Editing Vikings (section)

==Legacy==

===English language===
The Vikings heavily influenced [[Old English]] to contribute to [[Modern English]]. Nouns lost their [[grammatical gender]] and [[grammatical conjugation]] was reduced to a simple ''-s'' added to the third person verb. [[Preposition stranding]] also entered English, which is permitted in [[Old Norse]].<ref name="aeon1"></ref>

===Medieval perceptions===
[[File:Züge, Landnahmen und Siedlungsgebiete der Nordmänner - 800-1050.png|thumb|Exploration and expansion routes of [[Norsemen]]]]
In England the Viking Age began dramatically on 8 June 793 when Norsemen destroyed the [[abbey]] on the island of [[Lindisfarne]]. The devastation of [[Northumbria]]'s Holy Island shocked and alerted the royal courts of Europe to the Viking presence. "Never before has such an atrocity been seen", declared the Northumbrian scholar [[Alcuin of York]].<ref>English Historical Documents, c. 500–1042 by Dorothy Whitelock; p. 776</ref> Medieval Christians in Europe were totally unprepared for the Viking incursions and could find no explanation for their arrival and the accompanying suffering they experienced at their hands save the "Wrath of God".<ref>Derry (2012). ''A History of Scandinavia: Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Iceland'', p. 16.</ref> More than any other single event, the attack on Lindisfarne demonised perception of the Vikings for the next twelve centuries. Not until the 1890s did scholars outside Scandinavia begin to seriously reassess the achievements of the Vikings, recognising their artistry, technological skills, and seamanship.<ref>''Northern Shores'' by Alan Palmer; p. 21; {{ISBN|0-7195-6299-6}}</ref>

[[Norse Mythology]], sagas, and [[Old Norse literature|literature]] tell of Scandinavian culture and religion through tales of heroic and mythological heroes. Early transmission of this information was primarily oral, and later texts relied on the writings and transcriptions of Christian scholars, including the [[Icelanders]] Snorri Sturluson and [[Sæmundur fróði]]. Many of these sagas were written in Iceland, and most of them, even if they had no Icelandic provenance, were preserved there after the Middle Ages due to the continued interest of Icelanders in Norse literature and legal codes.

The 200-year Viking influence on [[History of Europe|European history]] is filled with tales of plunder and colonisation, and the majority of these chronicles came from western European witnesses and their descendants. Less common, although equally relevant, are references to Vikings in chronicles that originated in the east, including the [[Nestor the Chronicler|Nestor]] chronicles, [[Novgorod Chronicle|Novgorod chronicles]], [[Ibn Fadlan]] chronicles, [[Ibn Rusta]] chronicles, and brief mentions by [[Photius]], patriarch of Constantinople, regarding the first Viking attack on the [[Byzantine Empire]]. Other chroniclers of Viking history include [[Adam of Bremen]], who wrote, in the fourth volume of his ''Gesta Hammaburgensis Ecclesiae Pontificum'', "[t]here is much gold here (in [[Zealand (Denmark)|Zealand]]), accumulated by piracy. These pirates, which are called ''wichingi'' by their own people, and ''Ascomanni'' by our own people, pay tribute to the Danish king." In 991, the [[Battle of Maldon]] between Viking raiders and the inhabitants of [[Maldon, Essex|Maldon]] in Essex was commemorated with a poem of the same name.

===Post-medieval perceptions===
[[File:Vikings fight.JPG|thumb|A [[Combat reenactment|modern reenactment]] of a Viking battle]]
Early modern publications, dealing with what is now called Viking culture, appeared in the 16th century, e.g. ''Historia de gentibus septentrionalibus'' (''History of the northern people'') of [[Olaus Magnus]] (1555), and the first edition of the 13th-century ''Gesta Danorum'' (''Deeds of the Danes''), by [[Saxo Grammaticus]], in 1514. The pace of publication increased during the 17th century with Latin translations of the [[Edda]] (notably Peder Resen's ''Edda Islandorum'' of 1665).

