When Longships Sailed: Vikings AD 800-1100

Reviewed by Paul Rice

When Longships Sailed: Vikings AD 800-1100, 2d ed. (Time Life, 1998). Hardcover, 192 pages.

This 1998 book from the editors of Time-Life Books (no author listed) is filled with excellent color photography. This is the 5th Viking book I've read now, and it's not oriented specifically towards military history readers, but towards a general audience. It's actually quite good. This book generally reinforced much of what I've read in other sources, which I won't rehash here.

Starts off with a timeline from 793 to 1264, a 1200 word summary, and a map of Europe. Divided into three chapters, each with an "essay" at the end, yielding:

Stirrings in the Homeland (Gods and Giants)
Taking Europe by Storm (Birth of the Viking Ship)
To Iceland and Beyond (Prized Possessions)

Tells the story of the Vikings mostly from the Sagas of individuals, such as (later King) Harald Fairhair (Halvdanson) and the object of his desire, Gyda (Eriksdottir); Queen Asa; Ottar (of Halogaland); Rigthula, the Norse myth of the peopling of Midgard by Hemdall (going as Rig), which I had not read before; Kveldulf and his sons Thorolf and Skallgrim, and King Harald; myth of Sigurd and Regin; the Irish tale of Thorgils; Aud the Deep-Minded and her odyssey to Iceland; Rolf the Ganger; Harald Hardradi, the Rus Yaroslav the Wise, and the three women vying for Harald, Empress Zoe, her niece Maria, and Yaroslav's daughter Elizabeth, and Harald's later exploits in England; Hjorleif, Ingolf, the settling of Iceland and the founding of Reykjavik; Gunnar and Njal, and Gunnar's troublesome wife Hallgerd; King Olaf Tryggvason; Thorbjorg and Gudrid.

These personal stories and sagas give good descriptions of Norse personality traits. They also stress the self reliance of Vikings and their small farmsteads. Many of the stories include blood feuds, and some of these feuds practically depopulated communities. We learn beserkers were also shape shifters. Introduces the jarls as a group of people, the upper class, which name later became "earl" in English. We learn about Swedish trade, and about wedding rituals.

We also learn that under Norse law, which was determined during the thing, most crimes were punishable by paying of a fine. Killing a man in a fair duel was not even a crime, although ambushing him or attacking him when he was outnumbered or without weapons was murder. Murder was not punishable by death but by banishment, although theft of livestock was punishable by death.

Arab traveller Ibn Fadlan describes the poor hygiene of the Rus as the filthiest people he's ever met. One wonders how Norse the Rus were in that time frame.

The book translates "Gall-Gaedhil" as "Foreign Gauls." The glossary states, "an Irish faction which, according to legend, renounced Christianity and joined the Norwegians in their pagan rites. Also called foreign Gaels."

Book claims the origin of the word "slave" is because the Vikings rounded up the stone-age Slavs in such great quantity. Webster's Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary and Shipley's Dictionary of Word Origins both state slave comes from slav but through Latin and French, because the Romans and Franks drew their slaves from the slavs.

About 1/3 of the book is about Iceland.

I forgot that Vikings drank out of horns because a horn can not be placed down. The man has to either finish it or pass it to the next man.

This book claims that only half of the warriors slain in battle go to Odin at Vallhalla. The other half go to Freya. The Norse had a lot of gods of war, but, oddly enough, no gods of interpretive dance. :-)

Concurs on the story of the Vikings attacking Paris.

Again explains that the reason the Vikings raiding England primarily attacked churches, monasteries, abbeys, etc, is because that's where the money was. Why do people rob banks?

The Vikings were great players of board games.

At the end were a glossary and pronunciation guide -- quite helpful.

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