EDINBURGH.- The National Museum of Scotland is the only UK venue
for Vikings!, an outstanding exhibition of more than 500
objects, including jewelry, weapon fragments, carvings, precious
metals and household items, from the world-renowned collections
of the Swedish History Museum in Stockholm. Rarely seen outside
Scandinavia, these artefacts show the Vikings in a new and
intriguing light. By bringing together these fascinating
objects, archaeological evidence, hands-on displays and
innovative interpretation, the exhibition reveals who the
Vikings really were and creates a vivid picture of how they
lived more than 1,000 years ago, dispelling a number of myths in
the process. The term Viking is a modern invention of 19th
century Scandinavian scholarship and should not be used to refer
to a race or a people but rather to an activity. Men and perhaps
even women and adolescents, would go out on a Viking, which
could be the sort of pillaging raids that we commonly think of,
but it could also refer to a more peacefu