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00:00No other ancient people have such a strong hold on our imagination as the Vikings.
00:09But the truth about them is shrouded in the mists of Dark Age Britain.
00:14In this series, I'll be searching for evidence to unravel the story of the Vikings' invasion and settlement of these islands.
00:22What really happened when Vikings attacked?
00:24Were they only here to plunder, or did some stay and make Britain their home?
00:28To find the answers, I'll be investigating ancient monastic writing, the latest discoveries in archaeology, and genetics.
00:37We've commissioned a nationwide genetic survey to find out where in the British Isles today the descendants of the Vikings live on.
00:45To start, I'm going in search of the Vikings' hit-and-run raids, and new evidence for what accompanied them, death and destruction.
00:58We've got to fight the story of a two-uity- Boltonia.
01:04Set, for a constant battle with rockets.
01:08Now we're able to東西 of Death, or just block my ship's attack.
01:12The attack was Kimber- They pledged the following Yeep-a-ding-run raids, but it was
01:19For the first time, the saga of the mighty Viking hordes who swept across the world,
01:32breaking every commandment of heaven and earth as they put an age to the torch.
01:38They enjoyed war, didn't they? I mean, it was their thing, you know.
01:42To a Viking, there was no life except life in fact.
01:46They were very violent people who were into stabbing and raping, pillaging.
01:51There was no death except death in battle.
01:55Ugly, hairy, brute. Yes.
01:57There were no women except women taken in battle.
02:01Monks kneeling down and getting their heads back taken with axes.
02:07Over the centuries, our picture of the Vikings has become a sensational mix of fact and fantasy.
02:13For example, the horned helmet, one of our most powerful images of the Vikings.
02:20And yet archaeologists have never found a single Viking helmet with horns.
02:26In fact, this is the only real Viking helmet ever discovered.
02:31It was found in the Viking homelands of southern Norway,
02:34alongside the burnt remains of its owner in a pagan burial mound.
02:37The Vikings have a powerful image.
02:45Daring and ambitious, certainly, but also vicious, aggressive and barbaric.
02:49So what is the truth and where's the evidence?
02:53To find out, I need to go back to the beginning of the story.
02:57To the late 700s.
02:59Britain has been revolutionised by a new religion.
03:06But Christianity doesn't simply mean a new faith.
03:09It's also brought literature and art.
03:12And by acquiring land, the church has become immensely rich and powerful.
03:16One of its most important and sacred monasteries, St Cuthbert's, lies off the coast of Northumbria,
03:27safe on the Holy Island of Lindisfarne.
03:29The year was 793, and here on Holy Island, the monks of Lindisfarne lived a peaceful existence.
03:39But all this was about to be brutally shattered.
03:43The Vikings' raiding of British and Irish monasteries was just beginning.
03:47In us is fulfilled what the prophet first foretold.
03:55From the north, evil breaks forth, and a terrible glory will come from the door.
04:03See, the pirate raids have penetrated the north of our island.
04:08The attack was vicious, and has gone down in history as the start of the Viking Age.
04:30The feeling of the time is encapsulated in this stone found here at Lindisfarne.
04:34On one side, a sun, a moon, and a cross.
04:37The signs of the Day of Judgment.
04:40And on the other, what appears to be a band of ferocious Viking warriors.
04:45All over Britain, people now lived in fear of one of these attacks.
04:54But we only have one report that was written at the time.
04:58The apocalyptic words of a Northumbrian monk, Alquin of York.
05:02The pagans have desecrated God's sanctuary, shed the blood of saints around the altar,
05:11laid waste the house of our hope, and trampled the bodies of the saints like dung in the street.
05:18It's compelling stuff, and lies at the root of how we see the Vikings.
05:28But how reliable is it?
05:31What's interesting is that when Alquin wrote his gripping and bloody account of Viking raids,
05:36he wasn't even in Britain.
05:38He was hundreds of miles away in Aachen, safe at the court of the Christian Emperor Charlemagne,
05:44an arch-enemy of the pagan Vikings.
05:48And so when Alquin wrote about them, he probably already formed his own fairly strong opinion
05:53about what the Vikings were really like.
05:58Alquin's writings may have been highly political,
06:00but the only other accounts from England are in the Anglo-Saxon chronicles.
06:08Written by monks nearly a century later.
06:12Details are often sparse.
06:15There's only one more raid on England recorded during the 40 years that followed the events of 793,
06:20but again, the attack on Lindisfarne is painted in biblical terms.
06:24It's preceded by omens from the heavens, like whirlwinds and lightning,
06:31followed by famine, and then Vikings.
06:37It's no wonder we see them in the way we do.
06:44Behind these accounts, there surely lie real events.
06:47But how do I reach back to them?
06:50The best hint of a Viking raid from the archaeological record in Britain
06:53is a discovery made in Shetland in 1958.
07:01Underneath the floor of an ancient church, someone had buried this.
07:07A fabulous hoard of Pictish treasure.
07:10Silver bowls and brooches dating from Viking times.
07:15Some argue it was hidden from Viking raiders.
