Hand-Held Historical Research: #Viking Jorvik

Spear, long axe and seax (long knife), with shield behind.

Spring might not quite be with us here in the northern hemisphere, but in the Acaster household mid February starts the annual series of historical research field trips, not so much in a field – I could have done if I’d wanted – but in York’s city centre streets. Welcome to the trading empire of Viking Jorvik.

A little background: York began life in AD71 as a fortress built by invading Romans, and the rectangle of medieval walls still standing used the fortress walls as foundations, which gives a somewhat breath-taking notion of how large the fortress was. A civil settlement sprung up facing it across the river, to be known as Eboracum. I used this research and more for The Bull At The Gate, Book 2 of the Torc of Moonlight trilogy.

As the Roman legions left early in the 5th century the Saxons were arriving on British shores, and to a far lesser extent took over the fortress area and settlement, calling it Eoforwic. By the late 8th century “Northmen” were raiding the land using their state-of-the-art transports, langskips, and by 866/7 what became known as The Great Heathen Army had taken the settlement by sword-storm as it annexed the northern portion of the country. Ideally sited on a set of navigable rivers emptying into the North Sea for a crossing to Scandinavian lands, Jórvik, as the settlement was renamed, became the capital of the Dane Law. It remained under Norse rule for 100 years, re-blossoming into a trading hub as it had under the Saxons, this time stretching from Iceland to Russia to Byzantium and Ireland.

More weaponry for sale than can be imagined.

Getting the forge up to temperature to make arrowheads

All this was mere dry academic history until in the 1970s a major redevelopment of Coppergate, an area close to the river, re-wrote it. Viking Age streets full of houses were discovered in the silt, and 40,000 artefacts were lifted from the ground. The shopping centre redevelopment went ahead, leaving a somewhat unassuming small shopfront to announce The Jorvik Centre and act as a portal to an animated reconstruction of the old Norse dwellings in situ, complete with sounds and smells, deep below modern footfall. Since it opened in 1984 it has welcomed over 20 million visitors.

Along with the opening of the Centre came the Jorvik Festival, relying heavily on the participation of re-enactors. This has grown substantially over the years, now covering a week of events, with traders and participants coming from across Scandinavia and Europe, and North America by the sound of accents overheard, as well as talks, lectures, feasting and a battle. There’s always a battle; we are talking Vikings.

It is an opportunity to lift historically accurate weaponry and clothing for weight, try out skills, and discuss manufacturing techniques with people who actually make these items. So I could be found discussing the relative merits of various types of arrowheads, who in their society would be able to afford seal-skin ropes and whether ropes made from lime-bast would be as good aboard a longship – sorry, langskip – trying out a hand-quern, watching craftsman work with wood and iron, spinning with a distaff, and taking a lesson in nålebinding which looks halfway between crocheting and knitting. 

Have hand-axe, can split & plane wood

A writer never knows when these things might come in handy.