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0:00Okay, so good morning. Um, today we start the Vikings. We will do it over two classes. Um. And the Vikings are extremely interesting.
And I believe that they are one of the most under-appreciated and misunderstood European cultures. In the Western tradition uh, there are two main pillars, the Greco-Romans and the Judeo-Christians. Um, the four traditions uh, the Greeks, the Romans, the Jews, the Christians um, have been overstudied uh, and over-appreciated. I would argue that the Vikings are very important and should be part of these four pillars. I think there should be five pillars and I think um, that over next few decades people will, scholars will slowly reveal to us the importance of Viking culture to to development of Western civilization.
So that's my argument to you over next two classes, that the Vikings are extremely influential. And um, so today I'll do an overview of Viking history and influence. And in next class I'll focus more on the cultural system of the Vikings, what they believed um, and how they understood the world. Okay. So let's do a brief historical overview.
So the Viking age is what scholars term the period from the year 793 to 1066. 79 is uh, when there was the first recorded, written down um, incident of a Viking raid on a monastery in Europe. And this is really the first uh, one of the first written records of the Vikings. The Vikings were always there, actually,
2:00and there was some interaction between the Vikings and the rest of Europe. For example, Vikings did serve as mercenaries in the Roman Empire. Okay, so there was always a bit of interaction, but for the most part, the Vikings were an isolated culture. 1066, the year that the Viking Age is supposedly to have ended, is the year of the Battle of Hastings. That is when Normandy, the Normans, who lived in France, they crossed English Channel and conquered England.
And this is the last time that England would be conquered. And this would mark the end of the Viking Age because it really marked the assimilation or integration of Viking culture into the broader European framework. Okay? So, that's what scholars mean by the Viking Age. All right.
So, the Vikings are from the three countries today we call Denmark, Norway, and Sweden. Okay? Collectively, they are known as the Scandinavian countries. What's interesting about this area is the geography. This is a topography, okay?
Red means high altitude high altitude. Blue means low altitude, so by the sea. As you can see from the topography, um the Scandinavian area is extremely diverse. And as a result, the region historically has been very poor, isolated, um and diverse. Okay?
So, so this area for the longest time had tremendous diversity in terms of culture and politics. You had kings, you had tribal chieftains, and then you had
4:00different systems as as well. Okay? Um during the Viking Age, what we need to keep in mind is this is a period in history when Europe was being invaded or attacked or pillaged from everyone basically, okay? So, the three main invaders are the Vikings who come in from the north. But, then you have people called the Magyars who are the modern day Hungarians coming in from the east.
From the south comes the Arabs. Okay, next week we will do the Arabs. The Magyars, just just that you know who the Magyars are, they are just the most recent iteration of the Proto-Indo-Europeans, the Yamnaya. Remember last semester we discussed that 3 to 4,000 years ago Old Europe who are mainly who are which was mainly an agricultural society, they were eventually invaded and conquered by the Proto-Indo-Europeans, the Yamnaya, who lived in the steppes. Uh these are pastoral nomads.
And as a as a result, they brought their culture to them. So, the Magyars are just the most recent iteration of this culture, okay? Same as the Huns, same as the Goths, same as the Germanic people. Um what's interesting about the Magyars is that they are mainly a land people, meaning they ride horses into battle. And uh for and during the Viking Age, they were extremely successful pene- penetrating into many parts of Europe before they are eventually defeated and they're integrated into the the main European culture mainly by you guys remember?
Making into Christians, right?
6:01That that's how you assimilate people in Europe by turning them into Christians. And because this is the Western Europe, a lot of them become Catholic. But some also become Orthodox as well. The Vikings are a very different culture because they attacked Europe not by land, not with cavalry and horses, but by sea and rivers. Okay, this is a maritime people.
And what's really interesting about the Vikings is how far they extend across the world. Okay? So, the first the first sort of encounter is when the Vikings start to raid and pillage Europe, okay? Northern and Central Europe. But over time, what they will do is they will extend over to the east as well where they will found two major settlements.
The first is Kiev in modern-day Ukraine as well as Novgorod. Okay? So, they are going going into the Dnieper as well as the Volga. Why are they here? There's some pillaging, but mainly it's for trade purposes because if you look at where they are in Kiev and Novgorod, it gives it gives them access to three major centers of global wealth.
The first, of course, is the Byzantine Byzantine Empire in Constantinople, which we studied. Then there is something called the Abbasid Caliphate, which is the Islamic Empire in Baghdad. And the third, of course, is the Silk Road, right? Which gives them access to China. So, in other words, the Vikings encountered every major culture in the world at this time through their trade routes.
8:02And then, what they will also do is go west to found colonies. They will make settlements in Iceland, in Greenland, and in modern-day uh Canada. Uh the settlement's called Vinland. Uh and it's in modern-day Newfoundland, okay? So, Iceland is still with us today.
And Iceland is very interesting uh for three reasons. The first reason is, even though in this class I keep on saying there's no such thing as cultural and genetic purity, that that the the Icelanders come pretty close, okay? There's about 300 330,000 people who live in Iceland today, and they're all related to each other. And that's because for the longest time Iceland uh has been isolated from the rest of the world. And it it has always been extremely peaceful, egalitarian, and progressive society.
