![]() The bodies of dead berserkers were laid out in bearskins prior to their funeral rites. The berserkers maintained their religious observances despite their fighting prowess, as the Svarfdæla saga tells of a challenge to single-combat that was postponed by a berserker until three days after Yule. It is proposed by some authors that the berserkers drew their power from the bear and were devoted to the bear cult, which was once widespread across the northern hemisphere. The runestone Vg 56 at Källby in Västergötland, which may show a beserker in animal skin In the spring of 1870, four cast-bronze dies, the Torslunda plates, were found by Erik Gustaf Pettersson and Anders Petter Nilsson in a cairn on the lands of the farm No 5 Björnhovda in Torslunda parish, Öland, Sweden, one of them showing what appears to be a berserker ritual. Nowhere else in history are Germanic bear-warriors and wolf-warriors fighting together recorded until 872 AD with Thórbiörn Hornklofi's description of the battle of Hafrsfjord when they fought together for King Harald Fairhair of Norway. Scene 36 on the column shows some of these warriors standing together, with some wearing bearhoods and some wearing wolfhoods. There are warriors depicted as barefoot, bare-chested, bearing weapons and helmets that are associated with the Germani. The scenes show his Roman soldiers plus auxiliaries and allies from Rome's border regions, including tribal warriors from both sides of the Rhine. The bas relief carvings on Trajan's column in Rome depict scenes of Trajan's conquest of Dacia in 101–106 AD. Three main animal cults appeared: the bear, the wolf, and the wild boar. ![]() It is proposed by some authors that the northern warrior tradition originated from hunting magic. Thirteenth-century historian Snorri Sturluson interpreted the meaning as "bare-shirt", that is to say that the warriors went into battle without armour, but that view has largely been abandoned. It likely means " bear-shirt" (compare the Middle English word ' serk, meaning 'shirt'), "someone who wears a coat made out of a bear's skin". Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.The Old Norse form of the word was berserkr (plural berserkir). (Reporting by Hugo Greenhalgh Editing by Belinda Goldsmith Please credit the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers the lives of people around the world who struggle to live freely or fairly. In April last year, DNA tests showed that American Revolutionary War hero Casimir Pulaski was almost certainly intersex, ending rumours over whether the 18th-century Polish nobleman was born with both male and female sex characteristics. Last September, Italian scientists revealed that a famous pair of ancient skeletons, known as the "Lovers of Modena" after being found in Italy buried hand-in-hand, were actually two men. The re-evaluation of archaeological findings through modern eyes has yielded notable gender switches in recent years. "Bearing that in mind, you might not be too astonished that there were actually warrior women for real in the Viking period," Janes said. Janes also referred to 19th-century German composer Richard Wagner's description of the warrior-like female Valkyries, part of Norse mythology, in his four-part opera "The Ring Cycle". "This person may equally have been transgender, in our terms, or non-binary, or gender fluid."ĭominic Janes, professor of modern history at Keele University in northern England, said there was a long history of women as war leaders in Europe over the centuries, citing England's Queen Elizabeth I. "In a sense it does not really matter whether the person in the Birka grave was a female-bodied warrior woman or not," Price, part of the 2017 research team, wrote in the book being published later this month. In "The Children of Ash & Elm: A History of the Vikings", Neil Price, professor of archaeology and ancient history at Sweden's Uppsala University, re-examined the case of a Viking warrior grave excavated in 1889.ĭiscovered in Birka - often referred to as Sweden's first town - the 10th-century grave contained a skeleton buried with swords and spears that was presumed to be of a male Viking.īut DNA analysis confirmed in 2017 it was a female warrior. LONDON, Aug 17 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Vikings were known for brutality and chauvinism as they pillaged their way across Europe, but a new book has claimed that some of the Nordic warriors might have secretly been transgender men. (Adds detail of Casimir Pulaski to para 12 and clarifies Queen) "The Children of Ash & Elm: A History of the Vikings" claims that some of the Nordic warriors might have secretly been trans men
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