The Vikings

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The Vikings

Twelve thousand years ago, human beings slowly made their way into

northwestern Europe, hunting the animals and gathering the plants that began to

occupy lands left by the melting glaciers of the last ice age. The land and the

surrounding sea in what is now called Scandinavia would shape a people who

would eventually become known as the Vikings. This is a brief explanation of

who the Vikings were, the weapons they used and the ships that they sailed.

The word Vikings has been used to identify all the people who lived in

Norway, Denmark, and Sweden in early medieval times. They earned the name

Vikings, and the bad reputation that went with it. The word Viking meant pirate.

Vikings were known for their raiding and pillaging of settlements across Europe

during the ninth century.

For most of the last one thousand years, our impressions of who these

Vikings and how they lived have been based on writings like those of the

Lindesfarne monk, who portrayed them in the worst possible way, and on stories

written by thirteenth century Viking poets. In more recent time, books, movies

and cartoons have kept the barbaric image alive. But, the archaeological

evidence being uncovered in Europe and in western Russia in the past hundred

years is helping to change this and create a more positive image of these

northerners.

While raiding cities, towns and monasteries may have been a quick and

sometimes easy way to get rich, it was not the only means that the Vikings

supported themselves. For a majority of Vikings, the resources they needed to

survive came not from pillaging, but from the seas, the fields and the forests

around them. Based on archaeological finds such as sickles, picks, hoes and

ploughshares and the preserved remains of animals and plants, we now know

the Vikings were very skilled craftsmen and highly successful farmers. And as

seafarers, they cut...

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  • Submitted by: lmwisern
  • Date Submitted: 08/19/2008 08:22 AM
  • Category: American History
  • Words: 2991
  • Pages: 12
  • Views: 160
  • Popularity Rank: 10473

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