Did Vikings Read From Left to Right

Sources and gimmicky accounts

The Vikings have left many traces of their settlement which are even so visible today. Archaeology provides physical bear witness of their conquests, settlement and daily life. The study of place-names and linguistic communication shows the lasting effect which the Viking settlements had in the British Isles, and Deoxyribonucleic acid analysis provides some insights into the effect the Vikings had on the genetic stock of the countries where they settled. All of this provides valuable information, but the just reason that we accept an idea of the 'Vikings' as a people is their appearance in the written sources.

... the value of the written evidence is limited.

Unfortunately, the value of the written evidence is limited. Non a lot of evidence survives, and much of what we have is either uninformative or unreliable. Many popular ideas nigh Vikings are nineteenth-century inventions. Others are the upshot of early historians accepting sources which modern scholars now regard as completely unreliable. In Scandinavia the Viking Historic period is regarded equally office of prehistory considering at that place are practically no contemporary written sources. Even in western Europe, the Viking Age is frequently seen as function of the 'Dark Ages', from which comparatively few historical records accept survived.

Detail from the manuscript of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle  © Surviving accounts of Viking activity were well-nigh exclusively written by churchmen. These include monastic chronicles, such as the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle and similar Frankish and Irish Annals, which outline broadly what happened, at what date. In that location are as well sources of a more straight religious nature, such equally the much-quoted messages of Alcuin, and Wulfstan's famous 'Sermon of the Wolf', both of which chose to interpret the Viking raids every bit God's punishment on the Anglo-Saxons for their sins. Even the chronicles reverberate the fact that the Vikings often attacked monasteries for their wealth, which created an obvious bias against them, and the hostile tone of these contemporary accounts has washed much to create the popular image of Viking atrocities. However, mod historians have noted that the aforementioned sources show Christian rulers behaving equally unpleasantly, but without being condemned on religious grounds.

Runes

Runestone from Uppsala in Sweden. The inscription reads 'Thorkunn and Bruni had this monument made, in memory of their male parent Igulfast'.  © One of the reasons that we have then few records from the Viking Age is that the Vikings did non get familiar with the Roman alphabet (the alphabet we use today) until they adopted Christianity. All the same, they did have another grade of lettering, known equally runes. Runes were normally carved, rather than written, and were therefore generally used for adequately brusque inscriptions.

The word 'alphabet' comes from the Greek letters 'alpha' and 'beta'. Similarly, the runic alphabet is known as the 'futhark', from the first 6 runes. The original futhark had 24 runes, later reduced to sixteen. This meant that some runes were used for several different letters, merely there were two runes for the letter 'a', 2 for 'r', and one for our 'th'. More runes were gradually added afterwards the Vikings became familiar with the Roman alphabet. At that place were several unlike versions of some of the runes, and private runes might be carved dorsum-to-front or upside down. All these factors can brand runes difficult to read.

... it is likely that few people were literate in runes.

It is unknown how many people could read runes in the Viking Historic period. Runic inscriptions on pieces of wood from Bergen in Kingdom of norway show that runes were used for all sorts of everyday purposes afterwards in the Middle Ages, but no comparable bear witness has survived from the Viking Age, and it is probable that few people were literate in runes. However, the fact that some Vikings were able to cleave their names on their possessions suggests that the use of runes wasn't uncommon.

Nigh of the surviving runes are found on large memorial stones. Very oftentimes they but take the proper noun of the person in whose memory the stone was carved, and the names of those responsible for having it fabricated. Sometimes the name of the rune-carver was besides given. Occasionally the inscriptions describe the achievements of the person commemorated, and refer to historical events in which they were involved. For this reason, runic inscriptions are a valuable source for Viking history. However, considering they are and then brief, they never give a very full pic, and frequently raise every bit many questions equally they answer.

Coins

Coin of 'Rex Cnut', minted in York, c AD 900. This side has a distorted version of the name of York.  © The inscriptions on coins are normally even shorter than those on runestones, and contain even less factual information. Some coins have no inscription at all. Even and so, money inscriptions are contemporary texts from the Viking Age, and both the inscriptions and the images on coins can provide a surprising amount of information. Sometimes coins can provide information which is not known from any other source.

1 example of this is the so-called Cnut/Ebraice coinage from Viking Northumbria, dating from the beginning of the tenth century. Ebraice is a version of the Latin name for York, Eboracum, which became Eoforwic to the Anglo-Saxons, and Jorvik to the Vikings. The other side has the inscription CNUT Rex (King Cnut), although the letters are spread around the arms of the central cross design. This has nix to do with the later and more famous Cnut (1016-35), and if it weren't for these coins we would have no thought that York was ruled by a rex called Cnut around the yr 900, although we do know of someone of that name raiding around that fourth dimension.

Images on coins can as well exist significant.

Images on coins can also be significant. The minor-scale Danish coinage of the 10th century has no proper inscriptions, although some of the designs were originally copied from Carolingian coin inscriptions. All the same, from the mid-10th century the Danish coins begin to show articulate Christian symbols. This supports Harald Bluetooth'due south famous runic inscription from Jelling at the aforementioned flow, in which he states that he 'made the Danes Christian'.

