The Vikings, a group of Scandinavians during the Viking age, believed in various forms of magic, including Seiðr, a form of shamanism and divination practiced by them. Seiðr was deeply embedded in ancient Norse culture, associated with female practitioners and the goddess Freyja. It involved spells and rituals aimed at divination, prophecy, and altering fate. The magic was subtle and didn’t pay a major part in their way of life.
The pagan Norse believed in several different kinds of magic, including rune magic, which involved the use of runes and incantations. In the Icelandic sagas, it is often mentioned that the Vikings used runic magic, and in late Medieval folk songs, rune casting is mentioned as a method to heal.
The Vikings’ belief in magic was not only a means to survive but also a way of life. They believed in the gods as real and took part in the show. The concept of consciousness, will, and witches were also important in Norse religion and culture.
In conclusion, the Vikings believed in magic as an essential part of their daily lives, with Seiðr being a powerful form of magic. The pagan Norse, who were Scandinavians during the Viking age, believed in various types of magic, including rune magic, which was often used in the Icelandic sagas.
📹 Vikings: The Amazing Types Of Norse Magic!
Vikings: The Amazing Types Of Norse Magic! Welcome Back To Vikings Code! Vikings, also called Norseman or Northman, were …
Is there anything supernatural in Vikings?
The Viking gods, as depicted in sagas, poems, and artifacts, were not considered “big” gods. Norse mythology suggests that they were not supremely powerful, omnipotent, or even the first beings. Norse mythology also states that they were not immortal, but were fated to die in a cataclysm called Ragnarök. They were not even the first beings, as Odin and his brothers were born of the first man and the daughter of a frost giant.
Moreover, they were not particularly concerned about upholding moral standards or punishing humans who failed to do so. Instead, they might punish those who violated social norms and actively engineer situations designed to harm humans, for no other reason than because they could, making them powerful.
Are there monsters in Vikings TV show?
Jörmungandr, also known as the Midgard Serpent or World Serpent, is a sea serpent and the middle child of the giantess Angrboða and Loki. According to the Prose Edda, Jörmungandr was thrown into the ocean, grew large enough to surround the earth and grasp his tail, giving him the name Midgard Serpent or World Serpent. He is believed to let go of his tail, causing the world to end. Jörmungandr’s arch-enemy is the god Thor.
The last meeting between the serpent and Thor is predicted to occur at Ragnarök, where Jörmungandr will flood the world or poison the sky. Thor will kill Jörmungandr but will die himself due to his venom.
Does Norse mythology have magic?
Seiðr, a form of magic in Old Norse, was practiced during the Late Scandinavian Iron Age and is believed to be related to the telling and shaping of the future. Its origins are unknown, but it gradually declined after the Christianization of Scandinavia. Seiðr practitioners were of both sexes, with sorceresses known as vǫlur, seiðkonur, and vísendakona, and male practitioners known as seiðmenn. They often had assistants to aid them in their rituals.
In pre-Christian Norse mythology, seiðr was associated with the god Óðinn, responsible for war, poetry, and sorcery, and the goddess Freyja, a member of the Vanir who was believed to have taught the practice to the Æsir.
Can Odin do magic?
Odin, the one-eyed king of the Aesir, is a powerful sorcerer and master of various magical arts. He is the god of war, battle, victory, death, poetry, and wisdom. Odin is the husband of Frigg and father of several other gods. He was destined to be destroyed by Fenrir at Ragnarök, but he chose to become the god of wisdom after he hung 9 days from Yggdrasil. Odin possesses superhuman attributes such as strength, speed, agility, reflexes, durability, and is immortal, having lived for millenia.
However, he can only be killed by powerful beings or divine weapons, such as Fenrir. Odin’s powers and abilities are significantly superior to those of other Asgardians, making him a formidable force in the world.
Who is the magic man in Vikings?
Harbard Vikings has two main theories: he is a Norse god, possibly representing Loki, Odin, or Thor, or an ordinary man who causes trouble in Kattegat by running around with their women. The most likely theory is that Harbard is the Norse god Loki, known for his chaos and shapeshifting abilities. Like many Norse, Greek, and Roman gods, Harbard was known for sleeping in the realm of humans, which caused uproar in Kattegat.
Instead, Harbard in Vikings is shown to have mystical, god-like powers beyond understanding, likely representing Loki. His purpose in the story may be to show the friction and confusion caused by conflicting Western and indigenous religions in Viking society while providing a sense of purpose and healing.
Did Vikings practice witchcraft?
The Viking Age seeresses, who were believed to be predecessors of medieval witches, lost their function with the introduction of Christianity. The Danish word for seeress, “vølve”, referred to witches, and their rituals were associated with dangerous magic. Laws were issued in the Middle Ages to suppress pagan rituals and forbidden magic, but it was not entirely eradicated. Today, seid is used in various ways by various groups and networks.
Did Vikings believe in god?
The Vikings believed in numerous gods and goddesses with various abilities, including war, hunting, fishing, weather, grain growth, love, and child-rearing. Odin, the king of the gods, had one eye and was known for war, magic, wisdom, and runes. Tor, the son of Odin, was the god of war and fertility, known for his magic hammer, Mjølner, used in battle. Tor created thunder and lightening, providing rain for peasants. Tor was the most popular god, and many Vikings wore small hammers as jewelry or amulets. Odin, with his one-eyed appearance, visited the world of men, Midgard.
Does magic exist in Vikings?
Viking magic practices, also known as Seiðr, were a significant part of Norse mythology, involving spells and rituals for divination, prophecy, and altering fate. These practices, deeply rooted in Norse beliefs, were used for various purposes such as protection, healing, and battle success. The practitioners of these rites, often called seers or volvas, held significant positions within Viking society.
Understanding Viking magic practices provides insight into the Viking way of life, beyond their reputation as fierce warriors. This fascinating aspect of Norse history and culture offers a deeper understanding of the Viking way of life.
Do gods exist in Vikings TV show?
Vikings, a historical drama, has been a popular show for six seasons, making significant references to Norse mythology. The show’s narrative is loosely based on Nordic and Icelandic lore and legend, with the titular characters resembling the fates of Norse gods. The show’s initial focus was on the legendary warrior Ragnar Lothbrok, who later became his sons Björn Ironside and Ivar the Boneless. A sequel/spinoff series, Vikings: Valhalla, is expected to release later this year, set almost a century after Vikings.
