Editing Vikings (section)

====Status of women====
[[File:Eiríksstaðir - Wikingerschmuck.jpg|thumb|Typical jewellery worn by women of the ''karls'' and ''jarls'': ornamented silver brooches, coloured glass-beads and amulets]]
Like elsewhere in medieval Europe, most women in Viking society were subordinate to their husbands and fathers and had little political power.<ref name="Magnúsdóttir">Magnúsdóttir, Auður. "Women and sexual politics", in ''The Viking World''. Routledge, 2008. pp.40–45</ref><ref name="Women Denmark Museum">[https://en.natmus.dk/historical-knowledge/denmark/prehistoric-period-until-1050-ad/the-viking-age/the-people/women/ "Women in the Viking Age"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210903201903/https://en.natmus.dk/historical-knowledge/denmark/prehistoric-period-until-1050-ad/the-viking-age/the-people/women/ |date=3 September 2021 }}. [[National Museum of Denmark]].</ref> However, written sources portray free Viking women as having independence and rights. Viking women generally appear to have had more freedom than women elsewhere,<ref name="Women Denmark Museum"/> as illustrated in the Icelandic [[Grágás]] and the Norwegian [[Frostating]] laws and [[Gulating]] laws.<ref name="ReferenceB">Borgström Eva {{in lang|sv}}: Makalösa kvinnor: könsöverskridare i myt och verklighet (Marvelous women : gender benders in myth and reality) Alfabeta/Anamma, Stockholm 2002. {{ISBN|91-501-0191-9}} (inb.). Libris 8707902.</ref>

Most free Viking women were housewives, and a woman's standing in society was linked to that of her husband.<ref name="Women Denmark Museum"/> Marriage gave a woman a degree of economic security and social standing encapsulated in the title ''húsfreyja'' (lady of the house). Norse laws assert the housewife's authority over the 'indoor household'. She had the important roles of managing the farm's resources, conducting business, as well as child-rearing, although some of this would be shared with her husband.<ref name="Friðriksdóttir">Friðriksdóttir, Jóhanna. ''Valkyrie: The Women of the Viking World''. Bloomsbury Publishing, 2020. pp.98–100.</ref>

After the age of 20, an unmarried woman, referred to as ''maer'' and ''mey'', reached legal majority and had the right to decide her place of residence and was regarded as her own person before the law.<ref name="ReferenceB"/> An exception to her independence was the right to choose a husband, as marriages were normally arranged by the family.<ref>Borgström Eva{{in lang|sv}}: Makalösa kvinnor: könsöverskridare i myt och verklighet (Marvelous women : gender benders in myth and reality) Alfabeta/Anamma, Stockholm 2002. {{ISBN|91-501-0191-9}} (inb.). Libris 8707902.</ref> The groom would pay a [[bride-price]] (''mundr'') to the bride's family, and the bride brought assets into the marriage, as a [[dowry]].<ref name="Friðriksdóttir"/> A married woman could divorce her husband and remarry.<ref name="Women Denmark Museum"/><ref name="ReferenceC">Ohlander, Ann-Sofie & Strömberg, Ulla-Britt, Tusen svenska kvinnoår: svensk kvinnohistoria från vikingatid till nutid, 3. (A Thousand Swedish Women's Years: Swedish Women's History from the Viking Age until now), [omarb. och utök.] uppl., Norstedts akademiska förlag, Stockholm, 2008</ref>

[[Concubinage]] was also part of Viking society, whereby a woman could live with a man and have children with him without marrying; such a woman was called a ''frilla''.<ref name="ReferenceC"/> Usually she would be the mistress of a wealthy and powerful man who also had a wife.<ref name="Magnúsdóttir"/> The wife had authority over the mistresses if they lived in her household.<ref name="Women Denmark Museum"/> Through her relationship to a man of higher social standing, a concubine and her family could advance socially; although her position was less secure than that of a wife.<ref name="Magnúsdóttir"/> There was little distinction made between children born inside or outside marriage: both had the right to inherit property from their parents, and there were no "legitimate" or "illegitimate" children.<ref name="ReferenceC"/> However, children born in wedlock had more inheritance rights than those born out of wedlock.<ref name="Friðriksdóttir"/>

