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Home > News > UK > This Britain

The Vikings: it wasn't all raping and pillaging

Forget what history tells us about the Nordic invaders. New
research suggests they were model immigrants who co-existed peacefully with the
natives

By Arifa Akbar

Friday, 13 March 2009

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REUTERS/David Moir

Jarl Squad Vikings march while carrying lit torches to set fire
to a Viking longboat during the Up Helly Aa festival in Lerwick, the Shetland
Islands in northern Scotland

enlarge

For centuries, they have been stereotyped as marauding barbarians arriving in
their helmeted hordes to pillage their way across Britain. But now a group of
academics believe they have uncovered new evidence that the Vikings were more
cultured settlers who offered a "good historical model" of immigrant
assimilation.

The evidence is set to be unveiled at a three-day Cambridge University
conference starting today, when more than 20 studies will reveal how the Vikings
shared technology, swapped ideas and often lived side-by-side in relative
harmony with their Anglo-Saxon and Celtic contemporaries. Some may have come,
plundered and left, but those Vikings who decided to settle rather than return
to Scandinavia learnt the language, inter-married, converted to Christianity and
even had "praise poetry" written about them by the Brits, according to the
experts.

The conference, entitled "Between the Islands", draws on new archeological
evidence, historical studies and analysis of the language and literature of the
period, and shows that between the 9th and 13th centuries, the Vikings became an
integral part of the fabric of social and political life that changed Britain
and Ireland far more profoundly than previously realised. The academics hope it
will tip the balance still further in the "raiders or traders" question.

Scholars will argue that they should be seen as an early example of
immigrants who were successfully assimilated into British and Irish culture.
Their so-called "invasion" led, to some extent, to the creation of
trans-national identities, a process that has particular relevance to modern
Britain. Dr Fiona Edmonds, of Cambridge University's department of Anglo-Saxon,
Norse and Celtic, said: "The latest evidence does not point to a simple
opposition between Vikings and natives.

"Within a relatively short space of time – and with lasting effect – the
various cultures in Britain and Ireland started to intermingle. Investigating
that process provides us with a historical model of how political groups can be
absorbed into complex societies, contributing much to those societies in the
process. There are important lessons that can be gained from this about cultural
assimilation in the modern era."

Dr Máire Ní Mhaonaigh, who is co-organising the conference, said it was not a
simple case of the Vikings coming and conquering. There was a
"cross-fertilisation" of practices, including Anglo-Saxon communities adopting
Norse names. "They were mutually transformed in the process, it was two-way
interaction," she said. "Those who settled had to become different, and adapt to
the society around them and learn to communicate with each other."

Some Viking kings learnt to speak English, Welsh and Irish as well as Latin,
the language of the elite in Britain, and adopted Anglo-Saxon names. One king
who settled in Ireland was honoured with "praise" poetry dedicated to his rule
by the indigenous community. The Viking kings of Dublin, said Dr Ní Mhaonaigh,
became a very active element of the city's political scene.

"What is clear is that the popular picture of Vikings is not quite as it
seems, and when viewing their long-term presence, it is quite untrue. The
communities were mutually transformed in the process. Of course, there was
plundering and pillaging, but those who started to build camps and started to
settle began interacting in a very different way," she said.

She added that King Amlaib, who settled in Dublin in the 10th century, became
a Christian and was venerated by the local poets, while another leader from the
mid-11th century, whose Welsh name was Gruffud ap Cynan, bore Welsh and Norse
blood-ties, and spent a long time in Dublin. This, she said, was another example
of cultural inter-mingling.

"It's a good historical model when a relatively small number of people can
adapt and assimilate into a complex, sophisticated society," she said.

A new analysis of personal names in the Domesday Book also suggests that
settlements established in Yorkshire from the 9th century retained their
Gaelic-Scandinavian identity until the Norman Conquest. Even after the Battle of
Hastings, and long after the Norse were believed to have been expelled from the
area, there were people with some element of Scandinavian identity living
happily in the heart of Anglo-Saxon Yorkshire. Through this time, they were able
to hang on to elements of their Viking identity without expulsion by the
indigenous people – further evidence that there was little opposition to these
conquering emigres.

