Browse Items (45 total)

  • Tags: Daily Life

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This PhD thesis examines how houses were used in the Viking Age and medieval period, and compares archaeological evidence with the medieval Icelandic sagas.

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A photograph of a turf-built house in Iceland of a style that would have been common in the Viking Age

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The Icelandic horse is a breed of horse from Iceland that developed from horses taken to Iceland by the original Viking settlers. It is small, often pony-sized, but very hardy.

Pagan Scandinavians ate horse meat as part of their religious…

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Sheep were an important source of milk, meat and wool. The cloth made from wool was even a form of currency in Iceland during the Viking Age. Wool was gathered by plucking the sheep or by collecting it after it had been shed naturally. They did not…

Manuscript_Audhumla.jpg
An image of Auðumla the legendary cow that licked Odin's grandfather Buri from the ice and from whose udders milk flowed in streams. This milk nourished the giant Ymir, the first creature to be created in Norse mythology.

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The goddess Freyja rode a wild boar called Hildisvíni and the god Freyr owned one called Gullinbursti. This is a nineteenth-century imaginative recreation of what Freyja might have looked like riding her boar.

Pigs were a source of meat in the…

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Dogs are known from the Mesolithic period onwards in Scandinavia. They would have been used by the Vikings as guards, hunting animals, and even as pets. Dogs similar to the Norwegian Elkhound are known from the Mesolithic period, and remains of…

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Hnefatafl was a board game played by Vikings. Although no Viking Age rules are known, it is thought to have been similar to Tablut, a game recorded by Linnaeus in Lachesis Lapponica (1732). This record has been the basis of a number of reconstructed…

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The reconstruction of the hall at Borg shows how large the greatest Viking halls could be. Originally built in the 500s to a length of 67m, it was rebuilt and extended so that it was 83m long by the beginning of the Viking Age. This is the longest…

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The photograph shows part of the interior of a Viking house. The man is sitting on one of the 'benches' that ran down either side of the house. In most houses these would have provided both seating and beds with the whole household sleeping within…

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The Icelandic Saga Database is a website dedicated to making the sagas of the Icelanders available online. The sagas are predominantly in modern Iceland, but some are provided in Old Norse, and translated versions of many are available in Danish,…

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Knattleikr is a game known from the Icelandic sagas. It's rules are not known, but it is known that it involved a bat and a ball, and that people could get injured playing it. This article discusses an attempt to recreate the game.

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A small boat of approximately 37cm in length has been interpreted as a child's toy. This one was found at Winetavern Street during excavations by the National Museum of Ireland.

The Viking Home.pdf
PDF file of the exhibit page The Viking Home

Entertainment.pdf
PDF file of the exhibit page Entertainment

Trefoil.jpg
This is a stunning Borre style Trefoil brooch found in Wiltshire, one of over 20 on the Portable Antiquities Scheme's Database. To view the full record and associated metadata, go tohttps://finds.org.uk/database/artefacts/record/id/276198

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A Viking comb and a bronze pin found at Larne, County Antrim, and are on display in Ulster museum, Both items were found in 1840 in a male Viking grave dating to the tenth century.

Although television and film often depict Vikings as muddy, filthy…

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The Hørning stone (DR 58) was carved by an emancipated slave in honour of his master. The inscription reads: tuki : smiþr : riþ : stin : ift ¶ þurkisl : kuþmutaR : sun : is : hanum ¶ kaf : kul : uk :…

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Discussion of how metal fittings would have made their owners more noticeable in the dim light of a Viking Age house.
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