Civilization #35: The Viking Legacy

The Vikings are extremely interesting, and I believe that they are one of the most underappreciated and misunderstood European cultures in the Western tradition. There are two main pillars: the Greco-Romans and the Judeo-Christians. The four traditions—the Greeks, the Romans, the Jews, and the Christians—have been over-studied 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 that over the next few decades, scholars will slowly reveal to us the importance of Viking culture to the development of Western Civilization.

My argument is that the Vikings are extremely influential. Today, I'll do an overview of Viking history and influence, and in the next class, I'll focus more on their cultural system—what they believed and how they understood the world.

A Brief Historical Overview

Scholars term the Viking Age as the period from the year 793 to 1066. The year 793 marks the first recorded, written incident of a Viking raid on a monastery in Europe, and this is one of the first written records of the Vikings. The Vikings were always there, actually, and there was some interaction between the Vikings and the rest of Europe. For example, Vikings did serve as mercenaries in the Roman Empire, so there was always a bit of interaction. But for the most part, the Vikings were an isolated culture.

The year 1066, when the Viking Age is supposed to have ended, is the year of the Battle of Hastings. That is when the Normans, who lived in France, crossed the English Channel and conquered England. 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.

The Vikings are from the three countries we today call Denmark, Norway, and Sweden. Collectively, they are known as the Scandinavian countries. What's interesting about this area is the geography.

This is a topography map. Red means high altitude, and blue means low altitude by the sea. As you can see from the topography, the Scandinavian area is extremely diverse. As a result, the region historically has been very poor, isolated, and diverse. This area for the longest time had great diversity in terms of culture and politics. You had kings, you had tribal chieftains, and then you had different systems as well.

During the Viking Age, we need to keep in mind that this was a period in history when Europe was being invaded, attacked, or pillaged from everyone, basically. The three main invaders are the Vikings, who come in from the north; you have people called the Magyars, who are the modern-day Hungarians, coming in from the east; and from the south come the Arabs.

The Magyars are just the most recent iteration of the Proto-Indo-Europeans. Remember, we discussed that 3,000 to 4,000 years ago, Old Europe, which was mainly an agricultural society, was eventually invaded and conquered by the Proto-Indo-Europeans, the Yamnaya, who lived in the steppes. These are pastoral nomads, and as a result, they brought their culture to them. The Magyars are just the most recent iteration of this culture, same as the Huns, same as the Goths, same as the Germanic people. What's interesting about the Magyars is that they are mainly a land people, meaning they ride horses into battle. During the Viking Age, they were extremely successful, penetrating into many parts of Europe before they were eventually defeated and integrated into the main European culture, mainly by making them into Christians. That's how you assimilate people in Europe: by turning them into Christians. Because this is Western Europe, a lot of them become Catholic, but some also become Orthodox as well.

The Vikings are a very different culture because they attack Europe not by land with cavalry and horses, but by sea and rivers. This is a maritime people.

The Global Reach of the Vikings

What's really interesting about the Vikings is how far they extended across the world. The first sort of encounter is when the Vikings start to raid and pillage Northern and Central Europe. But over time, 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. They are going into the Dnieper as well as the Volga.

Why are they here? There's some pillaging, but mainly it's for trade purposes. If you look at where they are in Kiev and Novgorod, it gives them access to three major centers of global wealth. The first, of course, is the 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, which gives them access to China. In other words, the Vikings encountered every major culture in the world at this time through their trade routes.

Then, what they will also do is go west to found colonies. They will make settlements in Iceland, in Greenland, and in modern-day Canada. The settlement is called Vinland, and it's in modern-day Newfoundland.

Iceland is still with us today, and Iceland is very interesting for three reasons. The first reason is, even though I keep on saying there's no such thing as cultural and genetic purity, the Icelanders come pretty close. There are about 330,000 people who live in Iceland today, and they're all related to each other. That's because for the longest time, Iceland has been isolated from the rest of the world. It has always been an extremely peaceful, egalitarian, and progressive society. They had the world's first concept of a parliament, called the Althing, and that's where every citizen would come together once a year to discuss the major political events of Iceland. In other words, they really built the cornerstone of modern European democracy.

