welcome everyone to history today so
this is a podcast our discussion of the
way history makes its way into our daily
lives today we'll be talking about how
Vikings survived their winter
experiences and how those experiences in
turn shaped them as a culture so I am
gonna be joined by James McMullen once
again we had him on last time and we
were discussing why the Vikings went
west so now he's coming back and joining
us but again I'll let him give you just
a brief rundown of what he's all about
hi Julian it's good to be back so just
so everybody has an idea of what my
background is I'm a museum with a
master's degree in medieval Atlantic
Studies as well so I kind of walk that
fine line between medievalist and Musial
adji and I currently live waging an
eternal war on viking misinformation
online if you want to watch me scream
into the void about vikings museums
politics things like that you can catch
me on twitter at the viking jim perfect
yeah so today we'll be talking about
like I said the winter conditions of the
Vikings so just as a general overview of
what we discussing as hey what were the
winter conditions like how did they
survive them kind of in the short term
and then how did the things that they
did you know to survive winter impact
them in a more macro sense in terms of
their culture and religion so we'll
start off with the weather conditions
first so the first question I had were
you know how long were these winners how
was their severity and I know you have
some experience because you've been in
some of the countries that the Vikings
occupied as well yeah I mean I lived in
Iceland for a while and winter there
lasts about as long as you would expect
it would three three and a half four
months around there the thing is that
what we've got as far as information for
the duration of seasons during the
Viking Age and early medieval period in
Scandinavia they're basically showing us
that they're roughly the same length as
they are today generally from mid
October or early November through until
late January or mid March of course
there are anomalies from year to year
longer shorter winters can and
definitely do happen and you know we
have sources we have
that will give it for later periods once
we start getting more of the written
records and more annals coming in for
Scandinavia but for that particular
period we're looking at we're actually
kind of relying on our keel
climatological data so we don't have
anything really written to say that this
was a particularly long or particularly
hard winter that was contemporary but
again you know we can't expect anything
to go too far out of the normal but they
do happen as anybody who is in the
northeast part of the US or in Ontario
is aware you know it's late April and
we're just coming out of the deep freeze
the sudden deep freeze now so they have
so that's the main thing for people who
aren't maybe accustomed to the far
northern hemisphere it's just you know
the summers and winters are yes long but
also they're a bit more severe and
drastic so in the summer the sun's out
longer but the winner the sun's down
longer as well so it's not just how long
does it last but what are the conditions
like exactly it can get real dark real
quick and last for a good long time and
then you had actually in our discussion
prior to this talked about I think it
was Sebastian at Goulet who had started
to put back like a reconstruction of the
weather I thought that was kind of
interesting yeah there's actually
Sebastian Gillett and he has a whole
team working with him and we'll there's
a link that I've got to a study from the
NCDC
it's part of the the National
Oceanographic Association in the States
they did a 1500 year reconstruction of
weather for Scandinavia and you know we
can see for the period we're talking
about we're looking at some fluctuations
in temperature of course but they don't
get too bad nothing really much more
than about one point eight degrees below
average and that's in degrees Celsius
about 1.8 degrees below average for
temperatures in 800c was about the
coldest the biggest swing downward for
temperature to about 1.4 degrees Celsius
above average in 990 and
10:09 see so you know there's a swing
there but not a huge swing so they don't
get terrifically severe or terrifically
drastic changes in weather during this
during the Viking Age so you know from
about 700 to about 1100 if we're gonna
look in that range there's it's a pretty
calm weather or climate climatological
period at that point however that said
having lived in Iceland for a while and
having just gotten out of the eternal
winter here in Canada you know being
outside in even a slightly unsettled
weather you know even a couple degrees
colder than average it's really
unpleasant especially if you're just
going out there with not much more than
you know leather fur and wool to keep
you warm wind especially makes things
uncomfortable really uncomfortably cold
and moist air coming off audiences
unfrozen water like the ocean makes
extremely heavy snowfalls under the
right circumstances and otherwise it's
just kind of generally miserable so I'm
not saying it's a winter wonderland but
it is not necessarily too far removed
from what people who are who are living
