternal granddaughter, referred to as odalkvinna, all had the right to inherit property from a deceased man.^[184] A woman with no husband, sons or male relatives could inherit not only property but also the position as head of the family when her father or brother died. Such a woman was referred to as Baugrygr, and she exercised all the rights afforded to the head of a family clan, until she married, by which her rights were transferred to her new husband.^[184]

Women had religious authority and were active as priestesses (gydja) and oracles (sejdkvinna).

These liberties of the Viking women gradually disappeared after the introduction of Christianity,[190] and from the late 13th century, they are no longer mentioned.^[184]

Examination of Viking Age burials suggests that women lived longer, and nearly all well past the age of 35, as compared to earlier times. Female graves from before the Viking Age in Scandinavia hold a proportionally large number of remains from women aged 20 to 35, presumably due to complications of childbirth.^[191]

Examination of skeletal remains also allows the relative health and nutritional status of boys and girls in the past to be reconstructed, using anthropometric techniques. Burials from Scandinavia and other European countries suggest that, in comparison with other societies at the time, female equality was remarkably high in rural Scandinavia. Females in the rural periphery of Nordic countries during the Viking period and the later Middle Ages had relatively high status, resulting in substantial nutritional and health resources being allocated to girls, enabling them to grow stronger and healthier.^[192]

Appearance

Scandinavian Vikings were similar in appearance to modern Scandinavians: "their skin was fair and the hair color varied between blond, dark and reddish". Genetic studies suggest that people were mostly blond in what is now eastern Sweden, while red hair was mostly found in western Scandinavia.^[193] Most Viking men had shoulder-length hair and beards, and slaves (thralls) were usually the only men with short hair.^[194] The length varied according to personal preference and occupation. Men involved in warfare, for example, may have had slightly shorter hair and beards for practical reasons. Men in some regions bleached their hair a golden saffron colour.^[194] Females also had long hair, with girls often wearing it loose or braided, and married women often wearing it in a bun.^[194] The average height is estimated to have been 1.70 m (5 ft 7 in) for men and 1.55 m (5 ft 1 in) for women.^[193]

The three classes were easily recognisable by their appearance. Men and women of the Jarls were well groomed with neat hairstyles and expressed their wealth and status by wearing expensive clothes (often silk) and well-crafted jewellery like

Archaeological finds from Scandinavia and Viking settlements in the British Isles support the idea of the well-groomed and hygienic Viking. Burial with grave goods was a common practice in the Scandinavian world, through the Viking Age and well past the Christianisation of the Norse peoples.[196] Within these burial sites and homesteads, combs, often made from antler, are a common find.^{[197] [198]} The manufacturing of such antler combs was common, as at the Viking settlement at Dublin hundreds of examples of combs from the tenth-century have survived, suggesting that grooming was a common practice. The manufacture of such combs was also widespread throughout the Viking world, as examples of similar combs have been found at Viking settlements in Ireland,^[199] England,^[200] and Scotland.^[201] The combs share a common visual appearance as well, with the extant examples often decorated with linear, interlacing, and geometric motifs, or other forms of ornamentation depending on the comb's period and type, but stylistically similar to Viking Age art.^[202] All levels of Viking age society appear to have groomed their hair, as hair combs have been found in common graves as well as in aristocratic ones.^[203]

Farming and cuisine

The sagas tell about the diet and cuisine of the Vikings,^[204] but first-hand evidence, like cesspits, kitchen middens and garbage dumps have proved to be of great value and importance. Undigested remains of plants from cesspits at Coppergate in York have provided much information in this respect. Overall, archaeo-botanical investigations have been undertaken increasingly in recent decades, as a collaboration between archaeologists and palaeoethno-botanists. This new approach sheds light on the agricultural and horticultural practices of the Vikings and their cuisine.^[205]

The combined information from various sources suggests a diverse cuisine and ingredients. Meat products of all kinds, such as cured, smoked and whey-preserved meat,^[206] sausages, and boiled or fried fresh meat cuts, were prepared and consumed.^[207] There were plenty of seafood, bread, porridges, dairy products, vegetables, fruits, berries and nuts. Alcoholic drinks like beer, mead, bjórr (a strong fruit wine) and, for the rich, imported wine, were served.^[208][209]

