Embers of the Hands: Hidden Histories of the Viking Age

Barraclough begins with an epigraph. Terry Pratchett describes history as a continuous “ribbon of events that may extend back thousands of years” (1) rather than a set of clear eras. The author expands this idea by saying the reality of history flows like a river without clear boundaries in time or geography. The beginning of the Viking Age is traditionally dated to the first raids on monasteries in 793 CE. However, traces of what would become Viking societies appear in the archaeological record from nearly 1,200 years earlier at Vimose, a bog in Denmark. Iron Age weapons there suggest growing militarization, alliances, and tensions in Northern Europe.

Barraclough focuses on a comb from around 160, bearing the oldest decipherable runes ever found. Though the precise origin of runic writing is unknown, similarities between the shapes of these inscriptions and the letters of the Latin alphabet provide evidence of contact with the Roman Empire. The centuries before and after the fall of the Empire were marked by migration and shifting powers; territories and alliances in Scandinavia coalesced, a social structure was established, and everyday life left a deeper mark in the archaeological record.