Sheildmaidens Were Real! New Findings Show 1/2 of Viking Warriors Were Women

a reply to: pikestaff

Yes and just to add to your point (Star to the above comment not mine here).
www.ancient.eu...
They were called gladiatrix and I take the Roman's liked there mud wrestling to be a little more bloody.

When the Danish and Norse invaded Britain the army they faced was made up of house cars (saxon warrior cast) and the fyrd (local farmers who fought for their local lord)
Basically the fyrd was there to make up numbers and where invariably poorly armed.
I find it totally plausible that the norse women filled a similar role to the saxon fyrd

No,that's not what the dig paper says at all. The title of the paper was "Warriors and women: the sex ratio of Norse MIGRANTS to eastern England up to 900 ad ". All it said was "These results, six female Norse migrants and seven male, should caution against assuming that the great majority of Norse migrants were male, despite the other forms of evidence suggesting the contrary.

Note the use of the word “migrants,” not “warriors” or “fighters.” And:

Another important implication of the osteological sexing results is that Norse women appear to have been present from the earliest stages of the migratory process, rather than, as the commonly held theory has it, arriving as part of a second wave after the great army had started to settle the homelands it had conquered."

It was amass grave and at least one child was found in it so should we assume that children were also warriors. The leap to warriors from migrants to warriors is absurd and baseless.

That's what drives me crazy about ATS, the constant misinterpretation of data and studies. You get it wrong so often one might think you're journalists.


reply to: ATODASO

originally posted by: guohua
a reply to: FatherLukeDuke

The article you're using was wrote and updated in 2011.

The article the OP, ATODASO is using was, is another update in 2014.
Here is the Link.

Link

There's only one academic paper, and that's this one from 2011:

onlinelibrary.wiley.com....

The Tor.com article is still referring to that paper (though it doesn't link it), it just mispresents it - presumably because that headline generates far more traffic. It says this:

By studying osteological signs of gender within the bones themselves, researchers discovered that approximately half of the remains were actually female warriors, given a proper burial with their weapons.

This is rubbish.

originally posted by: LABTECH767
It is believed the first people to bare the Title Viking came from a small inlet on a Fjord in Norway, that Village and bay like Inlet are called Vikin (A name which may predate the Viking's), Now in old norse the Word Vik meant man as well so there is some dispute about the real meaning of viking with related norse word's such as Vikingr and Viking actually having two meaning's to do with adventure and travel.

Again, where are you getting your information from??

Im not going to give my opinion. Viking has to do with water. Allow me to quote the authority on Norse studies, Johannes Brøndsted:
"If it is Norse it may be related either to vig 'battle', or to vik 'creek', 'inlet', 'fjord', or 'bay'."

But the word "viking" may not be a Norse word and descended from Latin vicus, 'camp'. Viking was only used in Denmark. The northern and eastern term used was vaeringjar (source: page 39) and this is where that famous word from the Roman bodyguard comes from "Varangians".

The Norse people' are actually a more mixed bunch than you would think, though the scandinavian's through harsh terrain and weather are less mixed there origin's can probably be traced back to western russia and eurasia before there ancestors were displaced through tribal migration's of the Slavic Tribe's (the truth is they probably mixed and there was no definite displacement so they may simple be a vestige of the pre mixed racial grouping).

No kidding races are mixed, there is no such thing as a pure race. Even in Viking age some Norse had eastern genes (according to modern testing) due to them marrying Saami and Finni peoples. But the Scandinavians have been there for at least 80,000 years. Circumstantial evidence says 200,000 years (but its almost certainly not human, but neanderthal). Being surrounded by mountains things are more easily preserved from outside influence, as even the Romans and Greeks had much difficulty going there. Since it was unknown and mysterious they made legends about "Hyperboria" and "Thule". Speaking of which why do you continually mention a Thule cult? What are you even talking about?

and a stiff wind to fill there Goat Hair Sail's, Viking ship's used Goat Hair from a breed of Goat that is found today only in scandinavia in norway, it's hair does not retain water and is also great for making warm clothing that allows your body to breath and even when wet keeps the warmth in.

WHAT? Norse sails were made of wool or linen!!!
source 1
source 2
source 3

I could go on but where the hell do you get your opinion's from.

scholarly books and archaeological digs!!!

Having individual words in a language descending from Old Norse DOES NOT mean those peoples spoke Old Norse!!

a reply to: Ridhya

Scandinavia is today rising through a reduction in crustal mass pressure as a result of the melting of the ice that depressed the continental mass duing the ice age, the area you suggest the Neanderthal lived for 80.000 years was uninhabitable even to them though during the interglacial period's there were period's of habitability during which they most certainly did, they may not have been and probably were not the same tribes though.

The Glaciation actually totally encased those mountains and reached so far south it covered most of the british isles under up to two killometers or more of ice, the Neanderthal diet was mainly meat due to there far higher calorific requirement over modern human's but yes WE of Viking origin do have some neanderthal genetic material as indeed has most of europe and asia and just like there are modern subracial groupings' of humans it is more than probable this was also the case for the neanderthal's and other pre modern human grouping's, indeed the neanderthal did not actually go extinct except as a distinct species as it can be argued they live on in us today.

Linen was mainly produced in egypt and in northern europe the main fabric's were wool as cotton was expensive, in Scandinavia there is a type of goat that produces wonderful wool, it is an ancient heritage breed and the wool it produces is fine and naturally hydrophobic.

This is more geared toward kid's but may alleviate you concerns as to what they made there sail' cloth from.
www.rmg.co.uk...

Though they did grow flax that could be turned into linen this was probably not used for there sails in norway and iceland or greenland in the early period (the little ice age wiped out the isolated and at one time flourishing viking settlement on greenland, before they died they went from an average height per generation of about six foot to about 5 foot two inches and child mortality rose to the point children simply did not survive, the last greenland viking's died in there freezing beds probably of starvation as all there cattle had died out, during this little ice age the cannals of venice froze over and we have been warming up ever since it ended, until 1850 for instance the Thame's would freeze over every year and there was a regular london winter market held on the river thames every year but today there is no one alive who remembers it so cold, it froze over a few time's since but very rarely.

www.reikfelag.ca...

Their advantages in battle are obvious. A man facing a woman would either be stunned by their beautiful presence and distracted, or would be hesitant to harm a female and be distracted... a woman can pretend to be weak and do things wity their eyes... "help me!" or "you are so handsome and strong..." The next thing you know she puts a dagger through your heart or someone attacks you from behind while you are distracted.

a reply to: ATODASO

Shieldmaidens, fighting sword to sword on the battlefield thousands of years ago, yet today we question if women and gays should be fighting in combat...

The Vikings are such an interesting culture, as a woman it makes me proud that shieldmaidens were celebrated and fought for their way of life, risking their own on the battlefield. Such an inspiration.