Over the past century, Vikings have been portrayed very inaccurately. They were male-dominated, brutal, homogeneous and, of course, wore the infamous horned helmet. In reality it was much less dramatic and, well, horned helmets may have been worn, but the Vikings didn't wear them.
According to a Smith College report, the Vikings were a group of seafaring Norse people who explored, raided and conquered other civilizations in and around Europe, as well as the North Atlantic regions including Iceland, Greenland and Newfoundland, in the early Middle Ages. But perhaps even more interesting is that the Vikings were not a homogeneous group, but rather a mixture of many North Germanic tribes.
“The word Viking is a profession, not an ethnicity,” says Colin Connors, a researcher at the Institute of Archaeology, Conservation and History at the University of Oslo. People living in Scandinavia at the time did not use the term “Viking” to describe themselves; rather, they would have used it to refer to medieval pirates who raided villages.
“It was more of a job description,” he adds.
Myths about the Vikings
Although they were known as a formidable group, the Norwegians were not much more ferocious than any other society at the time. While there was a lot of violence committed by the Norse during the Viking Age, there was also a lot of violence committed by people living in other parts of Europe at the same time.
“The claim that the Norwegians were particularly brutal is a myth,” says Connors.
It is also a myth that they were especially good at war because although they won some battles, they also met a “horrible end.” The reason we tend to think about Vikings What makes it especially brutal is that their violence was recorded by the Christian monks they attacked.
If a Christian monk was killed by pagan Vikings, he was considered a martyr and therefore had the potential to achieve sainthood, Connors says. If they were killed by another Christian, it was simply considered murder. This is why documenting Viking brutality was more common.
“It was beneficial for a Christian monk to document pagan attacks,” says Connors.
Read more: Viking silver hoard reveals how silver coins from the Middle East ended up in England
Did Vikings wear horned helmets?
This is perhaps the most common historical inaccuracy regarding Vikings. No, they didn't wear horned helmets, but the truth behind this myth dates back to 19th-century opera. According to the Viking Age Museum, scientists know what Viking helmets really looked like from the only surviving helmet found in a Viking grave. They are metal, with frames surrounding the eyes, and do not have any horns.
According to the Mystic Seaport Museum, horned helmets first appeared in a performance of Richard Wagner's opera cycle “The Ring of the Nibelungs” in 1876. Costume designer Karl Emil Doppler borrowed the idea of horned helmets from Native Americans who wore buffalo headdresses. The image was so striking that it stuck, and even today horned helmets appear on every Viking Halloween costume.
The role of women in Viking culture
The Vikings were a patriarchal society, as was common in the early Middle Ages. However, women had more rights than in other European cultures. They could own and inherit property and manage their farms. But they were denied the opportunity to lead the community and represent themselves in court, Connors says.
Moreover, they most likely were not usually warriors, although according to research from antiquity, we have one example of the grave of a female warrior. However, from the grave we cannot know whether she then presented herself as a woman, because we only know that genetically she was a woman.
However, this is another example of how we look at Vikings the way we want to view them to achieve our own modern goals. Ultimately, this can lead to a perspective that is very different from what actually happened.
Read more: 2,400-Year-Old Warship in Denmark Reveals Rare Fingerprint and New Origin Story
Article sources
Our authors in discovermagazine.com use peer-reviewed research and high-quality sources for our articles, and our editors review scientific accuracy and editorial standards. Review the sources used below for this article:
.jpg.png?w=150&resize=150,150&ssl=1 "Your Weekly Horoscope: December 28 to January 3, 2025")
