FEMALE NORDIC WARRIORS PROFESSIONAL

Some Icelandic sagas introduce us to spectacular female characters like Gudrid Thorbjarnardóttir - the “far traveler” - and Aud the Deep-Minded, a leader of settlers.Īn artistic rendering from 1877 depicting Gudrid on an expedition to North America. These began as oral histories and mostly tell of the families who lived in Iceland from 930 to 1030 A.D. The Icelandic sagas, for example, were written in the 13th and 14th centuries. The sagas, meanwhile, are considered a mix of folklore, myth, and history. “One of the most important mythological texts is a woman speaking to us through the medium of a poem.” “In this poem, we get a lot of details about the Norse worldview,” Bell says. The Eddas include Völuspá, a poem told from the perspective of a seer who predicts Ragnarök. Our understanding of Vikings stems from evaluating several sources, including grave sites, rune stones, the writings of people who encountered the Vikings, Norse mythology, and two essential bundles of literature, the Eddas and the sagas. “Changing your name and pronouns suggests not everyone wanted to be in an incredibly limited role.” candidate at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and author of the paper Magic, Genderfluidity, and Queer Vikings.

FEMALE NORDIC WARRIORS PROFESSIONAL

“In my professional opinion, they were definitely not all white people, although several scholars in the 18th and 19th centuries helped perpetuate that myth, and it’s still upheld today in some pop culture,” says Jacob Bell, a Ph.D. This study helps break down the stereotype that Vikings were a monolithic people made up of white blonds. This discussion does help with understanding the aha moment in a 2020 study, which used ancient DNA to show being a Viking had more to do with one’s job than a shared genetic identity. Some researchers argue that technically only people from that region who raided other communities were Vikings, but it’s too late to abandon its popular meaning now. First recorded in English in 1807, the term is typically used today to describe the people of Scandinavia - a region that includes present-day Denmark, Norway, and Sweden - who lived around 750 to 1100 A.D. Even how the word “Viking” is used is sometimes disputed. “We may try not to, but the stories we tell are the stories of ourselves.” Sagas and mythsĪ 1754 painting depicting Valkyries riding into battle by Johan Gustaf Sandberg Fine Art Images/Heritage Images/Getty Images “I think we tend to under-evaluate the importance of the past, in both what it can tell us about ourselves and also in how it creates identity in the present,” Moen says. The dead don’t get the privilege of the final word - but some of the dead will have a lot more sway over the final word than others.

In turn, that history is typically written by men in service of bolstering the power structures within their own cultural context. “We need to reassess our understanding of Viking social order.”Īcademics like Moen and Friðriksdóttir argue that the examination of historic women forces us to consider how modern assumptions can reframe history - an important endeavor when history is so often used to validate the present.

“The story we’ve built from brooches and swords is only one part of the story,” Moen says. Marianne Moen, a researcher at the University of Oslo, believes that many academics have used archeological evidence to “extract a story that is just too simplified.” It’s time, she says, to step away from presuming there was one kind of Viking man - or one kind of Viking woman. The Viking Issue celebrates the glorious weirdness, diversity, and curious nature of everyone's favorite Scandinavian seafarers. The reality of Viking women is far more interesting and complex than mainstream understanding suggests. But some experts caution that modern perceptions of sex and gender can diffuse our interpretation of the past. Legends, myths, and archeological discoveries are our clues. How Viking women really lived and their influence on their society is an ongoing and hotly debated area of study. While the allure of female warriors and maiden-kings is obvious, the feminine power displayed in pop culture doesn’t tell the whole story. And then there’s The Northman, with its seer, folk witch, stolen queen, and prophesized “maiden-king.” Vikings: Vahalla, with its female warriors, remains one of the most popular shows on Netflix. In Thor: Love and Thunder, Natalie Portman returns to the Marvel Cinematic Universe to pick up Mjölnir and take the title of Mighty Thor, while Tessa Thompson’s Valkyrie takes on bureaucratic responsibilities as the king of New Asgard. Vikings, and female Vikings in particular, are having a moment in 2022.

Female nordic warriors