But not only that, a lot of the stories and mythology of the Vikings were reconceptualized and written down in Iceland. These stories, called sagas, would become the foundation of modern European literature. The cultural contribution of Iceland and the wider Viking culture to the European cultural framework cannot be overstated.

This was actually the first European settlement in the New World—North America—and this is at least 500 years before Christopher Columbus.

They will also make their way to the British Isles. They will have major encounters with the British people as well as the Irish people. They will found a new city in Ireland called Dublin, which, as you know, is the modern capital of Ireland. They will also settle down in Normandy. The reason why is they keep on attacking northern Europe, mainly the Carolingian Empire. Charles the Simple, the king of the Carolingian Empire, will defeat them in a battle and then he will give them land in Normandy. So, Normandy means "land of the Norse people." Then, from Normandy, as I mentioned, they will cross the English Channel and conquer England in the year 1066 at the Battle of Hastings.

If you look at this map, what you will discover is the Vikings either founded or influenced four major European civilizations: Germany, France, Britain, and Russia. 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 civilizations in the world. When we think of modern civilization, we really mean these four nations: Britain, France, Germany, and Russia. That's where the very best literature, philosophy, and art comes from. This is not just a historical coincidence; there are reasons and factors that will help us better explain why this happened.

Raiders, Traders, and Mercenaries

Today, when we think of the Vikings, we just think of raiders and pillagers. But what's important for us to remember is that in the larger Viking culture, most people did not do that. When most people engaged with the European world, it was mainly through trade. The vast majority was through trade. Then you have Vikings who joined the European world as mercenaries because they were very good fighters. And then you had a small minority who were raiders and pillagers. But because they were so violent, they captured the imagination of the Europeans and they inform how we today see the Vikings.They're mainly by the coast and by rivers because, again, the Vikings raided mainly by using their longships.

They mainly raided monasteries. To better understand what monasteries 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 their time worshiping God by celebrating his literary works, mainly the Bible.

The monasteries were built during something called the Carolingian Renaissance, and this marked the beginning of the Holy Roman Empire. During this time, there was a major cultural focus 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, bookmaking, fonts, and ink, and combined it into a system of bookbinding that we still use today. They mainly focused on religious classics like the Bible, and what they would do is illustrate them. It would take about 20 to 30 years for an individual monk to create one of these books, so it was an artwork, basically.

During this time, they experimented with different fonts. If you go to your computer and you ask Microsoft Word what kind of font you want to use, like Carolingian or others, a lot of these fonts were actually invented during this time. They also invented bookbinding at this time as well. To mark their cultural achievement, they would make covers of gold and jewels—diamonds, sapphires, rubies—as a book cover. These were extremely valuable, unique artworks.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. The Vikings knew through their trade networks that the monasteries had this concentration of wealth in them. There's a lot of gold, silver, and jewelry in monasteries, and in Viking culture, these precious metals were a status symbol. They wanted them.

But you can imagine what the Vikings did. Because the Vikings were a pagan, non-literate people, they didn't understand books. They had no use for books. So they would come in, take these books—the Bible—rip out the pages, keep the gold, and then leave. If you're a monk and you see this, 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 nothing nice to say about the Vikings. In fact, they thought that the Vikings were basically the equivalent of Satan. 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.

Gradually, over time, as the Vikings made more wealth from monasteries, word would spread back to the 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. They would do this multiple times during the Viking Age. What's important for us to understand is that these Viking raids would drive population growth in Scandinavia, and then this would drive further Viking expansion throughout the world. It was a cycle.

Aspects of Viking Culture

These are pictures of high-status warriors in Scandinavian culture. And this is a picture of these Vikings in the East; they are called the Rus. The Rus would lend their name to become Russia. So Russia, the country, would borrow its name from the Vikings.

