part0014

The northern realm was not empty and silent while the rest of Europe busied itself in the business of its neighbors near and far. Though the climate was considerably harsher than that of the Mediterranean, humanity flourished all the same. The Danes, as they were wont to call themselves at that time, grew oats, barley, rye, and grass, the latter to feed their livestock. In vegetable gardens, households grew turnips, beans, peas, and carrots, all of which were traditionally boiled with cuts of meat to form a thick, hearty stew. All in all, the diet and daily work of an ancient Dane was remarkably similar to that of a modern farmer.

For several millennia, the Danes had neither the means nor the desire to leave their farms or small communities in search of distant shores. Their time was precious, and most fishing boats were too small to bear more than a pair of people past the point at which the shoreline disappeared from sight. These were boats powered entirely by paddles and had limited strength and speed. Early Vikings were satisfied with the canoes that helped them catch seemingly unlimited quantities of codfish, just as they were content with a loaf of bread and a bowl of meaty stew for supper.

In the early Middle Ages, at least three Scandinavian towns existed by the 8th century CE. [52] One such town was Hedeby, found in the northernmost part of modern Germany. Situated near the eastern shore of the Kattegat, into which the Baltic Sea drains, Hedeby was probably reorganized by merchants who’d been forced to flee the destroyed trading center of Reric on the coast of the Baltic. It became a vital trading city, especially since the Vikings had just made big strides in maritime transportation.

Scandinavia’s coastal people had finally perfected the longship: a light and graceful craft about 30 meters (98 feet) in length with space to fit as many as 100 men and women. [53] About sixty of the longship’s occupants were tasked with rowing, while a square sail was positioned to catch a favorable wind. The combined strength of the rowers and wind allowed Danish sailors to travel up to 15 knots per hour, covering long distances in a reasonably short amount of time. The big boats also provided a higher degree of protection than their smaller predecessors did, which gave sailing crews the confidence to set out for distant shores both known and unknown.

Curious fishermen and farmers commissioned such longships of their own and piloted these across the Baltic to meet with other groups of Danes. They brought warm furs and slaves to trade with the communities they found throughout Scandinavia and eventually those located throughout Eastern Europe. Popular Scandinavian items included soapstone bowls and cooking pots, whetstones for sharpening tools, and iron ore. In exchange, the Vikings brought home glass and ceramics, cloth, salt, wine, tin, and copper. It was a remarkable era for the Vikings whose entire world was suddenly opened up and put within reach. In Hedeby, the population boomed. Craftsmen, merchants, and youth in search of employment crowded into the city to send their wares off on ships and excitedly search through new shipments from exotic lands. This import and export business characterized much of the next two centuries, though farming, fishing, and animal husbandry remained at the heart of Norse culture.

By the 10th century, Viking kings and their sailors were quite familiar with the world around them. [54] They’d visited Constantinople, traded with the Islamic caliphate, and even set foot in the lands of the Slavs (modern Russia). Adventurous Vikings had founded new towns across Scandinavia to facilitate more trading, both domestic and international. A Viking settlement was even founded in Dublin, Ireland, to better compete with the well-established partnerships between the British Isles and the European mainland.

This Dublin trading hub would serve the native Irish well since trade with Britannia soon grew out of fashion with the Norsemen. The Vikings were delighted by the riches of Europe, but by comparison, they had little to trade. Furs and slaves were in demand, but there were only so many that could be obtained each season, and arable land had started to run short in Scandinavia. The growing population of Vikings put a serious strain on the northern part of the continent, and without much room to start new farms or harvest more food, the leaders of the northern people overhauled their economic system. Tribes and cities without fortifications and the protection of a king’s army became targets for fearsome raiding parties.

The 800s, 900s, and 1000s saw countless violent raids. [55] The Vikings attacked small neighbors, distant economic rivals, and generally any settlements that were not protected enough to offer any sort of retaliation. Viking families and tribes banded together in raiding parties, sailing east or west to strike unsuspecting communities and plunder their treasures. The raiders ran in, brandishing axes, hammers, and daggers, and murdered their way into the heart of each town. Once the local population was mostly dead or at least subdued in bonds, the raiders seized everything of value, from silver goblets and animals to women and men. Both sexes became slaves, either in the form of a wife, a laborer, or both.

Hungry for treasure and land, thousands of Vikings sailed into Britannia to sack and plunder the precious metals of the Christian churches they found there. Unable to sack Paris, the Norsemen were offered a piece of land in the Frankish kingdom in exchange for their loyalty to the Frankish King Charles the Simple. The land was settled by the Viking leader Rollo and his followers as the Duchy of Normandy in 911 CE. [56] At the very end of that same century, the Viking civilization of mainland Europe had reached such peaks that its population spilled over the edges and began to search for new worlds. Iceland, Greenland, and Canada all felt the heavy weight of the Viking longships running aground before the turn of the millennium. These Arctic landmasses were a few degrees warmer around the year 1000 CE, which made them perfect sites for families in search of new beginnings. [57]

Though Vikings would always pride themselves on their physical strength and achievements in warfare, they wanted their own land to farm alongside their families. These new islands provided an opportunity to do just that. Raiding fell away again as settlers found the space to spread out comfortably and turn the soil, just as their ancestors had done in Scandinavia. They brought their pantheon with them and were sure to make the necessary sacrifices to the gods Thor, Odin, Freya, and their kin. Truly, theirs was the last stand of ancestral religion in Europe and the colonies. The Norsemen of the mainland abandoned the raids when enemy armies proved too great to overcome and became inundated with the new religion of the era, Christianity. In L’Anse aux Meadows in Newfoundland, settlers lost faith in the old gods when they failed to provide enough colonists and supplies from home to support the settlement. Slowly, the Danes trickled back to Greenland and then out of the New World altogether.