Viking Age Arms and Armor
Available Sources

Our knowledge of Viking arms and their use comes from a small number of sources. Alone, none of these sources paint a clear picture of the arms or of the combat techniques. Taken together, our understanding, although speculative, becomes more clear.

Archaeological Finds. Most of our knowledge about the weapons of the Viking age comes from archaeological sources. However, that knowledge is limited, compared to what is known about later arms and armor because, in comparison, little Viking era armament survives. Unlike the later medieval and Renaissance periods when arms and armor were stored under cover and protected from the elements, virtually all of the Viking age items survive only as excavated items — material dug up or dredged up from underground or underwater. Most of the artifacts are grave goods, but some are offerings, and others represent items lost or discarded during travel or in battle.

Most Viking people practiced the Northern heathen religion, worshiping the gods and goddesses of the Norse myths. The burial practices of these people included being interred with grave goods: items related to their work and social position when alive. Thus, prominent men or warriors were buried with their arms and armor. Whether intentionally or accidentally buried, it is this excavated material that we have available for study today. However, underground or underwater, these materials degrade. The wood and leather rot, and the iron rusts. So, it's only under unusual conditions that any Viking age arms and armor have survived at all.

While as many as one thousand Viking age swords survive in various states of preservation, only a small handful of Viking age helmets have survived. With so few items to study, it's difficult to determine if a particular specimen is normal or atypical for its historical period.

Because the surviving historical weapons tend not to be well preserved, it can be hard imagining what the weapon might have looked like when new. This photographic comparison of a historical weapon and a modern reproduction gives an idea of the appearance of the weapon when new compared to its appearance today, more than one thousand years after it was made.

Combat Treatises. Our knowledge of Viking age combat techniques is even more limited. The Vikings left nothing behind to teach us how they used their weapons.

Image ©2006 Higgins Armory Museum

The situation was very different later in the medieval era and in the Renaissance, when master fighters created training manuals that were used to teach combat techniques. Some of these manuals survive, and by studying them, one can gain an understanding of the fighting techniques used in those periods. An illustration from the combat treatise written by Joachim Meyer in 1570 is shown to the left. Nothing like that survives from the Viking era, so little can be said that's definitive about the use of Viking age weapons.

One approach to recreating Viking era fighting techniques is to make reproduction weapons based on historical examples, and then to use those reproductions to try various combat techniques in an attempt to reinvent the historical techniques. It's highly unlikely that we can reconstruct the kind of effective fighting techniques that were refined over centuries and practiced by fighting men from childhood in the Viking age.

Another approach is to study the techniques taught in the later medieval fight manuals and adapt them to Viking age weapons. While Viking age weapons and techniques differ considerably from those taught in later manuals, the later techniques did not spring up out of a vacuum. It's highly likely that the later techniques built upon prior practices. The later manuals attest to this sort of borrowing of techniques from earlier weapons. Since the historical manuals represent time-tested, martially effective fighting systems, we chose to use them as our starting point. However, when using the later manuals as sources, it is important to remember that they have a fundamental drawback: they teach weapons very different from those in use during the Viking age. The photo humorously but graphically illustrates those differences, showing a Viking armed with 10th century sword and shield facing a combatant armed with a longsword using techniques from Meyer's 1570 combat manual. The weapons are different, and the techniques are likely to have been different as well.

The Sagas. Another source of information about fighting techniques is the literature from the Viking age and the period immediately following, such as The Sagas of Icelanders. One might think the stories in these books would be especially useful as a source for fighting techniques. They were written by authors who had almost certainly witnessed combat, and who probably had participated in combat. In addition, they were written for an audience who, similarly, had probably either witnessed or participated in combat and who were familiar with fighting techniques. So, the combat situations described are probably realistic.

However, the sagas have limited usefulness to the student of historical martial arts due to questions about their historical accuracy and to their lack of detail. The stories were not written down until centuries after the events they describe took place. When the sagas describe fighting techniques, are they describing 10^th and 11^th century techniques (from when the stories took place) or 13^th and 14^th century techniques (when the stories were written down)? Further, the stories were written for entertainment, and a detailed description of combat technique is rarely necessary for advancing the plot. As a result, the sagas tend to say a lot about the participants in a fight and the ramifications of a fight, but very little about the techniques used. (A complete list of references to arms, armor, and combat in the Sagas of Icelanders is available for downloading from the Hurstwic library.)

Regardless, the sagas can be valuable to help confirm speculations based on other sources. If, for instance, material from a later combat manual teaches a technique, and that same technique appears in a saga, it affirms our speculations.

Pictorial Sources. An additional source of information comes from art: stone carvings, wood carvings, and tapestries from the Norse age. However, little pictorial art either of or by the Norse people survives. What does survive tends to be representations of Norse mythology and heroic tales. Grave markers (right) and memorial stones sometimes show warriors dressed for battle with their arms.

Some figurative art from other European societies during the Viking age has survived, such as the sketch of mounted Carolingian warriors (shown to the left). The illustration was drawn in the 9th century and depicts a contemporary scene.

Forensics. A final source of information comes from the forensic studies of Viking age skeletal remains having battle injuries. This field is an increasingly valuable source. Forensics can confirm information from other sources about targets and injuries. The 11th century skull shown to the right has two disabling injuries to the skull (indicated by arrows), both made with a blade, probably a sword. The sagas tell of combatants continuing to fight after multiple horrific disabling wounds. Such tales could easily be discounted as heroic exaggerations, but the historical skeletal remains confirm that at least some Viking warriors actually suffered the kinds of gruesome injuries described in the sagas. Further, the forensic evidence shows that some of these grievously wounded men survived, recovered, and lived to fight and suffer additional wounds later in their lives.

Limitations to this Study. Possible sources of information that have not been used in this study are some currently practiced martial arts, notably from Asia, that use weapons not dissimilar from Viking age weapons. I have not discarded these sources, but rather have focused first on martial arts systems from places and periods more closely related to the Viking era, even though these martial arts systems have not been continually practiced as have some of the eastern systems.

In studying the combat techniques, I focus on the use of Viking age arms by small groups of men in single combat, rather than the disciplined battle lines of mass combat. That focus is due, in part, to my personal interest in the medieval Icelandic literature, which shares that focus. I point out circumstances where significant differences are thought to have existed between the two fighting styles.

In this text, I tend to refer to the use of weapons by men because there are very few references to the use of weapons by women in the saga literature. In Norse society, women were prohibited from carrying weapons. (This prohibition and its implications are discussed in more detail in the previous article in this series, as well as in the article on women in Norse society.)

The techniques described here represent the author's opinion about what techniques may have been used in the Viking era, based on the limited historical material available.