They had the world's first uh concept of parliament called the Althing. And that's where every um citizen would come together once a year to discuss the major political events um of of Iceland. So, in other words, they really built they really built the cornerstone of modern European democracy. But not only that, but a lot of the stories, the mythology of the Vikings, were reconceptualized and written down in Iceland. And these sagas, they're called sagas, okay, would become the foundation of modern European literature.
So, the cultural contribution of Iceland and the uh wider Viking culture to the European cultural framework, it cannot be um overstated, okay? Also, they will make their way to the
10:03British Isles. Um they will have made major encounters with the uh British people as well as Irish people. They will found a new city in Ireland called Dublin, which as you know is the modern-day capital of of Ireland. Okay? And as And what they will also do is they will settle down in Normandy.
And the reason why is they keep on attacking northern Europe, mainly the Carolingian Empire. Um and Charles the Simple, the king um of Carolingian Empire, he will defeat them in a battle. And then he will give them land in Normandy. So, Normandy means land of the Norse people. And then from Normandy, as I mentioned, they will cross the English Channel and conquer England in the year 1066 at the Battle of Hastings.
So, if you look at this map, what you will discover is the Vikings either founded or influenced four major European civilizations. They are Germany, France, Britain, and Russia. Now, what's interesting is that for the past 500 years, these four nations were the dominant militaries in the world. And not only that, but they were the dominant civilized civilizations in the world. We think of modern Western civilization, really we we really mean these four nations: Britain, France, Germany, and Russia.
That's where the very best literature, philosophy, and art uh comes from. And what I will show you next class, not this class, but what I'll show you next class is this is not just a historical coincidence. There are reasons and factors that would uh that will help us better explain why this happened. Okay?
12:04Um this is the um settlement in Newfoundland. Okay? So, this was actually the first European settlement in the New World, North America, and this is 500 years at least 500 years before Christopher Columbus. Um this is a map that shows the Viking expansion over time, okay? So, as you can see from this map, they they they basically expand outwards.
And as they gather more information about the world, they continue to expand. Okay? So, what is the culture, what is the mentality of the worldview that drives this aggressive expansion? What is the Viking worldview? And this is something that I will introduce this class, but explain uh more in detail next class.
Um So, today when we think of the Vikings, we just think of raiders and pillagers. But what's important for us to remember is that the larger Viking culture, most people did not do that. Most people when they engage with the uh European world, it was mo- mainly through trade, okay? The vast majority was through trade. And they were and they were and then you have people, Vikings, who um join the European world as mercenaries because they were very good fighters.
And then you went up you had a small minority who uh were raiders and pillagers. But because they were so violent, they captured the imagination of the Europeans and they inform um how we today see the Vikings. Um this is a map of the Viking expansion and the yellow are written records, documented Viking raids in Europe. And as you can see, there's a lot of them, okay? They're mainly by the coast,
14:04they're mainly by rivers because again, the Vikings raided mainly by using their longships, their ships. Um they mainly raided monasteries. And uh to better understand monasteries, what they were, imagine that they are the equivalent of universities. They're basically the medieval equivalent of universities. These are places where monks spent most of the time um worshipping God by celebrating his literary works, mainly the Bible.
Okay? Um The So, the the monasteries were built during something called the Carolingian Renaissance and this marked the beginning of the Holy Roman Empire. During this time, there's a major major focus The major cultural focus was on producing books. Our modern conception of the book actually comes from this period. They took all this sort of diverse innovation such as printing, uh book making, uh fonts, ink, and combined with a system of bookbinding that we still use today.
Okay? So, they mainly focus on uh religious classics like the Bible, okay? And what they would do is they would illustrate them. It would take about 20 to 30 years for an individual monk to create one of of these books. So, it was it was a uh it was an artwork, basically.
Um during this time, they experiment with they experiment with different fonts. If you go to your computer and you ask Microsoft Word what kind of font you want to use, like Corillian or others, all of these fonts were actually invented during this time. Okay? Uh they also invented bookbinding at this time as as well. And what they would do
16:04um to mark their cultural achievement is they would make covers of gold and jewels, diamonds, sapphires, rubies um as a book cover. All right? So, these were extremely valuable, unique artwork. This is another book cover. Okay?
Extremely gorgeous. Again, they would spend a lot of resources, 20 to 30 years, in crafting each of these books. And that's why the Vikings raided them, because the Vikings knew through the trade networks that the monasteries had this concentration of wealth in them. There was a lot of gold and silver and jewelry in monasteries. And in the Viking culture, um these precious metals was were a status symbol.
They wanted them, okay? But you can imagine what the Vikings did, because the Vikings were a pagan non-literate people. They didn't understand books, they didn't have no use for books. So, they they would come in and they would take these books, the Bible, rip out the pages, and keep the gold, and then leave. Okay?
So, you're a monk, and you see this, right? And it's the equivalent of having your child killed before you. It was extremely traumatic for them. And again, the monks are literate people. So, they had absolutely nothing nice to say about the Vikings.
