Viking Age 793 A.D - 1066 A.D (793 Ad)

The Viking Age is the name of the period between 793 and 1066 AD in Scandinavia and Britain, following the Germanic Iron Age (and the Vendel Age in Sweden). During this period, the Vikings, Scandinavian warriors, leidangs and traders, raided and explored most parts of Europe, south-western Asia, northern Africa and north-eastern North America. Apart from exploring Europe by way of its oceans and rivers with the aid of their advanced navigational skills and extending their trading routes across vast parts of the continent, they also engaged in warfare and looted and enslaved numerous Christian communities of Medieval Europe for centuries, contributing to the development of feudal systems in Europe, which included castles and barons (which were a defense against Viking raids).
Viking society was based on agriculture and trade with other peoples and placed great emphasis on the concept of honour both in combat and in the criminal justice system.
It is unknown what triggered the Vikings expansion and conquests, but historians have suggested that technological innovations imported from Mediterranean civilizations along with a milder climate led to population growth due to a long period of good crops. Another factor was the destruction of the Frisian fleet by Charlemagne around 785, which interrupted the flow of many trading goods from Central Europe to Scandinavia and led the Vikings to come looking for it themselves.
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England was ruled by the French (or, rather, the Normans) for almost 100 years - 1066 - 1154. (before that, we were ruled, on and off, by the Vikings for 300 years). We call England at that time "Norman England." But I've never heard an age called "Norman Age."

England's Norman Kings.

King William I
Also known as William the Conqueror
Reigned 1066-1087

King William II
Reigned 1087-1100
Killed in a hunting "accident"; probably murdered

King Henry I
Reigned 1100-1135

King Stephen
Reigned 1135-1154

I think when people talk of the viking age, they are generally talking about that period of time which viking/norse cultural spread across europe in the ways of trade, raids and wars. Once the end of age came so did the decline in that type of norse activity, also I'd argue by the end of that age, Viking/norse culture had changed and also many had conservated to christanity which also changed there aditudes towards raiding, trade and war.

Yeah, they are in the video games.

I guess that's something.

But anyhow, the Norse were an a great culture and though like many culturers many focus on wars and raids, the Viking/norse, were amazing traders and settlers second to none that I can think of.

A big reason to why the "viking age" or the dark ages have been forwarded in a negitive light was in the collasp of the Western Roman Empire and the lose of the writen latin and education, really. True there was still some but in the west including the norse area's Western Romaization halted and went backwards. But the Norse were there own civilization with there own ways of doing things and I'd say they were strong traders, seafarers, explorers and settlers and the Romans were nt half as good as the "vikings" in those area's.

Ireland had a good "tourist commercial" a few years ago. Went something like this.. with visuals of sacking mind you.

"First the Romans came, then the anglos and then the saxons, the vikings and then the brits, come to Ireland, you will be the first we invited"

Anyhow it was something like that. was funny as hell.

The Vikings fought the Anglo-Saxons when they came over here and burnt and pillaged our villages.

The Anglo-Saxons came a few hundreds years previously from the areas that are now Northern Germany and Southern Denmark. When they landed on Britain's east coast, they fought the Celts, who were the natives of the island, and pushed them into the far extremes of the island - far west and far north. The Celts then stayed in those places far west and far north, and they became Wales and Scotland. The Germanic Anglo-Saxons inhabited the rest of the island, which later became England, which is why the English are described as a Germanic race who speak a Germanic language, whereas the Welsh and Scots are described as Celtic races, who speak they own Celtic languages. Really, the only native inhabitants of the island are the Welsh and Scots. They are the equivalent of the American Indians, I suppose.

The Vikings actually had a good play of Northern Europe and settled not only Iceland but Greenland as well! The Last Viking evacuated Greenland in favor of Iceland 1n the 1500's, thus ending the Colonization of Greenland! Several factors account for this failure in Greenland but the Little Ice Age, 1100-1850 probably brought on the diminuation of Agriculture on Greenland and thus the Hanseatic League of the Baltic concentrated it effort on Iceland which had slipped into a feudal barony of Denmark by 1500.

But anyhow, the Norse were an a great culture and though like many culturers many focus on wars and raids, the Viking/norse, were amazing traders and settlers second to none that I can think of.

A big reason to why the "viking age" or the dark ages have been forwarded in a negitive light was in the collasp of the Western Roman Empire and the lose of the writen latin and education, really. True there was still some but in the west including the norse area's Western Romaization halted and went backwards. But the Norse were there own civilization with there own ways of doing things and I'd say they were strong traders, seafarers, explorers and settlers and the Romans were nt half as good as the "vikings" in those area's.