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Viking Age Denmark

Sunniva

Sunniva

Administrator Emeritus
Hi Lila P,
(and everyone else interested of course),

Well, life in Roskilde in the AD900-years must have been exiting. We're in the beginning of the forming of the Danish Empire, Christianity and Paganism is still living relatively side by side.

Roskilde is not so different from the other major towns (Ribe, Hedeby) in that it's very vibrant, almost a metropolis - on a small scale of course, but you would have heard many different languages spoken there by foreign merchants.

We have graves from the area which we are most likely muslim graves. It gives an impression of the mixed ethnicities.

I will have to do a little more research to tell you about Roskilde in specific, but in general it must have been like the other big Viking Age towns with wooden streets, the small farmstead-like houses with yards facing the them.

Walking through that town you would walk through different quarters, most in your interest would be the handcraft-section. Pearls are very common in this period, so are combs and other personal accesories. I would have to stress the beautiful fibulas (needles to fasten dresses and capes) egg-shaped in elaborate patterns.

Today one of the sights in Roskilde is the a museum of "viking ships" (most of the wrecks are not war galleys, but for carrying goods and were just by ordinary merchants), they have all been excavated from the Roskilde Fjord.
Here's the link for the museum: http://www.vikingeskibsmuseet.dk/en/visit-the-museum/

I would love to help you investigate this life if you want to :) This has been very general, but I will only be happy to help you answer more questions (or validate) if you have any specific questions.

Look forward to hearing from you! :)
 
Fascinating. :) So Roskilde was much more international than I've imagined.

For others, this is what we are talking about:

Lila P said:
I don´t really remember anything of my Danish life, but I still am quite sure, there has been one. I´ve been digging out of information from my subconcious by using a pendulum as a tool. You can ask questions, and the answer must be in yes/no/no answer -form. I´ve tried something more sophisticated as well, but I won´t go to details now.

So this is pretty much what I got by this method: A male, born in Roskilde, Denmark in the late 10th century, died in Bury St. Edmunds, East Anglia (England), at old age. Worked as a craftsman, may have been a shipbuilder as well - some kind of an engineer of those days. He didn`t have a wife or children (I haven´t figured out why yet).

After doing some research I was really surpised of the information the pendulum (or my subconcious) had given me. Well, this was a typical viking life, Danish vikings did sail to East Anglia those days and lived in that city. Historically, all the information I got, could have been true.

Obviously I participated some battles as well, those days the Danes tried to conquer England. And or course, that´s what they got, Sven Forkbeard and his son Canute the Great ruled England until Canute´s death (1035).

What can you say about life in Roskilde-area around the year 1000?
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There are also other clues except the information I've got by working with the pendulum:

1. During a very upsetting moment years ago, I could "see" an axe in my hand. It looked like viking style. Do you know any links to viking age weapons?

2. As a child, I entertained myself by studying foreign alphabets from an Encyclopedia, which we had at home. The runes were absolutely the easiest ones, it took about 30 minutes to memorize them. There is something very familiar in these letters and I think that I've been able to read them in a PL(s).

3. A possible PL dream, but it could be just my imagination. When I saw this dream, I was already aware of this suspected viking life.
 
One more thing just occured to me:

it´s very likely, that I´ve worshipped Odin in a PL(s)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Odin

In this current life ravens and crows have introduced themselves to be my spirit guides in a dream about two years ago. I didn´t know then, that these birds were connected to Odin until someone said so quite recently (I use raven/crow as an avatar in another discussion forum).

And I have to say that the themes connected to Odin are very much reality to me in this current life... But that is another story.

Wasn´t it so that Christianity arrived to Denmark in the 10th century? So I may have been familiar with it, but probably haven´t been interested in adopting it to myself.
 
Religion

Hi again,

It is very likely that you haven't been Christian - at least not by heart. At the famous 'Jelling-stone' inscription we know that Christendom was at least introduced in the 900 years, but we also have other sources (from Ribe) that tells us of complaints from the heathen citizens, who thought the bell on the church was far too noisy.

It is most likely that most people around that time have worshipped both the Christian and the Norse gods. The best example is the graves. People are buried in the 'Christian way', that is without any gravegoods, but someone put a small Thors hammer down there as well - just to be sure :)

I will let you in on something quite controversiel (in Danish Archeology anyway) concerning Odin. It has been put forth that he arrived in the pantheon due to an earlier, failed attempt to introduce Christianity (likely in the 700 years). That he was actually the Christian God, mistranslated by people.

