Life in the Age of Vikings

Here, at the edge of the habitable world, a thousand kilometers away from the Norse homelands, exists a social order unlike any other in medieval Europe. It esteems political flexibility instead of warfare, and every hero’s actions have the potential to impact the entire nation.

Geography

Iceland is a land of extremes. The mighty forces of ice and fire have carved a dramatic landscape. The island’s interior is uninhabitable, with elevated plateaus partially covered by glaciers and extensive lava fields. Almost all settlements are on the coast, in sheltered valleys, or alongside the banks of fast-flowing rivers that cut deep gorges through the meadows.

The south coast consists mainly of broad sandy beaches. The north, east, and west coastlines are rugged and dominated by numerous long, deep, and narrow fjords. On either side of the coastal fjords, tall mountains or glaciers can be found, and there are likely to be many impressive waterfalls.

During the summer months, the sun never sets. This is called “night-less time” (nóttleysa). Conversely, during the cold winter months, there are only two or three hours of light during the day. Hot springs, geysers, and pools of boiling mud are a common sight, providing a readily accessible supply of hot water. People utilize this resource in a variety of ways, including washing clothes, boiling and steaming foods, attending to personal hygiene and comfort, and socializing in the natural hot pools.

Volcanic eruptions and floods caused by molten rock explosions under the vast ice glaciers are frequent and can have devastating effects on the population. Among the many active volcanoes, the most notable are the unpredictable and dangerous Shifting Slopes (Krafla) at the Lake of Midges (Mývatn) in the north, the explosive volcano Kettle (Katla) under the Mire Valley glacier (Mýrdalsjökull) in the south, Hooded Cloak Mountain (Hekla) in the southwest (also known as the “Gateway to Hell”), and finally, the mysterious Holy Hill (Helgafell) in the Westman Islands.

Forests

The old sagas tell that at the time of settlement, lush vegetation covered the lowlands. In the four centuries since settlement, however, most of this rich flora has been cut down to make way for livestock grazing fields or to be used as fuel and building material.

The few remaining wooded areas, mainly birch and willow forests, are considered very valuable property.

Good timber is primarily imported from Norway. This significantly increases the cost of maintaining ships.

Climate

Cool, dry wind blows from the north while warm, moist air collides from the south, making for unstable weather throughout the country.

Summers are wet and cold, with temperatures ranging between 5–13° C (41–55° F). Warm summer days can reach 20–25° C (68–77° F), but those are rare. Winters are relatively mild, with temperatures in the southern lowlands around 0° C (32° F) and –10° (14° F ) in the highlands.

Violent and unstable western winds regularly blow over the seas around Iceland, making sailing in the open ocean a frightening proposition to all but seasoned Icelandic sailors.

Driftwood

With so few of the native forests remaining, driftwood has become the main source of timber other than expensive imports from Norway. This makes coastal farms, especially in the North where driftwood is more abundant, much more valuable property than farms further inland.

The legends say the merfolk cut down the trees from vast underwater forests. Those trees not used by the mysterious half-human, half-seal people float to the surface and wash up on the beaches.

Animals

The arctic fox and the field mouse are the only native land mammals on the island.

Sometimes, solitary polar bears appear in the North, having traveled on ice floes from Greenland. By the time the bears reach Iceland, they are so desperately hungry that they attack anything and anyone, and represent a great danger to coastal settlers. Very few people know that a nation of intelligent polar bears exists in the highlands.

The settlers brought with them many farm animals, including dogs, cats, pigs, goats, sheep, horses, and cattle. With them also came lice, fleas, rats, dung beetles, and other animal parasites.

Icelandic Settlements

There are no towns—not even small villages—and no roads. Society is entirely rural. The population is spread across the country in isolated farms.

When the settlers arrived, they found no native population apart from a few Irish monks. With the area free of hostile native inhabitants, they were able to choose the location of their settlements, which were scattered mainly along the coastal areas and in a few sheltered inland valleys.

There are no farms in the central highlands, where the weather is too harsh and attacks by trolls and giants too frequent. Only the mad and desperate attempt to settle there.

Population Size

Throughout the country, there are some 5,000 farmers who possess enough property to enjoy full rights in the courts and at assemblies. When counting all members of the families as well as slaves and tenant farmers, the population of Iceland is around 50,000 people.

Farming

In all regions of Iceland, individual farmsteads are mostly self-sufficient. Farmers and their families live from the meat of their livestock and dairy products produced on their farms. They keep cattle, sheep, pigs, and goats. Most are kept inside during the hard winters—sharing space in the longhouse when necessary.

