New DNA evidence suggests that the Viking hordes took their women with
them on their journeys.
by John
Tyburski
Copyright © Daily
Digest News, KPR Media, LLC. All rights reserved.
Vikings
are thought of as groups cruel, ruthless male barbarians that conquered by rape
and pillage. A new study, however, suggests that women went along on the
journeys. The Viking expansion may even be said to have been a family affair.
The Viking
explorers covered vast distances and established colonies in Iceland and along
the regions of Northwestern Europe. They even made it to North America, and
their expeditions were long assumed to consist entirely of men who left their
women and children behind. However, DNA evidence paints a bit of a different
picture.
Researchers
at the University of Oslo, Norway, analyzed maternal DNA from teeth and bone
from skeletons dating back to between 796 AD and 1066 AD thought to be of
ancient Norse and Icelandic origins. These DNA samples were compared to samples
collected from modern-day residents of the North Atlantic islands of Orkney and
Shetland, as well as others near Scandinavia.
The
analyses reveal that women played a greater role in colonization than
originally thought.
“It
overthrows this 19th century idea that the Vikings were just raiders and
pillagers,” said report coauthor Erika Hagelberg.
The
results go further in suggesting that roughly half of the typical expedition
team consisted of women. However, this coed conquering did not last long, as
the violent colonization became more of a way of life, families were put into
danger.
The report was
published in the journal Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B.
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