Tuesday, May 08, 2007
For my final project I have mapped the Viking invasions of the 8th, 9th, and 10th centuries. It took much longer than I thought it would. The map is called Viking Age Expansion. I have a few notes about the map:
The first known Viking attacks which were in Lindesfarne and Jarrow, both on the west coast of England, have been attributed to "Danes"--as in Danes from Denmark. I think it is more likely that they were Norwegians. If you look at this map you will see that the prepoderance of early raiders came from Norway. Denmark didn't really get in on the action until about the 830's. I cannot say this conclusively at this point however because there is more data out there to be mined. Therefore the map is necessarily not complete.
The Dane's are said to have been raiding on the Frisian coast. I do not have dates or any more specifics therefore those raids do not show up on the map.
In the the 850's or so the Norsemen changed thier method of attack. During that time they began to set up local bases and attack from there. That is not on this map. The scale of the map would not allow that kind of detail.
The impacts shown on the map are not representative of any geographical measurement of distance. They are merely an impact point.
I gathered data from many readily available sources. A bibliography will appear at the end of this post.
I think it is very interesting to look at the trade routes in place when the Norsemen were doing thier raiding. Here a couple that I have found...they just loaded to the top of the posting....They provide a good context for what was going on at the time of the Northern expansion. Scandinavia was not an isolated area, they were actively involved with trade networks. They knew what was out there and - when they were ready - they went out and took it.
Below are the links to where I found those maps:
►http://www.mcah.columbia.edu/medmil/pages/non-mma-pages/maps/penguinpg43.html
§http://www.mcah.columbia.edu/medmil/pages/non-mma-pages/maps/penguinpg59.html
►http://www.mcah.columbia.edu/medmil/pages/non-mma-pages/maps/penguinpg43.html
§http://www.mcah.columbia.edu/medmil/pages/non-mma-pages/maps/penguinpg59.html
Bibliography:
Bede, Ecclesiastical History of the English People, trans. Leo Sherley-Price, revised by R.E. Latham (London: Penguin, 1990) 148.
Kenneth O. Morgan, Oxford History of Britain (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993) 78.
The Vinland Sagas: The Norse Discovery of America trans. Magnus Magnusson and Herman Palsson (London: Penguin, 1965) 13.
Snorre Sturlason Heimskringla:or The Lives of the Norse Kings, translated by Erling Monsen and A.H. Smith (New York: Dover,1990) 43-76.
Farley Mowat, WestViking: The Ancient Norse in Greenland and North America, (Boston: Little, Brown, 1965) 15.
Robert Lacey and Danny Danziger, The Year 1000: What Life was like at the Turn of the First Millennium (Boston: Little, Brown, 1999) 139.
Sallie Baliunas,PhD and Willie Soon PhD, “Recent Warming is not historically unique,” Enviromenal News Jan.2001
Tryggvi J. Oleson, Early Voyages and Northern Approaches 1000-1632, (London: Oxford University Press, 1964) 119.
Eleanor Guralnick Vikings in the West, Papers presented at a symposium (Chicago: 1982)
Gwyn Jones, The NorseAtlantic Saga:Being the Norse Voyages of Discovery and Settlement to Icleland, Greenland, America, (London: Oxford University Press, 1964)
Jared Diamond Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies, (New York: Norton, 1999)
Sallie Baliunas,PhD and Willie Soon PhD, “Recent Warming is not historically unique,” Enviromenal News Jan.2001
Tryggvi J. Oleson, Early Voyages and Northern Approaches 1000-1632, (London: Oxford University Press, 1964) 119.
Eleanor Guralnick Vikings in the West, Papers presented at a symposium (Chicago: 1982)
Gwyn Jones, The NorseAtlantic Saga:Being the Norse Voyages of Discovery and Settlement to Icleland, Greenland, America, (London: Oxford University Press, 1964)
Jared Diamond Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies, (New York: Norton, 1999)
// posted by Elizabeth Hull @ 11:01 AM 