Horses

Icelandic horses are small, strong, and sturdy. They are well adapted to the uneven terrain and the country’s harsh weather conditions. Horses are raised not only for transportation but also because their meat is a common part of the Icelandic diet. Horse meat is also eaten as part of religious ceremonies when horses are sacrificed to the gods.

Horses that misbehave or become a nuisance during the winter while inside the longhouses soon become food for the family. Statistics for the Icelandic breed of horse can be found on page 265.

Turf Houses

The longhouse, or turf house, is the focal point of everyday life. The average household size is around ten people, including the farmer’s wife, children, other family members, and slaves.

Icelanders have a limited amount of building wood available to them and must depend on turf. This grass with underlying sod attached is used to construct houses with heat-retaining walls. Two separate courses of turf bricks are used to build one wall, and a central cavity is filled with gravel to provide drainage. A finished wall is typically two meters (seven feet) thick.

Since the turf walls don’t support any of the weight, the structural support for the house is provided by posts and beams of driftwood or imported wood. The wooden beams lock together using pegs and notches. The roof is made of small tree branches supported by rafters, which are then covered with turf and a layer of birch bark for waterproofing. Over that is another layer of turf, followed by a final layer of living grass. Most rain runs off this top layer of grass into the gravel cores of the walls to drain, and the roots of the grass make the roof stronger. A smoke hole in the roof above each fireplace allows smoke to escape the interior. Sometimes sheep, and even cows, climb onto a roof.

The only sources of external light in a turf house are the smoke holes and a row of small holes at the base of the roof. When the house is under attack, these small holes are used as arrow slits. In extreme circumstances, it is possible for the roof of a turf house to be peeled off, either by strong winds, an attacker trying to invade the house, or by the strength of mythic creatures.

There are usually only one or two doors to a turf house, in front and at the back, opposite one anotherr, due to the thickness of the walls. These doors are always kept bolted to secure the house from invaders. Both doorways are short, both to reduce heat loss and to force invaders to bend down and expose their necks to those waiting inside.

The structure of the longhouse is a representation of the Norse universe. The wooden roof supports at the corners are known as dwarves (dvegar), just like the dwarves that hold the sky in place. The columns along the center of the longhouse represent the gods Óðinn, Þór, and Freyr, and prayers to these gods are fixed to the poles.

The inside of the house is divided into several rooms. The main room is a hall lined by wooden benches with a fire pit in the middle.

Over time, turf buildings tend to melt into the surrounding ground, appearing as small hillocks from a distance.

Social Ranks

The social structure in Iceland is unique in the Norse world and in Europe. Although Icelanders recognize the authority of foreign nobles and earls, none of them reside in the country. The one broad distinction is between those who are free and those who are not.

Householders

Householders are, in many ways, the dominant class, as only freeborn landowners can participate in assemblies, and only they can become goðar. They are also able to make other people work for them, whether as tenants or slaves. Age of Vikings heroes start as householders.

Tenants and Servants

These are freeborn farmers who do not own their land but rather rent it from the landowner or work another farmer’s land in exchange for room and board. They have most of the same rights as householders, including the taking of vengeance and the collecting of blood money, but they cannot take part in assemblies.

Freedmen/-women

Freedmen or freedwomen are former slaves who have been freed by their former owners. They are often not entirely free, as Icelandic law specifies that if a free person cannot maintain themselves, then the former owner is required to support them in exchange for becoming the freedperson’s legal heir if the freedperson dies childless.

Thralls

Most thralls (slaves) are gained from raids on the Celtic nations, but some are debt slaves, ordered into slavery when they were unable to pay for a debt they incurred and forced to remain until they work off their debt. They are generally at the bottom of the pecking order within any household, with few rights or freedoms.

Female slaves serve as nurses, foster mothers, and sometimes as concubines.

Thralldom in Icelandic Society

The topic of slavery, thralldom, may be a controversial one for some gaming groups, and as such, their existence may be either ignored or considered as a mere subclass of servants. Further information is presented here to provide context for their existence in Icelandic society.

Vagrants

Those who have no residence are not attached to any farm and thus travel the country, surviving on the charity of others. According to law, vagrants are not allowed to marry, and anyone is free to kill a vagrant and take their belongings without penalty.

Goðar

At the top of the Icelandic social structure are the chieftain-priests, called goðar (singular goði). They are political leaders who possess only a slight formal authority with no means to forcefully repress the surrounding population.

