Iona Abbey, situated on the remote Scottish island in the Inner Hebrides, was a central religious site that experienced multiple Viking raids. Source: Heartland Arts / Shutterstock
It is today fashionable among historians and commentators to recast the Vikings as a more peaceable group of settlers who came to places like the British Isles to trade valuable goods, swap farming tips, and exchange cultural niceties.
There is some truth to this, of course – a considerable number of Norse people did indeed integrate and settle abroad without any undue trouble.
At the same time, the Vikings (or, more specifically, the seafaring marauders who regularly ventured overseas) didn't establish a fearsome reputation as brutal raiders for nothing.
Read the rest of this article...
