Children of Ash and Elm

by Neil Price;

A classic work on place-names and landscapes of power is Stefan Brink, ‘Political and social structures in early Scandinavia: Aspects of space and territoriality—the settlement district’, Tor 29 (1997): 389–438. A recent and important study of huse names is by Lisbeth Eilersgaard Christensen, Thorsten Lemm, and Anne Pedersen (eds.), Husebyer—Status Quo, Open Questions and Perspectives (National Museum of Denmark, Copenhagen, 2016). Theophoric names are addressed by Per Vikstrand, Gudarnas platser: förkristna sakrala ortnamn i Mälarlandskapen (Royal Gustav Adolf Academy, Uppsala, 2001) and in the edited volume by Sæbjørg Nordeide and Stefan Brink, Sacred Sites and Holy Spaces: Exploring the Sacralization of Landscape Through Time (Brepols, Turnhout, 2013), the latter containing references to Brink’s many papers on this topic.

  Major works on runes and runic literacy are listed in the general section above, to which may be added Birgit Sawyer’s volume already cited. The great runologist whose pithy observations are quoted in the main text was Sven B. F. Jansson, whose work revolutionised their study. For the runic lore in the Lay of Sigrdrifa, I have quoted Carolyne Larrington’s translation. For the magic use of runes, see John McKinnell and Rudolf Simek, Runes, Magic and Religion: A Sourcebook (Fassbaender, Vienna, 2004) and Mindy MacLeod and Bernard Mees, Runic Amulets and Magic Objects (Boydell, Woodbridge, 2006). Sofia Pereswetoff-Morath’s book Viking-Age Runic Plates (Royal Gustav Adolf Academy, Uppsala, 2019) is the standard work on these objects. The runesmith with his own biography is Öpir: Marit Åhlén, Runristaren Öpir, en monografi (Uppsala University, Uppsala, 1997). The Gotlandic runestone mentioning the “snake-eels” is G 203 from Hogrän. The personal names on the runestones are collected by Lena Peterson, Nordiskt runnamnslexikon (Institute for Language and Folklore, Uppsala, 2007). The stone from Rök in Östergötland is designated Ög 136.

  Viking-Age horse-holding is discussed by Anneli Sundkvist, Hästarnas land (University of Uppsala, Uppsala, 2001). The concept of time distance is elaborated for the late Iron Age by Martin Carver, ‘Pre-Viking traffic in the North Sea’, in Seán McGrail (ed.), Maritime Celts, Frisians and Saxons (Council for British Archaeology, York, 1990: 117–125). The trials of the Sea Stallion are published as Anne-Christine Larsen et al. (eds.), The Sea Stallion from Glendalough (Viking Ship Museum, Roskilde, 2008). A variety of Viking-Age transport methods are reviewed in Kurt Schietzel, Spurensuche Haithabu (Wachholz, Neumünster, 2018: 534–537). A useful overview of sea craft is provided by Ole Crumlin-Pedersen, Archaeology and the Sea in Scandinavia and Britain (Viking Ship Museum, Roskilde, 2010) and Gareth Williams, The Viking Ship (British Museum Press, London, 2014); these works also contain details of weather vanes, figureheads, and ship depictions in other media. A range of ship types are reviewed by Ole Crumlin-Pedersen and Olaf Olsen (eds.), The Skuldelev Ships I (Viking Ship Museum, Roskilde, 2002); Ole Crumlin-Pedersen, Viking-Age Ships and Shipbuilding in Hedeby/Haithabu and Schleswig (Viking Ship Museum, Roskilde, 1996); and Ole Crumlin-Pedersen and Hanus Jensen, Udspændte både fra vikingetid og jernalder (Viking Ship Museum, Roskilde, 2018).

  For the funerary ships from Oseberg, Gokstad, Ladby, and Hedeby and the later graves at Valsgärde, see Nicolay Nicolaysen, Langskibet fra Gokstad ved Sandefjord (Hammermeyer, Kristiania, 1882); A. W. Brøgger, Hjalmar Falk, and Haakon Shetelig (eds.), Osebergfundet (4 vols., Universitetets Oldsaksamling, Oslo, 1917–1928); Arne Emil Christensen, Anne Stine Ingstad, and Bjørn Myhre, Osebergdronningens grav (Schibsted, Oslo, 1992); Michael Müller-Wille, Das Bootkammergrab von Haithabu (Wachholtz, Neumünster, 1976); Anne C. Sørensen, Ladby: A Danish Ship-Grave from the Viking Age (Viking Ship Museum, Roskilde, 2001); and Svante Norr (ed.), Valsgärde Studies: The Place and Its People, Past and Present (Uppsala University, Uppsala, 2008). The intangible aspects of ships are discussed by Ole Crumlin-Pedersen and Birgitte Munch Tyhe (eds.), The Ship as Symbol in Prehistoric and Medieval Scandinavia (National Museum of Denmark, Copenhagen, 1995). The comment on the introduction of the sail as a tool of power is by Ole Kastholm of Roskilde Museum.