The primary functions of the goði are to advocate or mediate disputes and to represent the people settled on the goði’s chieftaincy at the Alþing, or National Assembly. The members of this class also give spiritual guidance to the people living in their chieftaincy.

A chieftaincy, or goðorð, is treated as a private possession. It is sometimes inherited, can be purchased, shared, or received as a gift. The number of chieftaincies in the country is limited to 39. A chieftaincy cannot be compared to the petty kingdoms that flourished in Norway or Ireland. The chieftaincy is not defined by geographical area. Unlike Norwegian or Irish leaders, who lived surrounded by followers sharing a common loyalty, the goðar live interspersed among farmers who might be followers of other, sometimes rival, goðar.

Honor

Icelanders have a highly personal view of honor. It is more tied to maintaining life, property, status, or exacting revenge than it is to the traditional ideal of individual sacrifice for obligations to a lord, religion, or the defense of others. It is often true that a person acquires honor at another’s expense.

Honor is at stake in virtually every social activity: in gift exchanging, in feud and law, wealth, fighting skills, weaponry, clothing, and even (or maybe especially) in seating arrangements at feasts. In fact, feasts can be dangerous events. The host risks losing honor by inadvertently offending the guests, and guests risk offending each other and the host.

Ultimately, loss of honor suggests that the individual is incapable of defending either themselves or their property. No goði will mediate their disputes, and no punishment will be brought to those who harm that individual or take their possessions or land.

A violent attack to restore honor can happen at any place, against any person. For that reason, weapons are always carried. Honor is measured by the Honor passion.

Marriage

Marriage is a rather straightforward agreement linking two families into an extensive, though fragile, support network. In giving a child into marriage, parents and their family are investing in a new extended family alliance.

All marriages of the householder class are, to some extent, political. Some are overtly so, while others are not as much. A marriage is arranged by one’s kin, and their consent is not required by law. It is regarded as prudent, however, to get the person’s approval.

Language

Icelanders and other Norse peoples call their language dönsk tunga, the “Danish tongue”. For ease, it is referred to in Age of Vikings as Norse.

The same language is spoken throughout Scandinavia and the Viking colonies, such as Jorvik in Britain and Dublin in Ireland.

It is related to but different from the language spoken in Anglo-Saxon England. With some practice, however, speakers of the two languages can understand each other, a factor that significantly broadens the cultural contacts of Icelanders.

Economy

The ownership of livestock is the main measure of wealth. The primary source of food is sheep, mostly in the form of dairy products but also as meat. Fish is considerably less valuable as a resource.

There are no coins minted in Iceland. With iron only available in the form of low-grade bog ore. No individual or region has any significant production of iron, silver, or any other metals. Wood and charcoal are required to create the steady heat necessary to work, and they are increasingly scarce everywhere. The land allows only limited agriculture and produces little on which the outside world places a premium.

The main articles exported from Iceland are wool, tweed, sheepskins, hides, cheese, tallow, falcons, and sulfur. Those are traded for timber, tar, metals, flour, malt, honey, wine, ale, and linen.

Iceland is famous in the Scandinavian courts for one significant export—poetry. Most poets in the courts of the Norse countries come from Iceland. Songs of praise are often sold to earls and princes of Orkney, England, Dublin, and Scandinavia.

Trade and Gift-giving

Trade, where goods are sold and purchased, is not something that is done with a person of an equal social station. Among equals, goods exchange tends to be by gift-giving if they are on good terms, or by raid if the relations are bad.

The principle behind gift exchange among those of equal social standing is that a gift becomes, in effect, a challenge for the recipient to match or surpass the generosity of the giver. Giving someone a gift so great that it is beyond the means of the recipient to return in kind is considered a hostile gesture, an attempt to humiliate someone. Refusing a gift is considered an insult, as is reciprocating too quickly.

The exceptions are long-distance traders, regardless of personal status, whether they are Icelandic or Norwegian. These traders periodically sail between Iceland and other parts of the world and are happy to take vaðmál as payment for the goods they bring from abroad.

Money

Lacking a sufficiently large or stable source of silver from which to make coinage, commodities such as livestock, dairy products, and especially woolen homespun cloth called vaðmál, are used as currency instead.

The standard unit of trade is one ell (the length from the elbow to the point of the second finger—around 50 cm, or 20 inches) of vaðmál. Imported goods are mostly paid in bulk vaðmál or animal skins. Icelanders going abroad take with them vaðmál and other goods to sell.

The unit of measurement for silver and other metals is the eyrir, plural aurar, it is equal to one ounce or 28 grams.

