9 misconceptions about Vikings we believe in TV shows and games

1. The Vikings loved horned helmets

The stereotypical appearance of a Viking, supposedly resembling a character from Skyrim, has nothing to do with reality. No fighter in his right mind would wear a helmet with decorative horns. Yes, such hats existedCounterpoint: Essays in Archeology and Heritage Studies in Honor of Professor Kristian Kristiansenbut it was the ceremonial armor worn during religious rites. Or used as a status item.

In battles, a helmet with such an ornament is more likely to help the enemy kill you: if the weapon gets caught on the horn, it will seriously injure you.

Helmets were made smooth so that the enemy's weapons would slide on them when struck: this increases the chances of surviving. Therefore, on real Viking helmets, for example, on the one that was foundDid Vikings really wear horned helmets? in 1943 at Jermundbu farm in Norway, no horns are observed. On medieval imagesMedieval & Renaissance Manuscripts there are no Scandinavians either.

Most likely the reasonNordisch ‑ Germanische Götter und Helden, The Premiere of Richard Wagner's Der Ring des Nibelungen The myth of the Vikings in horned helmets became the costume designer and illustrator Karl Emil Dipler. For staging opera Wagner's Ring of the Nibelungen in 1876, he created beautiful but unrealistic robes, among which were winged and horned helmets.

2. Viking standard weapon - double-edged ax

This weapon is very popular in cartoons and viking games. And it really existed and was called labrys. One small but: the Vikings did not brandish such things, they were invented by the gunsmiths of the Cretan Minoan civilization of the Bronze Age.

Later the Greeks took overLabrys the Minoans had this ax and made it an attribute of Zeus. Yes, Thor had the hammer Mjolnir, Zeus had an ax. And the labrys was, apparently, not a weapon, but a ceremonialThe Labrys: Why Was the Double Ax Double? subject.

If the Vikings were given such an ax, they would probably find it very inconvenient and impractical.

Scandinavians used brodeksVegard vike - axes with one crescent-shaped blade and skeggoxDe Norske Vikingesverd: En Typologisk ‑ Kronologisk Studie Over Vikingetidens Vaaben - beard-shaped axes with a protruding lower part of the blade.

This is a handy and simple weapon. It's easier to own than sword, and easier to care for. Finally, the Scandinavian axes in peacetime or on long campaigns were used as a tool: chop wood, cut a board, hammer a nail into a drakkar. A double-edged ax would hardly do that.

And no, the Viking axes were not a heavy weapon for real heroes. They weighed on averageThe langeid broadaxe from 800 g to 1.5 kg. In general, the most popularViking spear the Viking weapon was not even an ax, but a spear: it is much easier to make.

3. Vikings are such a people

If you think that the Viking is a representative of some northern people, you are wrong. Viking is not a nationality, but a type of activity.

In the Old Norse language there was a word Víking, meaningWhat does the word 'Viking' really mean?, The Vikings at home both a raid with the aim of robbery, and just an expedition for peaceful purposes - for example, research or trade. And Víkingr is the one who takes part in such an expedition.

Vikings becameViking Swedes, Norwegians and Danes. Other peoples designated them with the Latin term Norman - "northerner". In ordinary life, a Viking could do anything: be a farmer, artisan, farmer, raise livestock, hunt or to fish. Such people were called bonds - free peasants with their own farms.

When a Scandinavian lacked a livelihood or wanted adventure and travel or military glory, he nailed other similar bonds, and they went on a campaign to rob neighbors, find a better piece of land for themselves, or even just to bargain. And then he returned home and lived as before.

4. Vikings were mighty red-haired giants

When you imagine the Vikings, you are probably drawing in your head mighty and tall red-haired barbarians with luxurious mustaches. Or fair-haired handsome men with a model appearance - like Travis Fimmel. However, the real Vikings will disappoint you a little.

According to archaeological findsWHAT DID THE VIKINGS LOOK LIKE?, their average height was 172 cm, and their women - 158 cm, which is 6-10 cm below the current average. Modern Scandinavians have become much higher than their ancestors. And this is quite natural, because they lived in very harsh conditions, ateWhat Vikings really looked like not as good and had a lower life expectancy. Not the conditions under which athletes and basketball players are born.

In addition, the hard physical work of the northerners led to health problems. Louise Campe Henriksen, curator of the Viking Ship Museum in Roskilde, notesWhat Vikings really looked likethat among the Scandinavians of that time were common arthrosis and dental diseases.

The Norman warriors did not differ in particular brutality and masculinity of their faces. Here's what saysWhat Vikings really looked like about this an archaeologist and anthropologist from the University of Copenhagen:

In fact, determining the gender of a Viking Age skeleton is difficult. Their male skulls were slightly more feminine than those of modern humans, and their female skulls were more masculine.

Liz Lock Harvig, Fellow, Department of Forensic Medicine, University of Copenhagen

She adds that Viking women had protruding jaws and developed eyebrows, while men had more feminine features. And also, according to the testimony of an Arab traveler who visitedWhat did the Vikings look like? city ​​of Hedeby around 1000 AD BC, northerners - both women and men - wore makeup to look more attractive.

As for red hair, they were not rare among northerners, but there were also enough blondes, and brunettes, and fair-haired Vikings.What Vikings really looked like.

And they didn’t wear those horrible, identical gray and black clothes like extras. "The game of thrones». The northerners preferred bright and colorful things, they loved silks and furs. Most popular colorsFashionable Vikings loved colors, fur, and silk were red and blue.

5. Vikings were dirty barbarians

No, the Scandinavians had nothing against hygiene. Unwashed savages, they were apparently dubbed by the British, who did not like the invaders-northerners for obvious reasons. In fact, the Vikings bathed at least once a week, on Saturday, which was very good for that time.

