{"id":1791,"date":"2010-08-27T08:59:00","date_gmt":"2010-08-27T14:59:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=1791"},"modified":"2010-12-20T13:33:03","modified_gmt":"2010-12-20T20:33:03","slug":"hot-baths-and-battle-wounds-among-the-norse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=1791","title":{"rendered":"Hot Baths and Battle Wounds among the Norse"},"content":{"rendered":"

A summary of ancient Norse practices<\/a> on personal hygiene, bathing, treatment of disease, and battle wounds.<\/p>\n

Both the saga literature and forensic studies of skeletal remains suggest that battle injuries could be horrific …. The \t\tfemur (leg bone) shown to the right is from another man who died of \t\tbattle injuries in the 11th<\/sup> century. The bone shows clear \t\tmarks of the impact of ring mail against the bone, suggesting his upper \t\tleg was hit with a sword blow so powerful as to force the rings of his \t\tmail shirt through the muscles of his leg into contact with the bone. \t\tAstonishingly, this injury was not the cause of his death. His skeletal \t\tremains show other serious injuries received in that battle. However, it was a cut that partially severed his spine at the neck that killed him.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

My own modest reading of the sagas suggest that when two men went at each other with battle axes, usually after no more than two swings of the ax someone had serious arterial bleeding.<\/p>\n

But in Iceland they sure loved their natural hot tubs\u2014and who wouldn’t?<\/p>\n

(Via Making Light<\/em><\/a>.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A summary of ancient Norse practices on personal hygiene, bathing, treatment of disease, and battle wounds. Both the saga literature and forensic studies of skeletal remains suggest that battle injuries could be horrific …. The femur (leg bone) shown to the right is from another man who died of battle injuries in the 11th century. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[20,134,4],"class_list":["post-1791","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-archaeology","tag-norse","tag-scholarship"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6xQTg-sT","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":10390,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=10390","url_meta":{"origin":1791,"position":0},"title":"Norse “Chess” Pieces Reveal an Ancient Whale Hunt","author":"Chas S. 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Clifton","date":"February 8, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"The saga of Kennewick Man, the 9,200-year-old Caucasoid (which is not the same as \"Caucasian\"!) skeleton found in Washington state in 1996, continues. An federal appeals court panel has ruled in favor of reseachers who want to continue to study his remains, now stored at the University of Washington, and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"archaeology\"","block_context":{"text":"archaeology","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=archaeology"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":73,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=73","url_meta":{"origin":1791,"position":2},"title":"Dem Bones","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"December 2, 2003","format":false,"excerpt":"American archaeologists have had more a decade's experience with the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA). It has also been misapplied, I believe, as in the case of Kennewick Man. Although that skeleton may have been proto-Polynesian rather than European, Steve McNallen of the Asatru Folk Assembly filed\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"archaeology\"","block_context":{"text":"archaeology","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=archaeology"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":12637,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=12637","url_meta":{"origin":1791,"position":3},"title":"No Amanita \u2013 Some Berserkers Were Even Christian","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"January 4, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"With the assistance\u00a0of Roderick Dale, \"doctor of berserkers,\" YouTube military historian Lindybeige offers an entertaining and enlightening video on the literary legend of the Norse berserker. From Dale's blog post, It is interesting to note how even those who accept the idea of berserksgangr as performance will often say something\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Norse\"","block_context":{"text":"Norse","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=norse"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2073,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=2073","url_meta":{"origin":1791,"position":4},"title":"‘Severed Ways’: Headbangers of 1007 CE","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"December 3, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"A movie made by a company called Heathen Films is likely to have a certain ideological component. Severed Ways, a 2007 indie production, however, has not become a cult favorite like The Wicker Man. The plot comes right from the Vinland Sagas, but adds a bit about two scouts abandoned\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Canada\"","block_context":{"text":"Canada","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=canada"},"img":{"alt_text":"\"Severed Was\" poster image","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/12\/severedways-202x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":4766,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=4766","url_meta":{"origin":1791,"position":5},"title":"The Norse on Baffin Island","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"December 1, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"Swedish archaeologist Martin Rundkvist discusses evidence of a Norse presence on Baffin Island in the Canadian Arctic and whether the people who were there were seasonal trappers or trying to establish a year-round settlement.\u00a0 Remains of Old World rats are indicative. 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