In fact, they thought that the Vikings were basically the equivalent of Satan. Okay? And And that's And that's why we have such a negative understanding of the Vikings, mainly through these raids, which again, were only a minority of Viking activity during this time. Um gradually, over time, what would happen is that as the Vikings made more wealth from monasteries, word would spread back to
18:05the larger Viking culture, and more and more people would partake in these raids, until eventually, they developed the skill, the systems, and the technology to sack even cities like Paris, which was a heavily fortified city. Okay? And they would do this multiple times during the Viking Age. So, what's important for us to understand is that this these Viking raids would drive population growth in Scandinavia, and then this would drive further Viking expansion throughout the world. Okay?
So, it was a cycle. Um let's look at some cultural aspects of the Vikings. So, this is These are pictures of high-status, meaning basically warriors um in the uh Scandinavian culture. And these This is a picture of these Vikings uh in the East. They are called the Rus.
Okay? The Rus. And the Rus would would then would would become Russia. Okay? So, Russia, the country, would borrow its name from the the Vikings, Rus.
So, some things some things to I will point out about these visuals. Look at the helmets, okay? The Vikings the popular depiction of the Vikings is they had helmets of horns, right? Have you seen movies? They did not have horns, guys.
Because horns are extremely unpragmatic impractical, okay? You might get stuck on on your boat or or your enemy could yank it off you, okay? So, these were extremely practical and utilitarian people. They were not that wealthy. They had to be very careful and conscious about everything they did.
Okay? So, that's the first
20:05thing. Second thing is that you will see major cultural differences between Western Vikings and Eastern Vikings. And the reason why is as the Vikings are interacting with different cultures, they're also assimilating themselves into different cultures. They're intermarrying, they're adopting local languages and local cultures, and they're also lending their own culture to these cultures, okay? So, history is a continuous process of cultural integration.
All right? It's dynamic process. It never really ends. Okay? And the third thing we need we need to appreciate is these are a poor people.
And as such, they're extremely egalitarian. Even though this these are high-status people, they're not that different from the majority of Vikings who are independent farmers, basically. Okay? This is where they usually live. This is called a longhouse.
All right? And so, because the weather in Scandinavia is very cold for most of the year, these are a very social people. They live together. They spend most of the time together. Okay?
So, this is a picture of a Viking hall. Um most of the time the Vikings are together and they're usually drinking and they're telling stories to each other. Okay? And so, they're they're very much focused on the oral tradition. Let's look very quickly at their longships, which is the dominant uh maritime technology of the day.
Okay? These are not that big, but they're but they are purposely designed to be small so that they have flexibility um and maneuverability. Okay?
22:05Um so, this this is what we think the ships look like. And this is what they really look like. Um so, some points we need to know about the ships is first of all, from these ships you can see that there's really no hierarchy in place. We don't know who the captain is. There's a captain, but he's really not that different from the others.
Okay? So, the Viking culture is extremely egalitarian, which is important if you want um cohesion on the battlefield. These the Vikings raided mainly for gold, but also for slaves. Okay? They're so, they're trading with the wider world, the Arabs, the Byzantines, uh the Chinese.
Um they're what they were trading were slaves in exchange for silver, which is very important for their culture. Okay? So, they were So, they these were slavers. Um the other thing to know about these ships is they're not that big. And the reason why is they're usually traversing rivers.
When you when you when you're traversing rivers, you need to be flexible. So, some sometimes you might hit some rocks. Well, then what you have to do is move that ship out of those rocks and go somewhere else, okay? All right. So, that's the idea of the longship.
And again, this was the dominant maritime technology of that time. The Europeans actually I had actually no way to counter this. Okay. Um also, what's important for us to understand is the Vikings had also many different designs. So, the thing about the Viking ships is they're extremely lean and mean.
They're extremely efficient. You know, the only way you can achieve this efficiency is through constant innovation. So, the Vikings are constantly always thinking about how to better improve their ships.
24:10Um the last thing I will mention is the idea of the Viking funeral. Now, in cultures that we've studied, there's always a spectacle that is the highlight of this culture. So, uh the Romans they had something called a triumph, which was a military parade to celebrate a general's military victories overseas. It was It was like the um biggest event in uh uh in the life of a Roman, okay? So, this would be the equivalent of the Nobel Prize today.
The Greeks had as equivalent of the triumph theater, right? Um every Greek wanted to be a playwright. That was the highlight of Athenian cultural life. What's interesting for us is that for the Vikings, the spectacle that they they cared the most about was a funeral, okay? Obviously, not everyone would get an elaborate funeral.
Only the chieftains or the great warriors would get an elaborate funeral. But these funerals would take 10 days and it would be very expensive. Basically, the entire savings of this great warrior would be invested in the funeral. Um there'd be a lot of sacrifices, mainly horse and animals. Humans would be sacrificed as well.
And the warrior, the king, would be buried with his ship. All right? So, next class, what I will do is go into detail about these funerals, explain to you why they happened, and the cultural significance. All right? Okay.
So, that's an overview of the Vikings. What I will do now is um explain the Vikings in the larger historical framework that we've been studying this semester. But before I do that, are there any questions about the Vikings?
26:19Yes. Okay. So, that's the slave trade, right? Okay. So, the slave trade, it is just an integral and interesting part of life in Europe at this time.