In Scandinavia, the 17th-century Danish scholars [[Thomas Bartholin]] and [[Ole Worm]] and the Swede [[Olaus Rudbeck]] used runic inscriptions and Icelandic sagas as historical sources. An important early British contributor to the study of the Vikings was [[George Hickes (divine)|George Hickes]], who published his ''Linguarum vett. septentrionalium thesaurus'' (''Dictionary of the Old Northern Languages'') in 1703–05. During the 18th century, British interest and enthusiasm for Iceland and early Scandinavian culture grew dramatically, expressed in English translations of Old Norse texts and in original poems that extolled the supposed Viking virtues.

The word "viking" was first popularised at the beginning of the 19th century by [[Erik Gustaf Geijer]] in his poem, ''The Viking''. Geijer's poem did much to propagate the new romanticised ideal of the Viking, which had little basis in historical fact. The renewed interest of [[Romanticism]] in the Old North had contemporary political implications. The [[Geatish Society]], of which Geijer was a member, popularised this myth to a great extent. Another Swedish author who had great influence on the perception of the Vikings was [[Esaias Tegnér]], a member of the Geatish Society, who wrote a modern version of ''[[Friðþjófs saga hins frœkna]]'', which became widely popular in the Nordic countries, the United Kingdom, and Germany.

[[File:Viking Siege of Paris.jpg|thumb|Viking long ships [[Siege of Paris (845)|besieging Paris]] in 845, 19th-century portrayal]]
Fascination with the Vikings reached a peak during the so-called [[Viking revival]] in the late 18th and 19th centuries as a form of [[Romantic nationalism]].<ref name="Wienberg2015">{{cite book |last1=Wienberg |first1=Jes |editor1-last=Larsson |editor1-first=Lars |editor2-last=Ekengren |editor2-first=Fredrik |editor3-last=Helgesson |editor3-first=Bertil |title=Small Things – Wide Horizons: Studies in honour of Birgitta Hårdh |year=2015 |publisher=Archaeopress Publishing Ltd |isbn=978-1-78491-132-4 |page=290 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=HxteEAAAQBAJ&pg=PA290 |chapter=Vikings and the Western Frontier |access-date=11 February 2023 |archive-date=11 February 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230211175220/https://books.google.com/books?id=HxteEAAAQBAJ&pg=PA290 |url-status=live }}</ref> In Britain this was called Septentrionalism, in Germany "[[Wagnerian]]" pathos, and in the Scandinavian countries [[Scandinavism]]. Pioneering 19th-century scholarly editions of the Viking Age began to reach a small readership in Britain. Archaeologists began to dig up Britain's Viking past, and linguistic enthusiasts started to identify the Viking-Age origins of rural idioms and proverbs. The new dictionaries of the Old Norse language enabled the [[Victorian era|Victorians]] to grapple with the primary Icelandic sagas.<ref name="bbc">[https://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/vikings/revival_01.shtml The Viking Revival By Professor Andrew Wawn at] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171107200719/http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/vikings/revival_01.shtml |date=7 November 2017 }} BBC</ref>

Until recently, the history of the Viking Age was largely based on Icelandic sagas, the history of the Danes written by Saxo Grammaticus, the ''[[Primary Chronicle]]'', and ''[[Cogad Gáedel re Gallaib]]''. Few scholars still accept these texts as reliable sources, as historians now rely more on archaeology and [[numismatics]], disciplines that have made valuable contributions toward understanding the period.<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/oxfordillustrate00sawy|url-access=registration|title=The Oxford Illustrated History of the Vikings|first1=Peter|last1=Sawyer|first2=Professor of Medieval History Peter|last2=Sawyer|date=1997|publisher=Oxford University Press|via=Internet Archive|isbn=978-0198205265|access-date=17 October 2015}}</ref>{{pn|date=December 2024}}