there now experience that's it yeah
sorry go ahead
no they're saying no that's a good way a
good way to put it so if you want if
you're looking to relive that type of
experience go strap on some furs and go
stand out there and you can kind of get
the same winter blast that they got yeah
you do and that said though before the
lake engage during what's referred to as
the Dark Ages cool period there were
absolutely much lower temperatures than
normal
get much more than two degrees below
Celsius or two degrees Celsius below the
average temperature and that's in the
summers so in the winter it's gonna be a
lot colder there's actually theories
coming around from people like focus
from and Neil Price who have who have
kind of posited that these sudden
drastic drops in temperature are
possibly the genesis for the the stories
of Jim brevet the the eternal winter
that procedures Ragnarok at the end of
the
gods it's a really interesting theory if
you're interested in finding out more
about that focused Rome had did a did
his book in the believe the 60s and Neil
price has has put out some stuff on that
more recently talking about the
relationship there so yeah that I was
reading at a National Geographic
Geographic article had mentioned you
know starting around eighty five thirty
six you get this general cooling in the
northern hemisphere and they were
attributing this to some volcanic
activity perhaps even you know dust
coming in from comets entering the
atmosphere or whatever but essentially
what the article was stating is that
they had this extended cold period in
the northern hemisphere and in
Scandinavia in particular part of the
article was quoting you know nearly 75%
of villages were abandoned this wasn't a
particular region in Sweden where they
were looking at but still it does kind
of show the drastic changes that this
could have even if it was over a
relatively small period still pretty
devastating and that kind of cultural
shock is something that can resonate
down the lines absolutely and I mean you
got to keep in mind a two degree drop in
temperature on average is huge if it
happens in one year okay that's just a
really cold year but I mean this is
happening over the course of 14 years
that these temperatures are lowered by
this huge amount so yeah just massive
massive damage to the the climate or
change in the climate are they're
dealing massive damage to the sort of
Agriculture and environment that people
are used to relying on yeah you run into
food shortages you run into sorta jhin's
of game which in turn runs into
shortages of raw materials to keep
yourself warm trees don't grow as fast
or as tall or as strong which means what
you're looking for for you know creating
charcoal to burn to keep yourself warm
that's not there quite as much you're
you're you're experiencing this sort of
environmental catastrophe with a drop so
drastically and so quickly that lasts
for so long kind of be the the mirror
image of what's happening contemporarily
with
an increase in temperature you know a
two degree increase in the average
temperature is gonna play havoc with
everything with the oceans with the sea
levels you name it and it did the same
thing in 536 sea
you know it just in Reverse you know
people are freezing to that at that
point and people abandon outline
settlements or small villages just
because there's simply not enough stuff
to keep them alive out there and I can
just imagine kind of what that period
would have been like just for some
reason I'm thinking like Game of Thrones
where you talk about them like winter is
coming and in the early season if
they're talking about oh you weren't
around in the last winter you know we
never saw daylight so you can kind of
imagine a similar scenario taking place
with these old Scandinavians talking
about this time period - they're their
children their descendants and so yeah
yeah that's that's exactly know it's
there are coming from Canada and having
lived in Scandinavia for a while talking
with friends of mine who are from warmer
climates and say all this is how do you
live up there it's like all 15 degrees
below zero Celsius that's nothing that's
it's sad I might need a you know a pair
of gloves and a toque to go out but it's
not so bad but once you get you know you
don't know real cold you don't
experience it it don't quite understand
and it's the same with heat it's the
same in in the converse you know you
don't extreme for me anything above 25
degrees Celsius is too is too warm it's
too warm to go outside at that point and
friends of mine who say well you know 30
degrees is great they're out of their
minds but it's again what what you're
what you're used to and dropping those
temperatures even a little bit will ruin
your day severely great so we've
established at this point kind of what
were the conditions like and then some
of the shocks and that conditions are
changes in those conditions so now we'll
move to the next one which is gonna be
okay the people who were there trying to
survive how did they do so so to preempt
this I know you had commented that you
know if we're looking for direct
evidence in the sagas it's hard to come
by because a lot of the time when
they're talking about them surviving