Research into Scandinavian settlements reveals a profound level of social and
economic interaction between Viking incomers and the Celts. There was mixing in
many towns and rural camps in Ireland, while recent studies of regional coins
from the Viking age show that these rulers were far from impervious to local
economies. In East Anglia, for example, where they had a well regulated monetary
system, they adapted the existing economic system, while in other areas with
only limited coin circulation, they introduced a bullion economy.

On a cultural level, Celtic folklore began to influence Viking literature. An
analysis of Old Norse literary works that shows some of their tales may have
been borrowed from Gaelic storytelling, thus the myths of Scandinavia, Ireland
and Britain became inexorably intertwined. Professor Judith Jesch, from the
University of Nottingham, reveals how Norse poetry was composed in the Hebrides.
Professor Terje Spurkland, from the University of Oslo, has found that rune
stones combined Scandinavian inscriptions with Celtic designs.

Over the centuries the importance of this cross-fertilisation was
overshadowed by a skewed mythology of the Viking age that was created by 12th
and 13th century Irish chroniclers and poets long after the Scandinavians'
golden era had ended. A host of poems and prose narrative emerged which depicted
the Vikings as "otherworldly beings" who came and stream-rollered across the
cultural terrain of the British Isles.

These Irish writers went to great lengths to "extol the virtues of their
Celtic ancestors who had fended off the Vikings", and so circulated this
mythology of the maurading invader. It is only now, in recent decades, that
academics have begun to unpick the stereotype and reveal an altogether different
story.

From raiders to traders

They were prolific seafaring explorers, warriors and merchants from Denmark,
Norway and Sweden who colonised swathes of Europe from the late 800s to the 12th
century. In Norse, the word Viking means piracy and therefore the Vikings have
become known as raiders who terrorised Europe instead of disciplined conquerors
who established settlements as far afield as Constantinople, Greenland and
Newfoundland.

There is archaeological evidence they discovered the Americas 500 years
before Christopher Columbus. Their famed narrow longships allowed them to enter
countries through rivers and it is this access which allowed them to settle and
trade throughout Europe. A stereotyped image as a noble savage emerged in 17th
century British texts and then again during the Victorian era. This image later
turned into a cartoonish caricature of Vikings as barbarian invaders.

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Don't forget the Normans
49niner
wrote:

Friday, 13 March 2009 at 06:35 am
(UTC)

When William the Conqueror landed in 1066, many of his
followers were descended from Vikings who had settled in northern France,
including probably, my ancestors. So the Norman conquest might be seen as much a
continuation of Viking raids, rather than a French invasion, which is how it is
often portrayed.

And it goes to show what a multicultural society we have
been for centuries. It gives hope that we can get over the tensions generated by
recent immigration. A good dose of intermarriage helps. As they say, "Love
Conquers All".

Link
| Reply
| Thread

Integration can happen...
solcreciente
wrote:

Friday, 13 March 2009 at 06:45 am
(UTC)

Integration can happen successfully when a population
does not have to be subjected to a daily diet of racism, innuendo and politics.
It is the fact that communications are so efficient today, and are so often
vehicles to support myths and stereotypes of immigrants, that encourages us not
to get one with one another, creates an atmosphere of distrust and difference.
In medieval times they weren't subjected to that so were inclined to talk to one
another and learn from each other.

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| Reply
| Thread

Further to "Integration Can Happen"
wolfstan
wrote:

Friday, 13 March 2009 at 08:38 am
(UTC)

Integration at that time was true "Integration". The
Vikings came over settled and mixed with the native people, they inter married
and took up the same religion. Today when people talk about "Integration" they
just mean "getting along" and respecting other people's culture. This is
probably where we are going wrong. Integration should mean a melding of
cultures, not keeping them apart.

Link
| Reply
| Thread

Viking integration/assimilation
ppinter
wrote:

Friday, 13 March 2009 at 10:33 am
(UTC)

The above article postulates that despite being invaders
and local rulers the Viking ended up being integrated. Actually what is desribed
is assimilation into the indigenous population and becoming part of
it..

A modern parallel is multiculturism ( politically encouraging
seperate/ equal ethnic blocks and identities) versus case for integration but
still defining by ethnic /cultural groups.

Instead multiculturism should
be ditched and assimilation actively encouraged aimed at a single national
identity . Without it social strife will get really bad ( eg currently
incompatibility of fundamentalist Islam in UK) . The future should be an
assimilated melting pot of proud Britons with a British historical identity.
Otherwise the indigenous majority will increasingly see the swarm of immigrants
as invaders to be repelled.