====In 20th-century politics====
The romanticised idea of the Vikings constructed in scholarly and popular circles in northwestern Europe in the 19th and early 20th centuries was a potent one, and the figure of the Viking became a familiar and malleable symbol in different contexts in the politics and political ideologies of 20th-century Europe.<ref>Hall, pp. 220–21; [[William W. Fitzhugh|Fitzhugh]] and Ward, pp. 362–64</ref> In Normandy, which had been settled by Vikings, the Viking ship became an uncontroversial regional symbol. In Germany, awareness of Viking history in the 19th century had been stimulated by the border dispute with Denmark over Schleswig-Holstein and the use of Scandinavian mythology by [[Richard Wagner]]. The idealised view of the Vikings appealed to Germanic supremacists who transformed the figure of the Viking in accordance with the ideology of a Germanic master race.<ref>[[William W. Fitzhugh|Fitzhugh]] and Ward, p. 363</ref> Building on the linguistic and cultural connections between Norse-speaking Scandinavians and other Germanic groups in the distant past, Scandinavian Vikings were portrayed in [[Nazi Germany]] as a pure Germanic type. The cultural phenomenon of Viking expansion was re-interpreted for use as propaganda to support the extreme militant nationalism of the Third Reich, and ideologically informed interpretations of Viking paganism and the Scandinavian use of runes were employed in the construction of [[Nazi mysticism]]. Other political organisations of the same ilk, such as the former Norwegian fascist party [[Nasjonal Samling]], similarly appropriated elements of the modern Viking cultural myth in their symbolism and propaganda.

[[Soviet]] and earlier [[Slavophilia|Slavophile]] historians emphasised a Slavic rooted foundation in contrast to the Normanist theory of the Vikings conquering the Slavs and founding the [[Kievan Rus']].<ref>{{cite web |last1=Ohloblyn |first1=Oleksander |title=Normanist Theory |url=http://www.encyclopediaofukraine.com/display.asp?linkpath=pages%5CN%5CO%5CNormanisttheory.htm |website=Encyclopedia of Ukraine |access-date=7 September 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180907221348/http://www.encyclopediaofukraine.com/display.asp?linkpath=pages%5CN%5CO%5CNormanisttheory.htm |archive-date=7 September 2018 |url-status=live }}</ref> They accused Normanist theory proponents of distorting history by depicting the Slavs as undeveloped primitives. In contrast, Soviet historians stated that the Slavs laid the foundations of their statehood long before the Norman/Viking raids, while the Norman/Viking invasions only served to hinder the historical development of the Slavs. They argued that [[Rus' (name)|Rus']] composition was Slavic and that [[Rurik]] and Oleg's success was rooted in their support from within the local Slavic aristocracy.{{Citation needed|date=November 2018}}. After the dissolution of the [[USSR]], [[Novgorod]] acknowledged its Viking history by incorporating a Viking ship into its logo.<ref>Hall, p. 221</ref>

=== In modern popular culture ===
{{main|Norse mythology in popular culture}}
[[File:Jomvikings Winkinger Kampftraining.webm|thumb|Viking reenactment training (Jomsvikings group)]]

Led by the operas of German composer [[Richard Wagner]], such as ''[[Der Ring des Nibelungen]]'', Vikings and the Romanticist Viking Revival have inspired many creative works. These have included novels directly based on historical events, such as [[Frans Gunnar Bengtsson]]'s ''[[The Long Ships]]'' (which was also released as a [[The Long Ships (1963 film)|1963 film]]), and historical fantasies such as the film ''[[The Vikings (1958 film)|The Vikings]]'', [[Michael Crichton]]'s ''[[Eaters of the Dead]]'' (movie version called ''[[The 13th Warrior]]''), and the comedy film ''[[Erik the Viking]]''. The vampire [[Eric Northman]], in the HBO TV series ''[[True Blood]]'', was a Viking prince before being turned into a vampire. Vikings appear in several books by the [[Danish American]] writer [[Poul Anderson]], while British explorer, historian, and writer [[Tim Severin]] authored a trilogy of novels in 2005 about a young Viking adventurer Thorgils Leifsson, who travels around the world.