Um the population was very limited because Europe was a poor place, and there was very few agricultural surplus. Plus, there was always these wars to be fought, okay? So, slavery was was this very important. Um the people who really drove the slave trade, um were the Byzantines and the Arabs. And there's always demand from these two cultural centers for slaves which the Vikings provided.
Now, what's interesting for us about the slave trade is the Arabs are Muslim and the Byzantines are Christian. And the consensus at the time is you cannot enslave a fellow believer. So, Arabs cannot enslave Muslims. Christians cannot enslave fellow Christians. That's why the Vikings were so that's why the Vikings found slave trade so profitable because the Vikings were pagans.
So, in theory, they could be sold to anyone. Okay? So, the Vikings basically enslaved other pagans and sold them to both the Byzantines and and the Arabs. Okay? And And look look um the slave trade it it has been an integral part of human reaction, human trade for most of civilization.
Okay? Does that make sense? It's only it's it's really only only until the British Empire that we see a clampdown and abolishment of the slave trade. But And also guys, I mean, I hate to say this, but slavery still happens. It just happens secretly.
We don't really pay much attention to it, but it still happens. All right? Okay, great great question. Any more
28:19questions be- before I I I continue? I I think it's just a small question, but I remember a long time ago this is probably like 20 years ago. In Sweden, they discovered a few of the Viking graves from from from the funerals like where the where the ships were Yeah. And at that time, the Swedish government decided like this was too sacred. We're not going to open up the We're going to keep it a kind of basically a mystery.
That's right. Since then, do you know if any anything has changed? Has anyone opened up these or Yeah. So, um So, so question then is, um we found in the like our colleagues have found a lot of these ship burials, a lot of graves. And there's just a lot of them.
And uh we we've we've had a chance to study a lot of these graves. And here's some interesting characteristics about these graves, okay? The first thing is these graves are unique onto themselves. There doesn't seem to be a system of burying someone. Okay?
So, you have these graves where um maybe a woman is buried with a horse. Then you have another grave where a woman is buried with a ship. That's the first really interesting thing about these graves. Second thing is these graves seem to have a um uh a record of of lineage. And And what what what we mean by that is these people are buried on top of their ancestors.
So, um if if a woman is buried here, then maybe her granddaughter would be buried on top of her. Okay? So, there seems to be a story going on um in these burials. Okay? Now, the third thing about these graves uh that we've discovered is that um there there's been a lot of care and
30:22attention paid to how someone was buried. Okay? Clearly, um someone put a lot thought or or the culture has put a lot of thought into how this person will be remembered. All right? And what I will show you uh next class is what's important is not the burial.
What's important is the funeral, the process of the burial, and that's where the culture expresses itself. And what I will show you next class is these burials they're meant to send the dead into the afterlife. Okay, and that's very important. What's really important um and why they have this pageantry or ritual in the funeral process is it's really about um memorizing that person into the larger culture. Making sure that everyone remembers the contributions of that person and having that person contribute eternally into the overall culture, okay?
If that makes sense. Right? But again, as as as you know, most of these graves have not been dug up. So, right now we are making some rudimentary guesses based on the available evidence. Okay?
All right. Any more questions before I continue? Okay. So, so I I know this is a lot to take in, but we are spending two classes on this and hopefully uh this will make more sense to you as we move along, okay? All right, good.
So, let me um discuss the larger historical framework that the Vikings are in. Okay. So, the major thesis of the semester is the idea of the oceanic oceanic
32:22currents of history. And so, one pattern that we see in history is a culture, you know, what we'll call the borderlands, they're isolated from most of history, okay? They're not completely isolated, but they're mainly isolated. And then what happens is that an empire, a major civilization, expands so that it starts to interact with uh this borderline culture. And what will happen for this interaction is the energy of the empire will start to transfer to the borderlands.
The borderlands itself will expand, okay? And until it it comes into conflict with the empire. And when this uh conflict happens the borderlands might be assimilated into the empire, it might be destroyed by the empire, or it might become the empire itself. All right? So, that's the uh major idea of this class.
And we see this throughout history. Okay? So, think of um the Greeks and the Persians. Think of the Romans and the the Carthaginians. Think of the Arabs and the um the Persians, okay?
So, we see this pattern uh repeat itself throughout history. What I want to do now is apply this idea to the Vikings and explain how this process works. Why does this work? Well, if you think about it, an empire and what what I mean empire I just mean large civilization. Um an empire and a borderland culture they are almost um complete opposites of each other.
Their advantages um mirror the the the the the they compensate for each other's advantage and disadvantages. So, for an empire, an empire usually
34:23usually has three major advantages. They are mass, organization, and depth. Okay? Some historians use the word strategic depth, okay? All right.
So, what what do we mean by this? Mass is a very simple idea. It just means a lot a lot of people. Okay? Very simple idea.
Second idea, organization means that there's a hierarchy in place that allows the empire to organize its people in a way that most benefits the empire. So, for example, the empire can field large armies. And the idea of strategic depth is that the empire can actually afford to lose a lot of battles and still continue to fight. So, think about when Alexander invaded Persia. He had already defeated the Persians at the Battle of Issus, but Darius was able to go deeper into his empire and assemble another large army for the Battle of Gaugamela, okay?