Link
| Reply
| Thread

Re: Viking integration/assimilation
jimg66
wrote:

Friday, 13 March 2009 at 11:47 am
(UTC)

Just as the British did in India, Nigeria, Egypt, Sudan,
Malaya, Burma, Australia, New Zealand, Belize, Guyana, Canada.......

Link
| Reply
| Parent
| Thread

Re: Viking integration/assimilation
vinodmoon
wrote:

Sunday, 15 March 2009 at 12:16 am
(UTC)

The process of assimilation is a two-way street. How
much so this was in the Viking era is shown by the number of key words which are
of Viking origin - for example 'law'. Within the Danelaw, it was the
Anglo-Saxons who were assimilated into Viking culture rather than vice-versa.
Indeed, prior to this, it was the Celts who were assimilated into the immigrant
Anglo-Saxon culture!
Unfortunately, the modern Anglo-Saxons do not seem to
realise to what an extent the 'separate ethnic groups' have integrated - they
would no longer fit into the cultures from which their ancestors sprang. The
Asians of Bradford belong to Bradford much more than they do to Lahore or
Ludhiana or wherever their ancestors may have come from.
The Jews never gave
up their culture or religion. They used to be reviled for living in crowded
rooms, for keeping coal in the bathtub, etc - the same thing that Pakistanis
were accused of not so long ago. Yet today they are respected members of
society.
As for 'incompatibility of fundamentalist Islam in UK', I have
noticed that fundamentalist Christianity does not seem to get in the way,
although it is alien to modern British society. In what way is Fundamentalist
Islam different from Fundamentalist Christianity?
The central concept of
British Society for much of the 20th Century was 'fair play'. Yet most British
people accepted Thatcherism - which is fundamentally alien to this concept. The
British people accepted the lies of the Blairite government and allowed their
troops to participate in the slaughter of over a million Iraqis in a new
crusade; how alien is this to the British idea of basic decency?

Link
| Reply
| Parent
| Thread

peersrogue
wrote:

Friday, 13 March 2009 at 11:09 am
(UTC)

"...but those Vikings who decided to settle rather than
return to Scandinavia learnt the language, inter-married, converted to
Christianity and even had "praise poetry" written about them by the Brits,
according to the experts."
That's the way to do it -

Link
| Reply
| Thread

Vikings
colmliathain
wrote:

Friday, 13 March 2009 at 11:33 am
(UTC)

Sounds a most interesting conference. I have to say
though that even the examination of place names throughout the Islands of Europe
demonstrates a pattern of settlement and not merely episodic raiding. Will a
book emerge from this conference? I hope so.
Colm O'Liathain

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| Reply
| Thread

Viking Invaders
condros1
wrote:

Friday, 13 March 2009 at 11:40 am
(UTC)

But lets not forget they were also brutal slayers, and
rapists, who surprised the local communities with absolute devestation,
especially the peaceful Monks and Nuns of the convents and monasteries.
Do
not be lulled by a pacifist ideology that people who come to conquer or kill,
won't do it -if you just are nice to them, today's headlines of brutality-should
be a warning-and not glossed over as mere propaganda.

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| Reply
| Thread

Re: Viking Invaders
oldskald
wrote:

Friday, 13 March 2009 at 03:03 pm
(UTC)

True, the dastardly Vikings attacked monasteries and
enslaved monks and nuns. And who were the only people able to write records of
such activities...? Yes! You guessed it! The very same monks who were apparently
attacked. Now, I'm not saying that the Vikings were all lovely folk, or that
they didn't attack monasteries (and after all, it was undefended free money to
them, with no religious significance. Plus, loads of Christian rulers were doing
the same so why single out the Vikings? Ahh, they were UNBELIEVERS! Shock!
Horror!). However, we must bear in mind that if someone went into a media
headquarters today and ransacked that, enslaving the pen-pushers, there would
probably a bit more of a media outcry than if they did it in, say, Sierra Leone
or Darfur. We merely see the 9th century version of this when considering the
Vikings...