Some things I will point out about these visuals: look at the helmets. The popular depiction of the Vikings is they had helmets with horns. They do not have horns, guys, because horns are extremely impractical. You might get stuck on your boat, or your enemy could yank it off you. These were extremely practical and utilitarian people. They were not that wealthy, so they had to be very careful and conscious about everything they did.

Second, you will see major cultural differences between Western Vikings and Eastern Vikings. The reason why is that 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. History is a continuous process of cultural integration, and it's a dynamic process; it never really ends.

The third thing we need to appreciate is that these are a poor people, and as such, they're extremely egalitarian. Even though these are high-status people, they're not that different from the majority of Vikings, who are independent farmers, basically.

This is where they usually live; this is called a longhouse. 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 their time together. Most of the time, the Vikings are together, and they're usually drinking and they're telling stories to each other. They're very much focused on the oral tradition.

The Longship: A Technological Marvel

Let's look very quickly at their longships, which were the dominant maritime technology of the day. These are not that big, but they are purposely designed to be small so that they have flexibility and maneuverability.

Some points we need to know about the ships: 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. The Viking culture is extremely egalitarian, which is important if you want cohesion on the battlefield.

The Vikings raided for gold but also for slaves. They were trading with the wider world—the Arabs, the Byzantines, the Chinese. What they were trading were slaves in exchange for silver, which was very important for their culture. So these were slavers.

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're traversing rivers, you need to be flexible. Sometimes you might hit some rocks; well, then you have to move that ship out of those rocks and go somewhere else. This was the dominant maritime technology of that time. The Europeans had absolutely no way to counter this.

Also, what's important for us to understand is the Vikings had many different designs. The thing about the Viking ships is they're extremely lean and mean; they're extremely efficient. The only way you can achieve this efficiency is through constant innovation. The Vikings are constantly thinking about how to better improve these ships.

The Viking Funeral

The last thing I will mention is the idea of the Viking funeral. In cultures that we've studied, there's always a spectacle that is the highlight of the culture. For the Romans, there was something called the Triumph, which was a military parade to celebrate a general's military victories overseas. It was like the biggest event in the life of a Roman, the equivalent of the Nobel Prize today. The Greeks had their equivalent of the Triumph: theater. 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 cared the most about was a funeral. Obviously, not everyone would get an elaborate funeral; only the chieftain or the great warriors would get one. But these funerals would take 10 days and would be very expensive. Basically, the entire savings of this great warrior would be invested in the funeral. There would be a lot of sacrifices, mainly horses and animals. Humans would be sacrificed as well. And the warrior or the king would be buried with a ship.

The Viking Role in the European Slave Trade

The slave trade was just an interesting part of life in Europe at this time. The population was very limited because Europe was a poor place, and there was very little agricultural surplus. Plus, there were always these wars to be fought, so slavery was just very important. The people who really drove the slave trade were the Byzantines and the Arabs, and there was always demand from these two cultural centers for slaves, which the Vikings provided.

What's interesting for us about the slave trade is the Arabs are Muslim and the Byzantines are Christian, and the consensus at that time is you cannot enslave a fellow believer. So Arabs could not enslave Muslims; Christians could not enslave fellow Christians. That's why the Vikings found the slave trade so profitable: because the Vikings were pagans. In theory, they could be sold to anyone. The Vikings basically enslaved other pagans and sold them to both the Byzantines and the Arabs.

The slave trade has been an integral part of human interaction and human trade for most of civilization. It's really only until the British Empire that we see a clampdown and an abolishment of the slave trade. But slavery still happens; it just happens secretly. We don't really pay much attention to it, but it still happens.

What Have We Learned from Viking Graves?

Archaeologists have found a lot of these ship burials, a lot of graves, and there are just a lot of them. We've had a chance to study many of these graves, and here are some interesting characteristics.

The first thing is these graves are unique unto themselves. There doesn't seem to be a system of burying someone. You have these graves where maybe a woman is buried with a horse, then you have another grave where a woman is buried with a ship.

