7.8 Skill activity USING HISTORICAL SOURCES Individual accounts of Viking raids reveal much to historians about what the Vikings (the ‘heathen men’) did, but also about the values and attitudes of the writers themselves. When weighing up the reliability of a source, it is important to view the whole context.
SOURCE4 An extract from the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle , which describes the first Viking raids on the monastic isle of Lindisfarne
Year 793. Here were dreadful forewarnings come over the land of Northumbria, and woefully terrified the people: these were amazing sheets of lightning and whirlwinds, and fiery dragons were seen flying in the sky. A great famine soon followed these signs, and shortly after in the same year, on the sixth day before the ides of January, the woeful inroads of heathen men destroyed god’s church in Lindisfarne island by fierce robbery and slaughter. And Sicga died on the eighth day before the calends of March. 1. Analyse the source to answer the following questions. a. Explain this writer’s view of the Vikings. b. Identify some of the factors that may have influenced their point of view. c. Explain what is happening in this description. d. State whether you can trust it to be a reliable source of information. Explain why or why not. 2. As a class, discuss some of the other evidence we can use about the Vikings in this period to give a more balanced view.
7.8
Exercise
Learning pathways LEVEL1 1, 2, 3
LEVEL2
LEVEL3
4, 6, 7, 9
5, 8, 10
REMEMBER AND UNDERSTAND 1. Identify why the early raids tended to be concentrated around the northern parts of England and Scotland. A. England and Scotland were traditional enemies of the Vikings. B. The Vikings liked the climates of England and Scotland. C. Viking maps only detailed these countries. D. It was a short trip to England and Scotland. 2. Select the correct options to complete the following sentence. Lindisfarne in Northumbria was attacked in 739 / 793 / 795 CE and Iona, off the coast of Scotland, in 739 / 793 / 795 CE. 3. State whether the following is True or False. On their raids Vikings took valuable church goods, such as works of art and valuable church icons, but not slaves. 4. State why you think the monasteries were such good targets. 5. Connect what you have learnt about Viking longships and weapons to explain why the Vikings were able to conduct lightning raids on these monasteries. ANALYSE AND APPLY 6. Carefully read SOURCE3 . a. Identify four actions that the Vikings took during the attack.
b. Explain the writer’s view of the Viking attack and how you know what this view is. 7. Explain what SOURCE2 tells historians about the techniques of Viking sea attacks.
TOPIC7 The Vikings 181
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