And Darius could have could have When he lost that battle, he could have also built a third army, but ultimately he was assassinated by his by his generals. On the other hand, Alexander the Macedonian, he could not have afford to lose one battle. All right? If you think about the World War II, Japan had had already conquered China's entire eastern seaboard, but the Kuomintang under Chiang Kai-shek refused to surrender. And he didn't have to surrender because he could continue to go in there, right?
He first went into Chongqing and then Chengdu. And if he had to, he would have gone to Kunming as well. Okay? So, that's the idea of strategic depth.
36:24Also, um remember in the history of Rome, Hannibal had won every single battle on the Italian peninsula. He had destroyed all Roman armies. But because of the idea of death, Rome did not have to surrender. And Rome only won one battle against Hannibal in its in its history, but that battle was the only battle that really mattered. It was a battle of Zama.
Uh between Scipio Africanus, the Roman general, and Hannibal. And Hannibal lost that battle, and so therefore Carthage lost the Second Punic War, okay? That's the idea of death. That's the three major advantages of empire. If you are a borderland, you have none of these advantages, okay?
But you have three other advantages that compensate for your weakness, okay? The first is the idea of energy. So, you have fewer people, but they're more energetic. They're more ambitious. They're stronger.
They're more aggressive overall. Second, uh you don't have um you don't have organization, okay? But you have openness. And the idea here is you are open to new ideas, and you can change a society at will. And the reason why is we said this when when we talked about the Yamnaya, okay?
It's a very important principle that drives innovation. It's called open cooperative competition. That's why the Yamnaya were able to innovate. That's why the Greeks were able to innovate. Open means there's no central authority.
There's no government. Co- cooperative means that you're separate, but you're still learning from each other. Competition means you want to be better than your neighbor. Okay? And that's true for the Vikings as
38:24as well. And that's how they were able to develop the ship technology that enabled them to pillage across Europe. Okay, so that's a main advantage of the the borderlands, okay? Does that make sense? Okay.
Okay. So, again, the borderlands have no depth. They can be wiped out by an empire very quickly. That's why the borderlands are opportunistic. This is a very important idea.
It's It basically means the borderlands have to be strategic in picking their fights. If you are bigger than me and stronger than me, I'll be your friend. Right? But if you're weaker than me, then I will steal from you. The idea here is opportunistic.
You're shameless in taking advantage of those who you can. Okay? Does that make sense? So, these are the three major advantages of the borderlands, and I want you to remember this idea because it will repeat itself over and over. All right.
So, let me very quickly explain the idea of energy and mass. And for this, let's do a thought experiment, okay? Let's pretend that you are 16 year old in Scandinavia in about 800. Okay? That's when the Viking Age begins.
By By By 816, what have you learned? What have you mastered? Well, you your family are basically independent farmers who will engage in trade in order to supplement their income, okay? So, this is what you can do. You can um uh basically work the farm.
Work the farm basically means you know how to grow your own food. You know how
40:24to cook your own food. It means you know how to take care of animals. If a cow is about to give birth to a calf, you know how to do so. Okay? You know how to, um, save the life of a horse.
You know how to speak with a horse. Okay? You also engage in, uh, sea trade, okay? And the idea here is is that you know how to cut wood and from the wood build a boat. And you know how to read the stars and sail across Europe.
Okay? Also, you're a good fighter. You're able to wield an axe as a weapon. You're able to use a sword as a weapon. You're able to shoot an arrow, okay?
If I dropped you anywhere in Scandinavia, you're able to find your way home. You'll be You'll be able to fight wolves. You'll You'll be able to feed yourself in the forest and you'll be able to find yourself home. Okay? If I put you anywhere in the European world, you'll know how to navigate yourself as to find yourself home.
Okay? And so, this builds the idea that the Vikings at age 16, they're extremely worldly people. Okay? They're strong. When I mean worldly, I don't mean cosmopolitan.
What I mean is they have street smarts, okay? They're very strong and they're very resilient. All right? That's what a Viking teenager looks like. Now, let's come back to China in the present day.
And what do you guys do? What are you guys able to do? Two things, okay?
42:24Memorize useless facts. Do stupid tests. Okay? I'm sorry to tell you the truth, but this is the truth, all right? You throughout your education in China have learned exactly two things.
Memorize useless facts and do stupid tests. All right? And the reason why China is like this, the way the the way that the reason why most mass societies are like this is they want to reduce your energy, right? They want to be able to control you. They want you to fit into a larger society.
Does that make sense? So, you now you can see the difference between um an an energetic society like the Vikings and a mass society like China. Okay? Um I am I'm I'll be very serious with you. I have three young kids.
My oldest is seven, my second one is almost four, my youngest is only one. As you know, um I received a very good education. I was at Yale College for my undergraduate. Um and I've spent the past 20, 30 years thinking deeply about education. And I'll be very honest with you.
If I had a choice whether to send my child to Yale or to Viking School I would send my kid to Viking School. Because I want my child to be worldly, strong, and resilient. Okay? All right? And I yeah, I'm not joking, guys.