07:18But no signs of pagan destruction were ever found.
07:21No victims of murder.
07:24No real evidence to pin this on the Vikings.
07:32Apart from the stories, evidence in Britain for Viking raiding is desperately thin.
07:38Could Christian monks have deliberately exaggerated what happened?
07:42Perhaps to frighten their flocks into repentance?
07:44So where can I look for something more convincing?
07:52Within a few years, Vikings would be sailing right round Britain into the Irish Sea,
07:57where from the mid-800s onwards, the Welsh Annals reported a new and deadly threat.
08:03Here on the North Welsh coast, according to records of the time,
08:08the locals were subjected to repeated attacks by Vikings.
08:11But for archaeologists, the frustration has been finding any evidence for the Vikings being here at all.
08:17That was until a few years ago, when a metal detectorist turned up some unusual objects in a corner of a field,
08:24at Llanbedagoch on Anglesey.
08:26The actual field leading on to this, we found quite a rare coin.
08:33And there's a lot of interest generated with it from the museum.
08:36And we started finding weights, lead weights, and I didn't actually know what they were at the time,
08:42you know, until they were sent to the museum and I was told that they were Viking weights,
08:48which sort of hit the jackpot.
08:50The lead weights that Archie had found were soon followed by other Viking objects,
08:56including a collection of hack silver, fragments of silver armbands.
09:02These were used by the Vikings, not as jewellery, but as currency.
09:08Bits were hacked off as required and spent instead of coins.
09:12A major excavation is now underway at Llanbedagoch.
09:21It's run by archaeologist Mark Redknapp from the National Museums and Galleries of Wales.
09:29Let's leave the sound there for a moment, because that's interesting.
09:33For years, he's been on the lookout for evidence of Viking activity.
09:37Could this new site shed any light on the events reported in the annals?
09:41As Mark's team excavate, they uncover the remains of an ancient wall.
09:47It's massive, over two metres thick, and encircles an area 100 metres across.
09:53The wall, together with its ditch, would have been a formidable defensive structure.
10:00What threat were these people defending against, so close to the sea?
10:05Who were they afraid of?
10:06As the archaeologists continue to excavate the ditch, they make another discovery.
10:15Something totally unexpected.
10:17The remains of five skeletons start to emerge.
10:25The first to be discovered, that of a young woman, is radiocarbon dated to some time between the mid-700s and the late 900s.
10:33By this time, Wales had long been Christian, but these burials don't conform to any sort of Christian pattern.
10:39The local population would have normally been buried in an east-west orientation.
10:47Here we've got north-south, casual burial.
10:50No sense of laying out of the body or of ritual.
10:54Exactly the opposite.
10:55The impression you really get, when you look at these, is that they were not deposited in the ground by people who cared for them, or who loved them.
11:04These are very casual burials.
11:06In the fill, we're getting animal refuse, joints of meat, suggesting that they're really just thrown out with the kitchen waste and offal,
11:13and then covered very unceremoniously with large lumps of limestone, which have literally crashed down on the bodies, to cover them with this rather thick layer of rubble.
11:27So what sort of explanation can you come up with for this?
11:30Well, there are a number of options we should consider.
11:33One is that perhaps they died as a result of some illness or plague, and perhaps that it wasn't possible to accord them normal Christian burial practice.
11:42You just wanted to dispose of them, basically.
11:43Dispose of the dead is an emergency situation.
11:46But probably the favoured option is that these are the victims of some other cause of death, some perhaps violent death.
11:56We know that the animals record first Viking attacks on whales in 855.
12:02We have a recorded attack on Anglesey.
12:05I think I can see what you're getting at here.
12:06Do you think these are victims of Vikings, then?
12:08Well, I hope that during the course of the exposure of these bodies, that we can accumulate enough data to actually come to a reasoned, rational argument as to the cause of death.
12:18It's going to be great to see these emerge.
12:21Well, I'm hoping that you're going to offer to do that for us.
12:24I'd love to.
12:25I'd love to.
12:25I've brought my trowel with me, so...
12:27Excellent.
12:37It looks like it's a male.
12:39It soon becomes clear that there are the remains of two men, a woman, and two children.
12:44But how did they die?
12:47As the bones are fully uncovered, we discover the first unsettling hints that violence might have been involved.
12:55One thing that does show up very clearly now, though, is the odd position that that one's lying in.
13:01Because what is it? I mean, it's lying partly on the left side, isn't it?
13:06With...
13:07That's right.
13:07Head to that side.
13:09Shall I move this one?
13:10Yeah.
13:11That one's...
13:12That's there.
13:12Like that.
13:14What about my arms, though? Where are they?
13:15This arm is really straight back behind, like that.
13:18Yeah.
13:19And this one you've got to tuck under.
13:20How am I going to get...
13:21So that one's right underneath.
13:22Right back there.
13:24Well, it's incredibly uncomfortable.
13:26But do you think that does suggest that this body might have had its arms tied behind its back?
13:31I don't think we can rule that out.
13:36Both males look as though they were tied up.
13:38So it seems unlikely that their deaths were peaceful.