winter it's something they assume the
audience already knows and so we don't
really get that much of like direct talk
about there's no survivors guide that
they publish or
thing that deduce some things yeah
that's exactly it I mean the the
audience who is going to be reading
these or who this is intended to be read
by initially they're familiar with what
goes into not freezing to death during
winter that said well we don't
necessarily have a lot of contemporary
written evidence we do have
archaeological evidence you know showing
all sorts of really sort of innovative
ways to keep yourself to keep yourself
warm and comfortable during the winter
you know generally there are two ways of
keeping yourself warm insulation and
radiation which is you know keeping the
heat trapped next to you or keeping
something warm nearby and it's you know
it's a combination of both what does
these which is the most effective in the
early medieval period Scandinavians
practices in a lot of different ways
from bumping up in layers of wool and
fur when they needed to go outside to
having thick walled houses with areas
inside for keeping their livestock we
can see in the archaeological record
four longhouses of the time that they
had integral bones for lack of a better
term where they would keep livestock not
only keeps the animal shelter and that's
an important thing because these are
these are your food sources these are
sources for raw materials as well but it
also provides a source of heat for
people inside the longhouse but it's an
additional body to help keep you warm
obviously there were drawbacks you know
living cheek-by-jowl with cattle pigs
and fowl is loud it's stinky it's it's
crowded but on balance these sorts of
you know inconveniences are outweighed
by the fact that no one's likely to
freeze to death when you're snuggled up
next to a cow next to you know a herd of
pigs so long as you've got a decent fire
willing to keep yourself keep everybody
else won't attempt fireplaces and hards
as well we're massively important
elements in the construction of a
longhouse they're they don't take
perform when we think of a fireplace now
we've got a fairly shallow
a fairly narrow fire pit with a with a
chimney going up that wasn't the way
that that went that they built fire pits
and in hearts in long houses what they
did is it would make long narrow fire
pits that they would line with stones
that would allow the heat to be
distributed across the the entirety of
the longhouse and those stones would you
know absorb the heat and help radiate
and heat that way
ventilation gaps in rubes would be there
to help let out some of the smoke there
was no central chimney or anything like
that to pull the hot air and smoke into
a central point out the top of the roof
so they had holes basically put into the
rooms to let some of the smoke out but
they weren't 100% effective
we know from descriptions of long houses
in song as that sort would accumulate
pretty quickly and there were actors
during the winter and you know it would
not be the most pleasant of places for
us to imagine staying in during the
winter but you know it beats the
alternative by a long shot okay so that
that cover is yeah and I'm glad we
covered the long house and this is like
a feature that you see in a lot of
different places along how it seems to
be something that kind of how do you put
it convergent evolution I guess in the
design principles you see the longhouse
also used in in North America by the
digitus peoples the longhouse pops up at
a bunch of different cultures in various
forms but yeah it's something that you
see they've kind of sprinkled through
our history yeah it's a it's a really
it's a ubiquitous sort of design and I
mean it's there we do that for a reason
as a species humans we kind of come to
the same conclusion no matter where we
are geographically it's like this is a
good design we should like yeah okay
cool so we've we've covered the I guess
yeah staying unfrozen and now how do we
cover you know how do you keep yourself
fed so maybe we can talk a bit about
food yeah maybe you can bring in a
sandwich for once but you gotta last
quite a couple months so how do they
store the food and then you're an intern
eat that food
and I mean food preservation during the
early medieval period in Scandinavia was
very similar to food preservation in
other countries at other times you know
it's pickling and brining smoking drying
things like that to keep the to keep the
the meat and produce as fresh as
possible for as long as as possible in
Iceland for example meat would sometimes
be stored in casks of whey which helped
act as kind of like a lacto-fermented
pickling solution for that to preserve
the you know they vowed preserved beef
they would preserve lamb they would
preserve fish of all sorts other meats
like the sort of whitefish that you just
find everywhere along the coast of
Scandinavia can be air dried or smoked
or even salted in places that have
access to a large amount of salt for
that sort of high scale production of
salted fish you know there's all sorts
of ways to extend shelf life just kind
of with what you've got
grains and pulses can be you know dried
out or use later on in porridges or to