Link
| Reply
| Parent
| Thread

Stereotype
godseyesore
wrote:

Friday, 13 March 2009 at 04:33 pm
(UTC)

Stereotypes usually have a basis of fact. I expect the
ruthless Viking image is true for conquest, as well as the subsequent peaceful
integration.

Link
| Reply
| Thread

Vikings
sciatis
wrote:

Friday, 13 March 2009 at 05:42 pm
(UTC)

Congratulations to the Independent for being only 20 or
so years late on this story. The 'new evidence' that you report has been the
common currency of scholars for a generation. Looks like you've been rolled over
by an efficient PR machine at Cambridge University.

Sciatis.

Link
| Reply
| Thread

goranbockman
wrote:

Friday, 13 March 2009 at 05:55 pm
(UTC)

It appears the paramount objective of the Vikings,
wherever they settled, was to conquer a "Place In the Sun" for themselves, much
like their Swedish cousins the Goths. So they did in Russia where they founded
the proto-Russian nation, so too in Normandie, as in Ireland and England, but,
unlike the Goths, they integrated with the local population and soon lost their
distinguishing features and their distinctive culture.

Link
| Reply
| Thread

ducky_dude
wrote:

Friday, 13 March 2009 at 11:47 pm
(UTC)

a

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| Reply
| Thread

christian mass killer's religion not
mentioned
wholetruth123
wrote:

Saturday, 14 March 2009 at 02:14 am
(UTC)

christian mass killer's religion not mentioned. Arab
travelers mentioned the vikings would wash hands and spit into the same bowl as
it was passed around. The Arab traveler/trader was very hard put to work around
the viking civilization.

Link
| Reply
| Thread

Arab travelers mentioned the vikings would wash hands
and spit into the same bowl
wholetruth123
wrote:

Saturday, 14 March 2009 at 02:45 am
(UTC)

Arab travelers mentioned the vikings would wash hands
and spit into the same bowl as it was passed around. The Arab traveler/trader
was very hard put to work around the viking civilization.

sorry for
garbling of my prior comment...
rh

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| Reply
| Parent
| Thread

Vikings
finkelgruber
wrote:

Saturday, 14 March 2009 at 08:30 am
(UTC)

It is high time that ALL history is reviewed and
rewritten. Previous historic accounts, written by biased and ignorant victors,
simply do not tell the truth. Most ,like Caesar, Alexander the Great etc. would
be today
charged with war crimes!

Hartmut,
Perth,
Australia

Link
| Reply
| Thread

The word 'viking'
olavnor
wrote:

Saturday, 14 March 2009 at 11:58 am
(UTC)

Actually, there is widespread disagreement among
scholars regarding the etymology of the word 'viking'. It could mean many
things, i.e. it could be a designation for people who lived in Viken, the area
from the Oslo fjord to the south-western edge of Norway. Also in modern
norwegian, that makes sense, grammatically, at least.

Link
| Reply
| Thread

Re: The word 'viking'
olavnor
wrote:

Saturday, 14 March 2009 at 12:21 pm
(UTC)

And one must also keep in mind that the borderline
between trade and piracy in these times was very thin. Piracy and trade would
often go hand in hand, as traders took advantage of "targets of opportunity" on
their journeys, and perhaps went on to sell the loot to others. The image of a
blood-thirsty gang of robbers could easily be applied to any group of traders
during the times. Perhaps the heritage of norse mythology has given the
'vikings' a particular colour of violence.

Link
| Reply
| Parent
| Thread

The Vikings: it wasn't all raping and
pillaging
profoundnosense
wrote:

Saturday, 14 March 2009 at 02:11 pm
(UTC)

The undeserved reputation imposed on the Vikings in
English history was the result of "bad press" given them by the only members of
society in those days who could read and write - Christian Monks.
The monks,
the only chroniclers of early English history, did not like these new arrival
simply because they were pagans. As a result of this dislike the Vikings went
down in history as rapists, pillages and murders.
The word Vikings in Old
Norse simply meant "people who live on a wick" (a wick being an inlet from the
sea, as is Wick in Scotland) and not pillagers and murderers.

Link
| Reply
| Thread

The Vikings' Bad Press
profoundnosense
wrote:

Saturday, 14 March 2009 at 02:12 pm
(UTC)

The monks, the only chroniclers of early English
history, did not like these new arrival simply because they were pagans. As a
result of this dislike the Vikings went down in history as rapists, pillages and
murders.
The word Vikings in Old Norse simply meant "people who live on a
wick" (a wick being an inlet from the sea, as is Wick in Scotland) and not
pillagers and murderers.

