17 Viking Women Facts: What You Need To Know About These Unsung Heroes

The Vikings were a tribe of seafarers that immigrated to different parts of Europe from Scandinavian countries - primarily Denmark, Norway, and Sweden - in the early middle ages.

They were looked upon as barbaric pirates but were more modern than the conservative Christianity that followed the Viking era in England. The Viking women enjoyed gender equality to a great extent at that age.

Viking women had facial features which were much more masculine in appearance, especially when compared to the women of present times. A Viking woman after the age of 20 was referred to as a maer or mey.

A 20-year-old woman had the right to choose her own place of residence. Even though Viking women had much more independence than the women of other tribes, they still could not choose their own husbands.

The responsibility of a woman's marriage was always bestowed on her family.

In the case of an unhappy marriage, women could also file for a divorce if they felt the need and remarry. Irrespective of so much household work, the women did share equal rights with men in many aspects.

At that time, females enjoying equal rights was seen as a rarity, since in most cultures they were treated as voiceless subordinates of men. The Vikings are known for their march towards the modernized concept of gender equality at such an ancient time.

The concept of mistress existed even during the Viking age where a woman could have a child with a man without marrying him. A mistress belonging to a man of high-status advanced socially although her position was lower than that of the wife.

A woman could rightfully inherit the property of her husband in the case of any mishap. A widowed woman enjoyed the same independence as an unmarried woman.

A household having no male influence could position a woman as their head and she could inherit the property rights. However, if she got married then the property rights went to the man. They also had religious authority.

Some Viking women acted as priestesses in the Viking age. There may have been female traders and entrepreneurs, artists, poets, and women that worked in Viking armies.

The Vikings lived in a much more liberated society up to the 13th century. Following the introduction of Christianity after the Viking rule, the rights and independence of the women gradually disappeared and they were confined to the household as subordinates of men.

If you are looking for more articles about the Vikings, then you can also check out the articles on Viking shield factsandViking armor facts.

Viking Women At Home

The women in the Viking age had an adventurous life. From traders to homemakers, they did it all. The Viking women played multiple roles in the household.

In the medieval ages, the Viking women at home acted as the subordinates of the males in the house. However, the Viking women had more power and freedom than women elsewhere. The written sources of history portray the Viking women as free and those who had rights.

There is no doubt that in the medieval period women existed in a man's world, and the situation was crueler for the homemakers. Viking women were married off at an early age.

Most of the female Vikings were housemakers, and their status in society depended on the social status of the husband. However, the Norse people gave Viking women authority in the domestic sphere.

The females were household managers, they played important roles like managing the farm resources and child-rearing. They often shared some of these duties with the Viking men.

A Viking woman was far less deprived than the women of other communities, they enjoyed a higher degree of social rights than the others.

They had a much modern outlook and some of their laws matched with the present laws. A Viking woman could own property and in case of an unhappy marriage, she could ask for a divorce.

They were also protected by law from harassing male attention. Apart from the husband, wife, and children a Viking family also consisted of elderly relatives and foster children.

The role of caring for the relatives as well as entertaining them fell on the shoulders of such women. They also had to entertain the honored guests in the house whenever the husband conducted any meeting in the house.

The married women of the Viking society had another important role, they were given the duty of spreading knowledge to the next generation. They shared poems and stories of the myths with the children.

The homes of the Vikings were decorated by the skilled artisan work of the women. From preparing food to stitching clothes, a woman had to do each and every work in the Viking period.

She spun the wool to make fiber from it using a hand spindle and made linen by beating flax. They also created many decorative items for the beautification of their home.

Along with taking care of the family, the married females often acted as the spiritual guide of the family. Indoor cult practices were common in the households of the medieval Viking era.

Women In Viking Literature And Norse Mythology

The Norse women of the Viking culture were respected more than any other women of contemporary European tribes. They enjoyed much more fundamental rights and were much more civilized than the Viking men. The Vikings mythology is full of examples of Norse women being portrayed as strong female figures and mighty women warriors.

The life of a woman in Viking literature was much different than other contemporary women, they were strong and capable and could take care of the family when the Viking men were away. Under given circumstances, they could also pick up the sword and act as female warriors.

The life of a woman influenced the oral Viking literature while the written literature recorded it, much later.

The vast majority of the Viking Scandinavian women spent their lives performing the typical jobs of homemakers, raising children, looking after the family, cooking, and gathering clothes.

Viking women after marriage had full authority over the household, they could also share some of their duty with the men. Marriage gave the Viking women economic security.