The show aimed to be as historically accurate as possible, but most of the primary characters were infused with mythic resonance due to the lack of complete historical records. This allows for the incorporation of various sources of Norse paganism, including medieval manuscripts, archeological representations, and folk tradition. The show has recreated every Norse myth with regards to its titular characters.
How realistic are Vikings?
Historical fiction often involves altering plot lines and characters to create compelling drama, but much of it is based on fact, including costumes, sets, and weapons. The Vikings’ world is open for interpretation, but many events and characters are real, including fictional ones like King Forkbeard. Historical consultant Justin Pollard helped craft the authentic elements of the story, writing an outline of what actually happened and then suggesting a story that could have happened at the time. Discover the true stories behind the axe-bashing series with insights from Stuart and Pollard.
Is Floki a god?
The hypothesis posits that Floki, a skilled shipbuilder and a figure of ambition, may be Loki, the god of mischief, masquerading as an ordinary individual.
📹 Ancient DNA reveals the truth about Vikings – BBC REEL
Vikings are often thought of as ‘pure-bred’, blonde-haired, and blue-eyed warriors who changed the course of European history.
Despite the use and practice of seidr, Odin still wasn’t seen as Ergi or “unmanly”. It’s more or less an allegory for shameful acts and a way to orally pass traditional values. such like the stories of Loki being used to teach children gender roles (aka the story behind slepnir, changing into fulla in the death of Baldr or convincing Thor to wear a brides dress to get his hammer back.) Not to mention he is literally called the “alfodr” and the mad god. Good article otherwise bub.
As a person of 100 % Norwegian background, I find this program fascinating. My great grandfather Kolnes whose picture I have looks like a Viking from a picture book. His name was Enoch and he received a medal from the king of Norway for saving the lives of a shipwreck in the Stavanger area by rowing his rowboat into the north sea and saving people from shipwreck on the rocks.
There are currently plenty of norwegians a swedes who are not typically blonde, yet their facial features are distinctly belonging to their countries. Sure, blondes are more common in nordoc vountries than elsewhere but Scandinavians are no where near exclusively blonde. Norwegians especially have all sorts of spectacularly “tall, dark and handsome” types and a fascinating array of deep dark blue eyes instead of conventional greyblues or clears. In fact you’ll probably find more “typical” blonds in westrussians than in Norwegians. There are just a lot of assumptions anout what scandinavians look like.
In the early 90s I spent 2 years in Pamir, Karakorum and Hindu kush mountains. In some of the most remote and isolate valleys I’ve met indigenous people with blond hair and blue eyes, we know that the Azores in the middle Atlantic ocean was inhabited 2000 bc so imo no doubt of the indo-european migration theory and much more frequent contacts than previous thought between ancient peoples. These people were more capable travelling long distances across land and sea than anyone believe.
Interestingly, when Thor Heyerdahl visited Azerbaijan and Caucasian region, he was shown the ancient petroglyphs (Gobustan) of boats on the western shore of Caspian Sea, strikingly resembling the Vikings’ ones. He also met people there with blues eyes and pale skin (living in mountains of Azerbaijan), which have legends of their ancestors sailing with these boats to the North. But Norwegian historical science never accepted Thor’s hypothesis of migration from Caspian to the North along Volga river and further. It died out. Hopefully, someone starts his work again.
I note that there was very little mention of Scotland, for some unknown reason. The Vikings in Scotland were from Norway and they ruled the north of Scotland, the Northern Isles (Orkneys and Shetland) as well as the Western Isles (the Hebrides). Those areas were all part of the Norwegian kingdom. Norwegian genes are a larger part of Scottish DNA than Danish DNA is in English DNA.
The trouble is, in these days terms like The Dark Ages have been re-defined, in order to be more historically correct and accurate to the period. So the Dark Ages are now the “Early Medieval Period”, AD and BC have now been re-defined as BCE (Before the Current Era). And yet, all the historians have not yet got to grips with the fact that the term “Vikings” is not only (largely) a more modern term, but is a completely un-defined term, which can include various different peoples in various different activities (or not, depending on the commentator), with no strict definition to categorise them. So working out “The Truth About the Vikings” is like trying to find out where all the slaves came from, in history, and what their ethnicity was. Define what “Vikings” means FIRST, then you can work out where those defined groups or individuals originated. Otherwise, taking a small sample of individuals from a certain place in time and history, establishing their origin, then claiming that you know where all the “Vikings” came from is nonsensical. Because how do you know if they were Vikings or not, and how do you know if that small sample is true of all the “Vikings”? You can’t know, unless you define what “Vikings” were.
“Vikings are often thought of as ‘pure-bred’ “not sure where you guys come up with this kind of assumption, however blonde people were very rare and relatively speaking they were more common in the north same as gingers. By the way in all popular depictions they are show to interact a lot with many cultures, as expected if you travel the world in your little boat. Had to watch it to the end, science mixed with politics….
Viking was a profession more than an ethnicity – But still only a Norse profession. The Vikings that went to conquer England never actually called themselves “Vikings” but only referred to them as “The Danes” because they were from Denmark. Viking raiders were Scandinavian. It’s not like there were Southern European or African Viking hordes, nor were there brown or black people among them. But dark hair and dark eyes was very normal like we see in Scandinavia today. Blue eyes and blond hair was more apparent than in other places in the world, but never dominant. That is only Hollywood fiction. Long before the Viking age, Scandinavia had DNA from many places which makes up the Norse gene pool in present time. So the “diversity” they talk about here is nothing special and shouldn’t be news, nor is it what they make it out to be. It’s basic probability theory that no European race is 100 percent pure. White people come from somewhere else like anybody – They didn’t grow from trees lol
Altogether now, “Genetics and culture are not the same thing”. This should be the headline of nearly all such studies. Europe, or even just the U.K., is replete with examples of invaders adapting to local cultures and assimilating, locals adopting the culture of the new overlords who killed off their aristocracy, cultures blending to produce hybrids etc – and all of that being overlaid onto changes – if rather less dramatic changes – in the underlying genetic composition of the population. One of the best examples – and relevant to this piece – is what happened to the Norse who colonised and dominated the islands and seas of western Scotland, coastal Ireland and Scotland and the Irish Sea for several centuries. They became the “Norse-Gaels” a hybrid culture. Norse disappeared. The last ruler of the whole territory, in the 12th c, was Somerled “Lord of the Isles”. His sons divided it between them and their descendants became some of the most powerful and numerous of Scotland’s clans – who thought of themselves as Gaels and who retrospectively claimed Somerled as a Gaelic hero who resisted the Vikings. But the echo of the Vikings is still there – From Wikipedia: “Since the early 2000s, several genetic studies have been conducted on men bearing surnames traditionally associated with patrilineal descendants of Somerled. The results of one such study, published in 2004, revealed that five chiefs of Clan Donald, who all traced their patrilineal descent from Somerled, were indeed descended from a common ancestor.
