It's cliche as all hell but I am so hooked. What do y

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What do you know about Viking life before Christianity?
A lot.
>What was daily life like,
War, blood and fire. Viking stuff.
>what did they eat,
Meat and mead mostly.
>how much did they work,
Not much, butchering christian pussies isn't much work.
>how often did they worship?
The whole life of a viking warrior is dedicated to Tor and Oden.
>What size groups did they live in?
Not large. Otherwise they'd just rip each other to pieces.
>How were they taxed?
They were not. A viking warrior is a free man.

>>2237610
>literal ancapistan

>>2237557
>What do you know about Viking life before Christianity?
Viking is Norse for 'seaman', so you have to be more specific. Do you want to know specifically about how Norse pirates and traders lived while they were at sea, on land, or do you just want to know how Norse people lived in general?

>>2238216
Also, just so we clear things up for OP, a large amount of Norsemen were already Christians by the height of the Viking period, and indeed many of the most famous and accomplished 'Vikings' were Christian. A 100% Pre-Christianity Viking era never existed.

>>2237557
>asking this on /his/ of all places
You'll be bombarded with memes.
But yeah, as the other guy said, know the distinction between Viking as an occupation and Norse as a people.

>>2237557
you're asking in the wrong place buddy, this board is reserved for memes and religious circlejerks
/tg/ might answer your question if you phrase it right.

>>2237557
Read sagas. This
>http://www.arild-hauge.com/elife.htm
kind of overview description doesn't give a very good idea of the pace and texture of life.

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I am interested Op, do you mean the -Vikings-, the Norsemen who went to trade, raid, and explore overseas to bring back wealth to their hamlets in Scandinavia, or do you mean the North Germanics as a whole?

Do you want art, arms/armor, religion, language, what is it?

because I'm a Germaniaboo, and I'll happily tell you what i know.

>>2238216
>>2238225
Well thanks for pointing it out guys, but couldn't you connect the dots that I meant Norse people before they were turned into Christians?

>>2238370
I'm interested in North Germanics as a whole really. I know that the Viking boat people themselves were roaming warriors, I'm wondering what was life like In Denmark, Sweden and Northern Germany for Norse and related German people before they were converted to Christianity.

>>2238370
Germanic, sorry. I'm wondering about their daily lives, arms, armor, housing situation, community types, types of leadership and governance, really whatever you want to talk about regarding what their society was and looked like.

>>2238353
Thanks man, what is sagas?

>>2238542
Probably a nondescript pastoral life. Tend the farms and livestock, maybe a few of you get bored and shove off to terrorize some other place and take their shit. You know, typical human stuff

>>2238570
So do we not really know the details? Were all men warriors? Did they go to Norse church or pray in some manner or was it more of parables and sayings they repeated amongst themselves?

>>2238530
The only issue with that is that spans a long ass time, including long before "Vikings" as we knew them existed. Also see >>2238224 again. Christianity coexisted in Scandinavia at the same time the Viking age was in full swing. Just making sure things were cleared up so there's no confusion regarding definitions.

>>2238585
There were Norse temples but they mostly acted as pilgrimage sites. There was no organized religious hierchy, only a set of beliefs passed down over the generations. The Norse didn't pray to their gods, at most they asked them safe passage for their dead relatives into whatever afterlife they wished to go to.

Agains, just to reinforce the point, it's not really correct to call this a religion in any real sense of the word. Norse language itself didn't have a word for religion, the closest thing translated as "custom" or "tradition"

>>2238585
They didn't keep records so there's not really a clear picture of their culture, which probably varied from tribe to tribe anyway. And while they weren't professional warriors these were hardy people from a hardy land so they were overall a rough and tumble group.

In terms of the type of people that you're dealing with in regards to vikings I think you could draw parallels to other (semi-)migratory tribespeople like steppe dwellers and such where social institutions didn't develop beyond tribal organizations.

>>2238601
Pre-Christian, Norse and northern germanic peoples, their society and their daily life is what I'm looking for. If I lived in that era, what would my daily life be like, what would my living situation and community be like?

>>2238625
It's my understanding that they did believe in an afterlife of some sort, and that there were moral sayings that were spread around and maintained. For example, the Nine Noble Virtues http://thewisdomwarrior.com/2010/09/17/the-nine-noble-virtues-viking-values-for-the-warrior-lifestyle/

and

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NWJGOoRWtq4

>>2238559
Sagas are a traditional form of story from northern europe that's kind of like a precursor to the novel. There are several different kinds. Sagas of Icelanders are good for being more grounded and plausible than a lot of mainland medieval literature. Still plenty of exaggerations, so take them with a grain of salt, but they'll give you an idea of what all these values added up to in practice, how Things worked, the importance of gift giving and so on.

