Vikingology Podcast

It’s our 60th episode! And what better way to spend our Diamond Jubilee than a long-awaited chat with Old Norse scholar Dr. Jackson Crawford?
Many of you will be familiar with him through his immensely popular YouTube channel, where you can experience the intersection of cowboy cool and the vikings. He has produced hundreds of videos about Old Norse, history, and the literature of the Viking Age, much of it set in a wild west backdrop. He has also done saga and poem translations, including The Poetic Edda, The Saga of the Volsungs, and Hávamál, and is currently working on a translation of The Prose Edda.
We chatted with him about a lot of things, as we tend to do, but we started with the word ‘viking’ and its linguistic origins in the Old Norse words viking and víkingr. Did actual vikings use that word to describe themselves? Did it mean the same to them as it does to us? Was it seen as a good thing to be a viking? Was it a full-time profession, or were they just seasonal violence workers?
Watch or listen for the answers to all of that and more!
Takk fyrir Jackson for spending some time with us. It was well worth the wait!
Vikingology is reader-supported. To support what we do, please consider becoming a paid subscriber.



Get full access to Vikingology Podcast at vikingology.substack.com/subscribe

We were honored to finally chat with Carolyne Larrington, Professor and Emeritus Research Fellow of Old English and Old Norse literature at St. John’s College, Oxford. She is one of the world’s foremost experts on mythology with many many books and publications, including her most recent books The Little Book of Trolls and The Little Book of Dragons. She has also done a translation of The Poetic Edda.
Since we are both historians, and C.J. is an historical fiction author to boot, we are hardwired for creating narratives about the past and storytelling in general, so we were delighted to get a chance to talk with Prof. Larrington about what stories and myths mean to us humans as a species. This took us not only to the Viking Age and Norse myths, but much farther afield into the realms of religion, modern medievalism, and the human condition in general.
This was a fun and enlightening chat. We could have talked for hours!
Thank you Carolyne. We hope you will visit us again in the future!
Skál!
Thank you to all who watch or listen to us! To further support our work, please consider becoming a paid subscriber.



Get full access to Vikingology Podcast at vikingology.substack.com/subscribe

This time we are excited to welcome back to the show experimental archaeologists and living history experts Kevin Alexandrowicz and Devon Rawlings of Regia Anglorum and Jarnborg Vikings. They have collaborated on a new book project that brings Viking Age death to life in a stunningly visual and visceral way.
Painstakingly staged and photographed, and based on the archaeology of actual burial sites, the graves Kevin, Devon, and their team created give us a glimpse into how the Norse prepared the dead for the next life. You’ll definitely want to watch instead of listen to see some of their amazing photographs as they explain the history and interpretation behind them.
Published by Hyldyr in Washington State, which has also brought to life other Norse themes such as the poems Völuspá and Hávamál, the Fuþark runic alphabets, and the Galdrabók, this new book promises to change the way we visualize death and burial in the Viking Age. It even includes introductions by friends of the show archaeologists Leszek Gardeła and Giorgia Sottotetti!
If you want to see an intriguing new way to engage with the Viking Age past, please buy the book! You’ll be supporting history, archaeology, artists, and publishers all at the same time.
Thanks so much Kevin and Devon for sharing your knowledge and artistry. Can’t wait to see what you do next!
Skál!
Thanks for reading! This post is public so feel free to share it. And it you like what we do, please consider becoming a paid subscriber.



Get full access to Vikingology Podcast at vikingology.substack.com/subscribe

The Norse during the Viking Age inhabited a world that was both utterly foreign to us and yet humanly familiar. Like us, they believed in ghosts. But maybe unlike us they believed in revenants and other supernatural creatures of all kinds. It seems their world was pretty porous when it came to the line between the living and the dead.
In this episode we chatted with Irina Manea, a scholar of Norse myth and the saga literature, to get a sense of the viking mind regarding death and the afterlife. How did they deal with dead bodies? Where did they believe people went after death? Were ghosts and revenants welcomed or shunned? Were the dead scary or benevolent? Did they take steps to protect against them? And how much did the Christianization of Viking Age Scandinavia change those beliefs?
It’s a fascinating topic that we hadn’t delved into much on the show. We learned a lot, including the fact that maybe an important way to keep bad spirits away is to cover your anus. To be safe, you’d better watch or listen and find out why :)
Thanks Irina! We must do it again soon.
You can find Irina on her Shield of Skuld newsletter right here on Substack. Do check it out. Lots of great viking content there.
Skál


Get full access to Vikingology Podcast at vikingology.substack.com/subscribe

The Norse during the Viking Age inhabited a world that was both utterly foreign to us and yet humanly familiar. Like us, they believed in ghosts. But maybe unlike us they believed in revenants and other supernatural creatures of all kinds. It seems their world was pretty porous when it came to the line between the living and the dead.
In this episode we chatted with Irina Manea, a scholar of Norse myth and the saga literature, to get a sense of the viking mind regarding death and the afterlife. How did they deal with dead bodies? Where did they believe people went after death? Were ghosts and revenants welcomed or shunned? Were the dead scary or benevolent? Did they take steps to protect against them? And how much did the Christianization of Viking Age Scandinavia change those beliefs?
It’s a fascinating topic that we hadn’t delved into much on the show. We learned a lot, including the fact that maybe an important way to keep bad spirits away is to cover your anus. To be safe, you’d better watch or listen and find out why :)
Thanks Irina! We must do it again soon.
You can find Irina on her Shield of Skuld newsletter right here on Substack. Do check it out. Lots of great viking content there.
Skál

Vikingology is reader-supported. Please consider becoming a paid subscriber.



Get full access to Vikingology Podcast at vikingology.substack.com/subscribe