Vikings Invasion Of England Included Large Number Of Women

Stories surrounding the Vikings are numerous, but may shift in time due to new discoveries and the implications they bring. As it turns out, a substantially high number of Viking women participated in early invasions of England, some being discovered in graves with swords and shields.

So says the University of Western Australia's Shane McLeod, who detailed the relatively recent discoveries of Viking women in Eastern England burial sites. This joins increasing numbers of Norse jewelry being discovered in the region.

In a recent study, a total of 14 Viking burial sites from the time period were looked into, and by analyzing the bones rather than the items in the sites, it was determined that six were women and seven were men, and one couldn't be determined either way.

Three sites containing swords were all identified as having female remains, and so the study concludes that items like that may have been used improperly by past researchers to determine gender. The estimated number of female settlers is between 30 and 50-percent.

SOURCE: USA Today