Fun Ways to Learn About the Vikings

The vikings are probably my favorite topic to study in history. They were in my opinion the fiercest warriors of the middle ages. At the time their weaponry and equipment was state of the art, and their ships were the strongest and fastest in all the seven seas. The best way to learn about these things is to see them used and built. You can do that by watching this video.

Click here to play the educational game Viking explorer. 

To learn about how the vikings attacked watch this funny music video.

Viking Mythology is many times known as Norse mythology.  It is very interesting.  It is very different than it is in movies though:  it is much more violent and gory.  We get what we know about viking mythology from poems.  Here is how they thought the human race was created.
     

Long ago the ice giants lived by four rivers. Instead of having water in them these rivers had milk. The milk came from a magic cow named Audhumbla who lived on Nifelheim (the ice realm). One day when Audhumbla licked some ice into the shape of a man, the ice turned into the first Viking deity. His name was Buri. Bestla, a youthful frost giant fell in love with Buri.  They had three children: Odin, Vili, and Ve who for some reason had none of their mother’s genes and were all Viking deities. One day Odin, Vili, and Ve decided to kill their grandpa. So much blood came out of their gigantic grandpa that it drowned most of the frost giants.  It would have killed all of them but some escaped on boats.  Their grandpa’s body made the land, his blood made the oceans, and his skull made the sky. A random log made the first man and woman.

As you can probably tell viking mythology was messed up, along with many other things in viking culture. Although the vikings weren't 100% insane, when a lot of people say 1066 was the end of the vikings in a way it was their rise. You see generations before the battle of 1066 a Viking conquered Normandy, and so when the Normans conquered England, so did the Vikings.  They were simply smarter Vikings.