As the second part of season 6 of Vikings finally arrives on Netflix, discover 5 unusual anecdotes about the Viking people that you may not know.
It will have taken some time but the last episodes of vikings are finally available on Netflix! From July 1, fans will be able to discover part 2 of season 6 of the cult series, completed in 2020. The first part of season 6 ended on a huge cliffhanger at the end of the fratricidal fight between Bjorn (Alexander Ludwig ) and Ivar (Alex Høgh Andersen). The destinies of the descendants of Ragnar (Travis Fimmel) will be played out in the last ten episodes of the final season.
On the occasion of the end of the series, finally available on Netflix, we invite you to come back to 5 anecdotes, which you may not know, about the Vikings people at the heart of the series created by Michael Hirstwhich was entitled to a spin-off Vikings: Valhalla, also available on Netflix.
The Vikings were not all blond with blue eyes!
Even though Vikings is based on true historical facts and Norse tales and legends, it remains a work of fiction that takes some liberties. And we can see that even the characters do not correspond to the image that we have in popular culture of the Viking people. And yet, recent scientific research shows that the Vikings were not all Scandinavian, nor blond with blue eyes!
The largest genetic study ever conducted on the Vikings has been carried out by an international team of researchers through the extraction and sequencing of DNA present in 442 bones of men, women, children and babies dating back to the vast majority in the Viking Age, between 750 and 1050 AD The results, published in the journal Naturesuggest that the Vikings were not a homogeneous people but mixed, especially with other populations they encountered during their explorations and that they were more often brown than blond.
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The Vikings sailed with their cats
Although we don’t see many pets in the series, the Vikings loved the company of animals, especially cats, which they took with them on their expedition ship. This was revealed by the first large-scale study of ancient feline DNA presented at Oxford in 2016 to find out how these little furballs were domesticated and how they spread.
And we learn that a wave of expansion led the felines to ancient sailors, farmers and Vikings thanks to DNA connections established in Germany. The study, relayed by TrustMyScienceexplains that having cats on board ships was probably encouraged at the time in order to be able to get rid of rodents during voyages.
The Vikings were in America before Christopher Columbus
No, Christopher Columbus is not the first European to have set foot in America. He was preceded by the Vikings. And scientists have managed to date their presence on the North American continent, already established in this study published in Naturemore precisely thanks to cosmic radiation, as relayed CNews.
From this unknown astrophysical event which occurred in 993 came a continual production of carbon 14 in the atmosphere, the traces of which are measurable on the trees and their growth rings. By analyzing a piece of wood that came from Viking remains in America, researchers found the date the wood was cut. Scientists were thus able to determine when the Viking people were present in the territory, that is to say in 1021.
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Viking women were also warriors
If Vikings can count on powerful female figures, like Lagertha (Katheryn Winnick), the reality is not so different. A study published in the American Journal of Physical Anthropology reported a sacred discovery around a tomb of a wealthy Viking warrior, which was a scientific example and represented the typical Viking warrior.
In reality, the burial site did not contain human bones and new DNA analyzes revealed that the grave was actually occupied by a woman. This discovery, we owe it to the bio-archaeologist Anna Kjellström of the University of Stockholm who carried out a first meticulous examination of the bones of the supposed warrior. It was later confirmed by a team of scientists led by Charlotte Hedenstierna-Jonson, an archaeologist at Uppsala University, who determined that this Viking woman was a warrior tactician and leader.
Kattegat actually exists!
Kattegat is the home of Ragnar Lothbrock’s family in the Vikings series. If there is no specific city of this name, there is a place called Kattegat or Cattégat (which means “cat flap” in Dutch. It is a maritime area that includes several straits to the south and a bay to the north and stretching between Denmark and Sweden.
The name of this space was surely chosen because of its central position, connecting the countries of Northern Europe, which thus makes it possible to connect all the characters of the series. For budgetary reasons, the shots for the port of Kattegat were filmed in Lough Tay, Ireland, a popular location for many filming of major productions such as Game of Thrones.