In 1962, American comic book writer [[Stan Lee]] and his brother [[Larry Lieber]], together with [[Jack Kirby]], created the [[Marvel Comics]] [[superhero]] [[Thor (Marvel Comics)|Thor]], which they based on the Norse god of the same name. The character is featured in the 2011 [[Marvel Studios]] film [[Thor (film)|''Thor'']] and its sequels. The character also appears in the 2012 film ''[[The Avengers (2012 film)|The Avengers]]'' and its associated [[Marvel's Avengers Assemble (TV series)|animated series]].

The appearance of Vikings within popular media and television has seen a resurgence in recent decades, especially with the [[History Channel]]'s series ''[[Vikings (2013 TV series)|Vikings]]'' (2013), directed by [[Michael Hirst (writer)|Michael Hirst]]. The show has a loose grounding in historical facts and sources, but bases itself more so on literary sources, such as [[Tale of Ragnar Lodbrok|fornaldarsaga Ragnars saga loðbrókar]], itself more legend than fact, and Old Norse Eddic and Skaldic poetry.<ref>Gareth Lloyd Evans, "Michael Hirst's Vikings and Old Norse Poetry", ''Translating Early Medieval Poetry: Transformation, Reception, Interpretation''. Edited by Tom Birkett and Kirsty March-Lyons. Boydell and Brewer (2017), p. 200.</ref> The events of the show frequently make references to the ''[[Völuspá]]'', an Eddic poem describing the creation of the world, often directly referencing specific lines of the poem in the dialogue.<ref>Ibid, pp. 201202.</ref> The show portrays some of the social realities of the medieval Scandinavian world, such as slavery<ref>Clare Downham, "The Viking Slave Trade: Entrepreneurs or Heathen Slavers?" ''History Ireland'', Vol. 17, No. 3 (May–June 2009), pp. 15–17. Wordwell Ltd.</ref> and the greater role of women within Viking society.<ref>Carol Clover, "Regardless of Sex: Men, Women, and Power in Early Northern Europe", Representations, No. 44, pp. 1–28. University of California Press</ref> The show also addresses the topics of gender equity in Viking society with the inclusion of shield maidens through the character [[Lagertha]], also based on a legendary figure.<ref>Carol Clover, "Maiden Warriors and Other Sons" ''The Journal of English and Germanic Philology'', Vol. 85, No. 1 (Jan. 1986), pp. 35–49. University of Illinois Press.</ref> Recent archaeological interpretations and osteological analyses of previous excavations of Viking burials have given support to the idea of the Viking woman warrior, namely the excavation and DNA study of the [[Birka female Viking warrior]], within recent years. However, the conclusions remain contentious.