  CHAPTER 7: MEETING THE OTHERS

  The practice of Norse ‘religion’ has attracted an extensive literature. In addition to the works cited above under chapter 1, a good inroad is Thomas A. Dubois, Nordic Religions in the Viking Age (University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia, 1999) and, for readers of Norwegian, Gro Steinsland’s Norrøn religion: myter, riter, samfunn (Pax, Oslo, 2005). Two major multi-volume works are also of relevance here: Anders Andrén, Catharina Ruadvere, and Kristina Jennbert (eds.), Vägar till Midgård (16 vols., Nordic Academic Press, Lund, 2001–2014) and John McKinnell, Margaret Clunies Ross, and John Lindow (eds.), The Pre-Christian Religions of the North (7 vols., Brepols, Turnhout, 2018–).

  The leading specialist in religiolects is Maths Bertell, who introduced the term into Viking-Age discourse; see his forthcoming paper, ‘Into a hall, out to an island: The Iron Age hall culture religiolect as a case study of religious change and diversity’. I thank him for permission to discuss the concept here. The primary work on religious ideologies of power is by Olof Sundqvist, Freyr’s Offspring: Rulers and Religion in Ancient Svear Society (Uppsala University Press, Uppsala, 2002). On cultic sites and structures, the classic work, outdated but still essential, is Olaf Olsen, Hørg, hov og kirke (Gad, Copenhagen, 1966). For more recent publications, also embracing the ritual specialists themselves, see Olof Sundqvist, Kultledare i fornskandinavisk religion (University of Uppsala, Uppsala, 2007); Gunnar Andersson and Eva Skyllberg (eds.), Gestalter och gestaltningar—om tid, rum och händelser på Lunda (Riksantikvarieämbetet, Stockholm, 2008); Olof Sundqvist, An Arena for Higher Powers: Ceremonial Buildings and Religious Strategies for Rulership in Late Iron Age Scandinavia (Brill, Leiden, 2016); Anders Kaliff and Julia Mattes, Tempel och kulthus i det forna Skandinavien (Carlssons, Stockholm, 2017); and Sandie Holst, Lars Jørgensen, and Egon Wamers, Odin, Thor und Freyja: Skandinavische Kultplätze des 1. Jahrtausends n. Chr. und das Frankenreich (Schnell & Steiner, Regensburg, 2017). The Uppåkra ‘temple’ is reported by Lars Larsson, Continuity for Centuries: A Ceremonial Building and Its Context at Uppåkra, Southern Sweden (Lund University, Lund, 2004). The translation from Adam of Bremen, on the Uppsala temple, is from the edition by Francis Tschan, modified by Olof Sundqvist.

  The sites at Lilla Ullevi and Götavi are discussed by Neil Price, ‘Belief and ritual’, in Gareth Williams, Peter Pentz, and Matthias Wemhoff (eds.), Vikings: Life and Legend (British Museum, London, 2014: 162–195). Blót sacrifices are reviewed by Britt-Mari Näsström, Blot: tro och offer i det förkristna Norden (Norstedts, Stockholm, 2002). For the Hofstaðir rituals, see Gavin Lucas and Tom McGovern, ‘Bloody slaughter: Ritual decapitation and display at the Viking settlement of Hofstaðir, Iceland’, European Journal of Archaeology 10:1 (2007): 7–30. On the wider practice of ritual, see Torsten Capelle and Christian Fischer (eds.), Ragnarok—Odins verden (Silkeborg Museum, Silkeborg, 2005) and Anders Andrén and Peter Carelli (eds.), Odens öga—mellan människor och makter i det förkristna Norden (Fälth & Hässler, Värnemo, 2006).

