Vikings
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7correct to beat the crowd
Discover how much you know about the legendary Vikings with our engaging free 132-question trivia quiz with answers. From their daring expeditions across the seas to their rich Norse mythology and culture, this quiz covers essential Viking history. Put your knowledge to the test and learn fascinating facts about these remarkable Norse warriors!
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Q 01Who was the Norse god primarily associated with thunder and storms?
Thor
Thor, the Norse thunder god, was the most widely worshipped deity of the late Viking Age; hammer amulets were worn in Scandinavia even as Christianity spread during the 10th century.
Q 02Iceland spar crystals, proposed as Viking navigation aids on overcast days, are nicknamed what?
Sunstones
Sunstones, likely calcite (Iceland spar), polarise light so the sun's position can be estimated under cloud; such a crystal was found in the 1592 Alderney shipwreck.
Q 03Which Norse explorer is thought to have been the first European to set foot on continental America, about 500 years before Columbus?
Leif Erikson
Leif Erikson sailed from Greenland around 1000 CE and wintered in a region he called Vinland, roughly half a millennium before Christopher Columbus.
Q 04The raid on what monastery in 793 CE is often considered the beginning of the Viking Age?
Lindisfarne
The brutal attack on Lindisfarne monastery in Northumbria on June 8, 793 CE, sent shockwaves across Europe and is widely regarded as the start of the Viking Age.
Q 05Which Norman leader's 1170 capture of Dublin is taken as the end of Ireland's Viking Age?
Strongbow
Strongbow (Richard de Clare) and Diarmait Mac Murchada took Dublin from its Norse-Gaelic king Ascall mac Ragnaill in September 1170; Ascall was killed trying to retake it in 1171.
Q 06Which Danish king won the throne of England in 1016 through conquest?
Cnut the Great
Cnut the Great, son of Sweyn Forkbeard, became king of all England after Edmund Ironside died in November 1016, and later ruled Denmark and Norway as well.
Q 07Which group formed the aristocracy at the top of Viking society's three-tier class system?
Jarls
Jarls formed the aristocracy of the three-tier society described in the Eddic poem Rígsþula; free farmers and the enslaved made up the two lower tiers.
Q 08Which weapon was the most common among the Scandinavian peasant class in the Viking Age?
Spear
The spear was the most common Viking Age weapon; a wealthy man might carry sword, shield and battle axe, while the average farmer had a spear, a shield and perhaps an axe or seax.
Q 09What term refers to Old Norse prose narratives of heroes and feuds, written mainly in Iceland?
Sagas
Sagas are epic prose narratives, primarily written in Iceland during the 13th and 14th centuries, detailing historical events, legendary heroes, and family histories of the Norse people.
Q 10In 845, a Viking expedition sailed up which river to reach Paris?
Seine
The Seine carried Ragnar's fleet of some 120 ships to Paris in March 845; Charles the Bald paid about 7,000 livres of silver to make them leave.
Q 11Which 1066 clash is often cited as marking the traditional end of the Viking Age in England?
Stamford Bridge
At Stamford Bridge on 25 September 1066, Harold Godwinson's English army destroyed Harald Hardrada's Norwegian invasion force; Hardrada and Tostig Godwinson were both killed.
Q 12A medieval Swedish law barred inheritance while in 'Greece' to stem emigration to which Byzantine unit?
The Varangian Guard
The Varangian Guard, the Byzantine emperors' Scandinavian bodyguard, drew so many Swedes that the Västgötalag denied inheritance to any man who stayed in 'Greece', the Norse name for Byzantium.
Q 13What hull feature let Viking longships sail metre-deep rivers and run straight onto beaches?
Shallow draft
Q 21According to one Norse account, who first sighted an unknown coast west of Greenland after being blown off course?
Bjarni Herjólfsson
Bjarni Herjólfsson, per the Saga of the Greenlanders, sighted the unknown coast around 986 after being blown off course bound for Greenland; Leif Erikson later bought his ship to explore it.
Q 22What overlapping-plank shipbuilding technique made Viking longships flexible?
