Editing Viking Age (section)

===Demographic models===
Barrett considers that prior scholarship having examined causes of the Viking Age in terms of demographic determinism, the resulting explanations have generated a "wide variety of possible models". While admitting that Scandinavia did share in the general European population and settlement expansion at the end of the first millennium, he dismisses 'population pressure' as a realistic cause of the Viking Age.<ref name="Barrett2008">{{cite journal |last1=Barrett |first1=James H. |title=What caused the Viking Age? |journal=Antiquity |date=1 September 2008 |volume=82 |issue=317 |pages=672–673 |doi=10.1017/S0003598X00097301}}</ref> Bagge alludes to the  evidence of demographic growth at the time, manifested in an increase of new settlements, but he declares that a warlike people do not require population pressure to resort to plundering abroad. He grants that although population increase was a factor in this expansion, it was not the incentive for such expeditions.<ref name="Bagge2014">{{cite book |last1=Bagge |first1=Sverre |title=Cross and Scepter: The Rise of the Scandinavian Kingdoms from the Vikings to the Reformation |year=2014 |publisher=Princeton University Press |isbn=978-1-4008-5010-5 |pages=24–25 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=NFJNAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA25}}</ref> According to Ferguson, the proliferation of the use of iron in Scandinavia at the time increased agricultural yields, allowing for demographic growth that strained the limited capacity of the land.<ref name="Ferguson2009 p. 47">{{cite book |last1=Ferguson |first1=Robert |title=The Vikings: A History |year=2009 |publisher=Penguin |isbn=978-1-101-15142-6 |page=47 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=HY_klT7NjvAC&pg=PT47}}</ref> As a result, many Scandinavians found themselves with no property and no status. To remedy this, these landless men took to piracy to obtain material wealth. The population continued to grow, and the pirates looked further and further beyond the borders of [[Baltic Sea|the Baltic]], and eventually into all of Europe.<ref>Fletcher, Richard. ''Roman–Britain and Anglo–Saxon England 55 BC–AD 1066''. Mechanicsburg, 2002, 177</ref> Historian [[Anders Winroth]] has also challenged the "overpopulation" thesis, arguing that scholars are "simply repeating an ancient cliché that has no basis in fact."<ref name="Winroth2016">{{cite book |last1=Winroth |first1=Anders |title=The Age of the Vikings |year=2016 |publisher=Princeton University Press |isbn=978-0-691-16929-3 |pages=51–52 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=E26YDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA51}}</ref>