13:41Were they locals, captured, slaughtered and disposed of by pagan Vikings?
13:46Or could anyone else have buried them in this way?
13:54Six months later, radiocarbon dates on all of the skeletons are in.
13:58They've narrowed down the likely date of the deaths to the second half of the 10th century,
14:04still a period when Viking raids were common.
14:06So what's Mark's best theory about what really happened?
14:13Looking at the circumstances of burial,
14:15the evidence there seems to suggest that they were not buried by the native population.
14:21And I think the candidates that best fit the bill are, of course, Viking raiders at this time.
14:29And there seems little doubt that the adult males were likely to be captives.
14:34And perhaps we have, with these five burials,
14:37the remains, actual remains, of the victims of a Viking raid.
14:41England, Scotland and Wales seem to have little more to offer in terms of evidence for Viking raids.
14:59So can I do any better on the other side of the Irish Sea?
15:03The coast of Ireland was reputedly a hotbed of raiding.
15:07And Irish monks recorded the activities of the Vikings at the time.
15:11Professor Donnaker O'Corain is the world's leading authority on the Irish Annals.
15:16I think people tend to overlook the enormous amount of detail in the Irish Annals about the Viking Wars.
15:23And this detail concerns not just Ireland, it concerns Scotland and it concerns England as well.
15:29In comparison to the writings of English monks,
15:32the Irish Annals tend to take a more sober view.
15:34They don't squeal and they don't blame their sins.
15:42They don't say this is God's vengeance on them for their evil living.
15:46They take it very deadpan, very realistically, that's life, so what?
15:54The first Viking attacks reported quite simply by the Irish, without any mention of omens.
16:00794. Devastation of all the islands of Britain by heathens.
16:07And this was soon followed by?
16:11798. The burning of St. Patrick's Isle by the heathens.
16:14In their matter-of-fact way, the Irish Annals record a story of incredible violence.
16:26In the 40 years following Lindisfarne, while just one raid is reported in England,
16:34there are more than 30 in Ireland.
16:37Could this onslaught have happened without leaving any trace?
16:44Archaeologist Dr John Sheehan believes that a clue may lie underground.
16:49Thousands of tunnels or sea terrains have been found in ancient settlements throughout Ireland.
16:53They've always been thought to be for underground storage.
16:57But a fragment of timber from one of them has recently been dated to the time of the Viking attacks.
17:02And John now believes that they had a radically different purpose.
17:08So do you think that these were places where people hid from Vikings?
17:11I do, absolutely.
17:13Because any Viking who wants to follow people down here has to crawl headfirst along a very narrow chamber
17:20and finally then come up through the floor of this chamber.
17:25And even a child sitting here with a rock or a pointed stick could render that Viking out for the count.
17:32So it was a very easy place to defend.
17:34And you could fit maybe 15, 12, 15 people in here.
17:37Yes, because I was quite surprised at how big this chamber is.
17:40I can't imagine what it would be like though, huddled in here in the dark,
17:44knowing that they were marauding Vikings rampaging around inside your settlement.
17:48Yeah, I'd say it would be scary enough.
17:50I mean, you might hear sounds, although we're at the very end of the Souterrain,
17:53and we probably would be fairly soundproofed.
17:55But you might hear sounds.
17:56You might smell burning going on, perhaps.
17:58But in general, you'd probably feel reasonably safe,
18:02because you'd know that apart from digging out the Souterrain,
18:05the only way they could take you was to come down that passage,
18:09and you have them at your mercy.
18:13In Ireland, there are accounts of attacks on Britain that aren't documented anywhere else.
18:18For instance, the monastery on the Hebridean island of Iona suffered a number of raids,
18:23including a particularly vicious one in 825.
18:28Hearing of an impending landing by Vikings,
18:36the monks rushed to bury the sacred shrine of St. Columba.
18:39The Vikings were after it.
18:41But the monks refused to reveal its hiding place to heathens,
18:45and were brutally martyred.
18:51But can we ever know the full extent of the Vikings' first attacks?
18:55If Ireland's experience was like the experience of Scotland and England,
19:01then there are a very large number of raids on English monasteries and churches
19:06and Scottish monasteries and churches that have not been recorded.
19:10It is impossible that the Vikings could be on the rampage in Britain
19:15and not do the same things as they did in Ireland.
19:18Feeling that I've exhausted all my leads in Britain and Ireland,
19:28I'm turning to the homeland of the perpetrators for evidence.
19:32The Vikings came from all over Scandinavia,
19:35but the early attacks on Britain and Ireland
19:37were probably launched from somewhere in Norway.
19:40It's hard to imagine, but 1,200 years ago,
19:48this little bay was full not of pleasure boats, but of Viking ships,
19:52because all the way along the edge of the water there
19:54stretched the Viking port of Kaupang.
19:59Kaupang is now the site
20:01of one of the biggest Viking Age excavations in Scandinavia.
20:04It grew up at the time of the early Viking raids
20:08and developed into a major trading centre,
20:11perhaps the first Viking town.
