# Question regarding a cruel Viking practice. **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 24, 2018, 2:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-a-cruel-viking-practice/825008 "2018-11-24T14:46:11Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Son\_of\_a\_Rich](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/son_of_a_rich/32/5439_2.png) [@Son\_of\_a\_Rich](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Son_of_a_Rich)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2018, 6:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-a-cruel-viking-practice/825008/41 "2018-11-28T06:39:25Z")
Sounds like a pogrom activity. ---
**Author:** ![BenedictusXIV](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b19c9b/32.png) [@BenedictusXIV](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BenedictusXIV)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2018, 8:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-a-cruel-viking-practice/825008/42 "2018-11-28T08:10:46Z")
> [@davidmich](#): > > So what are we to believe? Were the Vikings dirty as the Christians and Ahmad Ibn Fadlan described them or this > [Cleanliness - Did Vikings Take Baths?](https://www.danishnet.com/vikings/cleanliness-did-vikings-take-baths/). Actually Ahmad also not(ic)es their obsession with combing their hair. “Every frickin’ day” I paraphrase. Apparently haircare was not big among Arab millennials. Regardless of their grooming and hygiene, I believe there is consensus under modern historians that the picture we’ve been presented about Vikings is not even close to reality. They were stinky but generally friendly. Definitely compared to some of the other armies marching around. ---
**Author:** ![rat\_avatar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rat_avatar/32/255_2.png) [@rat\_avatar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rat_avatar)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2018, 6:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-a-cruel-viking-practice/825008/43 "2018-12-07T06:42:15Z")
Note that Sigfrid and Charlemagne being in political contact before the raids and Peter of Pisa being sent to try and convert him are also well documented, the initial conversion attempts started way before the raids did. While the northern perspective is not captured, it is quite possible that there was also a political/religious reason for targeting monasteries outside of them being soft high value targets. > **[Translations and Reprints from the Original Sources of \[European\] History](https://books.google.com/books?id=_dY8AAAAIAAJ&lpg=PR24&ots=j1iXKs9M5g&dq=%22the%20impious%20lord%20of%20a%20pestiferous%20realm%22&pg=PR24#v=onepage&q=%22the%20impious%20lord%20of%20a%20pestiferous%20realm%22&f=false)** This news story says that more recent evidence of them being primarily traders. > **[Viking city: excavation reveals urban pioneers not violent raiders](https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/nov/20/artefacts-reveal-vikings-were-more-urban-pioneers-than-violent-raiders-ribe)** > > Excavations in Ribe, Denmark show that Viking culture was based on sophisticated production and trade. Is their brutal reputation unfair? While still not angles, most evidence seems to point to them being more similar to their other European counterparts than different outside of which god(s) they prayed to. Or to put that another way, the world was brutal at that time and the Vikings seem to not be uniquely so in that context. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2018, 5:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-a-cruel-viking-practice/825008/44 "2018-12-07T17:30:38Z")
Children were valuable as [slaves](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_Irelandhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_Ireland).It’s unlikely the Vikings killed their profits for funsies. ---
**Author:** ![md2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/73ab20/32.png) [@md2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md2000)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2018, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-a-cruel-viking-practice/825008/45 "2018-12-07T18:09:39Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > Children were valuable as [slaves](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_Irelandhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_Ireland).It’s unlikely the Vikings killed their profits for funsies. IIRC, Jonathan Swift pointed out many years ago there were other uses for Irish babies; no need to throw them away. ---
**Author:** ![Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slow_moving_vehicle/32/291_2.png) [@Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slow_Moving_Vehicle)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2018, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-a-cruel-viking-practice/825008/46 "2018-12-07T18:21:06Z")
I no longer have the book, so this is a weak cite, but I do remember Iain Moncrieffe in _The Highland Clans_ quoting a medieval Hebridean chronicle that told of Scots under the Earl of Ross, during a raid on Skye in 1261, who had “taken the little children, and laid them on their spear-points, and shook their spears until they brought the children down to their hands; and so threw them away dead”. He didn’t say his source, though, so I’d take that _cum grano salis_. Wikipedia quotes the line in an article about the Manx king Magnus Olafsson, and cites a 1995 article in the _Scottish Historical Review_. ---