This is based mainly on the fact that we have depictions of all the other gods but him from the time before (especially Tyr is thought to be very old). However it seems that in 800 years and until Christian iconographs take over Odin is extremely popular.

Around the year 1000AD Christianity would probably be the official religion. I would think that those who still worshipped the old gods would do so in secret. It's even possible that their community would think bad of them. However that is mainly my own thoughts. However the signs of paganism are much much weaker at this point, almost completely absent, but that's not saying it wasn't there. Just that they had to be secretive and probably weren't well-seen in the community.
 
Runes

This is a very interesting subject and there is a lot of research going into that at the moment.

For those who didn't speak or write latin, but were educated enough to read and write, runes were probably used. They play a complex role, because we are not sure exactly how they were implemented in society, who used them and if they were used only for specific purposes.

Today we only have preserved runes from the Viking age on stones (like the Jelling-stone, you can google 'Jellingstenen' for pictures). They have been translated to texts like "Harald rose this stone for Bjorn" and the likes, but it's still debated how we can interpret them.

The more Christian the country got the more were runes only used for more peripheral purposes, like magic (spell-casting) or, actually, by handcraft-people - e.g. builders, who would write on the stones or timber to better organize the building process. We have examples of that later in the middleages too.

In the 1200 and 1300-years AD (and probably later too) runes were viewed as witchcraft only and closely connected to paganism, which was viewed as evil. That process had probably already begun around the new millenium.

But I bet that in those days, as always, there were conservative people, who thought well of the old ways and felt no reason to change anything. It must have been hard though to be well-accepted in a society kept in fear of the Devil.

So, as a conclusion, I'm afraid I can't give you a clear answer since we simply don't know to what extend runes were used. But they were used and probably a lot more than we know, but those writings simply haven't been preserved. As a man working with handcraft it is very likely that you would have known them and used them, I believe. Or perhaps connected to a more 'dark' side? Like spell-casting?

:)
 
Weapons

I have been looking online for pictures of weapons and it's not that there weren't any, but as a serious archeologist I have a problem with reconstructions made by socalled 'amateur-vikings', I simply can't show you a picture and say: yes, that's how looked.

(edited to add: Just picture googled 'viking+axes' and there are a lot of pictures of axes, reconstructions as well as authentic ones. Most of them are English and that is actually just perfect for you if went 'overtthere' :) )

But I *can* tell you that axes were very much used during that era. We also have swords and spears from this period though, so not everyone were running around with axes, but they were a popular weapon it seems for everyone from the ordinary soldier to the rich chieftain.
 
Roskilde

I just did some research on Roskilde and it turns out that Adam von Bremen has written that in 985AD Harald Bluetooth founds the first church in Roskilde. This is the church which is believed to be the fundament for the Roskilde Cathedral. Most of the churches were build around this time (at least 3 can be dated to be built around 1000AD +/- 100 years) and surely a town must have risen around them.

The oldest buildings can also be dated to around this time.

It was the seat of the king for many years onward and was actually the capital of Denmark until the kings moved to Copenhagen - it must have in the late middleages.

I hope this helps a bit. If you want information on houses or clothes or anything else please just say so, I'll be more than happy to help.

Have a nice weekend! :)
 
Thank you, very, VERY much, Sunniva for all this information.

I was already aware that Harald Bluetooth was the first Christian King of Denmark - I did some research concerning this life a few years ago.

I wonder why a famous Finnish cell phone manufacturer has given his name to a certain technology they use in their phones?? Bluetooth-technology, have you heard about that? Perhaps Danish vikings have mass reincarnated here in Finland?

However, I think that I was born during the reign of Harald Bluetooth.

I played a little bit with my pendulum again, and this is what it says about the runes:

Q: Was I able to read the runes in this life we are now talking about?
A: Yes
Q: Did I use them for magical purposes?
A: No

So I was familiar with them for some other reason.

And this is the obvious reason, why I sailed to England:

St. Brice's Day massacre
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The St. Brice's Day massacre was the killing of all Danes in England, as ordered by the English king Ethelred, on November 13, 1002. This eventually led to the invasion of England by the Danes under Sweyn I in 1003, as his sister Gunhilde was amongst those murdered. The massacre is described in the chronicle of John of Wallingford.

