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Off-topic / Re: Books adjacent to UW
« on: August 13, 2024, 01:38:51 PM »
Thanks for the suggestion. The book is available online and I even found some reviews here thomaskamphuis.com/2022/01/10/fibula-fabula-fact-the-viking-age-in-finland/
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Almost dismissing its subtitle from start on, the question is dropped if we can speak of a Viking Age in Finland on itself. Furthermore: what’s the Viking Age anyway from another – i this case Finnish – perspective? Did it begin and end within England? The more we think about this rationally, the more ridiculous such a concept gets. Or is there more than England to be considered and what is there to distinguish within the different areas of today Finland when it comes to vikings (or better: viking behaviour).And another review journals.uu.se/jaah/article/view/151/134
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From an international perspective, Finland has largely been excluded from Viking Age research. Focus on Vikings in the East has instead been on ancient Rus’ and the lands southeast of Staraya Ladoga. Our understanding of the Viking Age in Finland is built on limited and diverse sources, heavily relying on analogical material, and, to an extent, assumptions. The current volume has taken on the task of merging contemporary research from across disciplines to present a collected picture of an up-to-date interpretation of Viking Age Finland, while also discussing the potential significance the concept applied in a native context.
The relevance in assigning a ‘Viking Age’ to Finland can be questioned; cultural traits generally attributed to Scandinavian Vikings are rare, and no Norse settlement has been identified in Finland. As pointed out by Ahola and Frog in the introduction, both as a geographical entity, and as an historical era ‘Viking Age Finland’ is a foreign construction.