Vikings have served as an inspiration for numerous [[video game]]s, such as ''[[The Lost Vikings]]'' (1993), ''[[Age of Mythology]]'' (2002), and ''[[For Honor]]'' (2017).<ref>{{Citation|title=Top 10 Glorious Viking Themed Video Games| date=11 August 2017 |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_5W7yoMyV60| archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/varchive/youtube/20211027/_5W7yoMyV60| archive-date=27 October 2021|language=en|access-date=14 December 2019}}{{cbignore}}</ref> All three Vikings from ''The Lost Vikings'' series—Erik the Swift, Baleog the Fierce, and Olaf the Stout—appeared as a [[Player character|playable hero]] in the crossover title ''[[Heroes of the Storm]]'' (2015).<ref>{{cite web|url=http://us.battle.net/heroes/en/heroes/the-lost-vikings/|title=The Lost Vikings – Heroes of the Storm|website=us.battle.net|language=en-us|access-date=14 December 2019|archive-date=7 June 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170607163113/http://us.battle.net/heroes/en/heroes/the-lost-vikings/|url-status=live}}</ref> ''[[The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim]]'' (2011) is an [[Action role-playing game|action role-playing]] video game heavily inspired by Viking culture.<ref>{{Cite magazine|url=https://www.wired.com/2011/11/skyrim-review/|title=Review: Boundless Skyrim Will Become Your Life|last=Schreier|first=Jason|date=10 November 2011|magazine=Wired|access-date=14 December 2019|language=en-US|issn=1059-1028|archive-date=14 December 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191214182259/https://www.wired.com/2011/11/skyrim-review/|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.destructoid.com/how-historically-accurate-is-skyrim-part-2-284536.phtml|title=How historically accurate is Skyrim? Part 2|website=Destructoid|date=5 December 2014|language=en|access-date=14 December 2019|archive-date=7 August 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200807215759/https://www.destructoid.com/how-historically-accurate-is-skyrim-part-2-284536.phtml|url-status=live}}</ref> Vikings are the lead focus of the 2020 video game ''[[Assassin's Creed Valhalla]]'', which is set in 873 AD, and recounts an alternative history of the Viking invasion of Britain.<ref>{{cite magazine|last=Juba|first=Joe|title=Answers To Our Biggest Questions About Assassin's Creed Valhalla|url=https://www.gameinformer.com/2020/04/30/answers-to-our-biggest-questions-about-assassins-creed-valhalla|access-date=10 October 2020|magazine=Game Informer|language=en|archive-date=14 August 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210814142213/https://www.gameinformer.com/2020/04/30/answers-to-our-biggest-questions-about-assassins-creed-valhalla|url-status=live}}</ref>

Modern reconstructions of [[Viking mythology]] have shown a persistent influence in late 20th- and early 21st-century popular culture in some countries, inspiring comics, movies, television series, role-playing games, computer games, and music, including [[Viking metal]], a subgenre of [[heavy metal music]].

Since the 1960s, there has been rising enthusiasm for [[historical reenactment]]. While the earliest groups had little claim for historical accuracy, the seriousness and accuracy of reenactors has increased. The largest such groups include [[The Vikings (reenactment group)|The Vikings]] and [[Regia Anglorum]], though many smaller groups exist in Europe, North America, New Zealand, and Australia. Many reenactor groups participate in live-steel combat, and a few have Viking-style ships or boats.

The [[Minnesota Vikings]] of the [[National Football League]] are so-named owing to the large Scandinavian population in the US state of [[Minnesota]].

During the banking boom of the first decade of the twenty-first century, Icelandic financiers came to be styled as ''[[útrásarvíkingar]]'' (roughly 'raiding Vikings').<ref>Ann-Sofie Nielsen Gremaud, '[https://edoc.hu-berlin.de/handle/18452/8692 The Vikings are coming! A modern Icelandic self-image in the light of the economic crisis] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180508103503/https://edoc.hu-berlin.de/handle/18452/8692 |date=8 May 2018 }}', ''NORDEUROPAforum'' 20 (2010), pp. 87–106.</ref><ref>Katla Kjartansdóttir, 'The new Viking wave: Cultural heritage and capitalism', ''Iceland and images of the North'', ed. Sumarliði R. Ísleifsson (Québec, 2011), pp. 461–80.</ref><ref>Kristinn Schram, 'Banking on borealism: Eating, smelling, and performing the North', Iceland and images of the North, ed. Sumarliði R. Ísleifsson (Québec, 2011), pp. 305–27.</ref>