A woman had the right to inherit part of her husband's property upon his death,<ref name="Friðriksdóttir"/> and widows enjoyed the same independent status as unmarried women.<ref name="ReferenceC"/> The paternal aunt, paternal niece and paternal granddaughter, referred to as ''odalkvinna'', all had the right to inherit property from a deceased man.<ref name="ReferenceB"/> A woman with no husband, sons or male relatives could inherit not only property but also the position as head of the family when her father or brother died. Such a woman was referred to as ''[[Baugrygr]]'', and she exercised all the rights afforded to the head of a family [[clan]], until she married, by which her rights were transferred to her new husband.<ref name="ReferenceB"/>

Women had religious authority and were active as priestesses (''gydja'') and oracles (''sejdkvinna'').<ref name="autogenerated2004">Ingelman-Sundberg, Catharina, ''Forntida kvinnor: jägare, vikingahustru, prästinna'' [Ancient women: hunters, viking wife, priestess], Prisma, Stockholm, 2004</ref> They were active within art as poets (''[[skald]]er'')<ref name="autogenerated2004"/> and [[rune master]]s, and as merchants and medicine women.<ref name="autogenerated2004"/> There may also have been female entrepreneurs, who worked in [[textile]] production.<ref name="Women Denmark Museum"/> Women may also have been active within military offices: the tales about [[shieldmaiden]]s are unconfirmed, but some archaeological finds such as the [[Birka female Viking warrior]] may indicate that at least some women in military authority existed.<ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Hedenstierna-Jonson|first1=Charlotte|last2=Kjellström|first2=Anna|last3=Zachrisson|first3=Torun|last4=Krzewińska|first4=Maja|last5=Sobrado|first5=Veronica|last6=Price|first6=Neil|last7=Günther|first7=Torsten|last8=Jakobsson|first8=Mattias|last9=Götherström|first9=Anders|last10=Storå|first10=Jan|date=December 2017|title=A female Viking warrior confirmed by genomics|journal=American Journal of Physical Anthropology|language=en|volume=164|issue=4|pages=853–860|doi=10.1002/ajpa.23308|pmc=5724682|pmid=28884802}}</ref>

These liberties of the Viking women gradually disappeared after the introduction of Christianity,<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Clover|first=Carol J.|s2cid=165868233|date=April 1993|title=Regardless of Sex: Men, Women, and Power in Early Northern Europe|journal=Speculum|language=en|volume=68|issue=2|pages=363–387|doi=10.2307/2864557|issn=0038-7134|jstor=2864557}}</ref> and from the late 13th century, they are no longer mentioned.<ref name="ReferenceB"/>

Examination of Viking Age burials suggests that women lived longer, and nearly all well past the age of 35, as compared to earlier times. Female graves from before the Viking Age in Scandinavia hold a proportionally large number of remains from women aged 20 to 35, presumably due to complications of childbirth.<ref>Jesch, 13</ref>

Examination of skeletal remains also allows the relative health and nutritional status of boys and girls in the past to be reconstructed, using [[Anthropometry|anthropometric]] techniques. Burials from Scandinavia and other European countries suggest that, in comparison with other societies at the time, female equality was remarkably high in rural Scandinavia. Females in the rural periphery of Nordic countries during the Viking period and the later [[Middle Ages]] had relatively high status, resulting in substantial nutritional and health resources being allocated to girls, enabling them to grow stronger and healthier.<ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Baten|first1=Joerg|last2=Maravall Buckwalter|first2=Laura|date=2019|title=Valkyries: Was Gender Equality High in the Scandinavian Periphery since Viking Times? Evidence from Enamel Hypoplasia and Height Ratios|journal=Economics and Human Biology|volume=34|pages=181–193|doi=10.1016/j.ehb.2019.05.007|pmid=31208936|s2cid=190513459}}</ref>