Certain livestock were typical and unique to the Vikings, including the

Milk and buttermilk were popular, both as cooking ingredients and drinks, but were not always available, even at farms.^[217] Milk came from cows, goats and sheep, with priorities varying from location to location,^[218] and fermented milk products like skyr or surmjölk were produced as well as butter and cheese.^[219]

Food was often salted and enhanced with spices, some of which were imported like

Vikings collected and ate fruits, berries and nuts. Apple (wild

Sports were widely practised and encouraged by the Vikings.[225] Sports that involved weapons training and developing combat skills were popular. These included spear and stone throwing, building and testing physical strength through wrestling (see glima), fist fighting, and stone lifting.^[226] In areas with mountains, mountain climbing was practised as a sport. Agility and balance were built and tested by running and jumping for sport, and there is mention of a sport that involved jumping from oar to oar on the outside of a ship's railing as it was being rowed.^[227] Swimming was a popular sport^[228] – Snorri Sturluson describes three types: diving, long-distance swimming, and a contest in which two swimmers try to dunk one another. Children often participated in some of the sport disciplines,^[229] and women have also been mentioned as swimmers, although it is unclear if they took part in competitions. King Olaf Tryggvason was acclaimed for his skill in both mountain climbing and oar-jumping, and reputedly excelled in the art of knife juggling as well. Skiing and ice skating were the principal winter sports, and also provided transport on snow and ice for adults.^[225]

Horse fighting was practised for sport, although the rules are unclear. It appears to have involved two stallions pitted against each other, within smell and sight of fenced-off mares. Whatever the rules were, the fights often resulted in the death of one of the stallions.

Icelandic sources often mention knattleik, a ball game similar to hockey, played with a bat and a small hard ball, usually on a smooth surface of ice. Popular with both adults and children, it was a rugged game that often led to injuries. Knattleik appears to have been played only in Iceland, where it attracted many spectators, as did horse fighting.^[225]

Hunting was practiced as a sport only in Denmark, where it was not an essential food source. Deer and hares were hunted for meat, along with partridges and sea birds, while foxes were hunted to stop their killing of farm animals and for their furs. Spears, bows, and later crossbows, were the weapons used; stalking was the most common method, although game was also chased with dogs. Numerous kinds of snares and traps were used as well.^[225]

Games and entertainment

Archaeological finds and written sources indicate that the Vikings participated in social gatherings and festivities.

Elements of a Scandinavian identity and practices were maintained in settler societies, but they could be quite distinct as the groups assimilated into neighbouring societies. Assimilation to the Frankish culture in Normandy for example was rapid.^[234] Links to a Viking identity remained longer in the remote islands of Iceland and the Faroes.^[234]

Weapons and warfare

Knowledge about the arms and armour of the Viking age is based on archaeological finds, pictorial representation, and to some extent on the accounts in the

Trade

See also:

Trade route from the Varangians to the Greeks, Volga trade route, and Bukhara slave trade

The Vikings established and engaged in extensive trading networks throughout the known world and had a profound influence on the economic development of Europe and Scandinavia.^[244][245]

Other than in such trading centres as Ribe Hedeby in Denmark, Scandinavia was unfamiliar with the use of coinage. Therefore, its economy was based on bullion; that is, the purity and weight of precious metals used in exchange. Silver was the precious metal most commonly used, although gold was also used. Traders carried small portable scales, enabling them to measure weight precisely, which allowed an accurate medium of exchange, even lacking a regular coinage.^[246]

Goods

Organised trade covered everything from ordinary items in bulk to exotic luxury products. The Viking ship designs, like that of the knarr, were an important factor in their success as merchants.^[247] Imported goods from other cultures included:^[248]

• Spices were obtained from Chinese and Persian traders, who met with the Viking traders in Russia. Vikings used homegrown spices and herbs like caraway, thyme, horseradish and mustard,^[249] but imported cinnamon.
• Glass was much prized by the Norse. The imported glass was often made into beads for decoration and these have been found in the thousands. Åhus in Scania and the old market town of Ribe were major centres of glass bead production.^{[250][251][252]}
• Silk was a very important commodity obtained from Byzantium (modern day Istanbul) and China. It was valued by many European cultures of the time, and the Vikings used it to indicate status such as wealth and nobility. Many of the archaeological finds in Scandinavia include silk.^{[253][254][255]}
• Wine was imported from France and Germany as a drink of the wealthy, augmenting the regular mead and beer.

