The Vikings
Johannes Brøndsted
Penguin Books
Translated by Kalle Skov. With twenty-four plates. First published 1960. This new translation published 1965.

The Nordic Viking, that strange phenomenon that dominated European history from AD 800 to 1100... In the east those Northmen thrust down the great rivers of Russia to the Caspian and the Black Sea. In the west they sailed along the Atlantic coasts, past Arab Spain, through the Straits of Gibraltar, and over the Mediterranean. They reached out across the wild and unknown Atlantic, to Iceland, Greenland, and America. How did it happen? Why did Europe permit Danes and Norwegians to rule parts of England, Ireland and France, and the Swedes to form a ruling class in Western Russia? Why was Scandinavia strong and the rest of Europe weak? What inner forces led to the Viking raids? In this classic study, Professor Brøndsted examines the motives of their voyages and investigates the origin of the people, their industries and equipment, ships and armies, social organization, daily life and religious beliefs as they are reflected in runic inscriptions, burial customs and Icelandic medieval literature.