Funeral Rites - Viking Burial
By Polly Thompson Funeral rites of Passage: The burial of a Viking Noble. Vikings invaded Britain in their impressive dragon prowed ships, to rape, pillage and burn. They looted monastries and killed the monks. (including Lindisfarne). This is the reputation vikings warriors left behind, as claimed in sgraffito runes on the walls of the Orkney Stone Age burial mound Maeshowe. The sensational accounts of their marauding ignore the fact that Vikings were skilled craftsmen, famed sailors, farmers and great traders Narrow viking boats could be sailed up shallow river waters and manoevered over land. They established the Volga trade running across Russia to the Black sea and reaching as far as Baghdad. As they lived so they died. Their funeral rites of passage honoured the status of nobles and were testament to the fine skills of craftsmen. Burials would be on their Viking ship accompanied by fine grave goods, provisions, birds animals ...