Just wanna add, because I find it interesting, but ‘Viking’ comes from the Danish Vik, meaning bay or inlet of water. So Viking/ Baying would be an active action of travelling from bay to bay or town to town. Wic could also refer to a settlement, harbour or village from the Latin Vicus, York, was referred to as Eoferwic, Berwick is still called Berwick, Norwich, Ipswich, Dunwich etc. So ‘Vikings’ were anyone in northern Europe and beyond who actively travelled from town to town for whatever pragmatic purpose, trading or pillaging.
The Vikings also lived on the southern coast of the Baltic Sea on the Polish side, the daughter of Mieszko I Świętosław (Sygryda Storrada born in 968) was the wife of the Vikings king Eric the Victorious (1 son), second husband Swen Widłobrody. She had 2 sons with him, Harald (King of Denmark) and Cnut the Great, one invaded England and the other stayed on the throne after his father. The language and runic writing of the Vikings / Etruscan is a Slavic language, the so-called runes Polish researcher, archaeologist Tadeusz Wolański 1785-1865 read inscriptions on Etruscan monuments. After writing the book, he received the protection of the tsar – a battalion of the Russian army (Poland was under partition), who did not leave him a single step so that he would not die for reading Etruscan inscriptions.
We know what what the Vikings looked like because their little-changed descendants are still with us today. “It’s not ethnicity that determines whether you’re a Viking or not, it’s a lifestyle.” In other words if we redefine the word Viking to mean anything we want it to mean, then the Vikings weren’t Northern Europeans. A bit like saying because people around the world (unfortunately) wear American logos on their clothes and adapt many American fads they’re American citizens. Defining a people’s history out of existence in service to eventually putting them out of existence.
My brother did a test called the BigY that only men can take that will reveal the dna from the paternal lines a lone. Prior to this test, earlier tests revealed that he carried a mutant gene that has been found in the Scottish Highlander Kings. They were fraternizing with the Vikings long, long before England. Our ancestry is now included in this specialized research and study along with thousands of others. They found that my great grandmother was of Viking heritage.
I think research like this skipped the social system like it was back than. Slaves, vikings, lords, nobles, kings. If you don’t know whether you’re sampling any of these, or even worse, perhaps viking burials of those they’d slain, you cannot come to such strong conclusions. The logical reason the diversity decreased in the scandinavian region is because the import of slaves and wives, stopped at some point. You cannot conclude anything without knowing the social status of the ones you’ve sampled. This does sound like a (weak) attempt to justify mass migration, something the EU seems to love (and why there was money available for such a weak but costly project).
It would be useful if the BBC linked to the research. I did a search on Google scholar and cannot find relevant articles by Eske Willesley or Martin Sikora, so it is impossible to assess their claims or the BBC’s interpretation of them. I know David Reich argues that European populations are made up primarily of hunter-gatherers, farmers from Anatolia, and the Yamnaya from the Steppe. I would expect Viking DNA to reflect that, but who knows if we can’t read the research discussed in this package?
Yeah, the Scandinavians spread across the world and married people of other cultures, above all the British isles, today’s Russia, etc. That’s been known for a long time. It doesn’t mean that the Scandinavians were a recently “mixed” people. The population was mixed in the sense of it being a product of Yamnaya peoples who invaded Scandinavia and the neolithic farmers. Norway and Denmark has a majority distribution of R Y-DNA whereas Sweden has majority I, former being Yamnaya, latter being neolithic farmers. These people in the program want to make it seem as though Scandinavians were comprised of Afghans, Africans, Mediterraneans, which is just not the case.
😂 The Vikings were super diverse! Most of them from Central Africa and they accepted everyone from across the world as Vikings, no matter where they were from! Amazing BBC work. Also, they never invaded coastal towns. The Coastal people, mostly from Pakistan, invited them to increase their artistic variety! If I send this script in, the BBC will have me writing for them within two weeks!
One of interesting things is our modern usage of the word viking. The people of Scandinavia were known as Norse. When they went raiding they were going vikings or going on a viking. My usage is no doubt not completely accurate. But my understanding is they used viking as a verb. Modern usage is more of a noun. If you were tough enough to join a raiding group you could go on a viking no matter your ethnicity. You could stay in Scandinavia and be simply Norse. Of course there is a lot of crossover in names and terms.
There is no doubt that Scandinavian Vikings were taller and blonder than the others. However, those who settled abroad married local girls for the average man and local princesses for their chiefs. The interest of local lords was to tie friendly relationships with these rich traders. That means that the Vikings born overseas were very often only “half Scandinavian”. Even the chiefs and second generation may have been only a quarter Scandinavian. On the continent, the Vikings opened their ranks to any volonteer wishing to get rid of the Franks. People from Saxony, Frisia, Bretagne and Aquitaine joined Viking troops to fight the Franks. This is the reason why they were so efficient. Their scouts and spies were locals.
I am an ethnic Dane. I have brown hair and unusual facial features for one. I have been asked several times where I come from. My family on both sides were common farmers in Denmark as far back as any records go and up until my parents. And they stayed in and married people in the immediate area. According to family history on my mother’s side, they have been there since before the marshy land rose, which is 600-800 years ago. And yet there is this line of people in my mother’s family, with brown hair and these facial features. We look very much like each other. 2-3 people in each generation. I am curious about where it comes from, but I am not convinced that DNA testing would reveal anything. Because sometimes you are just a brown-haired ethnic Dane – not all ethnic Danes are blond with blue eyes. (I did suggest to my mom that the look might come from the Polish seasonal workers in the 1800s. She vehemently denied that it could be the case. Because that would have meant that, ahem, someone believed to be the father, wasn’t 🤭).
I’m from Orkney, and even though Orkney passed out of Norwegian possession into Scottish hands over 500 years ago, Orcadians still think of themselves culturally as more of a Norse-derived society. Biologically and geographically closer to Scotland, but even now, many Orcadians don’t refer to themselves as Scottish or British.