Link
| Reply
| Thread

Etymology of the word Viking
profoundnosense
wrote:

Saturday, 14 March 2009 at 03:09 pm
(UTC)

Statement from the above article: "In Norse, the word
Viking means piracy".
The author needs to study etymology a little further.
The Old Norse word "Vik" means an inlet from the sea.
The Norse word
"Vikinger" means "Dwellers on a wick". Wick being the Old English spelling of
Vik. In modern Danish the word "vik" is still used with its original
meaning.
In English the word wick is no longer used but is found in place
names - Wick in Scotland is a town on an inlet from the sea.

Link
| Reply
| Thread

Re: Etymology of the word Viking
andre_t
wrote:

Saturday, 14 March 2009 at 05:17 pm
(UTC)

In German a Viking is a Wickinger, and the Norwegians
spell the word Viking but pronounce as their Germanic cousins of Germany as
Wiking - so we are essentially speaking of related people being Saxons (Germany
or England) Angles (Northern Germany, Netherlands Denmark) and Norse men of
various kinds.

Link
| Reply
| Parent
| Thread

Re: Etymology of the word Viking
profoundnosense
wrote:

Saturday, 14 March 2009 at 05:58 pm
(UTC)

in Danish the word Vikinger is pronounced
Vee'king'er.

Ihe "er" on the end of the word is merely the plural. as "s"
is in English. Vikings in English - Vikinger in Danish

Link
| Reply
| Parent
| Thread

Goths
kodak321
wrote:

Saturday, 14 March 2009 at 06:20 pm
(UTC)

They didn't make it on the fashion front. In Britain,
the Goths beat them hands down. Still, I still like the Viking 'look'.

Link
| Reply
| Thread

Myth of of our fathers enemy
joethedumber
wrote:

Saturday, 14 March 2009 at 10:31 pm
(UTC)

I am not surprised at all that the "crown" and her
conquered territories would slander and lie about the people we were at war
with. Compare and contrast the myth of vikings to the myth of our current
oversea enemy. They share much in common.

Link
| Reply
| Thread

how about the Vikings in Russia
ricardohead
wrote:

Saturday, 14 March 2009 at 11:19 pm
(UTC)

The Vikings traded and bullied their way down the
Russian river system in the ninth century all the way to Constantinople (the
road from the Varanagians to the Greeks, as it was called), and in the process
established themselves as rulers in Novgorod and Kiev (and other places).They
established the Rurik dynasty which lasted until the time of Ivan the Terrible,
and within a generation were speaking old Russian, and had become more or less
slavicized.What started out as a kind of protection racket turned into the
Kievan state, which by the 11th century, was a power to be reckoned with in
Eastern Europe, like Normandy in France. By this time, the Vikings had had
become Russian.

Link
| Reply
| Thread

this article has been stolen
thiefwarner
wrote:

Sunday, 15 March 2009 at 02:47 am
(UTC)

VERY large part of this article stolen by dick
eastman blog

http://blog.eogn.com/eastmans_online_genealogy/2009/03/the-vikings-it-wasnt-all-raping-and-pillaging.html

Link
| Reply
| Thread

Re: this article has been stolen
the_editor_guy
wrote:

Sunday, 15 March 2009 at 03:23 am
(UTC)

No, the article was begun with the first few paragraphs
and then attributed to the Guardian with a link to this page. Be careful in
trying to be sensationalist. Dick Eastman is a proselytizer for proper
attribution.

The Editor Guy

Link
| Reply
| Parent
| Thread

Re: this article has been stolen
the_editor_guy
wrote:

Sunday, 15 March 2009 at 03:25 am
(UTC)

Sorry, should have been "The Independent" not the
Guardian. Late at night here in the few acres of snow colony.

Link
| Reply
| Parent
| Thread

the "good side" of the Vikings!
swedish2
wrote:

Sunday, 15 March 2009 at 03:47 pm
(UTC)

Being of Swedish ancestry, I am often reminded (mostly
by my husband) of my grim Viking heritage. A long over due tribute to the
Vikings!

A former Svensson.

Link
| Reply
| Thread

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