make soups or stews or ground up for
grain or into coarser meal for other
uses like making bread or biscuits or
things like that other vegetables would
be during the winter relatively rare
unless you know you would pickle them or
smoked them or or preserve them
you know like air dry them or something
like that Dairy was an essential element
however of a Scandinavian diet for a lot
of reasons we know now that dairy is
really high in vitamin D and one of the
best ways to get vitamin D outside of
dairy is by being outside in the Sun and
when the Sun doesn't come up for three
months of the year that gets a little
tough but dairy is a really good sub
supplement for that and so we have
records in the sagas where butter and
milk
and way and
cheese and skier of which is kind of
like a a soft cheese it's like that sort
of weird middle ground between a thick
yogurt and a soft cheese that was used
in Iceland especially are just being
consumed in mass quantities during the
winter because it's easy to get from a
cow you know if you've got a cow inside
your longhouse you can milk it and you
can preserve the milk by making these
long-lasting cheeses or scared or butter
and also you know it's a pretty tasty
product at the end of it and it comes
with all sorts of great byproducts as
well you know if the way is if you're
making way or making cheese rather or
butter you've got the way in buttermilk
which you then use to pickled and
preserve other foods right so it's a
sort of all-purpose really really useful
food source for Scandinavians at Apple
and so oK we've covered the vast amounts
of food but the logical question is then
at that point that's a lot of food that
you're storing they didn't really have
fridges so the question is you know how
do you where do you store that food and
I would assume you know that's a lot of
food over the summer a lot of your
activities are gonna be you know
planning it out how much do I need to
collect last over the number of months
over winter what excess am I gonna use
for you know selling or trading etc so
there's activities before but let's say
they've gathered gathered all the
necessities do they have a specific like
food silo or do they just keep it all on
their homes and a storage area well
that's it like there'd be storage areas
there would be if it's a larger farm or
a larger complex there are outbuildings
which could be used as storage areas we
don't have a whole lot of information as
to specific food storage locations but
we do know that you know casks and and
kegs were used to carry way and and you
know if you've got you know 25 30 litres
of way in a in a task who's - who's to
keep you from putting a side of beef in
there to help to preserve that
throughout the winter and air dried
things like like whitefish
you know it's hard to view scooter in in
Iceland it's it's dried once it's dried
it will last for ever so long as it
doesn't get wet so you know you can just
stack it up on shelves or in in the
pantry or in the kitchen wherever you're
going to to need or have that storage
space rather you can just stack it there
put it there or just put it into two
jars clay or ceramic containers for
stuff that might be grain and things
like that things that are a little bit
finer that you don't want to just kind
of have rolling around so all sorts of
different places to store that food you
know kind of a widely well they didn't
have fridges all right you know it's not
like they just kind of hoped that for
the best and just left everything on the
ground you know shelving and and
designated food storage areas were
definitely things that they would have
had in a long house make sense oh and
actually lastly I'm thinking for water I
mean easy enough to melt the snow I
think yeah I mean snow melt is is
definitely think I mean when you're when
you're situating your farm you want to
be near a source of running water you
want to be near a river someplace where
you can go and get you know draw water
whether it's from the river or if you've
dug a well right or if you're you know
you've got something that you can draw
water from that's probably where you're
going to be getting it from even during
the winter unless it's really really
badly snowing if you're if you're snow
bound or something like that then you'd
be bringing in snow from outside and
kind of melting it that way as as sort
of as a note um relying on meltwater as
your sole source of drinking water
I mean it's doable but it's not as it's
not as reliable a way of getting enough
water for a household as you would
imagine far easier to just go
bring casks of water up and lay water
away but you've also got wait that's a
that's a thing that people sometimes
overlook is that especially in Iceland
people would just drink the way or the
buttermilk because these things though
they are relatively long lasting and
they don't go bad as quickly as just
regular milk would spoil they will drink
that that's a good way of keeping
yourself hydrated and getting what
getting some nutrients as well at the
same time yeah yeah because I was
thinking most of the time when you're
preserving food the whole idea is to get
all the water out so because usually
like humans diet is like you get a fair
amount of water from your food but in