Silver coin of 'King Cnut', c AD 900. This side has the inscription CNVT King spread around the arms of a cantankerous.  © By contrast, coins sometimes give a very different impression from other sources. For example, Ceolwulf II of Mercia (874 - c.879) is dismissed in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle as 'a foolish male monarch'south thegn', and has often been seen every bit a puppet of the Vikings. Yet the coinage shows a articulate brotherhood between Ceolwulf and Alfredof Wessex, with both kings issuing coins of the same blazon. Since the coins are gimmicky and the Relate was written some years afterward, the coins may be a more reliable source.

Sagas

Saga of Gudmundr the Adept, written c 1710.  © The nigh detailed accounts which nosotros possess of the Viking Historic period are the Icelandic sagas. Some of these deal with the deeds of powerful rulers, such as the kings of Norway or the earls of Orkney. Others deal with the 'ordinary people' of Iceland, although the central characters even and then tend to come from the ruling form. Often the sagas describe events in great particular, including what was said by those involved.

This may sound platonic for the historian, but the film is far more complicated. The earliest sagas weren't written down until the twelfth century, and many of the well-nigh famous ones are even afterward. This means that the sagas were oft written downwards two or iii hundred years subsequently the events which they draw, and it is non always articulate where the compilers of the sagas used earlier cloth and where they simply made things up. There is a further problem that the sagas are primarily works of literature. Both events and peculiarly speech might well be rewritten to give a particular literary effect.

Detail from Saga of Gudmundr the Good  © Historians in the nineteenth century accepted the sagas every bit more or less accurate accounts, except where they clearly strayed into mythology and fantasy. The graphic accounts of the sagas played a large part in the creation of the 'Viking' myth. More recently, historians take looked at the sagas more than critically, and for a period in the late twentieth century, many historians wouldn't accept that the sagas had whatsoever historical value at all.

Today, most historians would take that the sagas are not reliable, and that some saga material is clearly not factual, or reflects a much later lodge rather than the Viking Historic period. Nevertheless, this does not mean that the sagas have no value at all. Sometimes the broad outline of events in the sagas is supported past other sources. In other words, we tin use sagas to study history, but nosotros take to be very careful when we do.

Skaldic verse

Egil Skallagrimsson, the hero of Egil's saga, from a late manuscript. Egil's saga contains many verses attributed to the hero  © One feature of the sagas may genuinely date dorsum to the Viking Historic period. Many of the sagas quote poems written in a traditional form known equally skaldic poetry. There were various dissimilar metres, but all skaldic verse was written according to complicated structures, including internal rhyme and alliteration. The verses are often attributed to known poets, or skalds, many of whom were eye-witnesses to the events which they describe in their poetry. The verses were probably only preserved orally until they were written down in the sagas. Even so, it is argued that the rigid construction of the verses meant that they would be remembered accurately, since any changes would disrupt the structure.

This should mean that skaldic poesy is a more reliable source for historians than the main saga text. However, skaldic verse presents many problems of its own. Firstly, the structures of skaldic poetry were still remembered in the 13th century, and some verses are probably late compositions, fifty-fifty though they may be attributed to earlier poets. Secondly, the poems are not always reliable accounts. For instance, a dramatic account of Eric Bloodaxe being welcomed into Valhalla past the gods is unlikely to have been written by an eyewitness.

... a dramatic account of Eric Bloodaxe being welcomed into Valhalla by the gods is unlikely to have been written by an eyewitness.

The rigid structures of the poems meant that the choice of words had to fit the grade. As a result, nosotros accept to be aware that the poets were probably more concerned with poetic form than authentic description. The poems likewise use a form of words called kennnings. Kennings involve using a poetic paraphrase instead of a unproblematic word. For example, the ocean could become the 'whale's route', while verse itself was described equally 'Kvasir's blood' or 'Kvasir's mead' in reference to a myth about the origins of poetry.

This combination of factors means that skaldic verse is a difficult and often unreliable form of bear witness. Nevertheless, it is not completely useless. For example, passing references in poems support both Frankish laws and archaeological bear witness in suggesting that the vikings got some of their weapons from western Europe.

Find out more than

Books

The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle edited and translated by N Garmonsway (Everyman, 1953)

Chronicles of the Vikings by RI Page (British Museum Printing, 1995)

Reading the By: Runes by RI Page (British Museum Printing, 1987)

Coins of Medieval Europe by Philip Grierson (Seaby, 1991)

Cultural Atlas of the Viking Age edited by Graham-Campbell et al (Andromeda, 1994)

Encyclopaedia of the Viking Historic period by John Haywood (Thames & Hudson, 2000)

Encyclopaedia of the Viking Historic period by John Haywood (Thames & Hudson, 2000)

Penguin Historical Atlas of the Vikings by John Haywood (Penguin, 1996). Detailed maps of Viking settlements in Scotland, Ireland, England, Iceland and Normandy.

Place to visit

Maes Howe, near Stromness, Orkney. This chambered tomb was broken into during the Viking Age and the centuries that followed. The visitors left graffiti in runes, and the terminate upshot is the finest collection of Scandinavian runes in the British Isles.

About the author

Gareth Williams is curator of Early on Medieval Coins at the British Museum. In improver to coinage, he specialises in the history of the Viking Historic period, with particular interests in the nature of royal ability, and in the human relationship between history and literature. He is as well a member of the re-enactment/living history group Vikings of Centre England.

carpenteroneven.blogspot.com

Source: https://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/vikings/evidence_01.shtml

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