20:16Because of the site's importance,
20:18every grain of soil is being sieved for clues about life in the town.
20:23But is there any evidence here for the raids?
20:26In one of the plots, they've found a die for making a brooch,
20:31a crucible for melting gold.
20:35Glass beads and offcuts.
20:40Weights and pieces of jet.
20:46All the signs of trade, industry and wealth.
20:51But one piece tells a more dramatic story.
20:55We have this book decoration.
21:00It's in silver with gold.
21:02And if you see on the back side,
21:06it's connected to something that is very, very thin.
21:09Right, it's sort of been riveted through, hasn't it?
21:11Yes.
21:12Those kind of things were attached to ecclesiastical books.
21:15And so this one was probably ripped off the book by some Viking,
21:20raiding a monastery or a church, and then brought back here.
21:24So it's loot.
21:25Yeah, I mean, that really is absolute classic loot, isn't it?
21:29Yeah.
21:29I mean, that's what you expect to find.
21:30Well, that's what I'd expect to find in a site like this,
21:32something that Vikings have simply pinched and brought back again.
21:41The design tells us that this latest find came from the continent,
21:44from the Christian Empire of Charlemagne.
21:47But discoveries have also been made of mounts from Britain and Ireland.
21:50Over the last century, hundreds of Viking graves have been found,
21:56scattered over the whole of Norway.
21:58And in many of them, amongst the jewellery and weapons of a pagan people,
22:03lay Christian treasures.
22:08A reliquary that once contained sacred bones of a saint.
22:11Part of an abbot's crozier.
22:24And dozens of gilt mounts from holy books.
22:34What would the monks have thought?
22:37Their sacred artwork, created to adorn holy objects,
22:40had ended up accompanying Vikings to a pagan afterlife.
22:45These objects are the best evidence for Viking raids
22:48that archaeology can provide.
22:50In fact, they're the nearest we can get
22:52to capturing the Vikings red-handed.
23:01But in order to understand the raids,
23:03I need a better idea of who the Vikings really were.
23:06My problem is that the first Vikings left no written records.
23:12But luckily, the archaeological evidence is truly spectacular.
23:19The most dramatic find of all was made back in 1904.
23:23At Åserberg in southern Norway,
23:25an entire Viking ship had been preserved in the clay
23:28of a massive pagan burial mound.
23:30By dating tree rings in its planks,
23:41we know it was built around 820,
23:43making it the earliest known Viking ship.
23:49The find tells us how these people of the sea
23:52were able to combine the power of both ore and sail,
23:56an innovation that gave them a huge advantage over their rivals.
23:59To me, it's little short of a miracle
24:06that all this wood has survived, and for so long.
24:09If ever we needed evidence of the skill
24:10of the Viking shipbuilders, then it's here.
24:13But there's more.
24:14The ship itself isn't all that survived.
24:17It was full of wonderful objects
24:18that show us life in the Viking world,
24:21and at the very highest level.
24:24Much more than just a ship.
24:26It's the Viking equivalent of the tombs of the pharaohs,
24:29the treasure trove of a Viking queen.
24:35Clearly, she had a taste for the finer things.
24:40And there's something really rare,
24:43images of Vikings as they saw themselves.
24:46Also discovered in the burial
24:52was a richly decorated wall hanging.
24:55The fragile material has now faded,
24:58but a painting made during conservation shows the scene,
25:02a grand procession,
25:03possibly of a religious nature.
25:06It's an image of an ordered society,
25:08of a people who are also technologically advanced.
25:11But the ship from Osserberg was just the beginning.
25:22Another was discovered nearby,
25:24in a burial mound at Gokšta.
25:28Built several years later,
25:30it's less ornate than the Osserberg,
25:32but highly streamlined.
25:35A warship, better designed for crossing oceans
25:38and landing on beaches,
25:40the most advanced ship of its day,
25:43the Viking's secret weapon.
25:45I know how I'd feel if I stood on the shore
25:48and saw a whole fleet of these approaching,
25:50fully rigged, hung with shields and crewed by Vikings.
25:54I'd be absolutely terrified.
26:00But even though they had the technology,
26:03crossing the unpredictable North Sea to Britain
26:05was a very risky undertaking.
26:07What drove the Vikings to do it?
26:10Were they simply reckless thugs?
26:12Or was there a deeper reason?
26:19It's easy to imagine how they became such good sailors,
26:22because the first raiders probably came
26:24from the fjords of western Norway,
26:26where travelling by water is the only way to get around.
26:29But building just one ocean-going Viking ship
26:32would have taken huge amounts of oak,
26:34wool for the sails and labour,
26:37resources only available to the wealthiest chieftains.
26:40So maybe the raids were driven by the powerful.
26:44Could there have been a political motivation behind them?
26:52One theory suggests that the reason for the raids on Britain
26:55lay not with Vikings, but with Christians.
26:58The Christian emperor Charlemagne was busy expanding
27:02his mighty empire at this time
27:03and was engaged in a bitter struggle
27:06with his pagan neighbours to the north.
27:10One of the things he did was to actually harass
27:13and massacre a lot of the pagans
27:16that lived just south of Denmark.
