Were the Vikings, as contemporary description had it, a 'valiant, wrathful, foreign, purely pagan people' who swept in from the sea to plunder and slaughter? Or in the words of a Manx folksong 'ware-wolves keen in hungry quest', who lived and died by the sea and the sword.
Or were they unusually successful merchants, extortionists, and pioneer explorers? This book, by leading international scholars, considers the latest research and presents a compelling picture of the Vikings and their age. Excavations as far apart as Dublin and Newfoundland, York and Kiev, provide fascinating archaeological evidence, expertly interpreted in this extensively illustrated book.
List of Colour Plates List of Maps Notes on Contributors 1: Peter Sawyer: The Age of the Vikings and Before 2: Janet L. Nelson: The Frankish Empire 3: Simon Keynes: The Vikings in England, ic./i790-1016 4: Donnchadh Ó Corráin: Ireland, Wales, Man, and the Hebrides 5: Sveinbjörn Rafnsson: The Atlantic Islands 6: Thomas S. Noonan: Scandinavians in European Russia 7: Niels Lund: The Danish Empire and the End of the Viking Age 8: Jan Bill: Ships and Seamanship 9: Preben Meulengracht Sørensen: Religions Old and New 10: Lars Lönnroth: The Vikings in History and Legend 11: Peter Sawyer: The Viking Legacy Further Reading Chronology Index
Peter Sawyer is Emeritus Professor of Medieval History at the University of Leeds.
Reviews for The Oxford Illustrated History of the Vikings
`the volume will indeed be a treasury for pictorial sources, and the illustrations to more off-the-beaten-track chapters (especially Noonan's, on European Russia) are correspondingly unusual.' Guy Halsall, War in History, 8, 3, 2001 `the truest picture yet of the Vikings and their age.' Publishing News