Second, these graves seem to have a record of lineage. What we mean by that is these people are buried on top of their ancestors. So if a woman is buried here, then maybe her granddaughter would be buried on top of her. There seems to be a story going on in these burials.

The third thing about these graves that we've discovered is that there's been a lot of care and attention paid to how someone was buried. Clearly, someone put a lot of thought, or the culture has put a lot of thought, into how this person will be remembered.

What's important is not the burial; what's important is the funeral—the process of the burial. That's where the culture expresses itself. These burials are meant to send the dead into the afterlife. What's really important about why they have this pageantry or ritual in the funeral process is it's really about memorializing 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. But again, 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.

The Oceanic Currents of History: Empire vs. Borderland

The major thesis of this semester is the idea of the oceanic currents of history. One pattern that we see in history is a culture in what we call the Borderlands. They're isolated from most of history—not completely isolated, but mainly isolated. Then what happens is that an Empire, a major civilization, expands so that it starts to interact with this borderland culture. Through this interaction, the energy of the Empire will start to transfer to the Borderlands. The Borderland itself will expand until it comes into conflict with the Empire. When this conflict happens, the Borderlands might be assimilated into the Empire, it might be destroyed by the Empire, or it might become the Empire itself.

We see this throughout history. Think of the Greeks and the Persians, think of the Romans and the Carthaginians, think of the Arabs and the Persians. We see this pattern repeat itself throughout history. I want to apply this idea to the Vikings and explain how this process works.

If you think about it, an Empire and a Borderland culture are almost complete opposites of each other. Their advantages compensate for each other's disadvantages.

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 basically means the Borderland has to be strategic in picking its fights. If you are bigger than me and stronger than me, I'll be your friend. But if you're weaker than me, then I will steal from you. The idea here is you're shameless in taking advantage of those who you can.

Energy vs. Mass: A Thought Experiment

Let's do a thought experiment to explain the idea of energy and mass. Let's pretend that you are 16 years old in Scandinavia around the year 800, when the Viking Age begins. By age 16, what have you learned? What have you mastered? Your family are basically independent farmers who will engage in trade to supplement their income. This is what you can do:

• You can work the farm. This means you know how to grow your own food, cook your own food, and take care of animals. If a cow is about to give birth to a calf, you know how to do so. You know how to save the life of a horse; you know how to speak with a horse.
• You also engage in sea trade. You know how to cut wood and from the wood build a boat. You know how to read the stars and sail across Europe.
• You're a good fighter. You're able to wield an axe as a weapon, use a sword as a weapon, and shoot an arrow.

If I dropped you anywhere in Scandinavia, you'd be able to find your way home. You'd be able to fight wolves, feed yourself in the forest, and find your way home. If I put you anywhere in the European world, you'll know how to navigate yourself to find your way home. This builds the idea that the Vikings at age 16 are extremely worldly people. When I mean worldly, I don't mean cosmopolitan; what I mean is they have street smarts. They're very strong and very resilient. That's what a Viking teenager looks like.

Now, let's come back to China in the present day. What are you guys able to do? Two things: memorize useless facts and do stupid tests. I'm sorry to tell you the truth, but this is the truth. Throughout your education in China, you have learned exactly two things: memorize useless facts and do stupid tests. The reason why China is like this, the reason why most modern societies are like this, is they want to reduce your energy. They want to be able to control you; they want you to fit into the larger society. So now you can see the difference between an energetic society like the Vikings and a mass society like China.

I'll be very serious with you. I have three young kids. My eldest is seven, my second one is almost four, my youngest is only one. I received a very good education; I was at Yale College for my undergraduate, and I've spent the past 20-30 years thinking deeply about education. I'll be very honest with you: if I had a choice whether to send my child to Yale or to a Viking school, I would send my kid to a Viking school because I want my child to be worldly, strong, and resilient. I'm not joking. 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, there isn't.