At the time, England suffered from repeated attacks by the Danes, and constant fear of invasion. England paid tribute to the Danes to prevent invasion. Frustration and, possibly, promises of support from Normandy, led Ethelred to decree the mass murder.

The name St. Brice apparently refers to bishop Bricius of Tours, whose memorial day is November 13.
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After this event Sven Forkbeard attacked England several times between the years 1003-1012. I may have been one of his warriors.
 
Yes, it was interesting. It would make sense, that there was some kind of military training before attacking England.
 
Sunniva said:
But they were used and probably a lot more than we know, but those writings simply haven't been preserved. As a man working with handcraft it is very likely that you would have known them and used them, I believe.
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I knew I had read about preserved rune messages on birch and wood - somehow connected with Novgorod, viking fonders of the first russian dynasty etc.
I found this on wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birch_bark_document
and more directly viking connected: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bryggen_inscriptions

So runes were very much used for everyday messages, and a few have miracously survived. :thumbsup:
 
Wow those are amazing! I actually didn't know about those 'documents' at all - they're really cool :)

However I would still be a little reluctant to say that runes were used by everyone all the time as an everyday way of communicating. We have examples of runes - like on weapons - where it's obviously someone who didn't know how to read runes. It's like a child trying to copy. Just rune-ish letters very much in contrast to other examples where names and sentences have been written on the weapons.

By the way: I'm going to a seminar next month about the massacre in England, november 13 1002! I'll make sure to make some good notes and share what I learn :)
 
By the way: I'm going to a seminar next month about the massacre in England, november 13 1002! I'll make sure to make some good notes and share what I learn
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WOW! It´s my lucky day!

I haven´t done much research lately concerning this life, but I guess it´s time to dig in to it again. :thumbsup:
 
That its so cool:thumbsup: . I love vikings...one day I dreamt that I was a viking princess or something like that, my father hated me for some reason, maybe it was because I was a rebel. Anyways he send a servant to drown me, it was horrible:( . I think he called me Fiona or Iona.
 
Interesting, Thalia. :)

I don´t love vikings and it was a pure coincidence that I found out that I may have been one.
I have most probably killed people in this PL and I´m not proud of that.

The funny thing is that soon after I was dead in this PL, I was reborn in France as a norman and started this conquering thing all over again. I have memories of a cavalry preparing for a battle, and I believe that it was a glimpse of the battle of Hastings in 1066.

BTW. Perhaps I already mentioned it, but I think that there´s a lot of dead and recycled vikings here in Finland.
 
Hi,

Sorry for not getting back - I'm in the middle of my exams, so a lot of energy is going into that.

First and foremost, I don't want to write too much, because I don't want to "lead you on", you know what I mean, but I think it's important.

You wrote in an earlier post that the sct. Brice massacre was the obvious reason why you went to England. The thing is that - according to the experts yesterday - the Danes were unsuspecting of the event, thus it became a massacre. They were simply unaware of the plot. I'm curious to know if you can elaborate on *why* you went to England?

The Danes in England could split into two groups: 1) were the Danes that by 1002AD already had been for something like 5 generations in what is called 'the Dane Law'. At this point they had probably married Anglosaxon women and were quite integrated in society, to use a modern term :)
2) were the raiding vikings. Their raids can be traced over a 10 year period before 1002. Twice the English king paid them to stop and twice they broke their oath. So, as an professor from Cambridge put it, in the end the English king and people were pretty irritated by the vikings. Thus the attack.

The experts did not believe that the massacre had involved *all* Danes present in England at the time, but only the raiding vikings.

So that is the historical background in very short :) Let me know if it strikes a cord with you. I'd rather you asked me question that we could seek to verify than just write it all down here for your subcounsciousness to soak up and make you believe stuff ;)

eta: I just read your above post again and thought suddenly that it may not have been the sct. Brice massacre you were in, but a following attack?
 
eta: I just read your above post again and thought suddenly that it may not have been the sct. Brice massacre you were in, but a following attack?
Click to expand...

Yes. The attacks were kind of a revenge of the massacre. It was personal for Sven Forkbeard, because his sister was killed there. I don´t know if my relatives or loved ones died there, but knowing myself, I must have needed a good reason to leave Denmark. I don´t think that I´ve sailed there only for adventure.

