and they also carry, heavy battle-axes of iron, exceedingly well wrought and tempered. This battle axe was quickly adopted by the Irish and became so much a part of the culture that in one version of his twelfth-century Topographia Hibernica, 'The Topography of Ireland', Giraldus Cambrensis (Gerald of Wales) treated the axe as almost the national weapon of Ireland: From the beginning, the Vikings were closely associated with axes - neither Irish nor Anglo-Saxon groups used them in battle at the beginning of the Viking Age.ĭid you know? Vikings introduced the battle axe into Irish warfare. In the early Viking-Age axeheads are found in a limited range of forms, which may have been used for fighting or for wood-working. These gleaming weapons would have been impressive to both friends and enemies. Sometimes these swords were covered with silver-plaiting, twisted silver and gold wires and gilded copper-plaiting. Many swords were highly decorated, although these decorations do not always survive after hundreds of years of corrosion. Many, but not all, have elaborately decorated hilts. Most found in Dublin correspond to types found in Scandinavia between 800 and 950 AD. The difference in the shape of blades has allowed archaeologists to determine a variety of sword-types throughout the Viking world. Viking weapons have also be found occasionally in rivers and wetland contexts.Īlthough Viking weaponry initially differed from Irish weaponry, the two weapons grew steadily more similar after Viking settlement in Ireland, with the Irish adopting Viking forms and vice versa. While very little is known about these public ceremonies, the grave goods indicate that weapons and other status-items were placed with the dead by family members as symbols of the person's status in life and to provide them with items they might need in the afterlife. Many Viking weapons have been found in furnished burials: although this pagan burial custom had begun to die out among Irish Vikings several generations before the battle of Clontarf. Other tools, such as slings, clubs and even flails were mentioned as being used as weapons in some early ninth-century Irish literary sources. Usually only the iron bosses of these shields survive in the archaeological record, as the wooden body of the shield decays over time. Warriors protected themselves from attack by using small round shields. Unfortunately, these sword types were no match for the Viking slashing swords and the Irish quickly began to adapt Viking blade forms into the manufacturing of their weapons. the claideb, a longer sword designed for slashing or cutting (similar to the Roman gladius). the colg, thought to be a small thrusting sword (similar to the Roman spatha) There were two types of swords in Ireland before the Vikings: Swords on the other hand, were expensive and usually used only by the nobility.Īccording to Nancy Edwards when the Irish came into contact with Romans they abandoned a particular La Tène type of sword in favour of smaller versions of the Roman spatha and gladius. Some swords also show that the Irish metalworkers may also have been influenced by the Germanic world.

Norse battle axe