>>2238674
Depends, do want to know what it was like through the lense of a slave, freeman, warrior, or Jarl/King? There was also Iceland which had its own unique political and social structure.

>>2238542
>>2238551
depending on the area within Scandinavia, there might be a few number of Jarls.

Iceland only ever had one Jarl (because it was tiny ofc, and a glorified retirement home for elderly raiders), Scandinavia, such as Norway and Sweden had a few in number. They were overall equivalent to an Anglo-Saxon Earl (same origin, hence the almost same name), and were the only position under a King that could levy troops, they were Dukes and Counts depending on where you went essentially.

While i can't quite give you the entire Germanic pantheon, they revered Þórr (Thor, god of thunder and protection of mankind), Óðinn(Odin, chief of the gods and god of wisdom, writing, knowledge, war, and even chess), and Týr(Tyr, the god of law and heroic glory) the most.

The North Germanics are those that essentially stayed in the Jutlandic/Scandinavian urheimat (original settlement) of all the Germanic peoples. The West Germanics would go into Great Britain and Mainland Europe such as the Anglo-Saxons, Franks, Saxons, and others and the East Germanics are now all dead (RIP) as the Goths and Vandals and Lombards.

They lived in Longhouses, like all Germanic peoples, and these were distinct to them. They wore arms and armors that are actually taken from Roman designs, the helmets are mostly roman types from Antiquity, and the swords are Spathas, and they wore chainmail like everyone else at the time. They did however have a unique tool they carried almost everywhere called a Seax, basically a long knife used for domestic work as well as fighting. I own one, they're neat.

>>2238697
CONT.
Since agriculture is fucking garbage in Scandinavia, they would usually go overseas to farm. They'd go and take over an area (parts of Russia and Britain were the typical victims), and settle there to far for the while, but if you were still in Scandinavia you probably ate things like whatever oats you could grow and shit-tons of fish, as well as whatever game you could catch, and of course, mead since alcoholic drinks killed off disease.

>>2238585
Being a Heathen myself had to study a lot on faith. There was no organizated faith, mostly temples and such that where used for pilgrimage. Gods weren't really prayed to, very rarely would one ever ask something from the gods. Usually that role was filled in by ancestor worship, and nature spirits. The gods in my personal opinion where more used as examples to live by. How one should and shouldn't act. You can glean a lot in that by reading the sagas. Not a whole lot is known unfortunately, as the Norse where not a literate culture, very few really used the Runes, and all lessions, knowledge, stories, where passed down orally. If you have more specific questions I'll try my best to answer.

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>>2238336
Hmm, indeed, quite so, quite so!
I too do wholeheartedly recommend /tg/, 'tis the thinking gentleman's subboard.

read Beowulf

>>2238707
As another Heathen, I disagree with your notion that they never prayed to the gods for things. We find examples throughout the sagas as well as the account of Ibn Fadlan. In Ibn's account of the Rus people we find an example of a trader who threw down his most prized meat in front of idols of the gods, and prayed for them to send him a man with loose pockets who would purchase his goods. Thor was often sacrificed to in the hopes that he would drive away disease or bring good rains. Freyr was offered to for peace, and Odin and Tyr for victory in warfare. However, prayer in a Heathen context is/was not the same as one in the Christian view. Items of value, precious metals, human/animal sacrifice as well as alcohol were offered in the hopes of establishing a gift cycle with the gods. "Do ut des," as the Romans called it. "I give so that you may give."

Unfortunately, we'll never truly know the extent to which the original Heathens approached the gods. There's a trend in Heathenry that the gods ultimately don't give a flying fuck about you as an individual, and frankly it disgusts me. I'll contend that they're not all-powerful or all-knowing/seeing. They got their own shit to worry about. However, ultimately, do as you see fit. It is a shame that many people tend to completely ignore both ancestors and wights though. Too many new Heathens completely throw out the idea of building a gift cycle with their ancestors and local wights.

>>2237610

Huh can I get your source

>>2237557
They drank cultured milk drinks pretty much identical to Kefir.
Now go read a book, nigger.

>>2237610
Fuck off idiot.