===Experimental archaeology===
[[Experimental archaeology]] of the Viking Age is a flourishing branch and several places have been dedicated to this technique, such as [[Jorvik Viking Centre]] in the United Kingdom, [[Sagnlandet Lejre]] and {{Interlanguage link|Ribe Viking Center|da|3=Ribe Vikingecenter}} in Denmark, [[Foteviken Museum]] in Sweden or [[Lofotr Viking Museum]] in Norway. Viking-age [[Historical reenactment|reenactors]] have undertaken experimental activities such as iron smelting and forging using Norse techniques at [[Norstead (Newfoundland)|Norstead]] in Newfoundland for example.<ref>{{cite web |author=Darrell Markewitz 1998–2010 |url=http://www.warehamforge.ca/ENCAMPMENT/smelting.html |title=Iron Smelting at the Norse Encampment – Daily Life in the Viking Age circa 1000 AD at Vinland. The Viking Encampment living history program at Parks Canada L'Anse aux Meadows NHSC in Newfoundland |publisher=Warehamforge.ca |access-date=21 May 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120428025659/http://www.warehamforge.ca/ENCAMPMENT/smelting.html |archive-date=28 April 2012 |url-status=live }}</ref>

On 1 July 2007, the reconstructed Viking ship ''Skuldelev 2'', renamed ''[[Havhingsten fra Glendalough|Sea Stallion]]'',<ref>[http://www.seastallion.ie/ Return of Dublin's Viking Warship] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081018224714/http://www.seastallion.ie/ |date=18 October 2008 }}. Retrieved 14 November 2007.</ref> began a journey from Roskilde to Dublin. The remains of that ship and four others were discovered during a 1962 excavation in the Roskilde Fjord. Tree-ring analysis has shown the ship was built of oak in the vicinity of Dublin in about 1042. Seventy multinational crew members sailed the ship back to its home, and ''Sea Stallion'' arrived outside Dublin's Custom House on 14 August 2007. The purpose of the voyage was to test and document the seaworthiness, speed, and manoeuvrability of the ship on the rough open sea and in coastal waters with treacherous currents. The crew tested how the long, narrow, flexible hull withstood the tough ocean waves. The expedition also provided valuable new information on Viking longships and society. The ship was built using Viking tools, materials, and much of the same methods as the original ship.

Other vessels, often replicas of the [[Gokstad ship]] (full- or half-scale) or [[Skuldelev ships|Skuldelev]] have been built and tested as well. The ''Snorri'' (a [[Skuldelev ships|Skuldelev I]] [[Knarr]]), was sailed from Greenland to Newfoundland in 1998.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.dougcabot.com/ship/vi_sailing.html |title=Beyond Lands' End: Viking Voyage 1000 |publisher=Dougcabot.com |access-date=21 May 2012 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120330191233/http://www.dougcabot.com/ship/vi_sailing.html |archive-date=30 March 2012}}</ref>

===Common misconceptions===
====Horned helmets====<!-- This section is linked from [[Minnesota Vikings]] -->
[[File:Viking Festival, Delamont County Park, June 2012 (17).JPG|thumb|Magnus Barelegs Viking Festival]]

Apart from two or three representations of (ritual) helmets—with protrusions that may be either stylised ravens, snakes, or horns—no depiction of the helmets of Viking warriors, and no preserved helmet, has horns. The formal, close-quarters style of Viking combat (either in shield walls or aboard "ship islands") would have made horned helmets cumbersome and hazardous to the warrior's own side.

Historians therefore believe that Viking warriors did not wear horned helmets; whether such helmets were used in Scandinavian culture for other, ritual purposes, remains unproven. The general misconception that Viking warriors wore horned helmets was partly promulgated by the 19th-century enthusiasts of ''[[Geatish Society|Götiska Förbundet]]'', founded in 1811 in [[Stockholm]].<ref name="Frank">{{cite book |last=Frank |first=Roberta |title=International Scandinavian and Medieval Studies in Memory of Gerd Wolfgang Weber |year=2000 |publisher=Ed. Parnaso |isbn=978-88-86474-28-3 |page=487 |url=https://www.scribd.com/doc/51267328/Frank-Invention-of-Horned-Helmet |access-date=17 September 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140413142627/http://www.scribd.com/doc/51267328/Frank-Invention-of-Horned-Helmet |archive-date=13 April 2014 |url-status=live }}</ref> They promoted the use of Norse mythology as the subject of high art and other ethnological and moral aims.