  At a personal level, the use of figurines and amulets is discussed by Bo Jensen, Viking Age Amulets in Scandinavia and Western Europe (BAR, Oxford, 2010); Michaela Helmbrecht, Wirkmächtige Kommunikationsmedien. Menschenbilder der Vendel- und Wikingerzeit und ihre Kontexte (Lund University, Lund, 2011); and Leszek Gardeła, Scandinavian Amulets in Viking Age Poland (University of Rzeszów Institute of Archaeology, Rzeszów, 2014).

  For water offerings, see Julie Lund, Åsted og vadested: deponeringer, genstandsbiografier og rumlig strukturering som kilde til vikingetidens kognitive landskaber (University of Oslo, Oslo, 2009); Anne Monikander, Våld och vatten: våtmarkskult vid Skedemosse under järnåldern (Stockholm University, Stockholm, 2010); Ben Raffield, ‘“A river of knives and swords”: Ritually deposited weapons in English watercourses and wetlands during the Viking Age’, European Journal of Archaeology 17:4 (2014): 634–655; and Torun Zachrisson, ‘Händelser vid vatten: om näcken vid Lutbron och de förk
ristna dödsoffren i sjön Bokaren, Uppland’, Saga och Sed 2014: 69–91. For the Frösö tree, see Ola Magnell and Elisabeth Iregren, ‘Veitstu hvé blóta skal? The Old Norse blót in the light of osteological remains from Frösö church, Jämtland, Sweden’, Current Swedish Archaeology 18 (2010): 223–250.

  With mild embarrassment, I have to say that the standard work on Viking-Age sorcery is still my own The Viking Way: Magic and Mind in Late Iron Age Scandinavia (2nd edn., Oxbow, Oxford, 2019). It contains all the spells, saga references, and archaeological correlates with reconstructions of the possible sorcerer graves and, in general, provides a four-hundred-page overview of the place of magic in the Norse mental universe. The book also provides extensive references for further reading. Essential works include Lotte Hedeager, Skygger af en anden virkelighed (Samleren, Copenhagen, 1997); Dag Strömbäck, Sejd (2nd edn., Royal Gustav Adolf Academy, Uppsala, 2000); Catharina Raudvere, Kunskap och insikt i norrön tradition—mytologi, ritualer och trolldomsanklagelser (Nordic Academic Press, Lund, 2003); François-Xavier Dillmann, Les magiciens dans l’Islande ancienne (Royal Gustav Adolf Academy, Uppsala, 2006); Eldar Heide, Gand, seid og åndevind (University of Bergen, Bergen, 2006); Clive Tolley, Shamanism in Norse Myth and Magic (2 vols., Academia Scientarum Fennica, Helsinki, 2009); Stephen A. Mitchell, Witchcraft and Magic in the Nordic Middle Ages (University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia, 2011); and Leszek Gardeła, (Magic) Staffs in the Viking Age (Fassbaender, Vienna, 2016).

  The social world of everyday magic, not least at a time of its waning in the face of new ideas and technologies, is compellingly captured by Hannah Kent in her novel of rural Irish folk belief, The Good People (Picador, London, 2017); I draw on some of her resonant phrases here in speaking of the power that could come of being forced to the margins. The translation from the Saga of the Völsungs about the crackling tensions of magic is by Jesse Byock.

  CHAPTER 8: DEALING WITH THE DEAD

  The first serious study of Viking-Age death rituals is still one of the best, although it is oddly neglected today; going far beyond the literary framework of its title, see Hilda Ellis, The Road to Hel: A Study of the Conception of the Dead in Old Norse Literature (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1943).

  The translation from chapter 8 of Snorri Sturluson’s Ynglingasaga is from Alison Finlay and Anthony Faulkes’s edition of Heimskringla (Viking Society for Northern Research, London, 2011).

  The burial customs of the Viking Age form one of my own primary research fields, and, unsurprisingly, this section draws heavily on my own work as well as that of others. Besides others listed later in this section, my publications here include ‘Dying and the dead: Viking Age mortuary behaviour’, in Stefan Brink and Neil Price (eds.), The Viking World (Routledge, London & New York, 2008: 257–273); ‘Nine paces from Hel: Time and motion in Old Norse ritual performance’, World Archaeology 46:2 (2014): 178–191; and ‘Death ritual and mortuary behaviour’, in Anders Andrén, Jens-Peter Schjødt, and John Lindow (eds.), Pre-Christian Religions of the North: Histories and Structures (Brepols, Turnhout, 2020). These works include references to the major cemetery excavations at Birka and Kaupang, on Öland and Gotland, and more.