this case they're actually purposely
removing all the water from the food to
store right so I'd assume water intake
was maybe a little higher than usual so
it's kind of interesting okay well with
that being said let's move on to the
kind of the next big portion which is
gonna be okay you're warm you're fed but
now you're bored so what would they
essentially do over the winter is to
keep themselves you know not only to
maintain you know probably collecting
firewood and water and stuff we've said
but what would they do you know to keep
themselves saying yeah I mean other than
as you said like the sort of day-to-day
stuff that you can't avoid doing
collecting firewood doing any sort of
maintenance or upkeep or things like
that you know you're gonna be doing kind
of the same thing you would do at night
you know it's talking with people doing
any sort of day-to-day crafts sewing
things spinning spinning homespun wool
telling stories reciting poetry playing
games all sorts of games that were that
were played during the during the winter
would be played during the summer as
well you know things like Natasha which
is a sort of a board game that kind of
combines checkers and chess you know
dicing like we have found dice from
roughly this period all across the world
so you know people are playing dice
people are are just kind of hanging out
with their extended family and doing the
the same sort of things that they would
do
at any other point of the year you know
they had ways to get around as well
snowshoes I don't know if they had skis
at this point but yeah it's still ooh
travel pretty well yes skiing is
actually that's one of the oldest
methods of transport that we know of
from Scandinavia skiing goes back
thousands of years up in that part of
the world so they had plenty of ways to
get around not necessarily snowshoes but
it's for sure and also I mean while when
you read in in the sagas my personal
favorite is is an episode from gisla
saga where he describes going where it's
described you know going from one farm
to the next in winter and it's this epic
journey that you know it seems to drag
on for days and days because the Sun
doesn't come up the actual distance is
maybe a kilometer and a half and it
probably in the length takes about two
hours to walk there maybe three if it's
if it's really badly snowed in but you
know you're you're not always going to
be bound to the to the house or to the
farm area itself you can travel it's
just one of those things that if you
have to travel if you don't have to
travel you don't just because it is
exceptionally unpleasant to travel long
distances without a whole lot of
especially compared to modern day
without a whole lot of warming stuff to
keep you warm right and another thing to
draw parallels to modern day when I was
doing research for kind of the Viking
military and their training part of the
thing that I found is that in in their
youth they would use snowball fights
I think it's training for their military
so they would build like little little
fortresses and then different teams
would spend time attacking each other
maybe they might have a shield to like
protect themselves from incoming fire so
snowball fight is very much a thing in
the past and it's always funny to think
of like modern you know children playing
snowball fights but you have Viking kids
also having snowball fights as well oh
yeah absolutely I mean you know sports
and things like that you can you can
play anything in the snow all right
there's there's there's no real
restriction
on a lot of you know ballgames and
wrestling and things like that and
snowball fights absolutely would be a
thing I can't think of even even people
who have never seen snow in their life
all right you know you put them out in
out in southern Ontario in in February
and there's a big pile of snow the very
first thing the kids will do pick it up
and throw it at each other right so I
mean we've been we've been doing that
forever so yeah snowball fights you know
building little snow forts things like
that I I can't see that not happening
yeah and then another important thing as
well because in the previous episode we
talked about the Vikings kind of more
doing the thing they're known for which
is raiding and trading and the winter
months
I think we're somewhat integrated in
this where if they were planning a
campaign they would spend the winter
months in some ways preparing the tools
and equipment and especially the the
long ship sails as well yeah yeah and I
mean that's that's it you know at that
point where all of the farming is done
where all of the the really hard work of
the the late spring summer and early
autumn is finished that's when you can
start working on other things you can
start working on on if you're not a
dedicated sail maker you can start work
work on your sails you can start work on
other projects that you might not have
had the time to devote all of your
energies to during farming season yeah
and this is also kind of a bit of an
aside but I've been playing the game
North Guard as well know where you do
actually ended up kind of using this
where during the summer time you're
spending a lot of your time farming
being very productive building up your
