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"The Viking Diaspora presents the early medieval migrations of people, language and culture from mainland Scandinavia to new homes in the British Isles, the North Atlantic, the Baltic and the East, in the period known as the Viking Age as a form of 'diaspora'. It concentrates on the connectedness between migrants and both their homelands and regions within the diaspora, particularly through language, naming customs and in traditional stories and poems. Rather than the movements of armies, it considers the movements of people, and on the linguistic and cultural effects of those population movements. Providing a broad survey of the Viking Age and its aftermath, the book draws evidence from a wide range of sources that will interest students and academics"--

Machine generated contents note: 1 Introduction: Rocks and Rhymes ' -- The Karlevi stone -- Runic inscriptions, skaldic verse and the late Viking Age -- Literacy and orality -- The runic corpus -- The skaldic corpus -- Verse in prose contexts -- Reconstructing viking verse -- The manuscript transmission -- Viking verse as a historical source -- Semantic study of skaldic verse and runic inscriptions -- Skaldic vocabulary in context -- Runes and semantics -- Comparative angles -- Sources and conventions -- Ships and men in the late Viking Age -- 2 Viking Activities -- Vikings -- vikingr -- viking -- Death and war -- 'He died' -- Battles and raids -- The fall of warriors -- Trade -- Pilgrimage -- 3 Viking Destinations -- 'East' and 'west' -- The western route -- 'West' -- England -- Britain and Ireland -- Further west -- The European continent and further south -- Saxony and Frisia -- Brittany and points south -- Normandy and southern Italy -- Africa -- The eastern route -- 'rast' -- The Baltic area -- Russia -- Byzantium and Jerusalem -- Ingvarr's expedition -- Serkland -- Scandinavia -- Hedeby -- Denmark to Sweden -- Two more towns -- 4 Ships and Sailing -- Words for 'ship' -- skip -- skeid -- snekkja -- dreki -- knQrr -- Oak and pine -- Miscellaneous words -- Summary -- Names of ships -- The ship and its parts -- The hull -- The stems -- Inside the hull -- Rudders, oars and shields -- Masts, sails and rigging -- In harbour and on land -- The vocabulary of sailing -- Description and metaphor -- Preparing and launching -- The ship in the sea -- Shipwreck and landing -- 5 The Crew, the Fleet and Battles at Sea -- Manning a ship -- The owner -- The captain -- The crew -- The fleet and the troop -- lid -- Compounds with -lid -- fioti -- leidangr -- The troop -- Units of the fleet -- Summary -- Battles at sea -- Maritime warfare -- Place and time -- Preliminaries to battle -- Bringing the ships together -- Attack and defence -- Victory and booty -- Not like leeks and ale -- 6 Group and Ethos in War and Trade -- The group and its vocabulary -- drengr -- fdlagi -- heimpegi -- huskarl -- gildi -- The ideology of battle -- 'He fled not' -- 'He fed eagles, ravens and wolves' -- The symbolism of battle: ravens and banners -- Murder and betrayal -- Kinds of killing -- Treachery -- Loyalty -- Treachery and politics -- 7 Epilogue: Kings and Ships -- From vikings to kings -- Royal and other ships in the eleventh century -- After the Viking Age -- Conclusion -- Works cited -- Appendix I: The runic corpus -- Appendix II: The skaldic corpus -- Index of words and names -- General index

From the late 11th century onwards, northern Europeans were also infected with the crusading spirit that swept the whole of Europe. With their knowledge of the East, their military abilities and experience, and their relatively new enthusiasm for Christianity, upper-class Scandinavians were well-placed to lead their own warlike expeditions to the Holy Land. Such upper-class Scandinavians were also both patrons and practitioners of poetry, and this paper examines two 12th-century expeditions led by Scandinavian rulers, King Sigurðr of Norway and Earl Rögnvaldr of Orkney, through the poetry they occasioned. In the 12th century, Norse culture derives its value and its new energy from this process of interaction with other cultures. An important aspect of this new historical context was the crusading impulse, involving as it did travel to distant places and encounters with other cultures. The poetry reveals that the Vikings began to experience the world of Western Europe in a new way, no longer simply as destinations for raiding and trading, but as destinations for spiritual and cultural activities. These encounters are faithfully recorded in their poetry, which achieved the unusual feat of continuing its tradition modes while also being highly receptive to new concepts.