To counter these valuable imports, the Vikings exported a large variety of goods. These goods included:^[248]

• Amber—the fossilised resin of the pine tree—was frequently found on the North Sea and Baltic coastline. It was worked into beads and ornamental objects, before being traded. (See also the Amber Road).
• Fur was also exported as it provided warmth. This included the furs of
  pine martens, foxes, bears, otters and beavers
  .
• Cloth and wool. The Vikings were skilled spinners and weavers and exported woollen cloth of a high quality.
• Samis. Down was used for bedding and quilted clothing. Fowling on the steep slopes and cliffs was dangerous work and was often lethal.^[256]
• thralls in Old Norse. On their raids, the Vikings captured many people, among them monks and clergymen. They were sometimes sold in as slaves in Russia to Arab merchants of the Bukhara slave trade in exchange for silver.^{[citation needed}
  ]

Other exports included weapons, walrus ivory, wax, salt and cod. As one of the more exotic exports, hunting birds were sometimes provided from Norway to the European aristocracy, from the 10th century.^[256]

Many of these goods were also traded within the Viking world itself, as well as goods such as

antlers from organised hunting with large-scale reindeer traps in the far north. They were used as raw material for making everyday utensils like combs.^[256]

Legacy

Medieval perceptions

In England the Viking Age began dramatically on 8 June 793 when Norsemen destroyed the

Alcuin of York.^[257] Medieval Christians in Europe were totally unprepared for the Viking incursions and could find no explanation for their arrival and the accompanying suffering they experienced at their hands save the "Wrath of God".^[258] More than any other single event, the attack on Lindisfarne demonised perception of the Vikings for the next twelve centuries. Not until the 1890s did scholars outside Scandinavia begin to seriously reassess the achievements of the Vikings, recognising their artistry, technological skills, and seamanship.^[259]

Sæmundur fróði

. Many of these sagas were written in Iceland, and most of them, even if they had no Icelandic provenance, were preserved there after the Middle Ages due to the continued interest of Icelanders in Norse literature and legal codes.

The 200-year Viking influence on

Maldon

in Essex was commemorated with a poem of the same name.

Post-medieval perceptions

Early modern publications, dealing with what is now called Viking culture, appeared in the 16th century, e.g. Historia de gentibus septentrionalibus (History of the northern people) of Olaus Magnus (1555), and the first edition of the 13th-century Gesta Danorum (Deeds of the Danes), by Saxo Grammaticus, in 1514. The pace of publication increased during the 17th century with Latin translations of the Edda (notably Peder Resen's Edda Islandorum of 1665).

In Scandinavia, the 17th-century Danish scholars Thomas Bartholin and Ole Worm and the Swede Olaus Rudbeck used runic inscriptions and Icelandic sagas as historical sources. An important early British contributor to the study of the Vikings was George Hickes, who published his Linguarum vett. septentrionalium thesaurus (Dictionary of the Old Northern Languages) in 1703–05. During the 18th century, British interest and enthusiasm for Iceland and early Scandinavian culture grew dramatically, expressed in English translations of Old Norse texts and in original poems that extolled the supposed Viking virtues.

The word "viking" was first popularised at the beginning of the 19th century by

Friðþjófs saga hins frœkna

Fascination with the Vikings reached a peak during the so-called

Until recently, the history of the Viking Age was largely based on Icelandic sagas, the history of the Danes written by Saxo Grammaticus, the Primary Chronicle, and Cogad Gáedel re Gallaib. Few scholars still accept these texts as reliable sources, as historians now rely more on archaeology and numismatics, disciplines that have made valuable contributions toward understanding the period.^{[262][citation needed]}

In 20th-century politics

The romanticised idea of the Vikings constructed in scholarly and popular circles in northwestern Europe in the 19th and early 20th centuries was a potent one, and the figure of the Viking became a familiar and malleable symbol in different contexts in the politics and political ideologies of 20th-century Europe.

