In the Norse myths, the moment Odin sat high on the throne of Asgard, he became all-knowing and ever powerful, as written by Snorri Sturluson in the Prose Edda . He is the Allfather who lives in all...
Three ancient Viking hall type structures of Norse power have been scanned at a Late Iron Age royal burial site in Norway. Borre is located in Horten municipality, Vestfold County, on the western...
Much of the modern world is very worried about climate change and it appears that Vikings were also very concerned about changes to the climate. Researchers now argue that one of the world’s most...
Vikings are often seen as heathen marauders mercilessly targeting Christian churches and killing defenceless monks. But this is only part of their story. The Vikings played a key role in spreading...
The early history of Norway, and Scandinavia in general, is characterized by powerful seafarers, traders, and warriors and by rich heathen mythologies and ambitious chieftains . The fierce sons of...
Archaeologists in Norway have uncovered a particularly odd burial. They have found two Viking boats in one grave. The second burial was placed in the grave some 100 years after the first ship burial...
The Isle of Man is a small, beautiful island in the Irish Sea and is a self-governing British Crown dependency. This island has a rich history as it is associated with the Vikings and has many...
Runes are the characters of the earliest written alphabet used by the Germanic peoples of Europe called Futhark. The runic alphabet was used within Germanic languages but primarily in Nordic...
The Egtved girl’s remains were found in an oak coffin in a peat bog at a Bronze Age archaeological site near Egtved, Denmark in 1921. Her remains have been dated to 1370 BC, but the story of where...
Ragnar Lothbrok was a fearless Viking hero who ransacked England and France and fathered the Great Heathen Army. However the historicity of the man with “hairy breeches” is subject to debate. Where...
The Sámi are the northernmost indigenous people of Europe. For thousands of years they have lived in an area called Sápmi - the northern sectors of Norway, Sweden, Finland, and the Kola Peninsula...
The box bed, sometimes known by its French name of lit clos, is a bed built into a piece of furniture. It looks curious to us today and it’s somewhat of a novelty to climb into bed and shut the doors...
One of the three children of Loki by a giantess (jötunn ) named Angrboða, Fenrir plays an imperative, though short, role in Norse mythology. A wolf of remarkable size and strength, Fenrir has one...
Kulning is a vocal art with its origins in the forests and mountains of Scandinavia. It was first used as a method to call back cattle who were left free to graze in the wild landscape, but it is...
When Danish archaeologists started to survey the site of the proposed Femern Belt link tunnel in 2015, they discovered a 5,500 year old ceramic vessel imprinted with the fingerprint of the craftsman...
If you’re from the British Isles, do you ever wonder if you’re a descendant of the marauding Vikings known sometimes to rape and pillage far from home and other times to set up settlements and...
In Scandinavian folklore, there are numerous races of beings, the best-known of which (apart from human beings) are the gods and the jötnar, their nemesis. In rather simplistic terms, these may be...
In the late 8th century, a group of Scandinavian sea nomads took to the sea and tormented Europe and Asia through their terrible acts of piracy. Thankfully, by the early 9th century, their piracy...
Ancient objects with rare Viking rune inscriptions have been discovered in Denmark. Experts suggest that the runic inscriptions could possibly shed new light on a very important period of the early...
Vikings in history and popular culture are known as strong and dangerous, bloodthirsty killers, raiders, pillagers – pirates of land and sea. But who were the Vikings, and what were the causes of...
Vikings struck terror into the hearts of many in Europeans—and their reputation still lingers today when you ask a person to describe them. The answers given are that they were violent, hairy brutes...
Scandinavian mythology claims the Kraken swallowed up whales and devoured ships. It has been described as a huge version of an octopus or squid. Legends have even claimed the terrifying sea creature...
By THORNEWS In 1943, extraordinarily rich finds from the Viking Age were made in Haugsbygd in Ringerike, Eastern Norway. The finds included – among many other objects – the only helmet dating back to...
"My fleet sailed from the mouth of the Rhine eastward as far as the lands of the Cimbri to which, up to that time, no Roman had ever penetrated either by land or by sea, and the Cimbri and Charydes...
