Book on the Vikings

[bailey_187]

I need ot create a bibliography of books on Vikings. I was hoping to include some Marxist texts if there is any? any help?

If not something about Viking's method of social reproduction of the material neccesities of life and all them ting there

[Dimentio]

Hm... while Dick Harrison isn't a socialist exactly, check up his titles on English. He has probably written a lot on Swedish vikings at least.

[Amphictyonis]

I need ot create a bibliography of books on Vikings. I was hoping to include some Marxist texts if there is any? any help?

If not something about Viking's method of social reproduction of the material neccesities of life and all them ting there

LOL. Their means of production was small scale farming and plunder. In lieu of private property they chose to steal with the sword. At least they had more balls than the capitalists?

[Pavlov's House Party]

LOL. Their means of production was small scale farming and plunder. In lieu of private property they chose to steal with the sword. At least they had more balls than the capitalists?

They were basically merchants, fishermen and other seamen who took advantage of the collapse of organized states in the European Dark Ages to raid and colonize. Places like Normandy, Dublin and Kiev were all founded by viking settlers while the Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms, the rest of Britain, Ireland and the French coast were subject to raids. Hell, they even made it to North America!

I don't think anyone really knows why they did it, but Scandinavia was relativley untouched by the collapse of Rome which plunged much of mainland Europe and Britain into chaos and the vikings probably saw a better way of making a living raiding and colonizing these unorganized lands than raising sheep and fishing herring. The merchants used the lack of political structure to create trading posts all over and ply their goods like slaves, ivory and fish onto the native populations; cities like Dublin, Kiev and Novgorod were built as trading posts so the Scandinavian merchants could control trade in the region, and the natives couldn't resist because they had no centralized states. In contrast, the vikings never settled in the Islamic Middle East because it was very centralized and capable of dealing with a few fishermen and sailors.

There's a bunch of pseudo-malthusian theories which say that Scandinavia had reached its productive potential at the time and forced its inhabitants to expand outwards, but I wouldn't believe it.

[empiredestoryer]

the vikings were farmers

[Dimentio]

They were basically merchants, fishermen and other seamen who took advantage of the collapse of organized states in the European Dark Ages to raid and colonize. Places like Normandy, Dublin and Kiev were all founded by viking settlers while the Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms, the rest of Britain, Ireland and the French coast were subject to raids. Hell, they even made it to North America!

I don't think anyone really knows why they did it, but Scandinavia was relativley untouched by the collapse of Rome which plunged much of mainland Europe and Britain into chaos and the vikings probably saw a better way of making a living raiding and colonizing these unorganized lands than raising sheep and fishing herring. The merchants used the lack of political structure to create trading posts all over and ply their goods like slaves, ivory and fish onto the native populations; cities like Dublin, Kiev and Novgorod were built as trading posts so the Scandinavian merchants could control trade in the region, and the natives couldn't resist because they had no centralized states. In contrast, the vikings never settled in the Islamic Middle East because it was very centralized and capable of dealing with a few fishermen and sailors.

There's a bunch of pseudo-malthusian theories which say that Scandinavia had reached its productive potential at the time and forced its inhabitants to expand outwards, but I wouldn't believe it.

Scandinavia was "overpopulated", in the terms that the elder sons got the most of the land, which prompted landless younger sons to become merchants. Most vikings were merchants rather than pirates.

[bailey_187]

They were basically merchants, fishermen and other seamen who took advantage of the collapse of organized states in the European Dark Ages to raid and colonize. Places like Normandy, Dublin and Kiev were all founded by viking settlers while the Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms, the rest of Britain, Ireland and the French coast were subject to raids. Hell, they even made it to North America!

I don't think anyone really knows why they did it, but Scandinavia was relativley untouched by the collapse of Rome which plunged much of mainland Europe and Britain into chaos and the vikings probably saw a better way of making a living raiding and colonizing these unorganized lands than raising sheep and fishing herring. The merchants used the lack of political structure to create trading posts all over and ply their goods like slaves, ivory and fish onto the native populations; cities like Dublin, Kiev and Novgorod were built as trading posts so the Scandinavian merchants could control trade in the region, and the natives couldn't resist because they had no centralized states. In contrast, the vikings never settled in the Islamic Middle East because it was very centralized and capable of dealing with a few fishermen and sailors.

There's a bunch of pseudo-malthusian theories which say that Scandinavia had reached its productive potential at the time and forced its inhabitants to expand outwards, but I wouldn't believe it.

Do you know of any books or articles that follow this theory? (i need to use sources)