A VIKING FUNERAL

The distinctive and sometimes brutal customs undertaken during a medieval Nordic funeral.

For any Norse warrior who fell on the battlefield, a grand funeral awaited them. Their body was laid in a wooden ship, which was packed full of valuables such as clothes, weapons, jewellery and food. There’s even evidence of some chieftains having their servants and horses accompany them into death. Chants and processions were performed at the ritual, and the ship was then buried under a mound or set alight and sent out to sea.

Norse mythology told that the greatest warriors who fell in battle would be allowed to enter Valhalla, a great hall where the mightiest heroes would feast and fight in preparation for Odin’s fi nal battle at Ragnarök, the end of the world. The longship symbolised the fastest passage to the afterlife, and it was believed that the higher the flames of the inferno, the quicker the dead would arrive there.

Not every Viking was given a burial this decorative. The poorest in society would be buried in a simple stone boat, while in Sweden in particular, the laying of tumuli (burial stones) was a common practice. These funerals disappeared once Christianity began to spread through Nordic lands.

From "How it Works" UK, issue 91, 2016, excerpt p. 82. Adapted and illustrated to be posted by Leopoldo Costa.