Vikings

[Berserker]

Oki, the vikings do look stupid. The helmets are not corect, so is their clothing. Ive red that u dont know yet how they will look. I have a link here where u can se how a real viking helmet looked like. Actually this is the only viking helmet ever to be found (its found in southern Norway) The viking helmets looked like this and probably the vikings used same types of helmet that the normans did. The two helmets in the bottom of the page is viking helmets, shown i FIGURE 9. <A HREF="http://"http://www.tidsskriftet.no/pls/lts/PA_LT.VisSeksjon?vp_SEKS_ID=362275" TARGET="_blank">VikingHelmet</A>

[Berserker]

ops sorry, that link came out all wrong :) This is the link: http://www.tidsskriftet.no/pls/lts/PA_LT.VisSeksjon?vp_SEKS_ID=362275 FIGURE 9, there is the picture!

[Angryminer]

Frujin already said that the horns on the helmets have disappeared. The website is just not up-to-date ;) .

Angryminer

[Berserker]

ahh oki...anyway, thats a viking helmet, and thats how the helmets in the game should look like heh.

[timurlenk]

the issue was discussed here! (http://forum.sunflowers.de/showthread.php?t=1092&highlight=eye+protection)

but now we know the "eye protection helmets" are called "gjermundbu-hjelmen".


btw, i protest against the wrong drawn :viking:

:p

[Berserker]

It surtently does :) I also think the vikings in the game should apare as the Hirdemenn (the professional viking warriors fallawing a King or a Earl). These warriors had armor, helmets and large shields eather with axe or sword....its kinda funny that they have made the vikings look like cavemen, but its not the way it was (exept from the long har and beard hehe :) )

[Jarlabanke]

The most common find from viking age graves in Scandinavia is the comb...
And while I can't quote anything exactly, there is this 13-14 century source, where an englishman claims the vikings had an unfair advantage over the natives when it came to women as the washed themselves at least once a week.
On the conterary we've got Ibn Fadlan (sp?), who met Rus (if it was Scandinavians or Russians isn't really clear though) at Volga. He called them "gods filthiest creatures" or something like that.
So even if they had long hair and so on at least they were probably rather well kept.
Oh, and I'd prefer the term Huskarl in stead of Hirdman.

[Berserker]

The fact is that the englis copied the norsmens hair and beard, enlish munks wrote that down (this goes for the north of the britsh isles). The vikings was "clean" and often well dressed, but they kept theitr hair long nd they had beard, no doubt about that. Hauskarl u say?Yes, huskarls (Huskarer, witch Stallar was the "captain") was moastly used by landlords (Lendemenn) Chieftens (høvdinger) and so on...under Huskarl u had Gjester who served as some sort of personal policemen...But still, Hirdemenn was above huskarls, and was used by kings and often Earls, they where better equiped then the hausekarls (depends on the wealth of the landloards holding the husekarls of course). Later on Hirdemenn took over complietly, and the husekarls dissapears.

[Berserker]

Wel, i use norwegian expressions...maby its different in swedish.

[Henrik]

@Berserker

Don't worry i know that Jarlabanke know excactly what you're talking about ! - we have discussed this matter before - as i recall the huskarls were equiped with what is commonly known as a danish battle axe - it is said that with one of these axes one could nearly split both man and horse in one single blow !

[Berserker]

Hey Henrik Jarl av Danmark

Danish battle axe? oki, never heard of, in norway we sipmly used the older "skjeggøksen" and the newer "bredøksen"....f.eks Sankt Olav ( Olav Haraldsson) used a "bredøks" called "Hel" :)

The vikings often used combinations like Jarlabanke has said, but almoast evrytime they had eather sword or axe as their "main" wapon. very rear to find a compination of spear and bow f.ex

[Henrik]

Hey Henrik Jarl av Danmark

Danish battle axe? oki, never heard of, in norway we sipmly used the older "skjeggøksen" and the newer "bredøksen"....f.eks Sankt Olav ( Olav Haraldsson) used a "bredøks" called "Hel" :)

The vikings often used combinations like Jarlabanke has said, but almoast evrytime they had eather sword or axe as their "main" wapon. very rear to find a compination of spear and bow f.ex

I have seen this "danish battle axe" exspression on many sites, so i think that it is the propper way to name it - why don't try to use the "danish battle axe" sentence as a search word on google, then you'll see what i'm talking about.

[Berserker]

I dont question the fact that there was axes called danish battle axes, i never heard of it thats all (i looked it up so i know there was, and these axes was later used by english huscarles), its just that in norway the battle axes that was moast used where bredøksen and skjeggøksen. Bredøksen (witch are of the same type as the danish battle axe, infact identical) i guess is the norwegian term.

[Jarlabanke]

Well both Broadaxes and Bearded axes are defined by the shape of the head and the edge, if I've understood it correctly a dane axe is in general twohanded (like the one of St. Olav), I also belive it's an english term, seeing how they called everything scandinavian danish.
BTW while Axes and swords are more common in Denmark and Norway, speartips are the most common in Sweden.
As a Hirdman would be better equiped and so on I really don't think it would represent the general viking but more the elite in the Scandinavian warrior soicety, which is what I guess they're trying to include in the game.

[Berserker]

Yea, if you want to represent the "ordinary" viking, its probably the best solution what ur saying, never the less, an ordinary viking would still be armed with more than one weapon. While swords where a more expensive weapon ( cus the blade often was imported from germany and france cus of the better steel down there) the battleaxes and spears could easely be made in any farm with a blacksmith. And bows was made by the common man and not bought. So even the poorest of the free men in scandinavia would have spears, bows, axes and many of them also swords (witch often was passed down from father to son amongst the poorest). actually there is an old law in norway, the Gulatingloven, its says that evry free man in Norway MUST own eather sword or axe together with a spear and a shield. So evry free man had atleast two weapons.

[Berserker]

And i think it would be strange if such a law as this only was in Norway and not in Sweden too...