I dabble in linguistics. I find it hugely interesting that when Danes speak English, the cadence and rhythm of their speech reminds me very strongly of Yorkshire, Northumbrian and even Liverpool English. There’s something about it. Once you notice it, you can’t unhear it. It’s fascinated when you stop and think that there were a lot of danish people that settled there in the late first millennium. Clearly, their language left its mark on the English spoken there.
My mom’s side of the family is Norwegian which I very much favor, but my dad appears very Native American. He has always been told that he was about 1/2 Native American. He wanted to have a DNA test done and low and behold his black haired, tan skinned self is 25% Scandinavian and the rest a combo of Irish, English, German, and 1.1% Western Asian. We all had a great laugh. Genetics is crazy!
This doesn’t change our understanding of history. This provides evidence of what we’ve long understood to be historically accurate. In a brief and very oversimplified explanation, Scandinavians abducted a wide variety of people from many lands during the Viking age. These people largely were enslaved, as has been the rule throughout most of human history. Many of the abductors and their victims had children who shared DNA with the ancestors of both parents… I really shouldn’t have to say that part, but there it is. These children, unsurprisingly, sometimes chose to emulate the lifestyle of the conqueror rather than the conquered. It doesn’t prove that the people we call Vikings were a diverse and inclusive group of globally minded people so much as it reinforces the well documented fact that they preyed on, plundered, and ravaged almost indiscriminately throughout the known world, the genetically mixed offspring of which then joined the ranks and continued the tradition. A number of abductees may even have joined their kidnappers in future raids, as was commonplace with Barbary pirates, Caribbean pirates, countless invading armies and navies throughout history, etc. If you want to show shocking evidence that we’ve been wrong about the genetic makeup of Scandinavians during the Viking age, the way to do that is by showing evidence of large scale diversity before that age and the abductions associated with it had begun. I do understand the need to portray this as overturning our understanding though.
In the times of the Byzantine Empire, it was common for Scandinavians to go to the Black Sea area to work as mercenary soldiers for the Byzantines. At the same time, there was possibly an arrival of “Scythians” from the steppe of what is now the northern Black Sea coast to Scandinavia, carrying burial mound culture and even the Indo-European language (the true Scandinavians possibly spoke something similar to present-day Finnish)
Interesting stuff. As an Englishman with a paternal heritage from one of the most famous Scottish clans, it came as no surprise that my “English’ and ‘Celtic’ DNA came back fairly equal – roughly 35% each. The surprise was the 20% Scandinavian (with a little bit of Finnish) and the 10% Eastern European!
My junior high world history class taught how the Norse, apparently Swedes in the article, traveled down the rivers into ancient Russia establishing settlements and trading with the local people. That was being taught around 1987-1988 so it was before genetic progress with the human genome project. It does require scientists to realize that there will be interbreeding when two groups live with/near each other. These guys did not change anything. They only verified what should be commom sense. The Celts (of Norse descent?) had established ports with maps showing how to get to South America by traveling across from Africa. There is proof of their traveling with Cartageans after Rome attacked Carthage circa 146BC. They traveled up the Amazon with evidence of settling in Peru. Likely influenced stonework used in constructing Machu Picchu and Chachapoya among other places. Very interesting show about that. So the Norse (and Celts) have at least a millenia of traveling and interbreeding with people around the world. Just as long as it did not involve cats amd dogs living together. . . Mass hysteria. . . surely announcing the returm of Gozer.
BBC keeps muddling the water by saying that Vikings were not homogeneous. Of course that’s true where they ended up at, being southern Italy or Russia but those who didn’t leave their native land were very homogeneous and surely had blond hair and blue eyes, two traits that can still be found nowadays in Scandinavia.
The Viking’s were more like a band of mercenaries and so one would expect that all kinds of people from various geographies were attracted to the mercenary life-style esp in those days and vikings were excellent sailors so I would have been surprised if there was no genetic diversity revealed in this study
There’s no confusion about who the Vikings were. Nobody’s claiming they were a monorace so I wonder where BBC gets that idea from. Northwestern Europeans are the 1st or 2nd most diverse in the world (the other is Ashkenazi Jews. Sorry I lost the source on that, so I don’t know which is 1st place or 2nd place but it doesn’t matter much). Proto-Germanic U106/R-L48 groups from around Friesland go up the coast around 1,700 BCE and take over, likely by invitation. From these people we get the language, Odin, boats, farming and much more. Proto-Germanic U106 groups are 5,100 years old and of that, R-L48 is about 4,700 years old. The dominant culture of Scandinavia is R-L48. R-L48 and I1 (native Scandinavians) and subsets of R1a Baltic-Slavic formed the peoples of Denmark, Sweden and Norway. From 1,700 BCE to about 500 BCE, things progressed. In the coastal areas, U106/R-L48 and I1 blended to some degree, becoming something new: Coastal North Sea Germanic Scandinavians. They built boats and ships, much, much earlier than the Viking Age. Jutes from Denmark, under Hengist, founded England in 449 CE. They even got up to Orkney at that time, all in rowed keel ships. They can’t tell a first wave Angle (or Jute) apart from later wave Danish Vikings by DNA. Just becase some Vikings joined in for work, from say, Belarus, or others in Orkney were part Pictish (and part Norwegian) does not discount all we know about Viking whatsoever, it only expands and confirms what we already know, if we think accurately.
I believe these are extremely unscientific biased conclusions.. As it is widely documented that Vikings and general Germanic tribes were known to raid and colonise large areas of Europe, and some areas of Africa, Asia and North America, this could and most likely just mean that the colonising vikings mated with local women and due to their supposed genetic and social advantage of warriors had loads of children in those colonies throughout the world and that might explain why those ancient Viking remains have portions of DNA similar to people across the globe. Also, bear in mind that ruling/warrior dynasties tend to have different genetics than the people they rule over. Think Lizzie II. Thus, I would be very wary of jumping into the conclusion of a rainbow crewed Viking ship sailing to Hollywood. Again, the image of a pale-skinned blue-eyed blonde Viking warrior might also be wrong.
I’m shocked but not surprised. The Vikings were motorcycle gangs with boats. Mostly Nordic pirates. Gang life is harsh, and it takes a fierce personality, as well as a powerful physique. I doubt that every Norse born male could fit that bill. Like all gangs, they were probably not above taking suitable recruits from wherever they could find them.
