Tropes about Vikings and the Viking Age in State-funded Museums in Contemporary Scandinavia

Abstract

The popularity of the Vikings and the Viking Age in Scandinavian history cultures never seems to fade. As a projection surface for meaning-making needs in the present, the Viking Age constantly finds new ways to mirror the present, thus voicing new history-cultural trends. However, the Vikings carry heavy history-cultural traditions that tend to lead them to being portrayed as national symbols and masculine warriors.

This paper explores the malleability of representations of the Vikings and the Viking Age by analysing tropes about them in state-funded museums in contemporary Scandinavia. This study compares three exhibitions: Víkingr at the Museum of Cultural History in Oslo, The Viking World at the Swedish History Museum in Stockholm, and The Viking World at the Danish National Museum in Copenhagen. This article's relevance extends beyond the case study by introducing a method to define and analyse historical cultural tropes as they appear in museum exhibitions.

Four key tropes emerge from the analysis: 1) The multicultural world of the Vikings, reflecting modern society, particularly in Sweden and Norway; 2) The Vikings as nation-builders, a trope strongly present in the Danish exhibition; 3) The androcentric Viking as seafarer, warrior, trader, and farmer, recurrent in all exhibitions; 4) How Women also existed during the Viking Age, which appears in all exhibitions but is less emphasised in Denmark. The exhibitions' tropes correspond to either a tradition or a trend in their respective history cultures, thus highlighting tensions between their diachronic and synchronic dimensions.