Clinker-built
UNESCO added the Nordic clinker boat tradition to its Intangible Cultural Heritage list in December 2021.
Q 23In the Viking social hierarchy, which class were the free farmers, merchants and craftsmen?
Karls
A shallow draft, with the hull drawing as little as a metre of water, let longships ascend rivers such as the Seine and beach directly for raids.
Q 14What metal, valued by weight and often cut into pieces, was the main medium of exchange in the Viking Age?
Silver
Silver, cut into hacksilver and weighed on portable scales, was the main medium of exchange; a Viking balance with weights was found on the Isle of Gigha.
Q 15Which English weekday takes its name from the hammer-wielding Germanic god?
Thursday
Thursday comes from Old English Þunresdæg, 'Thunor's day'; Thunor was the English form of Thor, whose name derives from a Proto-Germanic word for thunder.
Q 16Which figure is credited with establishing the first Norse settlements in Greenland around 985 AD?
Erik the Red
Erik the Red, after being banished from Iceland, explored and settled Greenland around 985 AD, establishing the Eastern and Western Settlements.
Q 17What was the main aim of the Great Heathen Army that landed in England in 865?
To conquer the four kingdoms
The Great Heathen Army came to conquer the four kingdoms rather than raid and leave; by 878 East Anglia, Northumbria and Mercia had fallen and only Wessex held out.
Q 18Which part of his body did Odin famously sacrifice to drink from Mímir's well and gain immense wisdom?
An eye
He also won the mead of poetic inspiration, and the seeress in Völuspá tells him she knows where his eye is hidden.
Q 19What is the name of Thor's hammer in Norse mythology?
Mjölnir
Mjölnir, Thor's hammer, was forged by the dwarves Brokkr and Eitri; Loki's meddling during the forging left its handle famously short.
Q 20In Norse mythology, what is Odin's hall called, where warriors slain in battle feast until Ragnarök?
Valhalla
Valhalla, meaning 'Hall of the Slain,' is Odin's majestic hall in Asgard where brave warriors who die in battle are taken by Valkyries to feast and prepare for Ragnarök.
Karls were the free farmers, craftsmen and merchants of the middle tier; Old English 'churl' and Norse 'húskarl' (household man) share the same root.
Q 24What name did the Norse give to Constantinople?
Miklagarðr
Miklagarðr, 'the great city', was the Norse name for Constantinople; runic graffiti scratched by a Norse visitor survives on a marble balustrade in the Hagia Sophia.
Q 25Besides his hammer, the thunder god's equipment includes iron gloves called Járngreipr and which belt?
Megingjörð
Megingjörð, the 'power belt', doubles Thor's strength; Gleipnir is Fenrir's fetter, Draupnir Odin's ring and Brísingamen Freyja's necklace.
Q 26Erik the Red left Norway as a boy after his father Thorvald was banished for what?
Manslaughter
Thorvald Asvaldsson was exiled from Norway for manslaughter around 960 and took his son to Iceland; Erik was later outlawed from Iceland for killings of his own.
Q 27What is the ancient Germanic alphabet Vikings carved into wood, stone and metal called?
Runes
Runes survive even in the Bluetooth logo, a bind rune combining the initials of the Danish king Harald Bluetooth.
Q 28What name, meaning 'Forest Land', did the Norse give the timber-rich coast west of Greenland?
Markland
Markland, 'Forest Land', was the wooded coast (probably Labrador) named by Leif Erikson; Icelandic annals record a Greenland ship fetching timber from Markland as late as 1347.
Q 29Odin's name stems from a Proto-Germanic theonym, Wōðanaz, meaning what?
Lord of frenzy
Wōðanaz is usually glossed 'lord of frenzy' or 'leader of the possessed', from Proto-Germanic *wōðaz, 'frenzy, inspiration', the root also behind Old English wōd, 'mad'.
Q 30By 1103 the first archbishopric in Scandinavia had been founded in which town, then part of Denmark?
Lund
Lund, in Danish Skåne until 1658, received Scandinavia's first archbishopric in 1103–04 under Archbishop Asser; Nidaros followed in 1152–53 and Uppsala in 1164.