by Laura Bagge
Did they wear shoes? How did they make these shoes?
Did they wear different clothes during the Winter?
Did men wear jewellery?
Viking Men and Viking Dress Warriors.
The Viking warriors wore coats of mail over their woollen tunics. Mail was armour made of rings laced together or plates that overlapped (see drawing). Shoes.
Vikings wore shoes of soft leather. But sometimes they left the fur of the animal on to preserve the warmth. How a leather shoe is made;
1. First the upper is cut from sheep skin or calf skin.
2. Then the sole is cut from cattle hide. The stitching holes are then punched around the edges of both.
3. Then the shoe is stitched inside out on a wooden foot-shaped block (called a LAST), using linen thread or leather thongs.
Trousers
Vikings wore long, cloth trousers which can be narrow or baggy. They wound strips of leather up in the knee in criss cross patterns.The length of the trousers varied. Merchants and traders picked up new ideas about how to dress from their travels and some wore baggy, eastern-style trousers. Viking sagas tell us that it was fashionable for a while to wear skin-tight trousers - some were so tight that they were difficult to get on and off! They also tell us that men often wore undertrousers for extra warmth in the Winter.
Kirtles.
A kirtle is the viking word used to describe the knee length shirts that the Viking men wore. It usually had sleeves. Vikings sagas tell us that men also wore short - sleeved undershirts made from linen or wool . They often wrapped leather belts around their kirtles. Their Viking shirts were made of wool and could be dyed a single colour. They could be embroidered with silk or metal threads.
Cloak
The Vikings wore rough, woollen cloaks, and they also used animal skins as cloaks. The length of these Viking cloaks varied. Fragments of a tapestry found on the Oseberg ship, which was excavated in Norway, show men in short cloaks. Other cloaks hung to the ground like those the men are wearing in certain carvings on Viking stones.
To fasten the cloaks they used pins. Many pins found during excavation digs in Waterford were on skeletons of both men and women. The Vikings made two types of pins - plain pins and also ringed pins which had a small ring on top of the pin. The design of the pins is of Irish origin and was copied by many Viking craftspeople. These pins have been found in England, Scandinavia and most interesting of all, in Newfoundland in Canada.
Head Gear. The Vikings had long hair and long moustaches with neatly trimmed beards. On their heads they wore hoods or fur caps. Of course when they went into battle they wore helmets.
Viking Women Like the men, the women liked to dress well too. The women wore a loose dress made of wool or linen and used brooches to hold it up. Sometimes they wore material over this which was wrapped around the woman, under the armpits. It was held up by two shoulder straps that were fastened with oval brooches, sometimes called 'tortoise' brooches because of their shape. This over-dress often had a band of decoration at the hem. Women carried things they needed, e.g. combs, scissors, on chains hanging from a brooch. Married women covered their hair with a scarf. Cloth leggings or some kind of sock were also worn. A woollen sock dating from the Viking age has been found at York, England. It was once white with a red trim and it shows traces of having been patched!!
Jewellery. Viking women wore jewellery of gold and silver, brooches, bracelets, armbands and rings. Some of the metal used in this jewellery came from the chalices and crosses which had been stolen from monks in Irish monasteries. Many brooches with animal patterns have been found in digs at Viking sites. The most spectacular of all the brooches found during the dig in Waterford is a gold and silver kite-shaped brooch. It is on show in the Waterford Heritage Centre. It is from the 11th century and it shows how skilled the craftspeople in Waterford were.
Ring Mould
The women made most of the clothes, they would spin, weave and dye their own cloth.
In south Scandinavia flax was grown and used to make linen. Woollen cloth was sometimes imported from Frisia, (this is now part of the Netherlands). Silk came from Byzantium and China. Bright colours were popular and were often woven with patterns. Most of the dyes they used came from plants like "madder",( a climbing plant ), this gave a deep red colour.
Make your own Viking Soap!
1. Peel and mash up some conkers.
2. Add some water.
3. Squeeze out the extra water.
4. Mould it into shape of soap.
5. Leave to dry.
6. Use it as soap!
Dress up like a Viking!
Shoes: Cover your shoes with a piece of fur to see what it is like! Kirtle: Get a large wool or linen shirt and turn the collar in. Add a leather belt. Trousers: Trousers can be narrow or baggy. Wrap a strip of cloth or leather up into the knee in a criss-cross pattern. Hair: You can leave your hair long or short, beards and moustaches can be added! Cloak: An old blanket is perfect for this. Use a brooch to hold it in place. My classmates dressed up as Vikings last week for a Viking Role- Play. My friends became 'Aud', 'Olaf'', 'Eric' etc. and they each had a story to tell about their Viking life! It was great fun!
Photograph of our class Vikings!
