Editing Viking metal (section)

=== Bathory ===
[[File:La caza salvaje de Odín, por Peter Nicolai Arbo.jpg|thumb|right|''[[The Wild Hunt of Odin]]'' by [[Peter Nicolai Arbo]] was used as the cover for Bathory's ''[[Blood Fire Death]]'' album, considered the first example of Viking metal.]]
The roots of Viking metal are generally found in Scandinavian metal, particularly the death and black metal scenes of the late 1980s. Inspired by the Viking themes used by Manowar, some bands identified with the Vikings far more completely than Manowar.{{sfn|Trafford|Pluskowski|2007|p=62}} At the forefront of this movement stood the Swedish band Bathory, which influenced the emergence not only of Viking metal but also of folk metal, [[Medieval folk rock|medieval folk]], and [[neofolk]].{{sfn|Sharpe-Young|2007|p=478}} The band's fourth album ''Blood Fire Death'', released in 1988, includes two early examples of Viking metal&nbsp;– the songs "A Fine Day to Die" and "Blood Fire Death".{{sfn|Rivadavia|n.d.b}} The cover to ''Blood Fire Death'' even features ''[[The Wild Hunt of Odin]]'', a painting by Norwegian artist [[Peter Nicolai Arbo]] which depicts the Norse god Odin on a [[Wild Hunt]].{{sfn|Trafford|Pluskowski|2007|p=62}} Vlad Nichols writes that while the parts of the album that were dedicated to Viking themes had more in common with Wagnerian imagination than Nordic music, the album "came closer to an intuited essence of a 'Viking feel' in music than any before".{{Sfn|Nichols|2019}} Bathory followed up on this Viking theme in 1990 with the release of ''Hammerheart'', a [[concept album]] fully devoted to Vikings.{{sfn|Trafford|Pluskowski|2007|p=62}} Like its predecessor, this album features a Viking-themed painting, this time ''The Funeral of a Viking'' by [[Frank Dicksee|Sir Frank Dicksee]].{{sfn|Trafford|Pluskowski|2007|p=62}} Following up this release were 1991's ''[[Twilight of the Gods (album)|Twilight of the Gods]]'', titled after Wagner's [[Götterdämmerung|opera of the same name]], and ''[[Blood on Ice]]'', recorded in 1988–1989 but released in 1996.{{sfn|Trafford|Pluskowski|2007|p=62}} ''Hammerheart'' is considered a landmark that introduced the metal world to the Viking metal archetype.{{sfn|Rivadavia|n.d.c}} With this album, Quorthon, the band's founder, inspired a generation of Nordic teens, and seeded a deep anti-Christian sentiment which culminated in the violence and hate crimes committed by members of the Norwegian black metal community in the early 1990s.{{sfn|Rivadavia|n.d.c}} The artistic choices by Quorthon contain völkisch elements which emphasize a return to heathen Europe rather than a "destructive" Christianity.{{sfn|Manea|2015|p=187}} Quorthon later explained, in the liner notes to ''Blood on Ice'', that his shift to Viking themes was an intentional move away from Satanism: {{Quotation|text=I came to the personal conclusion that this whole Satanic bit was a fake: a hoax created by another hoax&nbsp;– the Christian church, the very institution they were attempting to attack using Satanic lyrics in the first place. Since I am an avid fan of history, the natural step would be to find something in history that could replace a thing like the dark side of life. And what could be more simple and natural than to pick up on the Viking era? Being Swedish and all, having a personal relation to, and linked by blood to, that era at the same time as it was an internationally infamous moment in history, I sensed that here I might just have something. Especially well suited was it since it was an era that reached its peak just before the Christian circus came around northern Europe and Sweden in the tenth century, establishing itself as the dictatorial way of life and death. And so that Satan and hell type of soup was changed for proud and strong nordsmen, shiny blades of broadswords, dragon ships and party-'til-you-puke type of living up there in the great halls.|author=Quorthon|source=Liner notes of ''Blood on Ice''{{sfn|Mulvany|2000|p=30}}}}

Bathory's Viking metal features Wagnerian-style epics, ostentatious arrangements, choruses, and ambient keyboards.{{sfn|Rivadavia|n.d.d}} Mulvany notes that Bathory's 1990s work marks the beginning of a Viking-themed trend initially slow, even confusing, in formation.{{sfn|Mulvany|2000|p=32}} For example, the Austrian black metal band [[Abigor]] incorporated Viking themes and Germanic paganism in "Unleashed Axe-Age", the first track on its 1994 album ''Nachthymnen'', but said it "should not be seen as a part of the upcoming Viking trend".{{sfn|Mulvany|2000|p=32}} According to Mulvany, "The Viking trend presaged by Abigor was actually taking place around them, and it remains more 'true' to how black metal is often defined than the folk influenced metal that followed. Its folk elements are predominantly textual or musically evocative rather than musically-historically accurate."{{sfn|Mulvany|2000|p=33}}