| Abstract | Paper -a:
Though this paper I will demonstrate that slave raiding prior to the Vikings was an opportunistic system in which captives were the byproduct of war, and the slave trade was an infrequent means of profiting from an excess of captives. To this sporadic trade came merchants who were probably not exclusively slavers, and who had no part in the creation of slaves. With the development of the Viking system, Scandinavian raiders became both suppliers and merchants, and likely encouraged English and Irish to become suppliers as well. Thus the volume of the slave trade increased dramatically along with the expansion of logistics via Viking trade routes. It is my desire to illustrate the changes, or lack thereof which political and social situations imposed on slave raiding and the slave trade in Ireland and Northumbria from the 7th to 11th centuries.
Paper -b:
More and more attention has been drawn to the Scandinavian expansions in the Viking period, while leaving aside earlier period, which was a part of the further explorations. Scandinavia had never experienced more drastic change than it did in the late Viking Age: on the one hand there was expansion and movement; on the other hand, states were being formed in Scandinavia itself. But there were raiders and settlers long before Viking period, which left its footprints in the culture and warfare of the nations involved. In the paper a short overview of the Scandinavian expansion in the Eastern Baltic (modern days Latvia and Estonia) will be given, while analysing the further impact of the expansion and settlements outside Sweden, Gotland, Norway, and Denmark, which lead to the Viking Age in the Scandinavia and Scandinavian influence on Baltic tribes (like Curonian Vikings). A small part of further development of the relationships between Scandinavians and Eastern Baltic tribes also will be touched upon.
|
|---|
