The Unexpected Vikings | HistoryExtra Podcast - HistoryExtra
"'As always, you start the book in an unexpected way. With the history of keys. I didn’t even know Vikings had keys, how did you start there?’
‘That’s a great example because when we sort of brainstorm, when we do anything, essentially, but with these books, we sat down or James and I are often driving to our shows. So we've got plenty of time to talk about what we're going to do and we brainstormed this. And, you know, the first thing we did was like, well, what's the established way of doing Vikings? And it's all about invasion. It's all about ships and seafaring and all that sort of stuff. And I said, right, well, let's, let's think about it in an unexpected way. And James said, well, obviously you do the history of keys.’...
‘The whole concept of this series of the Vikings is that with our histories of the unexpected, what we tried to do was to take topics like keys and then connect them to other big topics. So keys were all about Vikings. What we wanted to do with this series, though, was rather than do that was basically flip it on its head. So the Vikings then became about different kinds of topics, and they were sort of a way in. So the key is a way of looking at a variety of topics related to the Vikings. Not only about power but also about female power and housewives as, as figures within Viking society, who would have often held the keys, had control of the keys, and therefore, the keys are all about property and privacy and ownership and legality and being able to control space and things, whether it be controlling domestic space within the household, whether it be controlling military arms, so a chest that has arms in it, whether it be controlling a fort. So it was a great way of just getting into all sorts of Viking topics.’
‘So we could look at it and say our keys are all about power. But it was also clear that for the Vikings, they were all about power. I mean, it was it was very clear. So there's lots of evidence of particularly women having symbolic keys all around their waist as a symbol of being someone who had access to something someone who controlled access… one of the ways they dealt with that was focusing on who had who was the key bearer’...
‘We've pulled the Viking world apart in the following way. We've looked at the history of keys, graffiti, nicknames, mischief, hair grooming, hot springs and soreness, break ins, color, toys, teeth, doors, goading - that’s my favorite chapter - criminal profiling, birds, luck, friendship, fun, double standards, silk, and staffs. So there's a real explosion there... one way of talking about the history of Vikings is actually talking about the history of imagination. So if you come down to the sagas, so these were written hundreds of years sometimes after the actual Viking period. It's someone who's living in medieval I don't know, might be Norway, might not be. Might be England, might be France, imagining what the Viking period would have been like based on a certain amount of information that they've received. And that's one of the things I find completely fascinating about it. It's being able to unpick the truth and the reality and being able to peel away the farce- the imagination of it…
[On goading] The Vikings were very, playful. And they were very provocative. And one of the key things that happened in Viking society as told to us by the sagas, alright, so may not actually be true, but there's enough evidence suggest it was pretty true, is that Viking men were goaded into action, were wound up by women. By principally their partners, but often by their mothers as well. And there's lots and lots of evidence of this. Wars are begun by women goading men into standing up for their, for their pride, for their honor. And it's, the sagas are absolutely full of it. And what's great and interesting about it is the way that you can look at the history of goading in terms of female power. So, on the one hand, this, story, the all of these stories about women exercising their power, suggests that it was, it was a way that women had power and could exercise power in the Viking world. They had a voice, and they could influence their world. But another way of looking at it is saying it’s actually a misogynistic way of looking at the world because often what they're doing is they're goading the men into doing something bad. Usually, wars are begun, usually murders happen, in which case the Viking men can turn around and say, well, it wasn't my idea. It was my wife's idea. It was my mother's idea. It gives the men an excuse for their bad behavior.’..
‘Nicknames. And there were some spectacular names. And my personal favorite has to be Einar Buttered-Bread. But why were names so important? Where did they come from?’
‘Well, butter is really important… also the history of butter. So what do you, to make butter, what do you need?... Cows. Grass. You need access to animals and pasture, which means it's a, it's a symbol of wealth. It's a symbol of success. So, yeah, butter was really, really important to the Vikings and someone who had butter on their bread. Wow, they were successful.’
‘So it's a status symbol.’"
Women only have positive agency - not negative agency. You can't blame them for anything
