The Vikings: A Very Short Introduction

The Vikings: A Very Short Introduction

Very Short Introductions are for anyone wanting a stimulating and accessible way in to a new subject. They are written by experts, and have been published in more than 25 languages worldwide.

The series began in 1995, and now represents a wide variety of topics in history, philosophy, religion, science, and the humanities. Over the next few years it will grow to a library of around 200 volumes – a Very Short Introduction to everything from ancient Egypt and Indian philosophy to conceptual art and cosmology.

Very Short Introductions available now:

ANARCHISM Colin Ward

CHRISTIANITY Linda Woodhead

ANCIENT EGYPT Ian Shaw

CLASSICS Mary Beard and

ANCIENT PHILOSOPHY

John Henderson

Julia Annas

CLAUSEWITZ Michael Howard

ANCIENT WARFARE

THE COLD WAR Robert McMahon

Harry Sidebottom

CONSCIOUSNESS Susan Blackmore

THE ANGLO-SAXON AGE

Continental Philosophy

John Blair

Simon Critchley

ANIMAL RIGHTS David DeGrazia

COSMOLOGY Peter Coles

ARCHAEOLOGY Paul Bahn

CRYPTOGRAPHY

ARCHITECTURE

Fred Piper and Sean Murphy

Andrew Ballantyne

DADA AND SURREALISM

ARISTOTLE Jonathan Barnes

David Hopkins

ART HISTORY Dana Arnold

Darwin Jonathan Howard

ART THEORY Cynthia Freeland

Democracy Bernard Crick

THE HISTORY OF

DESCARTES Tom Sorell

ASTRONOMY Michael Hoskin

DESIGN John Heskett

Atheism Julian Baggini

DINOSAURS David Norman

Augustine Henry Chadwick

DREAMING J. Allan Hobson

BARTHES Jonathan Culler

DRUGS Leslie Iversen

THE BIBLE John Riches

THE EARTH Martin Redfern

BRITISH POLITICS

EGYPTIAN MYTH Geraldine Pinch

Anthony Wright

EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY

Buddha Michael Carrithers

BRITAIN Paul Langford

BUDDHISM Damien Keown

THE ELEMENTS Philip Ball

BUDDHIST ETHICS Damien Keown

EMOTION Dylan Evans

CAPITALISM James Fulcher

EMPIRE Stephen Howe

THE CELTS Barry Cunliffe

ENGELS Terrell Carver

CHOICE THEORY

Ethics Simon Blackburn

Michael Allingham

The European Union

CHRISTIAN ART Beth Williamson

John Pinder

EVOLUTION

MEDICAL ETHICS Tony Hope

Brian and Deborah Charlesworth

MEDIEVAL BRITAIN

FASCISM Kevin Passmore

John Gillingham and Ralph A. Griffiths

FOUCAULT Gary Gutting

MODERN ART David Cottington

THE FRENCH REVOLUTION

MODERN IRELAND Senia Pasěta

William Doyle

MOLECULES Philip Ball

FREE WILL Thomas Pink

MUSIC Nicholas Cook

Freud Anthony Storr

Myth Robert A. Segal

Galileo Stillman Drake

NATIONALISM Steven Grosby

Gandhi Bhikhu Parekh

NIETZSCHE Michael Tanner

GLOBALIZATION

NINETEENTH-CENTURY

Manfred Steger

BRITAIN Christopher Harvie and

GLOBAL WARMING Mark Maslin

H. C. G. Matthew

HABERMAS

NORTHERN IRELAND

James Gordon Finlayson

Marc Mulholland

HEGEL Peter Singer

PARTICLE PHYSICS Frank Close

HEIDEGGER Michael Inwood

paul E. P. Sanders

HIEROGLYPHS Penelope Wilson

Philosophy Edward Craig

HINDUISM Kim Knott

PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE

HISTORY John H. Arnold

Samir Okasha

HOBBES Richard Tuck

PLATO Julia Annas

HUME A. J. Ayer

POLITICS Kenneth Minogue

IDEOLOGY Michael Freeden

POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY

Indian Philosophy

David Miller

Sue Hamilton

POSTCOLONIALISM

Intelligence Ian J. Deary

Robert Young

ISLAM Malise Ruthven

POSTMODERNISM

JOURNALISM Ian Hargreaves

Christopher Butler

JUDAISM Norman Solomon

POSTSTRUCTURALISM

Jung Anthony Stevens

Catherine Belsey

KAFKA Ritchie Robertson

PREHISTORY Chris Gosden

KANT Roger Scruton

PRESOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY

KIERKEGAARD Patrick Gardiner

Catherine Osborne

THE KORAN Michael Cook

Psychology Gillian Butler and

LINGUISTICS Peter Matthews

Freda McManus

LITERARY THEORY

QUANTUM THEORY

Jonathan Culler

John Polkinghorne

LOCKE John Dunn

RENAISSANCE ART

LOGIC Graham Priest

Geraldine A. Johnson

MACHIAVELLI Quentin Skinner

ROMAN BRITAIN Peter Salway

THE MARQUIS DE SADE

ROUSSEAU Robert Wokler

John Phillips

RUSSELL A. C. Grayling

MARX Peter Singer

RUSSIAN LITERATURE

MATHEMATICS Timothy Gowers

Catriona Kelly

THE RUSSIAN REVOLUTION

SPINOZA Roger Scruton

S. A. Smith

STUART BRITAIN John Morrill

SCHIZOPHRENIA

TERRORISM

Chris Frith and Eve Johnstone

Charles Townshend

SCHOPENHAUER

THEOLOGY David F. Ford

Christopher Janaway

THE HISTORY OF TIME

SHAKESPEARE Germaine Greer

Leofranc Holford-Strevens

SIKHISM Eleanor Nesbitt

TRAGEDY Adrian Poole

SOCIAL AND CULTURAL

THE TUDORS John Guy

ANTHROPOLOGY

TWENTIETH-CENTURY

John Monaghan and

BRITAIN Kenneth O. Morgan

Peter Just

THE VIKINGS Julian D. Richards

SOCIALISM Michael Newman

Wittgenstein A. C. Grayling