I understand that you want to be able try and dilute what it means to be Scandinavian to try to include migrants from the other side of the world that has arrived in the west the past decades, but you don’t have to basically lie about the conclusions. What the research actually states is that, if Scandinavian men married a woman of a different heritage, the vast, vast majority were other Europeans. The thing with blondeness i can kind-of see, since the Scandinavians valued attractive, blonde women to bring back from raids, which in turn slightly increased how common it was. We know that the Scandinavian DNA hasn’t really changed much at all since the viking age, don’t try to mislead people into believing anything else.
1. When graves survive usually they’re given elaborate burials. Common graves tend not to last so you’re selecting for elites who are more likely to mix through arranged marriages for alliances. Thus this study greatly overestimates the admixture of the Vikings. 2. All the admixture is European. So because the Vikings took back some English girls that means race isn’t real white people don’t exist and somali’s need to be in Sweden. 3. The fact that they don’t link the study and that it’s behind a paywall shows the dishonesty of this. Make a claim, but don’t show you the evidence.
I’m an ancestor of the Vikings during the Landnám period, with traceable ancestry back to the 11th century. There was almost no additional added DNA, according to the records, except some Danes in the 17th century. My DNA is basically what you would expect. 100% European with 99.8% northwestern European which comprises of 79.4% Scandinavian and 20.4% British, and then 0.2% Ashkenazi Jewish. My maternal lineage is Scandinavian and paternal lineage is British, which is the opposite of what is expected of my heritage. 🙂 I have straight dark brown hair and almost black eyes, and almost no one in my family is blonde, but the majority have light colored eyes.
The ‘Vikings’ were also Finnish, as a group lead by Rollo invaded and took over Normandy. South Normandy had leaders like Harold “the Dane” of Avenel – from Denmark. So the Norman conquest wasnt the French but another invasion by the Danes and the Scanda-Navy-ans. Even though we already had Danelaw.
Interesting idea. So we all have 2 biological parents, 4 grandparents, 8 great grands, etc. So I took this “doubling” of ancestors back assuming 4 generations each century, and I think by the year 1200 I was descended from about 4 billion individuals. So this is obviously more than the population of that year. So we at the same time more “related” and probably “diversified” in terms of inheritance than we all think.
It’s funny that they are financing research into subject that is already clear. It’s nothing new. Social phenomen of going viking wasn’t related to Scandinavian peninsula and local Scandinavian populations only and for that reason it’s logical, that there would be diverse genetics. If we are speaking about genetics, then it was already clear from various researces done already, that faire and blonde traits was more pronounced in local peoples from Eastern Baltic. All this research cleared was pinpointing concrete people groups.
Ok. If there are any youngsters out there perusal, unfamiliar with these kind of BBC claims: They could suggest that some of the active vikings were actually crossdressing, pashto-speaking Namibians, and none of us can be entierly sure about it. The surprising truth about the vikings… We simply know very little about it, and therefore i call agenda-driven PC bull on this. You knew more about vikings before you watched this. Thanks
It doesnt seem surprising at all to me. I dont think the vikings had the same thoughts on being “pure breed” like we do today. I’m swedish but i took a DNA test that showed me that Im actually norwegian before swedish, then im finnish and 2% indian/pakistani. And my long lost relative was a viking woman buried at Birka on my mothers side.
I can’t see how “scientific interpretations” can be used in defining identity. The modern Scandinavian debate on identity has nothing to do with the Vikings. I’m an Icelander and we are obcessed with story telling of vikings and elfs and kings and currupt clans. But that does not define our identity. The language and religion and local politics has defined our identy. These three main assets are under a constant threat and that makes some grabbing these straws of past alleged ancetral history that may or may not be real. That gives us fake partial identity. I find the same happen to those that come to the west from other parts of the world that they grab from their own past some thing that can boost their not so preferential status. Same with failed academics that take pride in a narrow world view and want to inflate it onto the rest of the population. Multiculturalism is that kind of narrow world view that has no base in reality but is a pure mental construct. Very unpractical but rhetorically sounds nice.
I am 56% English, 37% Scottish, 6% Irish and 1% Finnish. After looking into it though, I do share DNA with a lot of burial sites of ancient Swedish people and Danish Vikings that were executed in England. There’s plenty of Norwegian burials too that share DNA with me. It’s hard to say those “Swedish” people back then were 100% Swedish though, maybe they were 25% Gaelic/Saxon or Celt. I am happy just to know where my DNA is plotted around the Earth when compared to ancient burials. My grandad has hands now that are permanently balled into a fist. Like he’s trying to hold onto something and he cannot open his hands. I am also getting this, even in my early 30s. Then tendon of the hand is pulling my little finger closed. My GF has 7% Scandinavian DNA and shares DNA segments with people buried at Floki’s first Iceland settlement. That person was of Gaelic/Celtic ethnicity but was buried with weapons that suggests they were a warrior.
I do not know if anyone has mentioned this; I only just now watched the article and I see that the number of comments is moving toward 5000. The article does not really get clear about “how life was back then.” In raiding and conquering, a lot of men are dying and women are being captured and brought home, so to speak. Back then, Vikings were slavers as were so many other forces to be reckoned with in Europe and beyond. It was the way of life, pretty much. The exchange of DNA was not pretty. These were not high school dances and sweetheart affairs. War was brutal, life was brutal, and whole populations were being shuffled about into the larger whole. And no, this is not something that happened overnight or after one raid, so to speak. Killing all the men or enslaving all the men, or carting off all the children, or grabbing all the women, and so on, was a thing that added up over time. Sure some people escaped. By the way, this is what the Russian Federation is doing right now. Men are being grabbed from the far reaches of the Federation and sent to battle. Prisoners are sent to battle. Most of those sent to battle die. The Russian Federation even has a second army behind the army in front. You try to dodge away from the frontline, your own army will shoot you down. Children are being deported. Women and others are being deported. The Russian Federation had planned on killing all of the leaders and intellectuals and subduing the rest of the population. Why bring in immigrants from the south if you can just hop over the border and grab women and children and slaughter men.
Yes vikings did integrated with others then scandinavians, but the blond hair thing was most common amongst svear and some of the norwiegian tribes. Also they have done racial research and found that in ancient Sweden all people had the blue eyes and blond hair gene. Also when Sweden did racial research on modern people they found that about 60-70% if not more of all swedish people was homogeneous. Also the reason why scottish people had similar life style can be because celts and germanic people lived with eachother (some of them) and that dosent make them vikings. Also the danish person should know that viking just means people that live in the bay and was just an old norse word for it, so you can say that about any people almost because most people had farmers, warriors and traders. What made a norse viking was that they lived after the 9 virtues of asatrun and the 9 charges of asatrun abd yes they brought that to, others of course
I had my DNA analyzed and I must say the results change as time goes by. My point is recently Norwegian ancestry was added, but with a statement of not enough samples to be certain. Interestingly, my cousin from my Mother’s family has this finger contraction so maybe the DNA results are accurate. Also, when I read my results I knew this Norwegian DNA would be from my Mother’s Father. By the way I am of Italian ancestry.