  The intricate properties of the cremation pyre are explored by Mogens B. Henriksen, Bålets betydning. Ligbrænding i Danmarks oldtid belyst ved arkæologiske fund og ligbrændingsexperimenter (2 vols., Copenhagen University, Copenhagen, 2016). For the Byzantine text describing nocturnal funerals, see Alice-Mary Talbot and Denis F. Sullivan (trans.), The History of Leo the Deacon: Byzantine Military Expansion in the Tenth Century (Dumbarton Oaks, Washington, DC, 2005); Leo discusses the Rus’ in books eight and nine of his History. The study of birds’ eggs in Viking-Age graves is by Anna Jelicic, En hårdkokt historia: en studie av äggskalfynd från vikingatida gravkontext med särskilt focus på Uppland och Gotland (MA thesis in archaeology, Uppsala University, Uppsala, 2017).

  Funerary archaeology is admirably synthesised by Sarah Tarlow and Liv Nilsson Stutz (eds.), The Oxford Handbook of the Archaeology of Death and Burial (Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2013). The intriguing ambiguities of early medieval burials have been explored by many scholars, but see, in particular, the authors of the theme issue of Current Swedish Archaeology 24 (2016), with special reference to the works of Alison Klevnäs, and also the collection by Duncan Sayer and Howard Williams (eds.), Mortuary Practices and Social Identities in the Middle Ages (University of Exeter Press, Exeter, 2009); for useful English comparisons, see Howard Williams, Death and Memory in Early Medieval Britain (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2006).

  The long quotations from The Waking of Angantyr, which is preserved in the Saga of Hervör and Heidrek, are given here in the translation of Todd Krause and Jonathan Slocum, with my minor amendments. The excerpt about the circling fires is from Patricia Terry’s translation.

  Burials in wagon bodies are discussed by Inga Hägg, ‘Om vikingatidens vagnskorgsgravar’, Saga och Sed 2009: 91–99. ‘Deviant’ burials are discussed extensively in the many papers of Leszek Gardeła, summarised in, ‘The dangerous dead? Rethinking Viking-Age deviant burials’, in Leszek Słupecki and Rudolf Simek (eds.), Conversions: Looking for Ideological Change in the Early Middle Ages (Fassbaender, Vienna, 2013: 96–136); see also Andrew Reynolds, Anglo-Saxon Deviant Burial Customs (Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2009). For aspects of Icelandic burials, see Þóra Pétursdóttir, ‘Icelandic Viking Age graves: Lack in material—lack of interpretation?’, Archaeologia Islandica 7 (2009): 22–40 and references to chapter 17 following. The Lindholm cemetery is published by Thorkild Ramskou, Lindholm Høje gravpladsen (Lynge, Copenhagen, 1976). An excellent survey of regional customs is by Fredrik Svanberg, Death Rituals in South-East Scandinavia AD 800–1000 (University of Lund, Lund, 2003).

  The main catalogue of the Gotland picture-stones is by Sune Lindqvist, Gotlands Bildsteine (2 vols., Wahlström & Widstrand, Stockholm, 1941–1942); the latest synthesis is Maria Herlin Karnell (ed.), Gotlands bildstenar (Gotland Museum, Visby, 2012). For the story stones, the idea of pictorial ship burials, and door symbolism, see also Anders Andrén, ‘Doors to other worlds: Scandinavian death rituals in Gotlandic perspective’, Journal of European Archaeology 1 (1993): 33–56; the wagon stones are discussed by Þórgunnur Snædal, ‘Ailikn’s wagon and Óðinn’s warriors: The pictures on the Gotlandic Ardre monuments’, in John Sheehan and Donnchadh Ó Corráin (eds.), The Viking Age: Ireland and the West (Four Courts, Dublin, 2010: 441–449).

  The chamber grave ritual has been discussed extensively; see Silke Eisenschmidt, Kammergräber der Wikingerzeit in Altdänemark (University of Kiel, Kiel, 1994); Nils Ringstedt, The Birka Chamber-Graves (Stockholm University, Stockholm, 1997); Frans-Arne Stylegar, ‘Kammergraver fra vikingtiden i Vestfold’, Fornvännen 100 (2005): 161–177; and Neil Price, ‘Wooden worlds: Individual and collective in the chamber graves of Birka’, in Charlotte Hedenstierna-Jonson (ed.), Birka nu (Riksantikvarieämbetet, Stockholm, 2012: 81–94). For the use of chairs, see Heather Robbins, Seated Burials at Birka: A Select Study (MA thesis in archaeology, University of Uppsala, Uppsala, 2004).

