Embers of the Hands: Hidden Histories of the Viking Age

Content Warning: This section of the guide contains descriptions of enslavement, sexual abuse, and ritual sacrifice.



Between the Lines

Barraclough describes a scene where a warrior leads a captive by a rope about the neck. It is the image on the hostage stone, a visual story of enslavement by Viking raiders. Stories like this appear throughout accounts of the period, including an attack on Seville in 844: “They spent seven days there, killing the men and enslaving the women and children” (253). Elsewhere, accounts describe women taken in 821, abbots and reliquaries in 832. Some were ransomed, but many were sold.

One estimate suggests 20 to 30% of the population of Scandinavia was enslaved in the year 1000, yet evidence of their daily lives is hard to find. Legal rights were vitally important to free people, but enslaved people appear in law codes only as chattel. Enslaved men were called “thralls,” and enslaved women were “ambatt,” a term that sometimes indicated sexual enslavement. The enslaved could be foreign captives or individuals of Scandinavian origin who surrendered their freedom temporarily to pay a debt. Variations in their conditions meant “freedom” was a relative term.