27:18And at one point he killed something like 4,500 people in one go.
27:23Honestly, I think that this put the fear of God,
27:27literally speaking, into the Nordic countries.
27:31People understood that either we organise
27:35or we get swallowed or killed.
27:37I think with a threat from the outside,
27:44I think they are starting to unite.
27:45And that is the kind of response.
27:47And they need cash, they need something
27:50to get this political process going, so to speak.
27:54And I think that's what the early Viking raids are about.
27:59I find this idea fascinating.
28:02Could Viking raids really have been triggered
28:04by military pressure from the Christian south?
28:07All we can be sure about
28:09is that the Vikings had the technology
28:10to launch these audacious attacks.
28:15But are there other ways of finding out
28:17where they went once they got to Britain?
28:27A new branch of genetics may offer us
28:30an alternative way of tracing the Vikings.
28:34Professor David Goldstein,
28:37a geneticist at University College London,
28:39has pioneered the use of DNA
28:41to trace the movements of ancient peoples across the world.
28:46This branch of genetics is only a few years old,
28:49made possible by findings from the Human Genome Project.
28:53So what are Goldstein's feelings
28:54about making a test case of the Vikings?
28:56The Vikings are an extremely interesting group
29:01to look at in this way,
29:03and there's a couple of reasons for that.
29:05One reason is that the questions
29:07are relatively well-defined.
29:10We have a relatively well-defined geographic area
29:13for where the Vikings came from,
29:15and a relatively well-defined period of time
29:18during which they came into the British Isles.
29:21Now, what we don't know
29:22is when they went to those places,
29:24did they establish large populations,
29:27or was there just some fighting
29:29and then they went back?
29:30And that's actually what we're trying to get at,
29:32what was the genetic contribution
29:33of the Vikings to the British Isles.
29:36And so when you roll it all together,
29:38it's actually an extremely interesting problem
29:39for us to work on.
29:40The key to Goldstein's success
29:49is that part of human DNA
29:51responsible for maleness.
29:53It's known as the Y chromosome
29:55and is passed down from father to son.
29:58Only this chromosome contains the precise information
30:01that David Goldstein needs
30:02for tracking populations through time.
30:10In my family,
30:11the Y chromosome has come down
30:13from my grandfather Charles
30:14through my father Albert,
30:16who passed it on to me,
30:17and I in turn have passed it on to my son Barnaby.
30:20And this has been going on
30:21for countless generations
30:23and will continue to do so
30:24as long as this male line remains unbroken,
30:27as long as there are male Richards.
30:30Now, this particular chromosome
30:32alters very little
30:33from generation to generation.
30:36So as I trace this line
30:37back through my male relatives,
30:39the Y chromosome in my family
30:41will hardly have altered at all.
30:44And this is what makes the Y chromosome
30:45such a powerful tool
30:47in tracing populations.
30:51For the study,
30:52Goldstein will recruit males
30:54who live in small towns
30:55and whose own male line
30:56can be traced back several generations
30:58in the same place.
31:00This way, he hopes to reduce the effect
31:02of modern population movement.
31:04The small towns are chosen
31:10to be evenly spread across Britain.
31:14But there are also a few places
31:16of particular interest,
31:17such as those with a historical Viking link.
31:20What are you saying?
31:21It's not that the country's not wide enough
31:23for us to get our wanted rides?
31:24So we have...
31:25So probably...
31:26Goldstein hopes to estimate
31:27the ethnic mix of these islands
31:28more than a millennium ago.
31:30But to do this,
31:32he'll need thousands of samples,
31:34not only from Britain and Ireland,
31:35but also from the Viking homelands
31:37in Scandinavia.
31:39I think it is ambitious,
31:40but I think that we really
31:41now have the ingredients
31:42that we need
31:43to take on a project
31:44of this scale.
31:45The genetic technology is there,
31:49and genetics is, in fact,
31:51opening up a new window on history.
31:54So if we could just review
31:57the ethical implications
31:58of the project as it develops...
32:01Before he can go ahead,
32:02serious ethical questions
32:04have to be addressed.
32:05Amongst them is the sensitive issue
32:07of handling the DNA of volunteers.
32:10They'll see family members
32:11in cases of paternity and non-paternity.
32:13That's right.
32:14So we will try not to include
32:15any relatives in the study.
32:19There is one strange piece of evidence
32:21hinting that genetic clues
32:23close to a Viking presence
32:24might be found.
32:26It's a rare genetic disease
32:27called Dupitron's contracture,
32:30in which a tightening
32:31of the tendons in the hand
32:32give it a claw-like appearance.
32:36There's a suggestion
32:37that this disease
32:39may have come from
32:40a Viking genetic inheritance.
32:44I don't know how scientific this is,
32:47but there does certainly
32:47seem to be a lot of this disease
32:49in northern Europe.
32:50And as you move down
32:51towards the Mediterranean,
32:52it gets less common.
32:54And as you get to the equator,
32:55it's virtually never seen.