I am Icelandic and recently took a DNA test and found out I´m 89% Nordic and 11% Scottish/Irish, probably from slaves taken by the Vikings. I know this because my people are from a very remote part of the country and I don´t think anybody ever met a foreigner let alone procreate with them. I´m a redhead and a lot of my relatives are too 🙂
None of this is news here in Scandinavia ~ it has been known for decades, even centuries. “Viking” is a profession like “pirate”, so anyone can join in. The Viking certainly started in Scandinavia, but quickly included Celts, Balts and Slavs, as the closest other “barbarian” (pagan/non-civilized) peoples. The Norse were tribal, identified by immediate family, intermarried with neighboring tribes whereever they went, including non-Norse ~ had no sense of “nationality” or “ethnicity”. There are lots and lots of sagas from Ireland and Scotland, as well as the Eastern Baltic telling these exact stories. The genetic results in this report are more of a confirmation of what was already known from historiological and archaeological studies. Why report it as some sort of ethnological “gotcha” moment?
My grandmother’s grandfather was a 7′ Dane from Copenhagen. Ive always thought he would have been terrifying if he had been a viking. Did the height get passed down through our family? Not too much. His son emigrated to the US and married an short irish girl who had emigrated to the US around the same time. We have a lot of 5’+ people in the family with the tall ones being mainly men.
Vikings had Asian DNA and southern European DNA ? Some people in Viking Age burials (some of them with Viking grave goods), had local ancestry, or had local ancestry mixed with Scandinavian due to Vikings marrying locals and/or absorbing Viking culture . Hence some of the samples look very Scottish or Polish or mixed or whatever else because Vikings went all over the place from Scandinavia, trading, raiding, and settling, and yes they were the ancestors of modern Scandinavians . The way this study was presented in the media was extremely misleading, especially as it simply confirmed what had long been predicted : Norwegians went west, Swedes south east, Danes to England . Unfortunately the reality was obscured by the 21st century obsession with identity politics .
My take: The Vikings were initially Scandinavian seafaring criminal gangs, who went viking and gradually became a culture of toxic mansulinity and piratery,. Once the cult got going and Viking seemed successful, they had signons from everywhere they went. They had their own religion with Thor at its center, which glorified death in battle; even a lot of people in the homelands believed in it. Young maidens wore silver Thor’s Hammer pendants around their neck. Only later on did the Scandinavian groups which gave birth the Viking phenomenon try to occupy rather than just raid places overseas. There certainly seemed to be a lot of people willing to do practically anything to leave the homelands at that point, and they fanned out to many places which, it turned out, were climatically hostile. Parts of England was the target of one of the groups of migrant Scandinavians, where at least climatic conditions weren’t quite so hostile as, say Greenland. They lived there in tense proximity to the non-scandinavians, sometimes fought with them, and eventually they were expelled as a political force by King Harold a few days before the Battle of Hastings. A few Scandinavian migrants survived in England, who eventually assimilated. Questions?
“Viking” was a verb, not a noun. It was something you did, not a description of your ethnicity. In particular, due to a shortage of women, many Scandinavians who went Viking were highly prone to take wives and concubines from other ethnic groups. For example, historians long viewed Icelanders as the “purest” Nordic people. But genetic studies have shown that the original settlers of Iceland were primarily Nordic males and Celtic females (most likely from Ireland).
I always thought I was English Irish and French. But my dna test says mostly Scott’s and northern Western European. Which includes Viking. The geographical map includes Denmark Scandinavia and Iceland. My tree goes back to Edward I and the kings before him. All the nobility married only each other so I guess that’s why Viking genes still show in my tree even though it shouldn’t because it’s too many generations back. My family has lots of red hair. So did the kings.
Perhaps the heterogeneity of the DNA can be better explained in the context of what the coastal pillaging really meant — rape. If the mainstream portrayal of Vikings is correct, these coastal raiders took back not only food and goods, but also women. If you find that the mtDNA (mitochondrial DNA that is only passed from mother to child) is diverse, but much lower variation in Y-chromosome DNA (only passed down from father to son), then the case can still be made that the Vikings were very similar people, at least on the male side.
My paternal grandmother was born in Bergen and immigrated to America. My grandfather was born here but he was 1st generation as both of his parents were from Oslo. I never knew my grandmother as a young woman so I’ve only ever seen her hair as gray but her eyes were brown and so are my father’s. He and his father had dark hair but grandpa’s eyes were ice blue. My mom’s side of my ancestry is said to have Irish, possibly Scot-Irish,and Native American. Her people never said anything about Norwegian or Viking lineage but there could have been some in there apparently from the Scot-Irish connection. I’m getting my DNA done soon and it will be interesting to find out the break down for certain.
The Vikings captured both slaves and women for wives. When they captured women for wives they took them with heir infants. Which is why the mt-DNA of Icelanders has such a high representation of Irish mt-DNA. My birth name is Old Norse, still a forename in Norway. And both mt-DNA and Y-DNA are Irish.
Just to be clear In Western European we do not need to “Rethink” our image of Vikings being Blond haired Scandinavians….They were, what they are in fact dishonestly representing here is that the Viking culture spread far into Eastern Europe and even Asia and people’s of those lands were unsurprisingly genetically similar to the people’s living there today. They are not as they’d like people to believe uncovering graves in britain or Iceland of Vikings with Asian ancestry. Propaganda at its worst.
We know that Odin took his people from the land of Aeser “close to Caucasus”, somewhere between the Black and Casian seas.(sounds so familiar to any person from AZerbaijan). They were Scythian, I am pretty sure. The wolf totem, the shamanistic rituals, the runes, the strawberry blonde genes that originate from Siberia, the equality of men and women, the warrior lifestyle, etc etc etc – all connects Scandinavians to Turks. We definitely have common ancestry somewhere down the line. Too many similarities in our original ways, prior to Abrahamic religions adoption
A few descendants of captured southern European women doesn’t make the ancient Scandinavians oh so diverse. This was also not a representative sample, it came from one isolated place at the Swedish coast. The people further inland were not mixed and diverse at all, this has long since been established in other genetic studies. Another piece of selective, biased presentation and junk science.
