Scan barcode
A review by kiwi_fruit
The Age of the Vikings by Anders Winroth
3.0
This book a nice serious scholarly work, with great attention to the sources but not great as an introduction. The content is not organised chronologically, but by theme. The information is presented as discursive essays, with each chapter spanning decades or even centuries, sometimes covering more than one topic. Some chapters are better than others.
Winroth often challenges the veracity of long-held views of the Vikings and their practices putting them down as “creations of a vivid imagination of the high medieval writers”.
He presents interesting theories based on the latest archaeological evidence; the sections on the “Farm beneath the sand” and Osberg burial site were fascinating. I also found the chapter on economy and commerce well explained with the parallels between East and West carefully analysed.
Though the content is extremely interesting and well researched, the author’s style is somewhat dry. I overall enjoyed reading this book but I would not recommend it on its own to someone who is not already familiar with the subject. 3.5 stars.
Favourite quotes:
Viking Age emigration from Scandinavia was not driven primarily by population pressures at home, as is often imagined. Populations always tend to grow, but such growth is typically balanced by famine, war, and disease, as Thomas Malthus (1766–1834) postulated. People may always feel pressured by the lack of opportunity at home; what made the Viking Age different was not exceptionally great pressures at home but the appearance of real opportunities elsewhere.
It mattered that the Vikings brought into circulation silver and gold that had been hidden away in ecclesiastical treasure-houses, but we must not exaggerate the impact. Church plate had always been taken to mints and melted down when a bishop, an abbot, or a king needed cash, so it was never permanently withdrawn from the economy when placed in a treasury. More important for the early medieval resurgence of commerce in western Europe was the central Asian silver that Scandinavian merchants brought to Europe.
Although no exact statistics are available, it seems that Scandinavians and others who exported slaves, fur, and other articles to the Arab Caliphate and Byzantium rectified for some time the lopsided trade balance between western Europe and the East, stopping or perhaps even reversing the flow of silver and gold that had been leaving the western economy. The influx strengthened the European stock of silver, the coinage, and thus commerce. It was during the Viking Age that the European economy slowly began to grow again, eventually, in the modern era, leading to Europe’s economic, political, and cultural hegemony.
Their power over people extended so far that they could no longer maintain the kind of personal friendships that the gift economy of previous centuries promoted. Instead, they needed military and administrative structures to run what increasingly looked like older European kingdoms. The Church was the best organized institution in Europe at the time, and kings received help from clerics to build up their royal administration. Chieftaincy based on charisma and friendships yielded to organized and administrative kingship, although for a long time both “systems” existed in parallel.
Winroth often challenges the veracity of long-held views of the Vikings and their practices putting them down as “creations of a vivid imagination of the high medieval writers”.
He presents interesting theories based on the latest archaeological evidence; the sections on the “Farm beneath the sand” and Osberg burial site were fascinating. I also found the chapter on economy and commerce well explained with the parallels between East and West carefully analysed.
Though the content is extremely interesting and well researched, the author’s style is somewhat dry. I overall enjoyed reading this book but I would not recommend it on its own to someone who is not already familiar with the subject. 3.5 stars.
Favourite quotes:
Viking Age emigration from Scandinavia was not driven primarily by population pressures at home, as is often imagined. Populations always tend to grow, but such growth is typically balanced by famine, war, and disease, as Thomas Malthus (1766–1834) postulated. People may always feel pressured by the lack of opportunity at home; what made the Viking Age different was not exceptionally great pressures at home but the appearance of real opportunities elsewhere.
It mattered that the Vikings brought into circulation silver and gold that had been hidden away in ecclesiastical treasure-houses, but we must not exaggerate the impact. Church plate had always been taken to mints and melted down when a bishop, an abbot, or a king needed cash, so it was never permanently withdrawn from the economy when placed in a treasury. More important for the early medieval resurgence of commerce in western Europe was the central Asian silver that Scandinavian merchants brought to Europe.
Although no exact statistics are available, it seems that Scandinavians and others who exported slaves, fur, and other articles to the Arab Caliphate and Byzantium rectified for some time the lopsided trade balance between western Europe and the East, stopping or perhaps even reversing the flow of silver and gold that had been leaving the western economy. The influx strengthened the European stock of silver, the coinage, and thus commerce. It was during the Viking Age that the European economy slowly began to grow again, eventually, in the modern era, leading to Europe’s economic, political, and cultural hegemony.
Their power over people extended so far that they could no longer maintain the kind of personal friendships that the gift economy of previous centuries promoted. Instead, they needed military and administrative structures to run what increasingly looked like older European kingdoms. The Church was the best organized institution in Europe at the time, and kings received help from clerics to build up their royal administration. Chieftaincy based on charisma and friendships yielded to organized and administrative kingship, although for a long time both “systems” existed in parallel.