33:01And among its sufferers,
33:02I'm amazed to discover,
33:04are two modern-day warriors
33:05of the North Atlantic.
33:08According to the President's
33:09surgeon at Georgetown University Medical Center,
33:11the President was delighted to know
33:13that he was among such good company
33:15as the Vikings.
33:18And tonight,
33:19Mrs. Thatcher has gone into hospital
33:20for an operation on her hand.
33:22She's suffering from a condition
33:24called Dupitron's contracture,
33:25which could cause the loss of movement
33:27in her little finger if untreated.
33:29Could Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan
33:34really be the descendants of Vikings?
33:40Today, the disease is treated surgically
33:42by cutting tendons to free the hand.
33:46There's good reason to believe
33:47that Vikings suffered from this disease.
33:49Several mentions of such a condition
33:51are found in the sagas,
33:53stories written by the Vikings' descendants.
33:55One story in the sagas
33:58tells of Gudmundur the Good,
34:00an Icelandic priest.
34:02He has a servant woman brought to him
34:04to massage his feet,
34:05but the massage isn't very good
34:07because three fingers of the woman's hand
34:09are clenched into her palm.
34:13Gudmundur's frustration finally boils over.
34:18By kicking out,
34:20he ruptures the tendons in the woman's hand,
34:22but as a result, she's cured.
34:25The story of Dupitron's contracture
34:31is encouraging in the search
34:32for a Viking genetic legacy.
34:34But now, David Goldstein
34:36must begin the task
34:37of recruiting volunteers
34:38to donate their DNA.
34:40...largely east to west.
34:47One of the places
34:48where samples will be collected
34:49is Orkney.
34:50So, what do you do
34:56is just to break open the swab,
34:58pull it out and rub it.
35:00On the inside of your cheek...
35:01Goldstein's colleague,
35:02Jim Wilson,
35:03a native Orcadian,
35:04has returned home
35:05to look for volunteers.
35:07Cells taken from the inside
35:09of their cheeks
35:09should provide enough DNA.
35:13The reason I'm so fascinated
35:15by the Orkneys
35:16is because I grew up here
35:17and everyone here
35:19is really interested
35:20in where they come from
35:21in their heritage.
35:22I think out of anywhere in Britain,
35:24here has the strongest evidence
35:26for Viking settlement,
35:27both archaeologically
35:28and linguistically.
35:29I mean, all the place names
35:30of Orkney
35:31are Scandinavian in origin
35:32and we have such
35:33a strong cultural heritage
35:35I wondered if I'd be able
35:36to find a genetic heritage
35:38to go along with it.
35:39And at last we have the tools
35:40to really look into this question
35:42and answer it.
35:44In the coming months
35:45the team will travel
35:46across Britain and Ireland
35:47collecting samples.
35:54So I'll keep these cool
35:55in the fridge.
35:56But will they find traces
35:57of Viking ancestry?
35:59There's no guarantee
36:00of success.
36:02Yeah, but the Vikings
36:03didn't ask people
36:04to sign consent forms,
36:05did they?
36:08Back on the hunt
36:09for evidence of Viking attacks,
36:11something extraordinary
36:12has come up on the mainland.
36:14I'd almost given up hope
36:15of finding archaeological evidence
36:17in Britain for a Viking raid
36:18on a monastery.
36:20But new finds
36:20in the north of Scotland
36:21could be just what I'm looking for.
36:26On this site,
36:27at Talbot,
36:28about 30 miles
36:29north of Inverness,
36:30archaeologists have discovered
36:31traces of a monastery
36:32that dates from the 8th century.
36:34Now it carries on in use
36:35throughout the time
36:36that Viking raids
36:37are starting up
36:38and it certainly lies
36:39in a very vulnerable position
36:40because it's right next
36:41to the coast.
36:43But up till now,
36:44this monastery,
36:45along with all the others
36:46we know from this period,
36:48have shown no archaeological evidence
36:49of a Viking raid.
36:51Professor Martin Carver,
37:00who's been working
37:01on the site for six years,
37:03began to uncover clues
37:04that this monastery
37:05might have suffered
37:05a violent attack.
37:07The first sign
37:08was large fragments
37:10of broken Christian sculpture.
37:11When we found the pieces
37:15of sculpture,
37:15we noticed two things
37:17about them straight away.
37:19First,
37:20they are astonishingly beautiful
37:23and very, very fresh.
37:25Every body working on the site
37:27was, you can imagine,
37:28hugely excited
37:29digging up works of art
37:31if something doesn't happen
37:32very often
37:33in one's archaeological career
37:35or whatever, in fact.
37:37The carving just seems
37:38like it was made yesterday.
37:40We also noticed
37:42that in many cases
37:43they'd been sort of
37:44really just smashed
37:46and cracked.
37:47Look at that.
37:48And in many cases
37:49we could fit them
37:50together again, you see.
37:52Clearly some,
37:53one or more,
37:54great monuments
37:54had been broken up
37:55and broken up forcibly
37:57and quickly
37:58and violently
37:58with a sledgehammer.
38:01Right,
38:02we are going down
38:03to visit the revetment wall now.