Great Socialistic Point of View 😂 no facts, no numbers, … only said that a lot (what is a lot?) show resemblance of Southern Europe (considered same group of people=European) and Asians which is normal as the Swedish Vikings went to Asia. Why is in a Viking serie the head of the Vikings an african? Some historical objectiveness might be nice? What’s next the Samurai played by an African or European with Orange hair?
I don’t think anybody has ever suggested that vikings genocided every living people they met during their travels and populated the areas with their children born in Scandinavia. And of course being viking was a “lifestyle”. It was a culture with it’s own custom, traditions and religion. If one became fully part of that culture, other way than being a slave, why wouldn’t he/she be a viking?
At one point north africa or europe viking areas composed of black and white and inbetween… and a rule came out against vikings targeting christians or dark skin.. so the dark skin Viking during a chase or epic importance vs the roman army.. sacrifice their lives.. so the white skinned vikings would deliver the truth..
The reason they were darker haired was because there was more people from western Scandinavia active, to this day Norwegians have darker hair due to Ancient Hunter Gatherer admixture. So the various hair colours of Scandinavians including red hair is actually all native to the region. The same goes for eye colours and some Scandinavians are tan and some are pale. Why? Theres 3 major ancestral groups to modern day Scandinavians. Western Steppe Herders (Yamnaya, higher admixture than most Europeans) Early European farmers (lower admixture than most Europeans) Ancient Scandinavian Hunter gatherers (higher hunter gatherer percentage than most other Europeans) I find it hilarious that “””””researchers”””” don’t know these things. Then again its Basically sage to say they seem to have an agenda…
The Vikings were 100 percent Scandinavian. They did bring back slaves and they eventually did mix with populations they settled with. This program tries to paint a multicultural picture of the origins of the Vikings, that’s wrong. They are right however to say the Vikings themselves became multicultural on their journeys.
The vikings were a somewhat diverse group of people, they were from Scandinavia, Finland, Estonia and around The Baltic Sea area. This is true, even concerning the fact that in Finland there are 400-700 viking swords found (the exact amount is unknow), some even from the Ulfberth sort. There are viking settlements in Estonia etc. The myth that vikings were only from scandinavia is not totally true, they were the most famous tho.
This didn’t really explain anything. Remember that in the Iron Age, Scandinavians did not refer to each other as Vikings. Sweden, Denmark and Norway were divided into several kingdoms. And they rarely fought together. The mention of attackers at Lindisfarene was Norse. And Norse is translated directly into Norwegian. And Norwegian is translated directly into Norwegian. Og norsk er oversatt direkte til norsk. And Norse is translated directly into Norse. Og norrønt er oversatt direkte til norrønt. So, when testing DNA, you must always keep the old division of the Kingdoms in mind. The excitement of DNA research should be learning about who it was who settled in Norway, for example. Were there Roman soldiers who fled and settled in Norway? The Norse were the first warriors to have shield walls in battle. So did Roman soldiers. It is reasonable to believe that Norse are direct descendants of Roman soldiers. The question is whether DNA research can provide an answer to that. Preferably do not include Sweden and Denmark in that research. And don’t refer to Norwegians as Vikings.
Im a proud Norse-Gael 🇮🇪🇧🇻💪The Norse–Gaels (Old Irish: Gall-Goídil; Irish: Gall-Ghaeil; Scottish Gaelic: Gall-Ghàidheil, ‘foreigner-Gaels’) were a people of mixed Gaelic and Norse ancestry and culture. They emerged in the Viking Age, when Vikings who settled in Ireland and in Scotland became Gaelicised and intermarried with Gaels.
Why does the BBC always try to make Europe seem like it was always inhabited by non-Europeans or that Europeans have no distinct identity of their own? Every group has some outside DNA mixed in but the Viking were Norse Europeans and no other group gets to claim that heritage. ‘Diversity’ is not what defined being a viking.
My grandparents emigrated from Norway so I was curious to learn a little more of my viking heritage. Not gonna lie, it got real sus real quick as soon as I heard pure blood race. I mean come on you just gotta know thats a super loaded term… I should probably watch more than a few seconds before I go launchin’ sideeyes prematurely but eek EDIT: OK the topic of discussion is specifically focused on evolutionary genetics and heterogeneous diversity and reexamining certain notions and mental images we have of what they looked like etc … I see where they were going with it. Its just shiver ya know. An infamous term/catchphrase used by certain groups.
Well, there’s a surprise, I was expecting the BBC to have come up with research which proved that the Vikings were in fact a sub-Saharan African tribe. Nearly sixty years ago at school, I was taught that the Vikings were not a people, but that ‘viking’ was a verb. That is people, mostly from Scandinavia, went viking, which involved raiding, robing, raping and trading the spoils. As taking slaves was one of the most profitable parts of raiding and they traded goods and slaves as far south as Constantinople is it really a surprise that the odd drop of Asian blood turns up? As for Vikings being blonde, blonde hair was by no means unusual amongst the Scandinavian Vikings, but, unless you take your whole perception of them from the Thor character in Marvel Comics, red hair has always been more associated with them: look at the people of Viking heritage with red hair in eastern Ireland or Scotland. So what exactly is surprising about this new research? The title should have been: New Research Confirms What We Always New About The Vikings.”
Your haplogroup is: I Born between 35 and 28 thousand years ago, haplogroup I represents one of the first peoples in Europe, having several descendant lineages that spread throughout the European territory during the last Ice Age, having its maximum frequency in the Balkans. It is one of the most numerous haplogroups among European men, being the second largest paternal lineage found on the continent (second only to the R lineage). Its I1 branch is related to Nordic Europe, ancestral to the Germanic and Viking tribes, while I2 is strongly related to Neolithic cultures. Y-chromosomal Adam 160 to 120 thousand years A: Africa 140 to 90 thousand years BT: Africa 85 to 60 thousand years CT: Africa 80 to 60 thousand years CF: Out of Africa 75 to 60 thousand years F: Exit from Africa 62 to 57 thousand years IJ: Parent haplogroup of I and J 45 to 30 thousand years I: Eastern Eurasia 35 to 28 thousand years
I mean. Literally every single European populations are a mix of Mediterranean (Anatolia) and Asian (Steppe and Caucasus) admixtures. People who came into Europe, always had to do so from one those two places. And obviously, they were less blonde, because blondism was largely selected and breed into existence already in Europe, so it kept increasing over time.