If there If there were If there was such a thing as a Viking school where you learn to be a Viking, I would send my kids to that school. Unfortunately, um there isn't. Okay, let's talk about let's talk about the idea of opportunistic. So, the question that scholars have debated for a long time is, why did the
44:25Viking Age start? What prompted the beginning of a Viking Age? Why did the Vikings go attack these monasteries? And there are different theories. Okay, the most popular theory is that as Charlemagne and his Holy Roman Empire um expanded, it threatened Scandinavia.
And so, the Vikings had to come out and challenge him, okay? That's the most popular historical understanding. And then there are some other theories, for example, population growth, climate change, internal conflict within Scandinavia. Today, I want to I want to explain a different theory to you, which is just that the Vikings were opportunistic. An opportunity arose that didn't exist before, and they took advantage of it.
Okay? The opportunity are monasteries. After the collapse of the Roman Empire, everyone believes that Europe became a lot poorer. Okay? And that's a historical understanding.
But if you think about it, what really happened is that wealth became much more distributed. Okay? During the time of empire, all wealth was being channeled into certain centers. But we we don't have an empire, then farmers can keep their keep their wealth for themselves. So, after the collapse of the Roman Empire, wealth was much more distributed distributed.
But as these kingdoms start to arise under uh Charlemagne, then wealth became much more concentrated. Okay? So, these monasteries, they are universities, they're places of worship and of learning, but much more importantly, they are places where wealth is concentrated. Okay? Concentration of wealth.
These monasteries, like modern day universities, are extremely wealthy. Okay? The first reason why they're
46:26wealthy is their banks. So, the nobility was actually storing their surplus wealth, meaning silver and gold, in these monasteries. These monasteries were considered to be protected by divine power. Right? No one would dare steal from a monastery.
Monks are extremely trustworthy. So, these monasteries had a lot of gold and silver stored and hidden within their premises. Not only that, but the monasteries were uh land owners. So, they controlled up to 20% of local land. And of course, what they would do is they would take this land and lease it out to farmers.
And they made a lot of money that way. Um they themselves engage in their own businesses. For example, um they had their own breweries. Okay? They could make and sell alcohol and beer to locals.
Also, as you can imagine, because these are religious centers, the locals would invest heavily in them. Okay? The locals would uh give them treasures. And as you can imagine, because there was this concentration of wealth, and because monasteries were not protected, because they were considered protected by God, they made perfect places to pillage. Right?
Vikings knew about these places, and so these places were perfect to pillage. And that's what we started the Viking Age, the fact that wealth was not being concentrated, whereas before it wasn't. All right? So, minor stories. Then you had the idea of armored knights.
So, the main military innovation um in Europe at this time were these tanks called armored knights. And they were fantastic in battle. That's how Charlemagne was able to build the Holy Roman Empire. Okay? But you think about it, armored
48:28knights do not like water. They will drown in water. And so, these rivers were completely unprotected. And the Vikings had these long ships that were perfect for for river navigation. Okay?
So, that's that's another opportunity that presented itself. The armored knights would give rise to the idea of feudalism. Feudalism just basically means that these armored knights became land owner land owning nobles that took advantage of farmers. So, in order to get these knights to fight uh for them, kings would give them land grants. These knights would take this land and rent it to farmers.
Over time, as we know, farmers will incur a lot of debt. Which meant which means that they will not become slaves to these nobles. And this is the idea of feudalism. Okay? Um And what this means is that by the time the Viking the Vikings attacked, Europe was becoming a very hierarchical society.
The thing about hierarchies is they don't like to change. So, one question historians had is, well, why didn't the Europeans adapt themselves to these Viking raids? Some did, okay? But most didn't. And the reason why is if you change your military tactic in order to respond to Viking threat, you have to change your hierarchy.
You have to change your cultural hierarchy. Remember when we we did the Greeks, we learned that depending on your society, the structure of your society, you had a different military, okay? So you were a navy, like Athens, you were a democracy. If you had a cavalry, like the
50:30Macedonians, you were a monarchy. If you had hoplites, like the Spartans, you were an oligarchy. Okay? So the structure of your military de- determined the structure of your political system. So the Europeans purposely did not respond to Viking threat because they wanted to maintain their feudal system.
Okay? And of course this is a this is a very general statement. A lot did respond to Viking threat, but overall they did not respond to Viking threat with the same emergency or sense sense of anxiety um that they should have. The Viking Age came to an end when the Vikings amassed enough wealth to align themselves with the European nobility. Okay?
So the idea here is if you're a bandit and you steal a lot of money, what do what do you want to do? You want to become an aristocrat, because that's the best way to protect your wealth, right? Once you're an aristocrat, you your wealth becomes legitimate. So the Vikings um once they amassed enough wealth, the Europeans start to intermarry with them. And the Vikings in turn became Christians because that was the best way to assimilate.
And as Christians, they would convert their own followers and their own people as well. Remember, the spread of religion is usually a top-down process where you first convert the convert the elite who then convert the people. It is not a bottom-up process, okay? And also, the Vikings provided military um protection and support to the European powers. Okay, and that's what ended the Viking Age.