This section may contain irrelevant references to popular culture. Please remove the content or add citations to reliable and independent sources. (December 2019)

Led by the operas of German composer

Vikings have served as an inspiration for numerous video games, such as The Lost Vikings (1993), Age of Mythology (2002), and For Honor (2017).^[272] All three Vikings from The Lost Vikings series—Erik the Swift, Baleog the Fierce, and Olaf the Stout—appeared as a playable hero in the crossover title Heroes of the Storm (2015).^[273] The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim (2011) is an action role-playing video game heavily inspired by Viking culture.^[274][275] Vikings are the lead focus of the 2020 video game Assassin's Creed Valhalla, which is set in 873 AD, and recounts an alternative history of the Viking invasion of Britain.^[276]

Modern reconstructions of

Since the 1960s, there has been rising enthusiasm for historical reenactment. While the earliest groups had little claim for historical accuracy, the seriousness and accuracy of reenactors has increased. The largest such groups include The Vikings and Regia Anglorum, though many smaller groups exist in Europe, North America, New Zealand, and Australia. Many reenactor groups participate in live-steel combat, and a few have Viking-style ships or boats.

The Minnesota Vikings of the National Football League are so-named owing to the large Scandinavian population in the US state of Minnesota.

During the banking boom of the first decade of the twenty-first century, Icelandic financiers came to be styled as

On 1 July 2007, the reconstructed Viking ship Skuldelev 2, renamed Sea Stallion,^[281] began a journey from Roskilde to Dublin. The remains of that ship and four others were discovered during a 1962 excavation in the Roskilde Fjord. Tree-ring analysis has shown the ship was built of oak in the vicinity of Dublin in about 1042. Seventy multinational crew members sailed the ship back to its home, and Sea Stallion arrived outside Dublin's Custom House on 14 August 2007. The purpose of the voyage was to test and document the seaworthiness, speed, and manoeuvrability of the ship on the rough open sea and in coastal waters with treacherous currents. The crew tested how the long, narrow, flexible hull withstood the tough ocean waves. The expedition also provided valuable new information on Viking longships and society. The ship was built using Viking tools, materials, and much of the same methods as the original ship.

Other vessels, often replicas of the Gokstad ship (full- or half-scale) or Skuldelev have been built and tested as well. The Snorri (a Skuldelev I Knarr), was sailed from Greenland to Newfoundland in 1998.^[282]

Common misconceptions

Horned helmets

Apart from two or three representations of (ritual) helmets—with protrusions that may be either stylised ravens, snakes, or horns—no depiction of the helmets of Viking warriors, and no preserved helmet, has horns. The formal, close-quarters style of Viking combat (either in shield walls or aboard "ship islands") would have made horned helmets cumbersome and hazardous to the warrior's own side.

Historians therefore believe that Viking warriors did not wear horned helmets; whether such helmets were used in Scandinavian culture for other, ritual purposes, remains unproven. The general misconception that Viking warriors wore horned helmets was partly promulgated by the 19th-century enthusiasts of Götiska Förbundet, founded in 1811 in Stockholm.^[283] They promoted the use of Norse mythology as the subject of high art and other ethnological and moral aims.

The Vikings were often depicted with winged helmets and in other clothing taken from Classical antiquity, especially in depictions of Norse gods. This was done to legitimise the Vikings and their mythology by associating it with the Classical world, which had long been idealised in European culture.

The latter-day mythos created by

Cartoons like Hägar the Horrible and Vicky the Viking, and sports kits such as those of the Minnesota Vikings and Canberra Raiders have perpetuated the myth of the horned helmet.^[285]

Viking helmets were conical, made from hard leather with wood and metallic reinforcements for regular troops. The iron helmet with mask and mail was for the chieftains, based on the previous Vendel-age helmets from central Sweden. The only original Viking helmet discovered is the Gjermundbu helmet, found in Norway. This helmet is made of iron and has been dated to the 10th century.^[286]

Barbarity

The image of wild-haired, dirty savages sometimes associated with the Vikings in popular culture is a distorted picture of reality.^[9] Viking tendencies were often misreported, and the work of Adam of Bremen, among others, told largely disputable tales of Viking savagery and uncleanliness.^[287]

Use of skulls as drinking vessels

There is no evidence that Vikings drank out of the skulls of vanquished enemies. This was a misconception based on a passage in the skaldic poem Krákumál speaking of heroes drinking from ór bjúgviðum hausa (branches of skulls). This was a reference to drinking horns, but was mistranslated in the 17th century^[288] as referring to the skulls of the slain.^[289]

