Data
Date	IX century – XI century.
Location	North Europe.
Religion	Polytheistic.
Economy	Agriculture, livestock and looting.

The Vikings were a group of warriors and sailors belonging to some original peoples of Scandinavia, in northern Europe. These became known for their voyages of maritime exploration and for their incursions and looting in much of Europe, between the 9th and 11th centuries. In fact, this period in the Middle Ages is known as the “Viking Age.”

By considering the history of Vikings, the Vikings burst onto the European scene in 793 , with the looting of the Lindisfarne monastery in the north of present-day Great Britain. In the following 3 centuries, their violent attacks, looting and pillaging, terrorized the populations of the coasts of the Baltic Sea, the British Isles, the kingdom of the Franks, the Iberian Peninsula and southern Italy. Through the rivers of Eastern Europe, the Vikings reached the heart of present-day Russia and the gates of Constantinople, the capital of the Byzantine Empire .

There are several theories about the causes of the Viking invasions. One of the most accepted is based on the large increase in its population in territories that were not very suitable for good agricultural development.

The attacks of the Vikings, added to those of the Hungarians and Slavs in Central Europe, and those of the Saracens in the Mediterranean Sea, contributed to the fragmentation of the Carolingian Empire and the political decentralization characteristic of feudalism .

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Political and social organization

Political organization

The Vikings were organized into numerous independent political units that dominated small territories in Scandinavia. Each was led by a jarl or count , who only had authority over an urban center and the surrounding areas. As time went by, some Jarl took the title of king and tried to expand their dominions. It is estimated that around the year 800 there were around 30 small kingdoms in present-day Norway, and some others in Sweden and Denmark.

Social organization

The society of each of these states was made up of free men and women, and of slaves who were prisoners of war or people who could not pay their debts.

The jarl presided over the meetings of the Thing , an assembly in which all free men from each community participated. The thing sanctioned laws, tried criminals and applied sanctions. The most serious penalties were exile and death.

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Religion and gods of the Vikings history

The history of Vikings about religion was that they were polytheists : they worshiped various gods that they associated with the forces of nature and believed to be related to each other. Some of them were:

• Odin: god of the heavens and main divinity, he was considered the father of everything in the world.
• Frigg : wife of Odin, goddess of marriage and motherhood.
• Thor : god of thunder and strength, favorite son of Odin.
• Heimdall : bastard son of Odin, god of light and protector of the world.
• Freyja: goddess of beauty and love.
• Freyr – Freyja’s brother, god of rain, the rising sun, and fertility.
• Loki : god of lies and chaos, who tried to destroy the might of Odin.

The Vikings had no temples or professional priests. In each house there was an altar with statuettes of one or more gods . Each community had a fortune teller who threw stones called “runes” to make predictions about the future of the group and the fate of the warriors. They also performed animal sacrifices to promote bountiful harvests, large offspring, and resounding victories on the battlefield.

The highest honor for the Vikings was to die in combat with the weapon in hand, since in this way they accessed Valhalla , a kind of paradise where they drank and ate with the gods.

Viking customs

During the long Nordic winter the Vikings stayed on their farms, where they raised goats and pigs . At dusk, the warriors closest to the local jarl gathered in a large hall where they ate, recounted their exploits, and drank beer.

When spring came they cultivated the land , readied their ships, and set out on their war forays to obtain spoils of gold and silver.

The Viking ships (the drakkars) were very light, they had a single sail and on each side a row of rowers (the same warriors). They were ideal for sailing both on the open sea and in shallow waters and for carrying troops, merchants and settlers.

When they reached their destination they could disembark, loot quickly, and then withdraw or set up fortified camps on the banks of the rivers. From those camps they made trips to loot farms and cities or take hostages and then request ransoms. In the fighting they used axes, long swords, knives and round wooden shields.

The Vikings accepted polygamy , despised cowardice, and secretly condemned murders, as these could lead to bloody revenge. Any act of blood had to be denounced immediately.

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Location and Viking territories

The Vikings were originally from present-day Denmark, Sweden and Norway , in northern Europe, but their voyages of exploration and conquest led them to the following territories:

• British Isles : Norwegian and Danish Vikings occupied part of Ireland, Scotland, and the north and east of England. They never managed to occupy the south of the island, defended by the Christian kingdom of Wessex.
• Northern France : During the reign of Charlemagne’s grandsons, the Vikings went up the Seine River and besieged the city of Paris several times. To stop their incursions, in 911 King Charles the Simple granted the Viking leader Hrolf Ganger (also known as Rollo or Rollón, the walker) some lands located on the banks of the English Channel. From then on this region was called Normandy and its inhabitants Normans : “men of the north.”
• Southern Italy : Towards the end of the 10th century, Norman warriors settled in southern Italy as mercenaries in the service of Lombards and Byzantines. Shortly after they began to establish their own States, which in 1130 were unified to give rise to the Kingdom of Sicily, which lasted until 1814.
• Russia : Swedish Vikings, called Varangians, sailed east and up the rivers that flow into the Baltic Sea. In 882 Oleg, a Varangian prince, founded the State of Kiev Rus, which lasted until 1240, when it became part of the Mongol Empire . In 998, an agreement between Kiev and Byzantium gave rise to the Varangian Guard, an elite unit made up of Viking warriors who were in charge of the personal custody of the Byzantine emperors.
• Iceland : The Norwegian Vikings arrived in Iceland in the early 10th century. There they founded a confederation of independent communities that lasted until 1264, when Iceland was integrated into the kingdom of Norway.
• Greenland : the Vikings from Iceland, led by Erik the Red, arrived in Greenland in 982. In the following years they founded 3 independent colonies, which had about 10,000 inhabitants. In 1261, the local population accepted the authority of the Norwegian kings.
• Newfoundland : Around the year 1000, an expedition led by Leif Eriksson, son of Erik the Red, explored the coasts of Baffin Island, the Labrador Peninsula and Newfoundland, in present-day Canada. Soon after, another expedition returned to the island of Newfoundland to found a colony that did not prosper due to lack of women and hostility from the Algonquians. After a few years, the surviving settlers returned to Greenland.

The end of the Viking age

Viking raids began to cease in the second half of the 11th century , following the defeat of the Norwegian King Harald the Ruthless, in Saxon England (1066).

Other factors that led to the end of their invasions were the progressive Christianization of the Scandinavian territories and the acculturation of the Vikings settled in the British Isles, northern France and southern Italy. On the other hand, the kingdoms of Sweden, Norway and Denmark, already unified, wanted to trade with the states of the rest of Europe, instead of attacking and looting them as before.

We hope you have learned the history of Vikings.