The Vikings Are Deserving Of Their Bad Reputation

“The Vikings are deserving of their bad reputation”. To what extent is this statement accurate?

The statement “The Vikings are deserving of their bad reputation” is a deeply inaccurate statement. The bad reputation of being primitive, lawless, bloodthirsty pirates of the dark ages can be challenged by a consideration of the perspectives and motivations of written records such as the Anglo-Saxon Chronicles, as well as archaeological evidence that reveal the Vikings as a technologically developed people whose advanced longboats were used to surpass geographical disadvantage to trade their intricate cultural productions. Furthermore, Viking contributions to British law and linguistics is further evidence that the “heathen Northmen” were multifaceted

and significant in their contributions to both their own period of the 9th-11th centuries and the world today; much more complex than a people with simply a bad reputation.

The pagan religion of the Vikings and the fearsome battle prowess that they wielded led those who came up against them to condemn them to a bad reputation.

This was the case with the British Christian monks of Lindisfarne Abbey who illustrated the Vikings as savages in their historical compilation The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles. This reputation as savages was created to protect the monks’ own control of the world around them from potential Viking takeover. As shown in a letter to the Bishop of Lindisfarne, Higbald[1], from Alcuin, a prominent monk of the time, the monks feared the “heathen” Vikings would triumph over the Christian God both physically, in terms of desecration of the church, and psychologically, in reverting the masses to their former paganism. This motivated Christian monks to tarnish the Viking reputation to protect their control of medieval society by showcasing the malicious nature of the Vikings. Due to this, the Christian monk’s accounts of the Vikings that led to the formation of their savage reputation was deeply biased against them and thus contained distortions to fulfill the monk’s motives of protecting their influence. Therefore, it is imperative that historians consider both the context and motivation of accounts made about the Vikings before accepting them as deserving of a bloodthirsty

reputation.

The Viking longships are considered synonymous with their negative reputation as raiders and plunderers, but these boats along with the outstanding artisanal creations they carried are demonstrative of a technologically advanced and innovative society.

The discovery of the Oseberg ship excavated in Norway in 1904 originating from 800 AD is a Viking burial longboat constructed of pure oak, standing 21.58 m long and 5.10 m broad, with a mast of approximately 9–10 m achieving a speed of up to 10 knots. This is prime evidence of Viking's ingenuity; being able to create something that was unrivaled in the west for many centuries. These ships were also a necessity for a people whose lands were unable to sustain their population due to the poverty of their homelands for growing crops. Indeed, Al Turtushi, an Arabian trader, comments in the 10th century on the inadequate resources of the Vikings which led to a need for Vikings to practice infanticide as they could not support their growing population- therefore plundering and raiding was not born out of a desire for violence but a necessity to protect and feed their own people. Furthermore, Viking ingenuity in shipbuilding led to great exploration, trade and settlement in lands both close to them and far away such as Iceland, Greenland and the Americas. This proves that the Vikings were intelligent and resourceful rather than simply

barbaric.
The Viking reputation purports the Vikings as a race of pirates and raiders whose legal systems and linguistics were primeval, however, through an analysis of English law and linguistics, this is proven to be a flawed representation as the Viking’s legal codes contributed to the English legal code through the weregild and Viking linguistics are still present in modern English, showing that the Vikings were not entirely deserving of their uncivilised reputation. When the Vikings took control of North Eastern England in 886 AD, the area of land they ruled over was called the “Danelaw” denoting the legal system they put in place. The Danelaw areas of England proved more prosperous than the Anglo ruled South Western England with many major cities being established during this time, namely the city of York, with its name derived from the Old Norse “Jórvík”[2]. After the unification of England under the Anglo-Saxons, Danelaw still influenced the British legal system with the rules relating to reparation still being derived from Danelaw[3]. This therefore shows the Vikings were not the lawless, uncivilised pirates but lawful colonists whose legal system and language was incorporated into that of other nations and endures into modern times despite the passage of time.

Consequently, the statement “The Vikings are deserving of their bad reputation” to a great extent, is inaccurate as the Viking’s reputation was given to them by their enemies who painted the Vikings negatively to protect themselves and Christendom. The Vikings were lawful colonists and a culturally complex society who excelled at technology and whose lifestyle and laws became a part of British law and linguistics through the introduction of the Danelaw. They were a multifaceted people whose bad reputation for being primitive, lawless, bloodthirsty pirates of the dark is deeply inaccurate and can be easily dispelled through careful examination of historical and archaeological evidence.