How Did the Vikings Conduct the Slave Trade in the West?

Vikings and the Slave Trade

Vikings were Norse explorers who traveled around the waters of the North Atlantic raiding, trading, pirating, and colonizing lands wherever their boats could travel. They are historically known as a rough group of individuals with raucous personalities and innate brutality. They are credited with having been the first to discover the New World and to have reached locations which had not seen foreign invaders before the arrival of the Vikings. Between the 8th and 11th centuries AD, Norsemen and their Viking warriors traveled far and wide, forever changing history in Scandinavia and the rest of Europe and North America as well.[footnoteRef:1] One of the commodities the Vikings traded in was people. The Viking slave-traders were prolific in their activities, capturing people when they invaded and then selling them. More than any other commodity, slaves were how the Vikings were able to trade for goods and services that they needed or desired. Slaves were an important part of Viking life, providing physical labor, being a valuable trading commodity, and allowing for population expansion into the Norse-controlled lands of what are now Great Britain, Ireland, and Iceland. [1: Else Roesdahl, The Vikings, (Penguin, 1998).]

Within the Viking community, there was a decisive social structure. This class system allowed for the understanding of leadership without official written laws. Instead, everyone simply understood what was expected of them in turns of acceptable behaviors. This was ensured by the presence of the lovsigemann or law reader man who would be the only person required to memorize the laws of the land. This system was known as the Thing tradition which had been established by common meetings between villages as far back as 600 AD.[footnoteRef:2] Laws could not be changed by any one individual but instead the government was run by democracy wherein all citizens had the right to a say except for slaves and those forced into exile who were not counted as citizens of the society. [2: Arild Hauge. "Daily Life in the Viking Period." Last modified 2002. Accessed November 16, 2012. http://www.arild-hauge.com/elife.htm. ]

The Vikings were not the only group to utilize slaves. The practice goes back to before the time of written history. However, the Viking society was one of the first where the sale and trade of slaves became an integral part of the culture's economic foundation.[footnoteRef:3] The idea of a slave to this society was one which conveyed both a class distinction and an economic connotation.[footnoteRef:4] Slaves were taken from their homelands and traded as far away as present day Dublin and ancient Byzantium.[footnoteRef:5] So important was the slave trade to the continuation and growth of the Viking community that it was used as a justification for conquest of lands.[footnoteRef:6] When economic resources were limited, the Norse contended that the invasion of foreign lands and conquest was justified because they would be able to acquire more slaves which could then be put to work or traded with other communities. During each voyage, the Vikings would go ashore and capture Skraelings, a term which refers to all indigenous people who were not of the Norsemen and thus were ripe for kidnapping and forced entry into the booming slave trade.[footnoteRef:7] [3: "A Nice Little Earner." Last modified 2003. Accessed November 16, 2012. http://www.regia.org/earner.htm.] [4: Stefan Brink, The Viking World, (New York, NY: Routledge, 2008). 50. ] [5: Mark Harrison, The Vikings: Voyagers of Discovery and Plunder, (New York, NY: Osprey, 2006). 23.] [6: Clare Downham, "The Viking Slave Trade," History Ireland, 17, no. 3 (2009): 15.] [7: Mark Harrison, The Vikings: Voyagers of Discovery and Plunder, 70.]

Those who were involved in slavery as a trade did so with little regard to the human being now considered a possession. Slaves, known in the Viking Age as thralls or trells, were the sole property of their owner and made to do whatever was ordered them. The term thrall literally meant "unfree servant."[footnoteRef:8] Most people who were slaves were put into that position through the conquering of their lands by the Vikings. However, there were also slaves who were born into the class. Anyone born to a slave, whether or not they were in any way related to the owner, was also considered a slave and thus property. Slaves were essentially livestock, able to be bought and sold as easily as any other animal associated with a farm. According to historian Arild Hauge: [8: Ward, Christie. "Slavery and Thralldom: the Unfree in Viking Scandinavia." Last modified 2012. Accessed November 16, 2012. http://www.vikinganswerlady.com/thralls.shtml.]

The slave was owned by his owner in the same way the owner owned his domestic animals. Slaves were looked upon as the owner's property. The owner could buy and sell a slave, and he could treat his slave as he liked. If the owner killed one of his slaves, it was not considered as murder. If a free man killed another man's slave, the murderer only had to pay for a new slave. The price was nearly the same as that of a domestic animal.[footnoteRef:9] [9: Arild Hauge. "Daily Life in the Viking Period." Last modified 2002. ]

Even a man who had been born free and was Norse could become enslaved if he were no longer able to pay the taxes or mulct imposed by the Thing or if he had become so poor that he could no longer feed his family.[footnoteRef:10] Social mobility was extremely difficult, but a slave could potentially purchase his or her freedom if they were able to pay their owner the current value of their self as a servant.[footnoteRef:11] It was also the custom that when a thrall could no longer serve his owner, if he or she had become old or injured, then the person would be killed. Mark Harrison says, "He could be disposed of as a lame horse or a dog might be."[footnoteRef:12] There were various strata of power which the slaves belonged to. The higher up the slave within this system, the more freedoms they were allowed. Some could achieve the rank of bryti which meant they were given a small wage by which they could earn freedom. Once a man had paid for his freedom the person, now called a loysing, was still bound and forced to work for his former owner although for a fee. [10: Arild Hauge. "Daily Life in the Viking Period." Last modified 2002..] [11: Ward, Christie. "Slavery and Thralldom: the Unfree in Viking Scandinavia." ] [12: Mark Harrison, The Vikings: Voyagers of Discovery and Plunder. 23.]

Slaves were subjected to the most menial tasks on the farms as well as the most difficult manual labor.[footnoteRef:13] It would be the slaves who were forced to plant, tend, and harvest crops. The least desired jobs in the Viking society were always the responsibility of the slave class. Women were often the target of rape by their owners and since they were not valued as human beings, this also was not considered a crime. Indeed, it was profitable to rape a slave because there was a chance of pregnancy which would then yield further labor or a lucrative sale in the future. [13: James Graham-Campbell, The Viking World, (London, England: Francis Lincoln, 2001). 127.]