The Opportunistic Nature of the Vikings

The question that scholars have debated for a long time is: why did the Viking Age start? What prompted the beginning of the Viking Age? Why did the Vikings go attack these monasteries? There are different theories. The most popular theory is that as Charlemagne and his Holy Roman Empire expanded, it threatened Scandinavia, and so the Vikings had to come out and challenge him. That's the most popular historical understanding. Then there are some other theories, for example, population growth, climate change, and internal conflict within Scandinavia.

Today, 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. The opportunity was the monasteries.

After the collapse of the Roman Empire, everyone believes that Europe became a lot poorer. That's the historical understanding. But if you think about it, what really happened is that wealth became much more distributed. During the time of the Empire, all wealth was being channeled into certain centers. But when we don't have an Empire, then farmers can keep the wealth for themselves. So after the collapse of the Roman Empire, wealth was much more distributed. But as these kingdoms started to arise under Charlemagne, wealth became much more concentrated.

These monasteries are universities; they are places of worship and of learning. But much more importantly, they are places where wealth is concentrated. These monasteries, like modern universities, are extremely wealthy.

1. They were banks. 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; 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.
2. They were landowners. They controlled up to 20% of local land. Of course, what they would do is take this land and lease it out to farmers, and they made a lot of money that way.
3. They engaged in their own businesses. For example, they had their own breweries. They could make and sell alcohol and beer to locals.
4. They received donations. Because these are religious centers, the locals would invest heavily in them. The locals would give them treasures.

As you can imagine, because there was this concentration of wealth and because monasteries were not protected—they were considered protected by God—they made perfect places to pillage. The Vikings knew about these places, and so these places were perfect to pillage. And that's what started the Viking Age: the fact that wealth was now being concentrated, whereas before it wasn't.

The main military innovation in Europe at this time were these tanks called armored knights. They were fantastic in battle; that's how Charlemagne was able to build the Holy Roman Empire. But if you think about it, armored knights do not like water. They will drown in water. And so these rivers were completely unprotected, and the Vikings had these longships that were perfect for river navigation. That was 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 landowning nobles that took advantage of farmers. In order to get these knights to fight 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 means that they will now become slaves to these nobles.

By the time the Vikings attacked, Europe was becoming a very hierarchical society. The thing about hierarchies is they don't like to change. One question historians had is, well, why didn't the Europeans adapt themselves to these Viking raids? Some did, but most didn't. The reason why is if you change your military tactic in order to respond to a Viking threat, you have to change your hierarchy. You have to change your cultural hierarchy.

Remember when we did the Greeks, we learned that depending on the structure of your society, you had a different military. If you were a navy like Athens, you were a democracy. If you had a cavalry like the Macedonians, you were a monarchy. If you had hoplites like the Spartans, you were an oligarchy. The structure of your military determined the structure of your political system. So the Europeans purposely did not respond to the Viking threat because they wanted to maintain their feudal system. Of course, this is a very general statement; a lot did respond to the Viking threat, but overall, they did not respond with the same urgency or sense of anxiety that they should have.

The Viking Age came to an end when the Vikings amassed enough wealth to align themselves with the European nobility. The idea here is if you're a bandit and you steal a lot of money, what do you want to do? You want to become an aristocrat because that's the best way to protect your wealth. Once you're an aristocrat, your wealth becomes legitimate. So once the Vikings had amassed enough wealth, the Europeans started to intermarry with them, and the Vikings in turn became Christians because that was the best way to assimilate. 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 elite, who then convert the people. It is not a bottom-up process. Also, the Vikings provided military protection and support to the European powers. And that's what ended the Viking Age. The Vikings were so successful that they were eventually co-opted into the European nobility.

The Role of Intermarriage

For most of human history, we didn't have a concept of race, culture, ethnicity, borders, and states. These are all modern concepts that we use to apply to history; they're not very useful. The Vikings didn't see themselves as one culture. They didn't think, "We're Vikings, we are not Greeks, we're not Germans." No one saw themselves that way. The Vikings' main political unit was the village or the tribe. The way they fought wars is these tribes would join into temporary confederations, but these confederations were extremely fluid. If you're a tribe and you want to switch alliances, you could do so, and no one could stop you.