Vikings were so successful that they were eventually co-opted into the European nobility. Okay? So, um um as I mentioned,
52:31the Vikings, their culture would heavily influence um four new civilizations that we'll discuss later on this semester. And they are the British, the English, the French, the Germans, and the Russians. Okay? And so, what I would what I would do next class is show you why Viking culture is so influential. Okay?
And to be prepare for next class, what what I want to do is give you a preview of how the Viking worldview is very different from other worldviews, okay? So, um there's a pre-modern understanding of the world and there's a modern understanding of the world. Okay. So, in the modern understanding of the world, in the world we live in today, the community is distinct from the individual. Okay?
The individual can be outside the community. Okay? That's why even though you are Chinese, you're still able to go to America. Because you're you as an individual can be separated from your community. And often in the modern world, we believe that the community and individual are in conflict with each other.
So, for example, if you are a woman, historically you have been oppressed by your community. If you are a homosexual, the same is true. If you are a minority, you're often oppressed. Okay? And that's And that's what justifies the idea of a nation-state.
The nation-state is a entity that protects the rights of all individuals against the community.
54:34Okay? So, that's a modern conception of the individual. And we'll go into this later on in the semester towards the end, because it's a very important concept. But first, I want to introduce it to you, okay? Now, historically, most cultures have not believed this.
Okay? Most cultures have believed that the individual can only exist within the community. Okay? The community is that which gives you history, tradition, and a worldview, a religion, a mythology. And it's your interpretation of these things that allow for your individuality.
But you cannot exist outside this tradition. Okay? That's why um most cultures, the worst punishment inflicted on the individual was not execution. It was actually banishment. If you killed someone, we didn't kill you, we banished you from the community because that was considered the worst possible punishment to a person.
You cease to be an individual, you cease to be alive if you're removed from the community that gives you nourishment. Okay? Now, but within this tradition, within this within this understanding, there are different ways you can conceptualize the idea of the community and the individual, okay? So, for example, let's look at the Greeks. The Greeks, sorry.
Um let me let me let me do this. The Greeks believe that the community was a was the polis, okay? The polis. And that's where where we get the word politics from. The polis is a place where people gather
56:36in order to discuss the political spheres of the community. Okay? That's what community was. It was where people came together to discuss politics. And as a result, the individual is someone who stands out.
Okay? That's why we have the concept arete and eudaimonia. In this community, you are an individual, you are the best individual if you can speak the best, if you can argue the best, if you can stand out. Okay? So, the prime purpose of Greek life was to stand out so that you could achieve eudaimonia, human flourishing, as well as achieve arete, human excellence.
That is the um Greek understanding. Then you have the Romans. The Romans define community as tradition and history. And place. As long as you are in Rome and you believe in Roman history and practice Roman tradition, then you are a Roman citizen.
Okay? Doesn't matter where you come from, as long as you're in Rome and you practice Roman traditions, then you are a Roman. That's why for Romans, what's important is for the individual to be pious. Right? Individual is a pious person.
Someone who is loyal to to to this to Sorry. Someone who is loyal to the traditions of Rome and who extends the traditions of Rome through conquest. That's why everyone wanted to be a general like Julius Caesar.
58:37To win glory for Rome. And that's how you show piety to Rome. Okay? So, we did the Greeks and the Romans. Um now, the Vikings are very different.
The Vikings are very different people. For them, community and the individual are very different. The community is a collection of stories. All right? The community are stories that are told over and over by the people inside the community.
And as such, the individual has responsibility to add to the story. How do you add to a story? Through exploration. Through adventure. Through personal courage.
That's why the Vikings went off to settle Iceland and Greenland. That's why they pillage these monasteries in the south. That's why they went to the east and found settlements like Kiev and Novgorod and traded with the wider world because they were trying to add to the larger stories of the Viking community. And that's And that's what's important for them, to be remembered by the community through adventure and exploration. Okay?
It's a very different concept. And this is what I will explain next class. How the entire culture revolved around this understanding of the community and the individual. Right? The last thing I will say is what's
60:38really interesting uh for us is remember that these three different cultures are extremely different, right? They have a very different approach to the world. But they all come from the same cultural origin, which is the Proto-Indo-European culture, right? What's interesting is that as they came into Europe and they settled down in different geographic locations and interacted with different people, they adapted their culture accordingly. So, the story of human history is always one of innovation, change, and resilience.
Okay? All right. Great. Any questions before I conclude the class? Was there anything you you were not you're not clear about?
Okay. So, the idea of intermarriage, okay? What is the idea of intermarriage? Okay. So, what's really hard for us to understand is that for most of human history, we didn't have a concept of race, culture, ethnicity, and borders, and states, okay?
These are all modern concepts that we go that we use to apply to history. They're not very useful. So, what I mean by that is the Vikings didn't see themselves as a distinct culture. They didn't think we're Vikings, we are not Greeks, we're not Germans. No one saw themselves that way.
The Germans
62:38broke the the the sorry, the Vikings, their main political unit was the village, or the tribe, right? And the way they fought wars is these tribes would join into temporary confederations. But these confederations were extremely fluid. So, if you're a tribe and you want you want to switch alliances, you could do so, and no one could stop you. Okay?
