Did Vikings use swords, or just wave them around?

[B. de Corbin]

Re: Did Vikings use swords, or just wave them around?

As I recall (not an area of specific interest, execpt regarding regarding tactics) the Roman throwing javelin (pillum?) had a two foot long soft iron shaft ahead of the wooden shaft. The idea was to begin by throwing the spears. If they struck anything, like a sheild, the iron shaft would bend making it impossible to manuver the sheild effectively, or to pull the spear, or to toss it back at the legionare.

For the Romans, warfare was a pretty industrial procedure.

[MaskedOne]

Re: Did Vikings use swords, or just wave them around?

Or a Roman shield wall but I've seen some interesting arguments that the iconic Roman forces were actually primarily close range missile troops and stabby time didn't start till the enemy morale broke. Also Roman blades were rather specialized to the role of stabbing in confined space if memory serves.

Thanks.

[B. de Corbin]

Re: Did Vikings use swords, or just wave them around?

Forgive my ignorance on this but when we talk "viking raiders", are we talking about small, light forces with a goal of hit soft targets fast and then move on to new targets or head home before any serious response comes or are we talking about armies? The former has no business screwing with castles or walled cities. I'm in full agreement that circumstances and doctrine influence weapon choice. I just want to be sure I've got the right idea of what we're talking about here because one of these has almost as much business screwing with a walled city as somali pirates do charging a carrier strike group.

There's actually no good hand weapon to attack fortifications, anyway.

That's a long-term dig-in-and-starve-em-out situation. Seige engines would be nice, though -generally when used they're built on site.

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Cool, thanks for the info. Any idea why they went for the specific combo of axe and shield? Axes as weapons aren't something I'm particularly familiar with and I'm curious if they specifically liked the pair or if axe and shield was just cheaper than sword and shield.

Much cheaper. Any aprentice 'smith can make an ax, but a sword requires special training.

Aside from that, an ax is easier to use and learn. It's a simple fake high, chop low, or fake low, chop high movement. Also, in a melee, swords actually get in the way. They require space to use, and the methods of using one are intended for one-on-one or judicial combat.

Or you're on a horse and use shock tactics...

Added, 'cause I'm a weapons nerd: when the fighting gets close, pole arms get tossed. The back-up weapon is going to be an ax, hammer, mace, or very short sword. Something like a big knife.

[MaskedOne]

Re: Did Vikings use swords, or just wave them around?

The Vikings fought in larger armies as well. The Danes raided England in the 800's and eventually the raiders formed a larger force and invaded England. The Anglo Saxon Chronicle called it "The Great Heathen Army". Though most of their operations even in that time period constituted mostly raiding.

In those larger battles they generally used axes and shields. Swords were not commonly used.

Cool, thanks for the info. Any idea why they went for the specific combo of axe and shield? Axes as weapons aren't something I'm particularly familiar with and I'm curious if they specifically liked the pair or if axe and shield was just cheaper than sword and shield.

[ThePaganMafia]

Re: Did Vikings use swords, or just wave them around?

The Vikings fought in larger armies as well. The Danes raided England in the 800's and eventually the raiders formed a larger force and invaded England. The Anglo Saxon Chronicle called it "The Great Heathen Army". Though most of their operations even in that time period constituted mostly raiding.

In those larger battles they generally used axes and shields. Swords were not commonly used.

[MaskedOne]

Re: Did Vikings use swords, or just wave them around?

This might be of interest then to this discussion http://gladius.revistas.csic.es/inde...ewFile/218/222

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Personal opinion I think it would depend upon who they were fighting and where regarding whether they used swords or not. Figure they raided into Russia and such probably did use them up close. In Northern Europe and England maybe, maybe not as the landscape and defenses would dictate weapon choices. Pikes and such no to effective against walled cities or castles but good in open fields or mounted defenders. But admit my history is sort of cloudy though most viking raids I recall seem to occur at night or early / late in the day not in middle of the day when defenders are wide awake and well prepared. Again not times favoring the usage of the pike or other long staved weapons.

Forgive my ignorance on this but when we talk "viking raiders", are we talking about small, light forces with a goal of hit soft targets fast and then move on to new targets or head home before any serious response comes or are we talking about armies? The former has no business screwing with castles or walled cities. I'm in full agreement that circumstances and doctrine influence weapon choice. I just want to be sure I've got the right idea of what we're talking about here because one of these has almost as much business screwing with a walled city as somali pirates do charging a carrier strike group.

[monsno_leedra]

Re: Did Vikings use swords, or just wave them around?

This might be of interest then to this discussion http://gladius.revistas.csic.es/inde...ewFile/218/222

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Personal opinion I think it would depend upon who they were fighting and where regarding whether they used swords or not. Figure they raided into Russia and such probably did use them up close. In Northern Europe and England maybe, maybe not as the landscape and defenses would dictate weapon choices. Pikes and such no to effective against walled cities or castles but good in open fields or mounted defenders. But admit my history is sort of cloudy though most viking raids I recall seem to occur at night or early / late in the day not in middle of the day when defenders are wide awake and well prepared. Again not times favoring the usage of the pike or other long staved weapons.

[B. de Corbin]

Re: Did Vikings use swords, or just wave them around?

Yeah - swords would have been enormously expensive because they are very complicated to make correctly, and not the best battlefield weapon - when compared to a pole arm or an ax - so I wouldn't be surprised that few Vikings actually used them.

(the guys with the huge swords were the German Landsknecht. They used them to break up the formations and chop the poles of the Swiss Pikesmen who were acting as mercenaries all over Europe)

[MaskedOne]

Re: Did Vikings use swords, or just wave them around?

Swords, IIRC, were frequently a secondary weapon instead of a major killer on the battlefield anyway (pikes are cheaper to make and train) so viking swords not being their primary tools of killing wouldn't shock me. I'd expect that there were.swords designed for battle floating around and either they haven't made it to present day or simply haven't been examined yet but they were probably sidearms in most* cases.

* There was a nation that employed elite units packing great swords but I don't remember who. Vikings may have pulled similar.

[B. de Corbin]

Interesting article on the metallurgical analysis of a few Viking swords:

High-tech scans of Viking swords are revealing details of how the weapons were made and how their role changed in Viking society over time.

A new analysis of three Viking swords has found that, as fearsome as these seafaring people were, these specific "weapons" were probably not sturdy enough for battle or raiding, and instead were likely decorative.

This finding, along with similar examples of non-fighting swords from the Viking Age, described previously by scientists, indicate that swords became symbols of power and status that were only rarely used, the scientists said.

I found this interesting. I tried checking the original scholarly article, but I can only read the abstract, and the abstract says nothing about the usability of the weapons.

The article is correct in stating that the BEST way to take advantage of the different qualities of iron and steel is to steel line an iron core (as the Japanese did, and some higher quality European swordsmiths did), but that requires a hugely advanced metal technology that may not have been available to the Vikings of (at least) the earlier period. The second best - often used when highly refined iron/steel is not available - is to twist steel of differing carbon content together, as these Viking swordsmiths did.

Anyway, for what it's worth...