#65: How to Organize a Viking Raid — Lee Accomando from The Viking Age Podcast

Everyone is fascinated with Vikings. If you are in Minnesota, then the team is practically your official religion. If you love opera then you can’t help but think of a Wagnerian fat lady belting out tones and breaking crystal while adorned with a horned helmet. If you have any sort of cable package, you might be a fan of the Showtime series Vikings (my mother-in-law definitely is).

In this episode I talk to Lee Accomando, host of the Viking Age Podcast, all about their history. He starts off by going into great detail about how to conduct a coastal raid. All you need to do is be a chieftan, gather men together, have access to a longboat, and target a wealthy monastery or village to plunder for gold, relics, and other valuables.

But Vikings were far more than raiders. They were the most important explorers and traders of 800-1200 A.D., going as far west as Newfoundland and as far south as Baghdad.

In this episode we discuss…

• Viking paganism
• Their expansion across the entire North Atlantic

• How Vikings reached Iceland, Greenland, and the New World
• How Viking traders colonized Russia, personally protected the Byzantine Emperor, and frequently traded with Arabs

• What brought the Viking Age to an end

RESOURCES FOR THIS EPISODE

The Viking Age Podcast

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