So, the very idea of identity was extremely fluid. And what they understood was in order to survive in the world, you have to build alliances. That means you build alliances with other Vikings, but if you could, you could you also wanted to build alliances with the European nobility because they have far more wealth, technology, and resources than you do, okay? So, when the opportunity presented itself for them to intermarry into um these um your into European nobility, then they did so. Okay?
So, for example, the Byzantines the Byzantine Empire was as we discussed, a walled empire. So, it was impossible to invade and conquer, okay? The Europeans the Vikings couldn't really conquer the Byzantine Empire. But, at the same time, because they were closed in, the Byzantines couldn't really protect their empire. So, the only way they could protect their empire was not through the military, but through diplomacy, through bribery, through intermarriages.
Okay? So, the Vikings in Kiev the Byzantines made an offer. We will let you guys marry into the empire, okay? Basically, by having their ruler marry a princess. But, on the condition, of course, that you now serve the empire and
64:40that you uh convert to Christianity, Orthodox Christianity. Right? And as you can see, this makes sense for everyone. The Byzantines have now have uh more soldiers who are proven and who have their own territory, and the nobility in Kiev, like basically the prince, he now has legitimacy, right? Because he's also fighting against the other Vikings in the area.
Okay? Does that make sense? And And that's the idea of of intermarriage, to form a political alliance that benefits you. Okay? And And ultimately, if you are a ruler prince, you're always looking to intermarry as much as possible.
Right? That's why these kings had so many wives. These wives represented different political alliances. It wasn't because he was really horny and he loved sex. It was because as a prince, as a king, you have to have different alliances.
And the best way to form alliance was through intermarriage. And but if you if you marry someone, you must also marry into her faith, okay? That was a precondition. And that's why uh the Vikings in Kiev would convert to Christianity. The king converted and then the king would make his followers convert.
But it's a process that that would take generations, okay? These things are very slow because I keep as I keep on saying in this class, mar- uh culture is persistent. Right? Do Do you Do you understand? Great.
Great question, okay? Any more questions? Yep.
66:47Okay. So, the question then is how like were these pre-modern cultures, these pagan culture, uh tolerant? How did it perceive gays and minorities? Well, okay. Um uh this is a propaganda from the nation-state, okay?
This This is what you're taught today, that we are a much uh higher civilization because we're much more tolerant towards minorities. And the truth of the matter is, again, when you live in a culture which doesn't really have boundaries and borders, you're a pretty open person. So, in the pagan culture, there just isn't the idea of homosexuality. Men had sex with with each other all the time and no one cared. Okay?
And women had fewer rights, but in the Viking culture, women had status. Okay? Often because they were they practiced magic. Okay? In their culture, men weren't allowed to practice magic.
Women practiced magic. And you can imagine that would give women tremendous status. Okay? So, the idea the the idea that we have that community suppressed the individual is something that we believe. We have faith in it, but it just is not historically true.
Okay? Also, remember there's a fluidity within these communities. So, it's perfectly possible for you to get up with your family and move somewhere else. No one can stop you. Okay?
Does that make sense? So, the pre-modern world was much more tolerant than the world we live in today, mainly because we did not categorize people back then. Okay? So, one thing that we will learn um uh later on this semester is that the the very idea of race and racism is a new modern concept that didn't exist before. We only have this because of the idea of imperialism.
Right? When you go and conquer other people, you need to justify it somehow.
68:47And the best way to do it is through racism because they are an inferior race and therefore we have come to civilize them. Okay? But this is only in the past 20 years. And before we didn't have a concept of race. All right.
Great question. Any more questions? Um so, like what you mentioned, within society was like low identity like fluid. Fluid. Yep.
Um but the worst punishment is like banishing people from the society. So, how about like within society like Vikings where like identity like not seen in What is their worst punishment? Okay. Uh the Vikings? Okay.
Um the Vikings, their worst punishment is banishment as well. So, if you So, for example, if you killed someone, you'd be banished, okay? Um the actual punishment would be determined by a community discussion. But it was usually banishment or exile for a number of years. So, in Athens, um you would be banished for at most 10 years.
That was That was considered like the most grievous If you commit the most grievous crime, um then the worst punishment would be banishment for like 10 years. Okay? Because the understanding was that um the worst thing that could happen to you is banishment. Because again, the individual is part of the community. You uh were nourished by the community.
Without the community, you were a nobody. You were basically a ghost or a zombie. Okay? So, those people who get banished still come back after 10 years? Yes.
Yes, they always come back. Yes. So, the Athenians banished a lot of people, okay? And they always came back. And if if if they if they're banished, they're always thinking about coming back.
Because again, there was no idea of the individual existing outside the community. You were the community. And if you came into a new community,
70:48then people just just assume that you are a bad person. And you were ostracized because where's your community, man? Right? Because so, in the ancient world, the first question they would always ask you is not what is your name, but where are you from? Right?
What is your community? Because that's what mattered. Not what is your name. Like what do you like? Who are you?
It's always like where are you from? From what family, from what community, from what clan, what tribe are you from? Then we know how to interact with you. Okay? Great.
Great. Any more questions? Great. Okay. So, next class, we will do the cultural system, the cultural worldview of the Vikings, okay?
We'll take this We'll We'll take the idea of community and individual and expand it, okay? Okay.