  The Finnish graves nailed down with spears are discussed, along with other funerary rituals from the region, by Anna Wessman, Death, Destruction and Commemoration: Tracing Ritual Activities in Finnish Late Iron Age Cemeteries (AD 550–1150) (Finnish Antiquarian Society, Helsinki, 2010). The Mammen burial is published by Mette Iversen, Mammen: grav, kunst og samfund I vikingetid (Jysk Arkæologisk Selskab, Aarhus, 1991). For the Hedeby graves, see Ute Arents and Silke Eisenschmidt, Die Gräber von Haithabu (2 vols., Wachholtz, Neumünster, 2010); the boat grave is published by Michael Müller-Wille, Das Bootkammergrab von Haithabu (Wachholtz, Neumünster, 1976).

  References to the crucial account by Aḥmad ibn Faḍlān are given in the introductory section above. His description of the Rus’ ship burial has been discussed by archaeologists and others on numerous occasions, including in my own papers listed at the start of the section for this
chapter. For a guide to the archaeological literature on this subject, see Neil Price, ‘Vikings on the Volga? Ibn Fadlan and the rituals of the Rūssiyah’, in Jonathan Shepard and Luke Treadwell (eds.), Muslims on the Volga in the Viking Age: Diplomacy and Islam in the World of Ibn Fadlan (I. B. Tauris, London, 2020). I am grateful to James Montgomery for many discussions over the years about this central source. The concept of the hostile dead in the mound, perhaps referencing the cautious kindler of the pyre, is treated by Jan Bill, ‘Protecting against the dead? On the possible use of apotropaic magic in the Oseberg burial’, Cambridge Archaeological Journal 26 (2016): 141–155.

  References for the major Scandinavian ship burials are given above for chapter 6. For a sample of Scottish boat graves, see Olwyn Owen and Magnar Dalland, Scar: A Viking Boat Burial on Sanday, Orkney (Historic Scotland, Edinburgh, 1999) and Oliver Harris et al., ‘Assembling places and persons: A tenth-century Viking boat burial from Swordle Bay on the Ardnamurchan Peninsula, western Scotland’, Antiquity 91 (2017): 191–206. The Groix burial is published as part of Michael Müller-Wille’s 1976 paper on the Hedeby boat, referenced above, and also in my book, The Vikings in Brittany (Viking Society for Northern Research, London, 1989).

  The interpretation of certain ‘female’ figurines as mourners has been put forward by Frog and Eila Stepanova. For Viking-Age concepts of the ancestors, see Andreas Nordberg, Fornnordisk religionsforksning mellan teori och empiri: kulten av anfäder, solen och vegetationsandar i idéhistorisk belysning (Kungl. Gustav Adolfs Akademien, Uppsala, 2013) and Triin Laidoner, Ancestors, Their Worship and the Elite in the Viking Age and Early Medieval Scandinavia (PhD thesis in Scandinavian studies, University of Aberdeen, Aberdeen, 2015).

  For ritual drama, see the fundamental work by Terry Gunnell, The Origins of Drama in Scandinavia (Brewer, Woodbridge, 1995). For the performance of funerary stories, see my papers ‘Bodylore and the archaeology of embedded religion: Dramatic licence in the funerals of the Vikings’, in David Whitley and Kelley Hays-Gilpin (eds.), Belief in the Past: Theoretical Approaches to the Archaeology of Religion (Left Coast Press, Walnut Creek, 2008: 143–165); ‘Passing into poetry: Viking-Age mortuary drama and the origins of Norse mythology’, Medieval Archaeology 54 (2010): 123–156; and ‘Mythic acts: Material narratives of the dead in Viking Age Scandinavia’, in Catharina Raudvere and Jens Peder Schjødt (eds.), More than Mythology: Narratives, Ritual Practices and Regional Distribution in Pre-Christian Scandinavian Religions (Nordic Academic Press, Lund, 2012: 13–46). For the concept of mortuary citation, a term coined by Howard Williams, see ‘Mortuary Citations: Death and Memory in the Viking World’, a theme issue of European Journal of Archaeology 19:3 (2016).