Why Were Vikings Feared

When one sees the word Viking, the mind firstly shifts to men who are uncivilized and unprincipled. Using evidence of achievements and victories will not only show how much they impacted Europe, but how sophisticated Vikings actually were. As Charlemagne’s empire ended, the people of Europe showed extraordinary resilience toward the new movements of the era. From 800 to 1200 CE, Vikings ruled medieval Europe. These Vikings, along with thick soil, are credited with shifting Europe from endemic violence toward cooperation and legal order. An attack on the Lindisfarne monastery off the coast of Northumberland in northeastern England marked the beginning of the Viking Age. Vikings began to appear in Europe due to Scandinavian raiders repeatedly visiting the Christian countries of Europe. At first they were content with just raiding lands, but soon they began to seize land and proclaim rule. They sought riches, not land. With this established rule, Vikings promised safety and began to reform the lands they had acquired. The people agreed due to starvation and possible attacks from eneimes. The new lands had a need for settled agriculture, defensive warfare and commerce. As the Vikings began to fulfill these needs they saw an expansion in cooperation and rule of law among the villagers.

In the article “New Visions of the Vikings” Heather Pringle explains that the Vikings that once shrouded in mystery and in the past few years their culture has come more comprehensible as we find more Viking burial grounds. The Vikings were the first to find North America and explore it and trade with the natives. They were farmers that survived off of their summer plundering and fall harvest. They weren’t a masculine idealistic society, meaning that they have a couple famous warrior maidens.

'Ravagers, pagans, ruthless," Time magazine claims on the Vikings. They were more than that. Without them history wouldn't be the same. They had trade routes from Iraq to the Canadian Pacific. They were Metalworkers. they were explorers "whose restless hearts brought them to North America some 500 years before Columbus." They were warriors. They were Democrats. Many people think of them as the men who worshipped Thor and had horned hats. Well one of these is wrong. Vikings never wore horned hats. They had great Hygiene. They slave traded. Much like Sparta their women had rights. Vikings were known also for farming.

For centuries Vikings have been known as warriors and savages who raided

The Vikings were a Germanic people who were known for how they executed their raids and the discovery of new territories. They raided, colonized, and traded in the conquered areas and had a thirst for new waters and a hunger for land. Because of this hunger, the most impact they had on western civilization was as discoverers and settlers of the New World. They discovered and settled in Iceland, Greenland, and North America. Each of these was impacted in some way or another by the Vikings.

Vikings came from three countries of scandinavia; Norway, Denmark, and Sweden. The term Vikings literally means ‘a pirate raid’, they get their name from a scandinavian language called “Old Norse”(BBC-primary history). People who go off raiding in ships were called vikings. Because of the raids and constant battles in many places they were often also called savages, traders, and explorers. In scandinavia they were also called Norsemen. During the time A.D. 700 to 1100(BBC-primary history),

Who the Vikings were explores how the Vikings lived. Their religious ceremonies, their towns, their exchange, marine, colonization and looting, however Vikings were additionally settlers, traders

Vikings were a group of people from Scandanavia (modern-day Denmark, Norway and Sweden) who navigated the North Atlantic and Baltic Regions, sailing to destinations in the south to North Africa, and east to Russia, Constantinople (“Istanbul”) and the Middle East, as ‘hit-and-run’ looters, traders and colonists. Notably, the Vikings were seen as a barbaric clan by their victims, especially to those in Europe with whom they had an imposing influence. Equally, as the Old Norse (the language of the Norsemen) translation of the word ‘Viking’ signifies, the Vikings were feared as fierce and ruthless pirates. However, most of these people may not have called themselves Vikings since only a few engaged in raiding and pillaging, which was seen as a

When most people hear the word Vikings, they immediately think of them being fierce and savage beings with no sense of humanity. Vikings are believed to be a bunch of people killing everyone and stealing their belongings, but this was not the case and that stereotype is far from the truth. They were more advanced than people imagine and there was much more to them. The Vikings were a very complex and advanced society due to their laws, social classes, and religion.

Stokstad writes about the Vikings: “for the next eleven hundred year's Vikings, together with Huns and Vandals, were synonymous with barbarian destruction, lightning raids and ruthless devastation of settled and pious communities” (Stokstand & Watkins, 172). They were warriors, seaborne raiders that killed inhabitants and pillaged towns. They are known for their efficiency and self sufficiency. The Vikings were not only fighters aiming for the destruction of the Christian church but farmers, craftsmen, merchants, and traders.. They are “handy with a club, nifty with a sword -- also, on the evidence, the Vikings wielded a mean pair of tiny pliers” (Gale).

Denmark, Norway, and Sweden are three countries from Scandinavia in which the Vikings came from. They were mainly farmers, fishermen and traders. Most Vikings had more than one son and it was tradition for the eldest to inherit and take over the farm. Since there was more than one son a lot of men had to choose between working for their brother or leaving to go find their own wealth and land.

The Vikings have been seen through history as some of the most ruthless individuals to have roamed the earth. From the beginning, the Vikings would go to war with each other over property. After their invention of the Viking long boat however, they were able to plunder other countries with ease. When the Vikings came to Ireland they plundered the churches on the whole east side of the country. The Vikings targeted the missions first seeing as they were the most easy targets to attack, with widespread terror the Vikings quickly took control of the east coast of Ireland and port cities.

Coming from Scandinavian countries, predominantly Denmark and Norway, the Vikings began raiding the British Isles in the late 700s (James). The Vikings primarily targeted monasteries, because that is where most of the wealth was concentrated (Loughrey). These raids were very violent, people were killed, and the survivors were sold into slavery (Loughrey). These violent raids earned the Vikings the reputation of barbarians, much like the Mongols a few centuries later in Asia. After some time, once the Vikings exhausted most of the wealth in the monasteries, they turned their interest into settling the British Isles (James). By the late 9th century the Vikings had conquered most of England (James). However, even though these Viking kingdoms did not last very long, the Scandinavians who resided there stayed. These Scandinavians would go on to change the British Isles in many ways. Despite the violent and negative impacts of Viking raids on the British Isles, once the Vikings settled down, they had a significant and positive peaceful impact on the British Isles culturally, politically, and economically.

The Viking Age was from 800 to 1050 AD ("Where Did They Come From?”). During that time the Vikings attacked, plundered, and created their own culture in Scandinavia and other islands. The very first Vikings were from Scandinavia and most of them left their homeland to seek freedoms and fortunes elsewhere (History.com Staff.). There are many famous viking leaders, explorers, and gods. Many people think of Vikings as uncivilized and bloodthirsty, but many of the things that people think about the Vikings are not true.

The Vikings were a group of Scandinavian raiders that were around from about the 8th century to the 11th. They mainly attacked the British Islands , the Frankish empire, England, but they also plundered places such as the Iberian peninsula and northern Africa. Vikings did not always settle into the places that they found, for instance after exploring North America they left the place never to return again. Even so, after landing on Greenland they colonized themselves there, and ancestors of the Vikings still live there today. So now that you know a little about the history of the Vikings lets go into detail about the specifics of the Viking age. (Peter Sawyer, Oxford Ill. History of the Vikings p. 1-19)