However, in Viking history and literature, the appearance of the Viking women goes beyond the realms of the housewives. Even the housewives are portrayed as household warriors in the literature who managed all the resources in the home to feed a large number of people and take care of them.

The spiritual women leaders were given a key place in Norse mythology. Female warriors were only a literary fantasy of hyper-masculine medieval Scandinavia.

In some literature, featuring women as warriors, it was generally the hero's duty to convert them unto wives.

The warrior women were never the central heroes of any surviving Norse literature but given wooing personalities. Valkyre was a legendary mythical character of the Norse myth, the females at war were referred to as Valkyries.

Running The Household

The key responsibility of the Viking women was to look after their household, even when the men were away from home for months. The females did not seem to make a big deal out of such situations, rather they handled each responsibility of the household smoothly on their own.

They lived in a longhouse with a single room and had benched for accommodating the family members.

The most typical task of a female Viking was to care for the home and take care of its residents. Starting from the relatives to honored guests, the wife had to look after them and entertain them at every cost.

They wore a dress with a smock underneath. The housewives were adept storytellers, they recited poems, stories, myths, and even sagas to the future generation.

The Viking women practiced preaching stories orally from one generation to another until these stories were captured in writing. The women could pursue land rights, businesses, divorces much easily but their area of influence was mostly domestic.

The women of the household also had the right to be priestesses and offer prayer to God.

Most of the information about the culture of the Vikings comes from written histories and they portray a homemaker as independent and free. In the case of a household that did not have any male presence, a female could exercise her full property rights.

She was also given the position of the family's head in the absence of a brother or father. However, if she married someone, all the property rights went to her husband immediately.

Housewives As Key Carriers

The Norse literature says that a married woman of the Viking culture used to be the key carrier of the society. Women of high status carried keys among their all other personal belongings. The key symbolized a women's status as a housewife in the Viking society.

The Viking history suggests that the women of the Viking age society were believed to carry keys with them wherever they went. The keys were a symbol of their marital status.

The keys discovered around several female graves are suggestive of the fact that the housewives were the key carriers of society. Not only the keys but legal texts were also found around rich women's graves that stated that the women of the Vikings had the fundamental rights to the keys.

Women also carried some other goods like oil lamps, household tools, and knives with them into their graves. However, numerous keys have also been discovered by archaeologists that were not found around the graves of the women.

This shows that the families had an extensive number of keys.

A larger study shows that keys have been discovered from only 5% of women's burial grounds. Apart from the wealthiest families of the Vikings, keys were found from all types of burials.

Some of these keys were not even usable. So the question now arises is that if a key did not suggest the status of a wife, then what did it actually indicate?

Some believe that strong women with special power had keys with them. Therefore, it is also possible that the women with keys were looked up to as knowledgeable women of the Viking age rather than the typical housewife.

Warrior Viking Women

The women of the Viking age were all-rounders, they managed the households, took care of their families in one hand, and did the works of a trader and clothes maker on the other. However, the only designation where no evidence of Viking women has been recorded is the designation of warriors.

According to the Viking studies, it is believed that the women of the Viking age never actually became a warrior. The concept of warrior women originated from the remains of a female Viking found in a grave in Birka, Sweden.

A grave in Sweden appeared to be the grave of a warrior of the Viking age.

The belongings that were found in that grave, for example, a board game like chess indicated that it was a warrior's grave. Items like that were often found in the graves of warriors and based on those belongings, the assumption was made.

However, a DNA test of the remains of the Birka proved that the bones in the grave actually belonged to a female.

As a result, the researchers started implementing the fact that the person buried in that grave must have been a female warrior. However, the Viking historians did not agree to this conclusion at all and stated it as disputed.

They said that the presence of a board game in the grave of a Viking does not have any links to warriors.

There is also a possibility that the bones got mixed during the burial and the grave was not any warrior's grave. They simply could not agree with the fact that any Viking women warrior existed during the Viking age since they had strong evidence against the assumption.

However, this did not make the Viking women any less powerful in the society, rather they had a level of quality that many societies could not achieve even after many years. Even though most of the roles of women revolved around household activities, they were not simply housewives.

They had the right to take decisions and disagree with men when necessary. They also had property rights which were curbed from the women just after the Viking rule ended.

Remains of Viking women found from large Viking ships and carved with wooden furniture were assumed to be of royalty and nobility.

This shows that even powerful women enjoyed social hierarchy in the age and were respected by their peers. Law was much fairer to the Viking women than any other women of contemporary tribes.

Here at Kidadl, we have carefully created lots of interesting family-friendly facts for everyone to enjoy! If you liked our suggestions for Viking women facts, then why not take a look at Viking helmet facts or Viking axes facts?