The Vikings were often depicted with winged helmets and in other clothing taken from [[Classical antiquity]], especially in depictions of Norse gods. This was done to legitimise the Vikings and their mythology by associating it with the Classical world, which had long been idealised in European culture.

The latter-day ''mythos'' created by [[National Romanticism|national romantic ideas]] blended the Viking Age with aspects of the [[Nordic Bronze Age]] some 2,000 years earlier. Horned helmets from the Bronze Age were shown in [[petroglyph]]s and appeared in archaeological finds (see [[Bohuslän]] and [[Vikso]] helmets). They were probably used for ceremonial purposes.<ref>[http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mhornedhelmet.html Did Vikings really wear horns on their helmets?] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20041211224330/http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mhornedhelmet.html |date=11 December 2004 }}, The Straight Dope, 7 December 2004. Retrieved 14 November 2007.</ref>

[[File:Viking Arms and Armor (9302360544).jpg|thumb|Modern "Viking" helmets]]
Cartoons like ''[[Hägar the Horrible]]'' and ''[[Vicky the Viking]]'', and sports kits such as those of the [[Minnesota Vikings]] and [[Canberra Raiders]] have perpetuated the myth of the horned helmet.<ref>{{cite news |title=Did Vikings wear horned helmets? |url=https://www.economist.com/blogs/newsbook/2013/02/economist-explains-did-vikings-wear-horned-helmets |newspaper=The Economist|access-date=10 April 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140413141629/http://www.economist.com/blogs/newsbook/2013/02/economist-explains-did-vikings-wear-horned-helmets |archive-date=13 April 2014 |url-status=live }}</ref>

Viking helmets were conical, made from hard leather with wood and metallic reinforcements for regular troops. The iron helmet with mask and mail was for the chieftains, based on the previous [[Vendel]]-age helmets from central Sweden. The only original Viking helmet discovered is the [[Gjermundbu helmet]], found in Norway. This helmet is made of iron and has been dated to the 10th century.<ref>{{cite web |title=The Gjermundbu Find – The Chieftain Warrior |url=http://nvg.org.au/article.php?story=20050923081703965&mode=print |access-date=10 April 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140215064628/http://nvg.org.au/article.php?story=20050923081703965&mode=print |archive-date=15 February 2014 |url-status=live }}</ref>

====Barbarity====

The image of wild-haired, dirty savages sometimes associated with the Vikings in popular culture is a distorted picture of reality.<ref name="Roesdahl, pp. 9–22"/> Viking tendencies were often misreported, and the work of Adam of Bremen, among others, told largely disputable tales of Viking savagery and uncleanliness.<ref>Williams, G. (2001) [https://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/vikings/evidence_01.shtml How do we know about the Vikings?] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060816165251/http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/vikings/evidence_01.shtml |date=16 August 2006 }} [[BBC]].co.uk. Retrieved 14 November 2007.</ref>

====Use of skulls as drinking vessels====
There is no evidence that Vikings [[Skull cup|drank out of the skulls]] of vanquished enemies. This was a misconception based on a passage in the [[skald]]ic poem [[Krákumál]] speaking of heroes drinking from ''ór bjúgviðum hausa'' (branches of skulls). This was a reference to [[drinking horn]]s, but was mistranslated in the 17th century<ref>By Magnús Óláfsson, in Ole Worm, ''Runar seu Danica Litteratura antiquissima, vulgo Gothica dicta'' (Copenhagen 1636).</ref> as referring to the skulls of the slain.<ref>E. W. Gordon, ''An Introduction to Old Norse'' (2nd edition, Oxford 1962) pp. lxix–lxx.</ref>