Genetic legacy

Margaryan et al. 2020 analysed 442 Viking world individuals from various archaeological sites in Europe.^[16] They were found to be closely related to modern Scandinavians. The Y-DNA composition of the individuals in the study was also similar to that of modern Scandinavians. The most common Y-DNA haplogroup was I1 (95 samples), followed by R1b (84 samples) and R1a, especially (but not exclusively) of the Scandinavian R1a-Z284 subclade (61 samples). The study showed what many historians have hypothesised: that it was common for Norseman settlers to marry foreign women. Some individuals from the study, such as those found in Foggia, displayed typical Scandinavian Y-DNA haplogroups but also southern European autosomal ancestry, suggesting that they were the descendants of Viking settler males and local women. The five individual samples from Foggia were likely Normans. The same pattern of a combination of Scandinavian Y-DNA and local autosomal ancestry is seen in other samples from the study, for example Varangians buried near lake Ladoga and Vikings in England, suggesting that Viking men had married into local families in those places too.^[16]

The study found evidence of a Swedish influx into Estonia and Finland; and Norwegian influx into Ireland, Iceland and Greenland during the Viking Age. However, the authors commented "Viking Age Danish-like ancestry in the British Isles cannot be distinguished from that of the Angles and Saxons, who migrated in the fifth to sixth centuries AD from Jutland and northern Germany".^[16]

Margaryan et al. 2020 examined the skeletal remains of 42 individuals from the Salme ship burials in Estonia. The skeletal remains belonged to warriors killed in battle who were later buried together with numerous valuable weapons and armour. DNA testing and isotope analysis revealed that the men came from central Sweden.^[16]

Female descent studies show evidence of Norse descent in areas closest to Scandinavia, such as the Shetland and

A specialised genetic and surname study in Liverpool showed marked Norse heritage: up to 50% of males of families that lived there before the years of industrialisation and population expansion.^[292] High percentages of Norse inheritance—tracked through the R-M420 haplotype—were also found among males in the Wirral and West Lancashire.^[293] This was similar to the percentage of Norse inheritance found among males in the Orkney Islands.^[294]

Recent research suggests that the

Margaryan et al. 2020 examined an elite warrior burial from Bodzia (Poland) dated to 1010–1020 AD. The cemetery in Bodzia is exceptional in terms of Scandinavian and Kievian Rus links. The Bodzia man (sample VK157, or burial E864/I) was not a simple warrior from the princely retinue, but he belonged to the princely family himself. His burial is the richest one in the whole cemetery. Moreover, strontium analysis of his teeth enamel shows he was not local.  It is assumed that he came to Poland with the Prince of Kiev, Sviatopolk the Accursed, and met a violent death in combat. This corresponds to the events of 1018 AD when Sviatopolk himself disappeared after having retreated from Kiev to Poland. It cannot be excluded that the Bodzia man was Sviatopolk himself, as the genealogy of the Rurikids at this period is extremely sketchy and the dates of birth of many princes of this dynasty may be quite approximative. The Bodzia man carried haplogroup I1-S2077 and had both Scandinavian ancestry and Russian admixture.^[16][296]

See also

Notes

Constructs such as named references (quick guide), or an abbreviated title. (October 2020) (Learn how and when to remove this template message )

References

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• Lindqvist, Thomas (2003). "Early Political Organisation: (a) An Introductory Survey". In Helle, Knut (ed.). The Cambridge History of Scandinavia: Prehistory to 1520. Cambridge University Press. pp. 160–67.
  ISBN 978-0521472999. Archived
  from the original on 2 February 2023. Retrieved 17 October 2015.
• Online Etymology Dictionary (2014). "Viking". Archived from the original on 7 September 2014. Retrieved 11 September 2021.
• Price, Neil (2020). The Children of Ash and Elm: A History of the Vikings. Allen Lane.
  ISBN 978-0-241-28398-1
  .
• Roesdahl, Else (1998). The Vikings. Penguin Books.
  ISBN 978-0140252828
  .
• ISBN 978-0312013653. Archived
  from the original on 2 February 2023. Retrieved 17 October 2015.
• Sawyer, Peter, ed. (1997). The Oxford Illustrated History of the Vikings. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
  ISBN 978-0-19-820526-5
  .
• Williams, Gareth (2007). "Kingship, Christianity and coinage: monetary and political perspectives on silver economy in the Viking Age". In
  ISBN 978-1598742220. Archived
  from the original on 2 February 2023. Retrieved 17 October 2015.
• Wolf, Kirsten (2004). Daily Life of the Vikings. Greenwood Publishing Group. p. 2.
  ISBN 978-0-313-32269-3
  .