38:06I'll just lead the way...
38:07At the site,
38:08Martin shows me the spot
38:09where he'd uncovered
38:10the sculpture.
38:12It's this layer here.
38:14You see the black one
38:15that goes across.
38:17That's the one
38:18that produced
38:18all the sculpture,
38:20the broken pieces of sculpture.
38:21There's some big bits
38:22of charcoal in that.
38:23There are.
38:23This is burnt wood
38:24and there's nails as well
38:26in the same layer.
38:27So what do you think
38:28is actually going on here?
38:30Well,
38:30somebody has burnt down buildings,
38:33but I think not here.
38:34This isn't burning in situ.
38:36They've burnt down a building
38:37probably near the top
38:38of the hill
38:38where the church now stands,
38:40broken up sculpture
38:41and tipped it down here.
38:43So the heart's been
38:44torn out of this monastery.
38:48Given that
38:49there's lots of documentary evidence
38:51for Viking attacks
38:52on monasteries,
38:54but no archaeological evidence
38:55up to now,
38:56do you think you've got
38:56the first evidence
38:57of one of these attacks?
38:59I think we may have.
39:00I mean,
39:00this burning layer
39:01may well be a clue.
39:03And if we can confirm
39:05this as the violent
39:07end of a monastery
39:08and we can date it
39:09to the 9th century
39:09and ascribe it to the Vikings
39:11and why not,
39:12I think that will be down
39:13to opening a really big area.
39:18But that's not all.
39:19There's other evidence
39:20at this site
39:21that points to a Viking raid,
39:23the bodies of murdered monks.
39:26Most of the monks' burials
39:28probably lie underneath
39:29the present churchyard,
39:30but some of them
39:31were discovered
39:31when the present church
39:32was investigated
39:33and its floors were dug up.
39:35They're really what you'd expect
39:36of a group of monks.
39:37They're mostly middle-aged males,
39:39but several of them
39:40showed signs of sword wounds.
39:43They may have been
39:44a group of peaceful monks,
39:45but some of them
39:46seem to have had
39:47a very violent death.
39:51Could this have happened
39:52during the period
39:53of Viking attacks?
39:55Martin has sent bones
39:56from three of the skeletons
39:57for carbon dating.
40:00Two of the skeletons
40:02are from what looks like
40:03part of the monastic burial ground.
40:06A third is from
40:07a different part
40:07of the cemetery
40:08and carbon dating reveals
40:09that he died after 1100,
40:12once the monastery
40:13had been destroyed.
40:14But the two skeletons
40:15thought to be monks
40:16tell a different story.
40:18They died sometime
40:20between the years 700
40:21and 1000,
40:23a large range,
40:24but it fits perfectly
40:25with the period
40:26of Viking attacks.
40:31If you look at the injuries,
40:32you'll see that the kind
40:33of injuries they sustained
40:34are the kind of injuries
40:35that come from sword cuts.
40:38Yes, so what sort of injury
40:39did this person sustain, Martin?
40:40Is it these?
40:42Yes, two grooves here
40:44made by a heavy blade,
40:46but then healed up.
40:50Now, this one here
40:50was less lucky.
40:53I mean, that is a very,
40:54very, very...
40:54That's a massive...
40:55That's a massive cut
40:56and a very heavy blade
40:57that's cut that through.
40:59And there's another little...
41:00Can you see that little one there?
41:01So that's two slicing blows
41:03to the back of the head.
41:04Yes, to the back of the head.
41:05And then that one,
41:07coup de grace, so to speak,
41:08that's a cut across here.
41:10And then this fracture
41:10has spread as a result
41:12of that massive blow.
41:14Do you really think
41:15that these are the victims
41:16of Vikings?
41:18Well, I think they could be.
41:19These two people
41:20have both suffered blade injuries.
41:22This one certainly died
41:23from the attack.
41:26And at the same time,
41:27our monastic establishment
41:29seems to be coming to an end.
41:33I mean, as a result
41:34of this evidence,
41:34I at least find it easier
41:37to believe in tales
41:39of Viking attacks
41:40on monasteries
41:41than I did before.
41:44These new discoveries
41:46are surely the best
41:48archaeological evidence
41:49from the British Isles
41:50for Viking raids.
41:52But they're exciting
41:53for another reason.
41:55No raid at Tarbot
41:56was ever documented.
41:58Indeed, not even the existence
41:59of the monastery
42:00was known
42:01until the recent excavations.
42:03So how many other raids
42:05went unreported?
42:06But this isn't the end
42:15of the story.
42:16The Vikings didn't only
42:17hit and run.
42:19In Anglesey,
42:19where I've seen evidence
42:20for attacks,
42:21there are also hints
42:22that the Vikings
42:23later settled.
42:26Viking silver,
42:28weights and other objects
42:29suggest a trading post.
42:31And nearby,
42:34at the church
42:34of St Serial,
42:35I met someone
42:36who believes
42:37that the Vikings
42:38eventually returned
42:39and left their mark
42:40in sculpture.
42:48So what is it?
42:50Is it somebody
42:50holding something
42:51in their hand?