food storage and in the winter months
that's where you transition your economy
over into production mode because you
have all the food even if you try and
produce food you're not going to be very
efficient at it so now you kind of
switch over to more production focus so
it was great to see kind of those
parallels yeah for sure and and that's
that's kind of the way that we as a
species have always worked is that once
we've gotten all of our food laid away
then we can do stuff with it all right
once we've got all these resources
collected then we can do stuff
and winter is a good time for that sweet
well let's move into the the next big
one so we've stated what the winner was
alike how they survived them what they
did and then now it's gonna be kind of
in the long sense how did doing this
every season impact them as a whole as a
culture and just again to draw parallels
this is you know something that you'll
find all across the world I mean Jared
Diamond for instance is kind of famous
famous for his gun germs and steel where
he tries to talk about how different
cultures and a lot of human history is
derived from where they were
geographically now I know there's a lot
of criticism for how deterministic it is
but still there's an undeniable link so
for instance one of the things is like
in Mesopotamia early on the humans there
had a lot of problems with flash floods
storms that would come sweeping in with
little notice and then therefore their
view of the Gods was these kids these
guys don't care about them their view of
the afterlife was pretty bleak and then
you turn to the Egyptians and they have
you know more mild climates with cycles
of fertility with flooding of the Nile
that would bring life and rebirth and
regrowth and that kind of drives our
mythology so in all of these you kind of
have the weather and the terrain and all
that impacting the development of their
culture so with that being said we can
turn to you know maybe the Viking aspect
of that well yeah I mean there's there's
definitely something to be said for the
fact that winters were not pleasant to
be out in influencing the culture when
we look at how them all which is part of
the pro of the poetic Edda rather excuse
me it acts kind of like a how-to guide
for living a proper life it begins the
the first real sort of advice it gives
in the first four stanzas of the poem
are basically saying make sure you've
got space for random people to show up
and stay at your your house make sure
you've got food drink towels and dry
clothes hanging around just in case and
you know make sure that you're going to
be a generous host to people who show up
in the winter because being outside and
winter sucks it's awfully cold and it's
awfully wet and people will need warmth
and comfort if they are looking for if
they're there on their way from
place to the other you know it's it's a
sort of there's a definite sense that
being a traveler at any time of the year
you should expect hospitality but
especially during the winter you should
be you should be as a traveler expecting
hospitality but also as a host you know
be prepared to provide that hospitality
for people who will come by there's
actually what does it uh stands up three
is is my favorite sort of description of
that you know it's jeans fire who the
one who has come in from the frozen
fells with icy knees right like you know
the guy has just come in from the cold
and he is so cold that his knees have
have started to freeze over so get him
food get him fire get him warm you need
to take care of these people so it's
definitely an aspect that of the culture
that has been you can see is being
directly influenced by the harshness of
winters and you can imagine the idea
this culture of hospitality not just you
know practically applying in the winter
but also how that might extend to
relationships with your neighbor or the
ways you can tuck diplomacy the idea of
you know even if you're you know dealing
with your enemy you do want to be a
generous host the way maybe the the top
king interacts with the lower lords etc
maybe you a king might go to a certain
longhouse and there's the expectation
that he would wine and dine with them as
his guests and there's it kind of
infiltrates the whole culture I think
that's exactly yeah I mean you you do
see depictions of the the higher state
is higher status nobility going to lower
status nobility and everyone is
welcoming them there's the expectation
that as as a vassal you would go to to a
superior to to your noble Lord or
something like that and get hospitality
and generosity from them after all
they're the guys who control where all
of the wealth is coming from so you know
this is why you have epithets like a
ring giver is
something to be to be known as because
you're giving away you know silver arm
rings or or just wealth material wealth
to your followers your generous that way
so you can see how that does sort of
link the the generosity of the host to
the generosity of the economically or
politically superior individual to the
lower ranked individual but also in
Reverse because if they come to your
place you want to put on a good spread
for the boss right you want to make sure
that they are they understand that you