**Author:** ![rat\_avatar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rat_avatar/32/255_2.png) [@rat\_avatar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rat_avatar)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2018, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-a-cruel-viking-practice/825008/47 "2018-12-07T18:46:49Z")
> [@Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](#): > > I no longer have the book, so this is a weak cite, but I do remember Iain Moncrieffe in _The Highland Clans_ quoting a medieval Hebridean chronicle that told of Scots under the Earl of Ross, during a raid on Skye in 1261, who had “taken the little children, and laid them on their spear-points, and shook their spears until they brought the children down to their hands; and so threw them away dead”. He didn’t say his source, though, so I’d take that _cum grano salis_. Wikipedia quotes the line in an article about the Manx king Magnus Olafsson, and cites a 1995 article in the _Scottish Historical Review_. The problem is assigning only to one side. While I have stated that I think the behavior is the probably the unfortunate norms of the time, if we go by what is written down Charlemagne wanted to act like a true king of Israel and this resulting in the ‘Massacre of Verden’ in 782, where he ordered the death of 4,500 Saxons is the earliest known act of “barbarism” in these related groups I can find. While there is not enough information to say with certainty it is unlikely that the raids that followed these attacks weren’t in part used by the Vikings to justify their actions. Perhaps even if the events you mention above are historically accurate they were in response to mass murder committed by the attempts to forcefully convert people to Christianity. History is written by the victors, but in this case the victors routinely resorted to massacres in the name of a _“peaceful”_ faith. The claims of moral failings are almost universally reserved for ones opponents, just as it is in modern times. ---
**Author:** ![Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slow_moving_vehicle/32/291_2.png) [@Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slow_Moving_Vehicle)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2018, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-a-cruel-viking-practice/825008/48 "2018-12-07T19:22:21Z")
> [@rat\_avatar](#): > > The problem is assigning only to one side. While I have stated that I think the behavior is the probably the unfortunate norms of the time, if we go by what is written down Charlemagne wanted to act like a true king of Israel and this resulting in the ‘Massacre of Verden’ in 782, where he ordered the death of 4,500 Saxons is the earliest known act of “barbarism” in these related groups I can find. While there is not enough information to say with certainty it is unlikely that the raids that followed these attacks weren’t in part used by the Vikings to justify their actions. > > Perhaps even if the events you mention above are historically accurate they were in response to mass murder committed by the attempts to forcefully convert people to Christianity. > > History is written by the victors, but in this case the victors routinely resorted to massacres in the name of a _“peaceful”_ faith. The claims of moral failings are almost universally reserved for ones opponents, just as it is in modern times. As I said, I don’t know the original source of that quote, nor the date nor the author of it, save that it was said to come from a _Hebridean_ chronicle; i.e., from the community that suffered the raid. So it may just be the usual propaganda. Ross’ raid is historically attested, though. It took place in the context of the Scoto-Norwegian conflict over ownership of the Hebrides. The raiders who were said to have committed these atrocities were Gaelic Scots from the mainland, not Vikings. ---
**Author:** ![rat\_avatar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rat_avatar/32/255_2.png) [@rat\_avatar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rat_avatar)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2018, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-a-cruel-viking-practice/825008/49 "2018-12-07T19:29:11Z")
> [@Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](#): > > As I said, I don’t know the original source of that quote, nor the date nor the author of it, save that it was said to come from a _Hebridean_ chronicle; i.e., from the community that suffered the raid. So it may just be the usual propaganda. > > Ross’ raid is historically attested, though. It took place in the context of the Scoto-Norwegian conflict over ownership of the Hebrides. The raiders who were said to have committed these atrocities were Gaelic Scots from the mainland, not Vikings. Yes my point is that was more than a century after the Northern crusades started which involved subjugation and forced baptism of indigenous people. There is very little high ground for any of the Christian nations to take during that period. “Viking” really isn’t a valid historical grouping of peoples BTW, so it makes these types of discussions a bit challenging. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-a-cruel-viking-practice/825008.md?page=2)