Saturday in Old Scandinavian was calledTOP 15 MYTHS AND MISCONCEPTIONS ABOUT THE VIKINGS Laugardagur - laundry day. And as archaeological finds show, the Vikings had tweezers, beard combs, tools for cleaning nails and ears, and toothpicks. The chronicler John of Wallingford wrote in the chronicle of 1220What Vikings really looked likethat they washed, changed their clothes and combed their hair and therefore enjoyed success with English women.

John disapprovingly called hygiene "a frivolous whim." What are these pagans not imagining?

Also the Vikings laid7 Myths About Vikings, Debunked, What Vikings really looked like and bleached hair and applied eyeliner. By the way, in the last seasons of "Vikings" Ragnar Lothbrok sports a shaved head. And other characters like to wear spectacular hairstyles, shaving their heads in the best barbershops in Scandinavia.

But in reality, the Vikings cut their heads off criminals and slaves, while they themselves walkedWHAT VIKINGS GETS WRONG ABOUT HISTORY, What Vikings really looked like, Viking Hairstyles: Is Ragnar's Haircut Historical? with long hair.

6. They drank wine from the skulls of their enemies

It sounds very brutal, but this is also a myth - for the most part.

In general, there are many examples in history when various vessels were made from human skulls. Indulged in similarSkull cup Scythians, Mongols, Chinese, Europeans, Slavs and Japanese. Most likely, some Vikings could also make goblets from skulls. However, the manufacture of dishes from defeated enemies was hardly a mass phenomenon.

Perhaps the myth arose from the fact that Ole Worm, a Danish physician and naturalist, in his book Runer seu Danica literatura antiquissima, published in 1651, incorrectly translated a fragment of Krákumál's poem, “The Word of Krake ".

In ancient Scandinavian it saidDid Vikings drink from the skulls of their enemies?drekkum bjór af bragði ór bjúgviðum hausa - "Drink beer from the crooked branches of skulls rather." "The curved branches of the skulls" is kenning, a metaphor for "horn." Worm translated the fragment as follows: "The heroes hoped to drink in the hall of Odin from the skulls of those they killed." It just wasn't there "Google Translate».

Mostly Scandinavians made dishes from animal horns, as well as wood and metal.

7. Women in Viking society enjoyed equality

You can often find on the Internet claims that Viking women had the same rights as men and even fought on an equal footing with them on campaigns. Unthinkable privileges for the VIII-XI centuries, when women of other nations were oppressed in every possible way. The Severians were lucky, right? But it is not so.

Series like Vikings exaggerate the role of women in combat a bit. So, researcher Judith Yesh from the University of Nottingham claimsViking women, warriors, and valkyries, A Female Viking Warrior? Tomb study yields cluesthat brave female fighters were found only in the myths of the Normans and there is no evidence that they existed in reality. Other scholars speculate that female warriors did exist, but this was not common.

Such women were called Skjaldmær - "maiden of the shield".

And although northern women enjoyed greater freedom than representatives of other peoples, there was no equality in the Viking society.

For example, the medieval Icelandic code of law Grágás prohibitedThe Role of Women in Viking Society women wear men's clothing, cut their hair or wield weapons. They were not allowed to participate in most political or government events. Only men were admitted to the Ting, a public gathering of free northerners. A woman could also not become a judge and testify in court.

But the northerners couldWomen in the Viking Age own property, dispose of land inherited from a husband or inheritance, and demand a divorce if the spouses mistreated them. For Middle ages already good. In general, the Vikings respected their women, because they looked after the house and the harvest while the husband was on the hike.

8. Favorite torture of Vikings - "bloody eagle"

Most likely, this terrible torture, when the back of a living person is cut and the lungs are taken out, was invented by Christian chroniclers who sought to present the northerners as terrible devils of hell.

Researchers are inclined to believeViking atrocity and Skaldic verse: The Rite of the Blood-Eagle, Torture and Brutality in Medieval Literature, The Vengeance of Ivarr the Bonelessthat the Vikings would not have thought of such an ingenious surgical operation.

But it is too difficult to cut out the lungs for profit: the victim will rather quickly die from painful shock and pneumothorax and will not have time to suffer.

It is possible that the bloody fantasies of ripped ribs and lungs sticking out of the back were born out of a mistranslation of the Ragnarssona þáttr saga, The Strand of the Sons of Ragnar. In it, Ivar the Boneless takes revenge on King Ella II for his father. Vaguely interpreted words about eagles and ripped backs can meanThe ‘Blood Eagle’ Torture Method As Seen On The Show Vikings: Was It Real, Or The Stuff Of Nordic Legend?that Ivar simply threw Ella's corpse to profit by the birds of prey, and they pecked him.

9. Ivar the Boneless was weak

In the TV series "Vikings" Ivar was given the nickname because he is unable to walk due to osteogenesis imperfecta. But it is far from the fact that the real Ivar was so helpless. On the contrary, in the sagas he is calledIvar the Boneless a cruel and ferocious warrior, tall, handsome and the smartest of Ragnar's children.

The chronicler Saxon Grammaticus says nothingIvar the Boneless about Ivar's absence of bones, although this seems to be a worthy of mentioning part of his appearance. As a result, the exact history of the nickname is unknown. Perhaps the boneless leader of the Vikings was nicknamed because of problems with potency.

Ivar the Boneless was king for a long timeSaga om Konung Ragnar Lodbrok och hans Söner in England. He had no children, because he was with women incapable of lust, but let no man say that he lacks cunning and cruelty.

Ragnarssona þáttr

Also, Ivar could be called in a similar way for flexibility and mobility in battle. Or his nicknameIn the Footsteps of Ivarr the Boneless just wrongly spelled in Latin, and in fact he should have been called Ivar the Hated.