SOCIOLOGY Steve Bruce

WORLD MUSIC Philip Bohlman

Socrates C. C. W. Taylor

THE WORLD TRADE

THE SPANISH CIVIL WAR

ORGANIZATION

Helen Graham

Amrita Narlikar

Available soon:

AFRICAN HISTORY

HIV/AIDS Alan Whiteside

John Parker and Richard Rathbone

HUMAN EVOLUTION

ANGLICANISM Mark Chapman

Bernard Wood

THE BRAIN Michael O’Shea

INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS

CHAOS Leonard Smith

Paul Wilkinson

CITIZENSHIP Richard Bellamy

JAZZ Brian Morton

CONTEMPORARY ART

MANDELA Tom Lodge

Julian Stallabrass

THE MIND Martin Davies

THE CRUSADES

PERCEPTION Richard Gregory

Christopher Tyerman

PHILOSOPHY OF LAW

THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS

Raymond Wacks

Timothy Lim

PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION

Derrida Simon Glendinning

Jack Copeland and

ECONOMICS Partha Dasgupta

Diane Proudfoot

THE END OF THE WORLD

PHOTOGRAPHY Steve Edwards

Bill McGuire

PSYCHIATRY Tom Burns

EXISTENTIALISM Thomas Flynn

RACISM Ali Rattansi

FEMINISM Margaret Walters

THE RAJ Denis Judd

THE FIRST WORLD WAR

THE RENAISSANCE

Michael Howard

Jerry Brotton

FOSSILS Keith Thomson

ROMAN EMPIRE

FUNDAMENTALISM

Christopher Kelly

Malise Ruthven

ROMANTICISM Duncan Wu

For more information visit our web site

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Julian D. Richards

THE VIKINGS

A Very Short Introduction

1

3

Great Clarendon Street, Oxford o x 2 6 d p

Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford.

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Published in the United States

by Oxford University Press Inc., New York

© Julian D. Richards 2005

The moral rights of the author have been asserted Database right Oxford University Press (maker) First published as a Very Short Introduction 2005

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics rights organizations. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above

You must not circulate this book in any other binding or cover and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Data available

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Data available

ISBN 0–19–280607–6

978–0–19–280607–9

1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2

Typeset by RefineCatch Ltd, Bungay, Suffolk

Printed in Great Britain by

TJ International Ltd., Padstow, Cornwall

Contents

List of illustrations ix

1

Vikings then and now 1

2

Early Scandinavian kingdoms 8

3

Pagans and Christians 19

4

Changes in the countryside 29

5

Towns and trade 39

6

Across the ocean: seafaring and overseas expansion 47

7

Settlers in England 63

8

Raiders and traders around the Irish Sea 77

9

Vikings and Picts: genocide or assimilation? 88

10

Landnám
in the North Atlantic 97

11

The edge of the world: Greenland and North America 106

12

Reinventing the Vikings 117

Timeline 134

Further reading 137

Index 141

This page intentionally left blank

List of illustrations

1

Red Erik: Danish

8 Russia and the East

59

luxury beer

3

Courtesy of Ceres Brewery,

9 Scandinavian activity in

Denmark

England

65

2 Viking Age

Scandinavia

11

10

Excavations in progress

at Coppergate, York

69

3 Rune stone, Jelling

16

© York Archaeological Trust for

© Julian Richards

Excavation and Research Ltd

4 Artist’s impression of the

11

Middleton warrior,

fortress at Fyrkat

16

North Yorkshire

75

From J. Graham-Campbell
et al.,

© Department of Archaeology,

Cultural Atlas of the Viking

University of Durham.

World
(1994), 57. © Brown

Photo: T. Middlemass

Reference Group

5 Burial mounds, Birka 22

12

Brough of Birsay:

© Julian Richards

aerial view

91

Crown copyright, reproduced

6 Aerial view, Hedeby

43

courtesy of Historic Scotland

© Wikinger Museum, Haithabu

7 The Oseberg ship;

13

Westness, Rousay. Male

excavation crew in the

boat grave with the prow

mound, 21 September

and stern packed with

1904

49

stones to create a central

© Museum of Cultural History,

chamber for the body 93

University of Oslo, Norway

© Bergen Museum

14

The bay at Tjørnuvik,

17

Second World War

Faroes: site of a Norse

recruitment poster

125

cemetery

99

© German Historical Museum,

© Julian Richards

Berlin

18

The Vinland Map

127

15

The North Atlantic

The Beinecke Rare Book and

routes

101

Manuscript Library, Yale

University

16

L’Anse aux Meadows

19

Street scene, Jorvik

130

reconstruction

111

© York Archaeological Trust

© Parks Canada

for Excavation and Research Ltd

The publisher and the author apologize for any errors or omissions in the above list. If contacted they will be pleased to rectify these at the earliest opportunity.