It´s also possible that I´ve experienced something dramatic in Denmark, which has given me a motive to channel my anger to something "useful". In this lifetime I got contact with my inner viking after my soulmate betrayed me - made me feel like a complete fool, and this released enormous amounts of rage. At that point I felt that I could kill anyone who comes too close to me. At this stage I also saw the weapon very clearly in my hand, and that was the classical style Viking battle axe. I was actually afraid of myself, but fortunatily my anger management methods have developed a little bit in thousand years. No dead bodies left behind this time.
 
The myth of Sven Forkbeards sister is unfortunately probably only a myth. There are absolutely no historical accounts of this lady other than the sources that were written by norman historians much later than the actual massacre (in the 1050's). These sources can't really be trusted at all since their political agenda is to give the conquest of 1066 a pretext. They really wanted to let the world know how foul the English king had been and that the norman conquest was 'God's Punishment'.

Sven, however, did come back to England several times after the massacre for whatever reason, and as you probably know, he did in fact conquer England in the end.
 
Well now that u 2 know a lot of vikings maybe you can help me...In my Vikink PL I saw two big coffins(or something like that) but they were made of stone and they had this serpent carved in them, very creepy and.....they were underwater:eek: . Maybe you know what that means?
 
Also this: "The serpent, or worm, that eats its own tail was seen by Viking culture as a symbol for the natural forces of land , sea and sky. Ouroboros was and is the name given the Great World Serpent, encircling the earth."
 
:eek: .Yeah its something like that but it was grey and it only had the drawing of the snake...I really can't say if it was the one that you said, because I couldn't see it very well. I was scared:o
 
I will do some research on it, but the vikings in England were apparantly buried in stone coffins with ornaments on them. I've only seen one picture of it and it was a few days ago, but I'll try to see if I can one in a book or something :)

The only thing that puzzles me is that they were underwater. Since the stonecoffins weren't to or from England they couldn't have been on a sunken ship, but I don't know.

I'll see what I can find :)
 
Maybe there was a flood or something? Thalia, any idea if it was deep water, or shallow or in the sea, in a pool, in a flooded tomb ...? Any idea who is in the coffin? A relative? A friend? Is it empty?

Can you get any more info do you think? I know it is a bit scary, but perhaps try to do a bit of meditation and see if you can get any idea of the events leading up to the scene?
 
Thalia, I was also thinking about your name back then - Fiona. I did some research and found out that this name is celtic in origin, it is not a typical scandinavian name.

So perhaps one of your parents was for example Anglo-Saxon or something like that. What do you think?
 
I will do some research on it, but the vikings in England were apparantly buried in stone coffins with ornaments on them. I've only seen one picture of it and it was a few days ago, but I'll try to see if I can one in a book or something

The only thing that puzzles me is that they were underwater. Since the stonecoffins weren't to or from England they couldn't have been on a sunken ship, but I don't know.

I'll see what I can find
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Ok, Thank You:thumbsup: .

Maybe there was a flood or something? Thalia, any idea if it was deep water, or shallow or in the sea, in a pool, in a flooded tomb ...? Any idea who is in the coffin? A relative? A friend? Is it empty?

Can you get any more info do you think? I know it is a bit scary, but perhaps try to do a bit of meditation and see if you can get any idea of the events leading up to the scene?
Click to expand...

When I first had the dream the coffins were in a deep water, it was in the sea. But when recently I had the dream again the coffins were almost in the shore in an island, I don't think there was someone near it. In the coffin there is a man and a woman, I don't know their ages. Something tells me death and murder...I'll try to find out :D

Thalia, I was also thinking about your name back then - Fiona. I did some research and found out that this name is celtic in origin, it is not a typical scandinavian name.

So perhaps one of your parents was for example Anglo-Saxon or something like that. What do you think?
Click to expand...

Yeah I did some research too and when I was going to put the name "Fiona" in the search I mistakenly put this
"Iona"..and it had to do with a place or a name I can't remember:o :(
 
Isn't Iona a small, rocky island off the west coast of Ireland?
It rings a bell for me, place-name wise anyway :)
 
Omg...and there is people in that island?:eek: Because the two coffins were like in the shore of an island:eek: :eek:
 
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