understand the the pecking order and and
the sort of responsibilities that are
entailed in that and I'm sure we could
do a whole other episode on the concept
or the culture of the long haul feasting
traditions festivals and all that oh
yeah they all will save that for another
episode the last little bit that I did
want to touch on is and rather large
would be how did the the winter
influence their religion in particular
yeah well this is the thing when it
comes to Norse religion a lot of our
stuff almost all of our of our written
sources come from a post conversion
milieu right like there's a lot of
what's called you hammer ization
basically making making the myths into
sort of plausible human humanistic
iterations but we still have in poetry
we still have in reference guides for
poets you know associations of
particular gods with winter or with snow
or things like that we also have as I
mentioned before the film Bavetta that
the great winter before the ending of
the world you know we have concepts of
Hell the the place rather than the
goddess being cold and damp and dark
which again if you've been to
Scandinavia during the winter is a good
description of of it at times you know
we also have references to rim thirst or
frost giants in Old Norse they show up
occasionally not not as frequently as
just referring to them as yacht nod or
thirst as a Giants or or well Giants um
but the most famous one is emitter BB
giant from whom all the world is made
you know he's this frost giant and and
there's this this idea that he is just
this massive being of ice and rime and
frost but when he's killed by ultimately
by Walden and his brothers you know they
they use his flesh to form the earth his
bones form the mountains his skull is
the sky
you know his blood makes up the ocean so
there's a sense of rebirth from this
this definite stasis of cold
there's also references to winter in in
Norse mythology and as I said in
references and associations with gods
Scottie and woodland are really
associated closely with winter sky V is
the the daughter of Fiat C has a yotan
there's a big story about him but she's
associated specifically with winter but
also with hunting and skiing or lauder
as well is associated with hunting and
skiing and through that we can kind of
assume an association with winter as
well so we have those those associations
of winter with with specific gods of
specific activities with people
associated with winter skiing obviously
is going to be associated with winter
hunting associated with winter because
well that's the best place to get your
food when you can't grow any it's so so
we definitely do have those of those
sorts of associations going through the
culture right and they'll be like we
keep saying and all these podcast
there's always room for discussing more
and more of this so we'll probably do a
future episode on mythology and
different cultural aspects but to cut on
some things up we've talked about the
winners how they could be comparable to
today's winners in the similar areas we
talked about the impact on food storage
and all that how they're influenced
different cultural attributes like
hospitality the religiosity
or religious aspects but what we've
covered kind of a main thing and I kind
of want to end on a note here stating
that I'm talking about the Vikings
it's kind of a label we put on these
people that they wouldn't have
necessarily applied themselves and a lot
of times in the olden world you have
these various groups that are operating
under labels that we only apply today
whereas back in the time they would have
really understood more so things through
you know what language did you speak
what culture do you share and so this
culture this shared thread of the the
shared winter experience the shared
culture coming from that winter is
really one of the things that did define
kind of these Scandinavian cultures so
it's really important to kind of
understand this and understand how it
really impacted not only their daily
lives but associations with others yeah
absolutely
you're absolutely right on that one of
the things I always like to to remind
people is that when we refer to early
medieval Scandinavians as a whole as
Vikings it would be like referring to
Americans as a whole as Marines or
Canadians as a whole as Mounties you
know they're iconic they're they're
emblematic they're yeah that's what
that's you know what a lot of people
know them as but there are so much more
to the culture than just that and so
great yeah I'm glad we've been able to
talk about this so again people in the
in the comments below I'm sure we can we
can go ahead and try and answer some of
the questions that you have in the
comment section and then also be sure to
direct them over to Twitter as I'm sure
the Viking gym will be able to answer
some of them there and then also if you
have any questions that we can you know
maybe spin into specific episodes
following up we're all ears for that
yeah absolutely and I look forward to
answering any questions you guys have
for for me Twitter is probably the best
place to get me but I'll definitely be
checking the comments once this is up
okay well great thanks again for joining
us and we will see you in the next one
okay
you