00:00The authorities in a town in northwestern Poland decided to build an observation tower in a public park.
00:06Nothing special about that, right?
00:08It wasn't until a local archaeologist started digging.
00:12It seemed that he had found remains of a fort.
00:15But not just any fort.
00:17The legendary Jomsborg, or as people also call it, the Viking medieval New York.
00:22It's not unusual for Viking finds to pop up in this area.
00:26Archaeologists have suspected for a long time that the Polish island near Germany could be the site of the legendary city.
00:32And the locals believe in this too.
00:34Every year they hold the continent's biggest Viking festival there.
00:38People dress up and reenact the Vikings' way of life.
00:41The time period I'm talking about is the 10th century.
00:44Scholars believe Jomsborg thrived back then, if it was even real.
00:48And that's a big if.
00:50The mystery has been going on for more than half a millennium.
00:53The two most important questions troubling historians are whether the Viking stronghold was real and where it was located.
01:00The first historical records that mention the town can be traced back to the 12th century.
01:04Recently a golden disc appeared in Sweden.
01:07It contained the names of Jomsborg and Harald Bluetooth.
01:10Does the man's last name sound familiar?
01:13That's because the Bluetooth technology we use today was named after him.
01:17He was a Danish king who apparently ruled over Jomsborg as well.
01:21And historians know he lived in the 10th century.
01:24Right around the time the Viking legendary city reached its peak.
01:28All the historical sources we have lack one thing.
01:31The city's exact location.
01:33Ancient texts describe Jomsborg as a vibrant trading post that grew around a fortress.
01:38It had thousands of residents and a pier for ships to dock.
01:42This settlement should be somewhere along the southern coast of the Baltic Sea.
01:46Just the Polish section of the coastline is more than four times longer than the Grand Canyon.
01:51The city could be anywhere within the medieval Wendland.
01:54Today this region is split between Germany and Poland.
01:57And it's called Pomerania.
01:59Luckily for archaeology buffs, there are clues.
02:03The Polish city with the newly discovered fort lies near a lagoon.
02:07According to ancient sources, the legendary city had room for hundreds of ships.
02:13Sagas put the total number of vessels at 360.
02:17These are old Norse epics and prose.
02:19A lagoon is the perfect place to moor a large fleet.
02:22The waters here are calm.
02:24There are no big waves like in the open sea.
02:26Speaking of the sea, some historians believe that the city now lies underwater.
02:31According to them, the site was located off the northwest coast of Eustim Island.
02:35Today this area is submerged under the Baltic Sea.
02:38Let's say Jomsborg really existed.
02:40Who lived there?
02:41The name of the inhabitants is not very imaginative.
02:44Jomsvikings.
02:45These people are just as mysterious as their fabled city.
02:48They are mentioned in sagas and legends.
02:51And there are a couple of rune stones, those are raised stones with runic letters,
02:55that mention battles they took part in.
02:57Runes were a writing system used by Germanic peoples, including the Vikings,
03:02before they adopted the Latin script.
03:04And that's pretty much it.
03:06There's no hard archaeological evidence that would prove Jomsvikings ever existed.
03:10If these myths and legends turn out to be true, then Jomsborg really resembled New York.
03:16All nationalities with historical ties to the region lived there.
03:19Germans, Slavs, and Vikings.
03:22Now keep in mind that a Viking wasn't a nationality, but more of a profession.
03:26The hotspot of Viking activity was present-day Sweden and Denmark.
03:30A lot of Vikings had Scandinavian origins, but not all of them.
03:34In terms of genes, they were a mixed bunch.
03:37Scientists even found evidence that some Vikings came from Southern Europe.
03:41But none of them wore those helmets with horns.
03:44We owe that image to 19th century operas.
03:47The real Vikings had simple iron helmets with a prominent nose guard.
03:51The Jomsvikings were sort of a brotherhood.
03:54And in any tight-knit community, members had to obey certain rules.
03:58One of them stated that you had to be brave.
04:01This meant that if your opponent is not bigger than you, and didn't have better fighting tools,
04:06you weren't allowed to flee the scene.
04:09Sounds a bit far-fetched, but this was an actual Viking rule of conduct.
04:13Also, Vikings could leave the city for only three days.
04:17Any longer absence required permission from the elders,
04:20and they wouldn't allow you to have a conflict with anyone from the brotherhood.
04:24Forgive and forget seemed to have been the Jomsvikings' motto.
04:27These rules sound fair, but Jomsborg didn't last long.
04:30It only existed for some 85 years.
04:33That's the length of the average lifespan in the European Union today.
04:37Basically, one human generation.
04:39In fact, the whole Viking Age lasted shortly, just over two centuries in total.
04:44But this was long enough to create the legend of the Norsemen.
04:47They are all over our popular culture.
04:50There was a TV show Vikings, and the movie The Northmen.
04:54Even the animated movie How to Train Your Dragon had a little Viking as the main hero.
05:00Most of them mention a place from Norse mythology, Valhalla.
05:03Now, if Jomsborg is semi-legendary, Valhalla is 100% fiction.
05:08It is the Hall of Fallen Warriors.
05:11Remember how the Jomsvikings had to honor a code of behavior?
05:14They did so in the hope of earning their place in Valhalla.
05:17This was a splendid place.
05:19The people there feast on boar meat every day, under a roof made of shields.
05:23Every Viking's dream, right?
05:25That's not all.
05:27Vikings got into scrimmages with each other on a daily basis.
05:30But what exactly motivated the Vikings to take up a life of seafaring?
05:34There is no simple answer, but this seems to be a rags to riches story.
05:39Scandinavian people traded fur with other European nations.
05:43From them, they found out about the riches that lay to the south of their homeland.
05:47And they also knew that European leaders didn't always get along well with each other.
05:51So why not take advantage of this and earn extra cash on the side?
05:54The Vikings' motivation seems pretty modern.
05:56The very first raid was carried out by Norwegian Vikings.
05:59They sailed across the North Sea to northeast England.
06:02Europeans were shocked by the boldness of these raiders from the north.
06:06The Viking Age was about to begin.
06:09The Norsemen soon realized that European nations were ready to pay a hefty sum to avoid their visits.
06:15At the beginning of the 11th century,
06:17the English paid the Vikings more than $300,000 in today's money to leave them alone.
06:24There was even a special word for this tax.
06:26The influx of all this wealth made the Vikings' appetite only grow bigger.
06:31But this was all about to change in 1066,
06:34possibly the most important date in English history.
06:37That year, the last great Viking king went to England.
06:40However, he couldn't find victory at Stamford Bridge.
06:44Yes, the place where the Chelsea Football Club plays its matches today.
06:48After the Norwegian king lost, the number of raids decreased.
06:52The Europeans were better equipped to defend themselves.
06:55The Viking Age slowly came to an end.
06:58But this didn't mean that the Vikings were gone forever.
07:01They stayed in Iceland for 400 years.
07:04The island was largely uninhabited before they came in the 9th century.
07:08And in England, the Vikings left their trace in place names.
07:12Every town that ends in by was first settled by the Scandinavians.
07:16There are around 2,000 place names across Great Britain and Ireland
07:21that can be linked to the Vikings.
07:24And can you guess which part of France has the most Viking-related toponyms?
07:29The name says it all. Normandy.
07:32The mouth of the river Seine is where most Danish Vikings settled in the 9th century.
07:36From there, they sent several raiding parties to Paris itself.
07:39That's it for today.
07:40So hey, if you pacified your curiosity,
07:42then give the video a like and share it with your friends.
07:45Or if you want more, just click on these videos and stay on the Bright Side.
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