Embers of the Hands: Hidden Histories of the Viking Age

Embers of the Hands examines the interactions between environment, culture, and belief that created Norse social and economic structures, and how they carried these with them into the world. The author’s primary concern is the people behind the warriors in their longships, yet the environmental and economic factors that motivated them were a driving factor in Norse cultural diffusion. Barraclough analyzes how Norse society developed economically as a result of its expansion into the wider world, how this expansion created religious tensions, and the lasting effects of the Viking diaspora and its culture on the wider world.

Early in the book, Barraclough explains that contact with large empires provided models of “kingship” societies, which influenced a Norse social structure with wealthy males at the top, followed by a free population where women were subordinate but essential, and enslaved people with no legal rights or protections. This economic stratification, the author hypothesizes, was the motivation behind the earliest Viking raids: In a region with limited arable land, expeditions provided a source of wealth to build a life, marry, and have a family. Men brought reliquaries and jewels home to the women “who were the keys to these futures, who would be buried one day with their exotic gifts from over the sea” (66).