Further reading

• Askeberg, Fritz (1944). Norden och kontinenten i gammal tid: studier i forngermansk kulturhistoria. Almqvist & Wiksells boktr. Archived from the original on 2 February 2023. Retrieved 17 October 2015.
• Blanck, Dag. "The Transnational Viking: The Role of the Viking in Sweden, the United States, and Swedish America." Journal of Transnational American Studies 7.1 (2016). online Archived 5 December 2021 at the Wayback Machine
• Downham, Clare (2007). Viking kings of Britain and Ireland: the dynasty of ́Ívarr to A.D. 1014. Dunedin Academic Press.
  ISBN 978-1903765890. Archived
  from the original on 2 February 2023. Retrieved 17 October 2015.
• Downham, Clare (January 2012). "Viking Ethnicities: A Historiographic Overview" (PDF). History Compass. 10 (1): 1–12.
  doi:10.1111/J.1478-0542.2011.00820.X. Archived
  (PDF) from the original on 13 August 2022. Retrieved 17 September 2022.
• Hadley, Dawn (2006). The Vikings in England: Settlement, Society and Culture. Manchester University Press.
  ISBN 978-0719059827. Archived
  from the original on 2 February 2023. Retrieved 17 October 2015.
• Heen-Pettersen, Aina Margrethe (2014). "Insular artefacts from Viking-Age burials from mid-Norway. A review of contact between Trøndelag and Britain and Ireland". Internet Archaeology (38).
  hdl:11250/2385823. Archived from the original on 20 September 2022. Retrieved 17 September 2022.
• Heide, Eldar (2005). "Víking – 'rower shifting'? An etymological contribution" (PDF). Arkiv för nordisk filologi. Vol. 120. C.W.K. Gleerup. pp. 41–54. Archived (PDF) from the original on 14 July 2014. Retrieved 16 June 2014.
• Heide, Eldar (2008). "Viking, week, and Widsith. A reply to Harald Bjorvand" (PDF). Arkiv för nordisk filologi. Vol. 123. C.W.K. Gleerup. pp. 23–28. Archived from the original on 2 February 2023. Retrieved 17 October 2015.
• ISBN 978-0715634295. Archived
  from the original on 2 February 2023. Retrieved 17 October 2015.
• Melleno, Daniel (2014). Before They Were Vikings: Scandinavia and the Franks up to the death of Louis the Pious. UC Berkeley. Archived from the original on 20 September 2022. Retrieved 17 September 2022.. online Archived 16 October 2022 at the Wayback Machine
• Svanberg, Fredrik (2003). Decolonizing the Viking Age. Almqvist & Wiksell International.
  ISBN 978-9122020066. Archived
  from the original on 2 February 2023. Retrieved 17 October 2015.
• Wamers, Egon (1985). Insularer Metallschmuck in wikingerzeitlichen Gräbern Nordeuropas. Untersuchungen zur skandinavischen Westexpansion. Neumünster: Karl Wachholtz.
  ISBN 978-3529011566
  .
• Wamers, Egon (1998). "Insular Finds in Viking Age Scandinavia and the State Formation of Norway". In Clarke, H.B.; Mhaonaigh, M. Ní; Floinn, R. Ó. (eds.). Ireland and Scandinavia in the Early Viking Age. Dublin: Four Courts Press. pp. 37–72.
  ISBN 978-1851822355
  .
• Wawn, M.A. (2000). The Vikings and the Victorians: Inventing the Old North in Nineteenth Century Britain. Woodbridge: Boydell and Brewer.
  ISBN 978-0859916448
  .

External links

Look up Viking in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Vikings.

Wikivoyage has a travel guide for Vikings and the Old Norse.

Wikisource has original text related to this article:

Northmen

• Vikings – View videos at The History Channel
• Copenhagen-Portal – The Danish Vikings
• BBC: History of Vikings
• Borg Viking museum, Norway
• Ibn Fadlan and the Rusiyyah, by James E. Montgomery, with full translation of Ibn Fadlan
• Reassessing what we collect website – Viking and Danish London History of Viking and Danish London with objects and images
• Wawm, Andrew, The Viking Revival – BBC Online, Ancient History in Depth (updated 17 February 2011)