42:51Well, that's right.
42:53You see,
42:53it's holding
42:54what appears
42:54to be a hammer
42:55or an axe
42:58in its hand.
42:59And there is nothing
43:00like it in Wales.
43:01Right.
43:02Now, it could be
43:03a sheer coincidence.
43:05But the only example
43:07that I know of
43:08occurs in the church
43:10at Gotland in Sweden.
43:12Now, as you can see,
43:14it's a similar bearded figure,
43:16but he is holding
43:18in his hand
43:18a hammer.
43:19But more interestingly,
43:22in his other hand,
43:23and sadly this one
43:24has lost his other arm
43:26and hand,
43:26he is holding
43:27Smith's tools.
43:29And we know exactly
43:31who this little gentleman is.
43:32He is the dwarf god
43:34of Smith's,
43:36pure Norse.
43:40There may be a connection,
43:42but there certainly
43:43is clear-cut evidence
43:44for a more permanent
43:45Viking presence
43:46elsewhere across
43:47the British Isles.
43:48found in pagan grave goods,
43:51place names,
43:52and sculpture.
43:53But what does it all mean?
43:55Did Vikings stay a while
43:57before heading back
43:58to Scandinavia?
43:59Or did some never
44:00leave these islands?
44:02We hope to find some answers
44:03in the genes
44:04of the Vikings' descendants.
44:05David Goldstein has come
44:12to Bergen
44:12in western Norway
44:13because before
44:15he can identify
44:16Viking roots
44:17in the British Isles,
44:18he needs to know
44:19how to recognise
44:20Viking genetic signatures.
44:21Thanks very much.
44:22To find these,
44:24he'll collect blood
44:24from a number of locations
44:25across Scandinavia,
44:27starting close to
44:29where the first Vikings
44:30may have set sail.
44:30Some men here
44:32ought to share DNA
44:34with those first raiders.
44:38I'm wondering
44:39how you view
44:40your own ancestry.
44:41Do you view yourself
44:43as having
44:43Viking ancestors?
44:45Yes, I do.
44:47It's a sort of
44:48mixed feeling
44:49because you're
44:50sort of proud
44:51of your history
44:54and at the same time
44:55you know that
44:56these people
44:57were barbarians.
44:58I've heard that
45:02the Vikings
45:02settled in Dublin
45:05or made Dublin
45:07so if we Norwegians
45:09can claim Dublin
45:09back to us
45:10that would be great.
45:13What Professor Goldstein
45:14finds in the DNA
45:15of these samples
45:16would be critical
45:17for the success
45:18of the project.
45:21He must be able
45:22to distinguish
45:23the Norwegian samples
45:24from those
45:25of another important
45:26sample area,
45:27Castlereagh
45:27in Central Ireland
45:28because in contrast
45:30this is a region
45:31unlikely to have
45:32been invaded
45:33by the Vikings
45:33or anyone else
45:35over the last
45:352,000 years.
45:37So it should give
45:38Goldstein the signature
45:39of the ancient
45:40indigenous Britons
45:41the people who
45:42occupied these islands
45:43before the Vikings
45:44arrived.
45:45These first results
46:01will indicate
46:01if it's going
46:02to be possible
46:03to distinguish
46:03the DNA
46:04of Norwegian Vikings
46:05from that
46:06of the indigenous
46:07Britons.
46:09Fortunately
46:09the first signs
46:11are good.
46:11What we're showing
46:15is the results
46:16of looking
46:17at Y-chromosomes
46:17from both samples
46:18and doing that
46:19we can identify
46:20particular types
46:21of Y-chromosomes
46:22and we just represent
46:23those types
46:24with colors here.
46:25So if you look
46:26at the Irish sample
46:27here what you can see
46:28is in fact
46:29just two types
46:30of Y-chromosomes.
46:31The type
46:31that we've designated
46:32in yellow
46:32that's very dominant
46:33and then you see
46:35a second type
46:35represented in blue.
46:37When you look
46:38at the Norwegian sample
46:39immediately you see
46:40that it's quite different
46:41and in fact
46:42you see a set
46:43of types
46:44in the Norwegian sample
46:45that aren't found
46:45in the Irish sample
46:47at all.
46:48So this is a pretty
46:48good start to the project
46:49isn't it?
46:50Yeah that's right.
46:51I mean fortunately
46:52the differences
46:52are so great
46:53which I should say
46:54is not something
46:55that happens all that
46:55often when you do
46:56this kind of work
46:57but here
46:58the differences
46:58are sufficiently great
46:59that we can see
47:00some things immediately
47:01in terms of identifying
47:03Scandinavian signatures
47:04in the British Isles
47:05so this is really
47:06extremely encouraging
47:07that the project
47:08that we've set up
47:09to do can be done.
47:14The vital first step
47:16finding the key
47:17for tracing Norwegian Vikings
47:18has been successful.
47:21What will it tell us
47:22about where they settled?
47:23We'll be following
47:24the project
47:25as it unfolds
47:26in Blood of the Vikings.
47:46Transcription by CastingWords
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