My family is French..Canadian. We have records going back to the 1100s in some cases. So we know our lineage and can prove it with records. My family was in the second group to settle Montreal in 1653. I am descended from at least 9 French soldiers and 8 of the kings daughters. Still I am genetically about 48 % English because my Grandfather and dad married women born in Scotland when they moved to the US. We know of no Englishmen in our Families ( clearly we must,but we don’t know who they are and how they could be related. )… The French part of my family married Spanish, Romanian and Arabic men and women before leaving France centuries ago . I can believe at least some French Canadians could stay French Genetically if they stayed in the old French areas around Quebec and Montreal where many French descendants live . … Any Geneticists can tell you… you could be surprised who you are genetically related to. Thanks for your comment.
Grandparents were all swedish, but my ancestry dna came back as two main areas with about 20% remaining divided into scott, irish, german and some others but two main ones were scandianavian and jewish, but no family tree indicaters of jewish people. so somewhere back down the line, my swedish ancestors mixed with jewish people. always baffled mr why i have this dna. this kinda explains alot.
While the idea of genetic diversity is something I agree with, there is still a primary racial/geographic component to most Vikings and that is based in Scandinavia. As the Vikings moved out and infiltrated and replaced other cultures, of course they intermingled and obtained the diversity. Ironically, this intermingling of genes strengthened the Viking stock. An isolated human population is always an unhealthy one.
As far as i know vikings descend from the lower Danube river and are most likely from the thracian tribe Getae!!We the bulgarians are also closely related with the Getae too as it was massive tribe for its time on territories of today North Bulgaria,whole Romania,Hungary,Austria,Czech!!In the end split,most likely because roman and mongol invasions some go north,we stayed there,others went to Germany(Goths)!!
My eyes are hazel (male) but most of my female relatives have blue eyes. Apparently the Kievan Russ when they invaded Sweden and parts of Denmark and Norway, brought the blue eyed gene with them. And killed the males and enslaved/married/bred the females. I have two pure Norwegian grandparents and one pure Swede grandparent, but if I do a DNA test it should be very interesting.
BBC of course think the Vikings are diverse, but things is they took slaves back home. Some were lucky to get married with a Scandinavian/Viking and ended their slave life. I think is is taking it too far saying there were people from southern Europe and Asia in Scandinavia. If you can get all the slaves you need from close by (Baltic, Britten), why get they longer away? It is not a surprise that Vikings who settled down in places, mixed with the locals. The world wasn’t diverse locally back then and it wasn’t in Europe just 50 years ago.
Over hundreds of years, Vikings captured many female slaves and took them back to Scandinavia. Their progeny could have been allowed access to Viking membership, altering the native genetics. Introduction of traits through the female line can be tested by genetic analysis. In bronze age Spain the invaders killed the men, mated with the women and their children become members of society. Similarly in Arab cultures.
The Vikings were sailors who travelled and traded over the known world. They believed in peace-weaving, which is mending divisions born of conflict with marriage. Sailors hop on and off ships to go wherever. Like with the ‘shockjng’ revelations of the Mary Rose, this is not news. In fact, when you apply an iota of thought, it’s bleeding obvious.
Viking wasn’t just a life style, it was a job. It was something you went out and did. You literally went a vikingr. If you lived in an aired cold rocky part of the world where nothing grew well and no modern amenities then you had to do what you had to do to survive and provide for your family. Viking does not apply to all ancient or current Scandinavians, literally anyone of any background or culture could be a Viking, despite what some bigoted and hateful people think or believe.
It seems nobody wants to admit they are blondes. Then where did they come? If Scandinavians were so so diverse, then how it is nowadays 70-80% of population in Scandinavia are blonde haired? Sure among Vikings by their life style were also Finno-Ugrians (east) and Western Slavs (south). Less perhaps Greeks, Turkish people etc.
So as we all know the Vikings were very well known for raiding parties. These raids were to capture resources such as women, slaves, food, gold and other such things. So as an obvious result the captured women would have children with the men who captured them. Obviously this was a barbaric system but it was quite common in many cultures to capture women in cases where there were not enough in local communities.
Guys, this material is shown as scientific and proved by researchers, but in fact in current Scandinavia situation it may serve the goal of acceptance by Scandinavian people adoption of diversity. If Vikings were multiracial then why not Scandinavia can’t accept influx of migrants from different regions of the world? All were Vikings indeed? In the situation of demographic changes that now taking place in scandinavian countries its at least striking.
OK, so a DNA-ethnic Scot/Pict, who is a mix of a bid of mesolithic Hunter Gatherer with some neolithic Anatolian Farmer with most early Bronze Age Steppe Herder, was found in a settlement on an island between Scotland an Scandinavia that had Scandinavian Viking-type culture. And the same nature-paper from 2020 shows that the Danish and Norwegian vikings themselves were mostly a mix of a bid of mesolithic Hunter Gatherer with some neolithic Anatolian Farmer with most early Bronze Age Steppe Herder? Hm, does not sound like such a ground-breaking scientific “diversity” discovery to me.
Than it means those are related to Turkics. The Native Englands are Turks. The body was not in the ground, that means it is a Kurgan. From Turks. Odins family was Turkic, he comes from Tyrkland(Turkland). And went to Scandinavia and mingled there with the local people. The Runik alphabet is also Turkic. It actually looks more like our Turkic Orhun alphabet. A writing system derived from the Turkic writing system. Gene D. Matlock – What Strange Mystery Unites the Turkish Nations, India, Catholicism, and Mexico?
I’m surprised that BBC possibly got it right without tarnishing it for political motives. And as far as the sweads going to the Baltic, I remember it the other way around, the aryan race in the Russian stepe north of the Baltic migrated north after the glaciers melted and settled in what is now Scandinavia.
the Scandinavians, the Norse or the Northmen had a rich enough culture and society that they were not only able to enrich other cultures without dehumanizing themselves or doing that to others and in doing so they maybe were able to survive much much longer than even their competing cultures or enemies thought was even possible some of these early barbarians were working for romans then some romans screwed them over at times and that didn’t bade well for the Romans and it really secured the potential downfall of what was the scattered what was left of the Roman empire at that point the sacking of Rome was like “you don’t love us anymore now look what we are going to do”. Im a big fan of the Norwegian band Bathory ‘s music and how Quorthon or Thomas Forsberg and the songs that he composed songs like dragon’s breath and the blooded shore or father thunder mother earth that band was very good at creating a visual of his country where he was from and it definitely came across in their music