The value of vaðmál can fluctuate over time according to many factors, such as the harshness of the last few winters. The tables which follow show the current value in the summer of 977, the current year.

Vaðmál Value

• 1 eyrir of currency-grade silver = 4 ells of vaðmál
• 1 eyrir of refined silver = 30 ells of vaðmál
• 1 eyrir of refined gold = 40 ells of vaðmál
• 38 aurar of forged iron = 1 ell of vaðmál
• 1 mark = 8 eyrir
• 1 hundruðum = 120 ells of vaðmál

Land Travel

The most used means of transportation on this large island is, by far, the horse. Even for a journey down the coast, people most frequently resort to long overland horse rides.

An extensive system of horse paths connects the entire island. These lead to almost every part of the country. Piles of stone as high as a person mark the way along each path. When a rider reaches one of these stone piles, the next one should be visible at a long distance.

The main route crossing the Central Highlands is called Keel (Kjölur), located between the Long Glacier (Langjökull) and Temple Glacier (Hofsjökull). This route is only usable during the summer and is used only with large numbers of well-armed guards due to fear of encountering trolls, giants, and bands of outlaws living in the highlands.

Crossing the breadth of the country can take up to two weeks during the summer. During the winter, it can take twice as much time and can be very dangerous due to extreme weather conditions.

An important aspect of land travel is the giving of hospitality. It is a matter of honor to offer shelter, a place by the fire, and food and drink to any traveler that knocks on the door of even the most modest farm.

Outlawry

Icelandic sagas tell of many outlaws sentenced by an assembly court to be banished from society because of crimes they committed. Most often, outlaws flee to the uninhabited highlands in the central region of the country.

Life is extremely tough for an outlaw. There is a constant fear of being killed, not only by one’s enemies but also by those hunting outlaws throughout the year. Killing an outlaw is seen as an honorable act and thus improves a person’s reputation. It is also seen as a fair way of becoming wealthy by keeping any loot the outlaws may have accumulated. Even cooperation among outlaws is rare, as a criminal may be forgiven their crime if they kill three other outlaws. As if this wasn’t enough hardship, there are also the challenges of surviving the unpredictable and harsh weather of the highlands.

Outlaws who manage to survive for many years despite the odds stacked against them can sometimes be celebrated by storytellers for their heroism and independence.

Foreign Relations

Icelanders maintain contact with the rest of the Norse world, and often, individuals go abroad to join Viking or mercenary bands. Even so, Icelandic society remains distant from most exterior forces of change. Beyond the consensus that it is wise to be on friendly terms with the Norwegian king, Iceland has no foreign policy and no defensive land or sea force.

Death and Burials

When buried, the dead are given personal possessions, some or all of their weapons, tools, and household equipment, and animals such as horses are sacrificed to accompany them. The dead body is placed in an underground grave, which is topped with a mound. Wealthy individuals may also be buried with one of their boats. The family decides what goods are buried with the dead, and it might be that a great figure is buried with new goods instead of particularly special ones, such as a named piece of war-gear.

It is imperative that everyone receives a proper burial and is thus equipped for the afterlife. People are commonly allowed to return to a battlefield in their enemy’s farmland to give their fallen a proper burial. This matter is beyond family or individual rivalries.

Graves are sometimes raided for weapons or other precious objects buried with their owners. This is a dishonorable act if committed while there are still living descendants of the deceased.

Grave robbing can also be dangerous, as the dead may rise to protect their grave treasures.

The burning of dead bodies, a common practice in other Norse countries, is very rare in Iceland.

Viking Raids

Icelanders and other Norse peoples see a raid as something entirely distinct from theft. Stealing someone’s belongings is always regarded as shameful in Viking society. Raiding, on the other hand, is regarded as an honorable challenge to a fight, with the winner keeping all the spoils.

This is well-illustrated by a passage in Egill’s Saga, where Egill and his men have been taken as prisoners. They manage to free themselves, grab some of their captors’ treasure, and head back to the ship. Along the way, however, Egill realizes that he is acting like a thief. Ashamed, he decides to right his shameful behavior. He does what he thinks is the honorable thing: he goes back and kills every single one of his captors. Returning to the ship with the treasure, he is now regarded as a hero because he fought and won the battle and can rightly claim the booty.

Raiding, and consequently bringing rich treasures home, raises one’s status in Norse society. It is, however, a part-time occupation. Icelanders may go raiding in the summer, but they come back home to tend to their farms for the rest of the year.

Viking Raids are detailed in Age of Vikings: The Roleplaying Game