Editorial Content for The Real Valkyrie: The Hidden History of Viking Warrior Women
Contributors
Reviewer (text)
Several years ago, archaeologists thrilled and delighted their colleagues and armchair historians alike when DNA examination of a Viking warrior revealed her to be a woman. This seemingly raised tons of intriguing questions.
In THE REAL VALKYRIE, Nancy Marie Brown sets herself an admirable goal: to show readers who that Viking warrior woman might have been. She effectively weaves together the possibility of fiction and the records of hard science, but ultimately her argument is not persuasive.
"[Brown's] knowledge of Viking archaeology and discussion of it are thorough and intriguing, which is where the book excels."
Brown begins by examining what was found in the grave --- numbered Bj581 --- in Birka, Sweden. Her knowledge of Viking archaeology and discussion of it are thorough and intriguing, which is where the book excels. But then she posits the general assumption that Viking warriors being mostly male is simply a product of Victorian gender. She is right when saying that “we don’t know the Vikings as well as we thought” --- and that includes how they regarded men and women and warrior status. But she simply name-drops “the Victorian stereotype” without explaining the emergence of that stereotype, what it means and where it comes from, undermining her own argument by not fleshing out the other side.
As a result, Brown relies on readers’ assumptions that the Victorian era automatically equals prudery and traditional gender roles. If she wants to convince readers that the Viking understanding of women was different from what we previously believe, she needs to explain how the Vikings were regarded for the 750 years before the Victorians, why the Victorian era was so influential in understanding the Vikings, and exactly how we define a “Viking.” Moving the focus away from the fictional story of “Hervor,” as she affectionately dubs the Birka woman, and back to the semantics of an academic argument would have made this volume more well-rounded.
As it is, Brown’s study of the sagas and depiction of “Hervor” is interesting. But THE REAL VALKYRIE would have worked better as a novel, with the academic study of the real-life warrior woman as a separate book.
Teaser
In 2017, DNA tests revealed to the collective shock of many scholars that a Viking warrior in a high-status grave in Birka, Sweden was actually a woman. THE REAL VALKYRIE weaves together archaeology, history and literature to imagine her life and times, showing that Viking women had more power and agency than historians have imagined. Nancy Marie Brown uses science to link the Birka warrior, whom she names Hervor, to Viking trading towns and to their great trade route east to Byzantium and beyond. She imagines her life intersecting with larger-than-life but real women, including Queen Gunnhild Mother-of-Kings, the Viking leader known as The Red Girl, and Queen Olga of Kyiv.
Promo
In 2017, DNA tests revealed to the collective shock of many scholars that a Viking warrior in a high-status grave in Birka, Sweden was actually a woman. THE REAL VALKYRIE weaves together archaeology, history and literature to imagine her life and times, showing that Viking women had more power and agency than historians have imagined. Nancy Marie Brown uses science to link the Birka warrior, whom she names Hervor, to Viking trading towns and to their great trade route east to Byzantium and beyond. She imagines her life intersecting with larger-than-life but real women, including Queen Gunnhild Mother-of-Kings, the Viking leader known as The Red Girl, and Queen Olga of Kyiv.
About the Book
In the tradition of Stacy Schiff’s Cleopatra, Brown lays to rest the hoary myth that Viking society was ruled by men and celebrates the dramatic lives of female Viking warriors.
In 2017, DNA tests revealed to the collective shock of many scholars that a Viking warrior in a high-status grave in Birka, Sweden was actually a woman. THE REAL VALKYRIE weaves together archaeology, history and literature to imagine her life and times, showing that Viking women had more power and agency than historians have imagined.
Nancy Marie Brown uses science to link the Birka warrior, whom she names Hervor, to Viking trading towns and to their great trade route east to Byzantium and beyond. She imagines her life intersecting with larger-than-life but real women, including Queen Gunnhild Mother-of-Kings, the Viking leader known as The Red Girl, and Queen Olga of Kyiv. Hervor’s short, dramatic life shows that much of what we have taken as truth about women in the Viking Age is based not on data, but on 19th-century Victorian biases. Rather than holding the household keys, Viking women in history, law, saga, poetry and myth carry weapons. These women brag, “As heroes we were widely known --- with keen spears we cut blood from bone.” In this compelling narrative, Brown brings the world of those valkyries and shield-maids to vivid life.
