Vikings

The History of the Vikings        by Sir Thomas D. (T.D.) Kendricks 

This enthralling, well-documented and vivid account chronicles the activities of those bold sailors of the North who terrorized Europe from the 8th to the 11th centuries. Invaluable to scholars and students of Nordic history, this dramatic narrative takes readers from the White Sea in the Arctic to Africa's Moroccan Coast, and from Viking operations in Russia, England and Ireland to daring exploits in Iceland, Greenland, and America.

Sir Thomas D. Kendrick —archeologist, art historian and director of the British Museum — wrote this remarkable history of Viking travels, adventures and commerce, the most complete study of the Viking phenomenon. This book — supplemented with 12 plates plus 40 black-and-white illustrations — is an unabridged republication of Kendrick's 1930 edition.  The subject is enormous, but in Kendrick's hands it "becomes absorbing drama."  

V2 - 06              Paperback         $18.95

 

Far Traveler: Voyages of a Viking Woman   by Nancy Marie Brown

Described by The New York Times Book Review as "[A] snappily written biography . . . " this story is based on Icelandic sagas and takes place 500 years before Columbus's voyages. It offers readers a peek into medieval life, but what makes this book extremely special are its rare insights into women's lives during the Viking era, and the ultimate rewriting of history.

Is it fiction or nonfiction? Even after archaeologists first found a Viking longhouse, no one believed the details of Gudrid's story. Gudrid, the central character, purportedly lived in such a house in the New World. She had sailed into the unknown, landed in the New World, lived there for three years, and had given birth before sailing home. Now, however, thanks to thorough onsite research by the author and further scientific study, Gudrid's tale is considered nonfiction.

In 2001, a team of scientists — experimenting with cutting-edge technology and the latest archaeological techniques — discovered what is believed to be Gudrid's last house. It was buried under a hay field in Iceland, and its location was just where the sagas (frequently handed down by oral tradition) suggested it would be. 

Brown, who had traced Gudrid's steps both on land and in the sagas, joined this scientific expedition. The result of Brown's years of work resulted in Far Traveler, a book that reconstructs a woman's life that spanned—and expanded—the bounds of the then-known world.

As The Boston Globe wrote, "Brown's enthusiasm is infectious as she re-teaches us our history." Brown's research and book shed new light on a society that gave rise to a woman even more extraordinary than legend had painted her, and illuminated the previously speculative reasons for the demise of early Viking settlements.    

V2 - 07   Paperback    $15.00

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