The very idea of identity was extremely fluid. What they understood was that 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 also wanted to build alliances with the European nobility because they have far more wealth, technology, and resources than you do. So when the opportunity presented itself for them to intermarry into European nobility, they did so.

For example, the Byzantine Empire was, as we discussed, a walled empire, so it's impossible to invade and conquer. 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. The only way they could protect their empire was not through the military but through diplomacy, through bribery, through intermarriages. So for the Vikings in Kiev, the Byzantines made an offer: we will let you guys marry into the Empire, basically by having their ruler marry a princess, but on the condition, of course, that you now serve the Empire and that you convert to Orthodox Christianity.

As you can see, this makes sense for everyone. The Byzantines now have more soldiers who are proven and who have their own territory. And the nobility in Kiev, basically the prince, now has legitimacy because he's also fighting against the other Vikings in the area. That's the idea of intermarriage: to form a political alliance that benefits you. Ultimately, if you are a ruler or prince, you're always looking to intermarry as much as possible. That's why these kings had so many wives. These wives represent 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 an alliance was through intermarriage. But if you marry someone, you must also marry into her faith. That was a precondition, and that's why 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 would take generations. These things are very slow because culture is persistent.

The Viking Worldview: A Preview

To prepare for next class, I want to give you a preview of how the Viking worldview is very different from other worldviews. There's a premodern understanding of the world and there's a modern understanding of the world.

In the modern understanding, the world we live in today, the community is distinct from the individual. The individual can be outside the community. That's why even though you are Chinese, you're still able to go to America, because you as an individual can be separated from your community. Often in the modern world, we believe that the community and individual are in conflict with each other. For example, if you are a woman, historically you have been oppressed by your community. If you are homosexual, the same is true. If you're a minority, you're often oppressed. And that's what justifies the idea of the nation-state. The nation-state is an entity that protects the rights of all individuals against the community.

Historically, most cultures have not believed this. Most cultures have believed that the individual can only exist within the community. 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 allows for your individuality, but you cannot exist outside this tradition.

Banishment as the Ultimate Punishment

That's why for most cultures, the worst punishment they 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 for a person. You cease to be an individual, you cease to be alive if you're removed from the community that gives you nourishment. The Vikings' worst punishment was banishment as well. The actual punishment would be determined by a community discussion, but it was usually banishment or exile for a number of years. In Athens, you would be banished for at most 10 years. That was considered the most grievous crime. The worst punishment would be banishment for 10 years. The Athenians banished a lot of people, and they always came back. 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. If you came into a new community, then people just assumed that you were a bad person and you were ostracized. "Where's your community, man?" In the ancient world, the first question they would always ask you is not "What is your name?" but "Where are you from?" What is your community? Because that's what mattered. Not "What is your name?" or "Who are you?" It's always, "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.

Three Visions of Community and the Individual

Within this premodern tradition, there are different ways you could conceptualize the idea of the community and the individual.

• The Greeks: The Greeks believed that the community was the polis. That's where we get the word "politics" from. The polis is a place where people gather in order to discuss the political affairs of the community. As a result, the individual is someone who stands out. That's why we have concepts like arete (human excellence) and eudaimonia (human flourishing). 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. The prime purpose of Greek life was to stand out so that you could achieve eudaimonia as well as achieve arete.
• The Romans: The Romans defined community as tradition, 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. It 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. The individual is a pious person, 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: to win glory for Rome. And that's how you show piety to Rome.
• The Vikings: The Vikings are very different people. For them, the community is a collection of stories. The community is stories that are told over and over by the people inside the community. As such, the individual has a responsibility to add to the story. How do you add to the story? Through exploration, through adventure, through personal courage. That's why the Vikings went off to settle Iceland and Greenland. That's why they pillaged these monasteries in the south. That's why they went to the East and founded 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 what's important for them: to be remembered by the community through adventure and exploration.

That'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.

What's really interesting for us is that these three different cultures are extremely different. 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. 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. The story of human history is always one of innovation, change, and resilience.