00:00small enough for children, windowless, low-roofed. Storage buildings designed not for goods,
00:07but for human cargo. Dublin's Norse rulers did not only plunder gold and silver,
00:13they plundered bodies. A captured wife ceased to be a person. She became inventory. In the markets,
00:20her value was calculated without emotion. 20 silver for a young woman, 15 for a mother,
00:2810 if she was injured during capture. These prices are not speculation. They are carved
00:35into runic inscriptions in Schleswig, receipts etched in stone, and yet being sold was sometimes
00:42the best possible fate. In 862, Viking forces stormed the settlement of Port Marrow. Irish annals record
00:5247 warriors killed and say nothing about the 53 women taken from the longhouses.
00:59The bogs nearby tell the rest. Soil tests uncovered 23 female bodies, all bearing signs of deliberate
01:07violence. These were not chaotic deaths. The injuries followed patterns. Skulls fractured from behind,
01:15forearms shattered in defence, ribs broken by prolonged assault. These were not battle casualties.
01:23They were executions, carried out days after the raid, after decisions had been made.
01:29The pattern repeats. In 871, the great heathen army captured Reading.
01:36Chroniclers describe King Æthelred's defeat, but remain silent about the royal women.
01:41Excavations at the old Saxon palace speak instead. Stone floors stained with iron oxide. Blood residue,
01:51enough for dozens of deaths. Norse war culture had laws, strict ones. If a warrior was slain,
01:58his wife became the lawful property of his killer. Not a servant, a forced wife. The old Norse word was
02:06Kona, an owned woman. Property that breathes. Icelandic law codes describe the ritual precisely.
02:14The captor declared ownership before witnesses. The woman had no choice. No voice, no escape.
02:22The marriage was legal. Any children born were legitimate. The assault was not merely tolerated,
02:29it was written into law. The Gragas law codes were explicit. The claim had to be made within three
02:36days of capture, or rivals could contest it. Women were fought over like livestock. And forced
02:43marriage was not even the worst fate. In 878, Norse raiders destroyed the monastery at Bangor. The
02:51annals record its annihilation, but omit what followed. Burn layers at similar sites reveal the truth.
02:58Bone fragments of women arranged in deliberate patterns. Norse funerary law demanded sacrifice.
03:05When a warrior died, so did his horses, his weapons, and his women.
03:12In 921, Ibn Fadlan witnessed such a funeral on the Volga. A slave girl was raped,
03:19then killed at her master's burial. Archaeology confirms this was no isolated ritual.
03:26Boat burials across Scandinavia contained female skeletons with strangulation marks. Drug residues,
03:33henbane, embedded in teeth. They were subdued before death. Dazed, hallucinating, compliant.
03:41Perhaps it dulled the terror. Or perhaps it made it worse.
03:44By 873, the great army wintered at Thetford. Chronicles mention cattle stolen and churches burned.
03:55They say nothing of what happened inside the camp. The rubbish pits speak instead. Infant bones.
04:01Dozens. Blunt force trauma. Not stillbirths. Murders. Viking law was clear. If the mother was a slave,
04:10the child was a slave. If the child could not work, the child was killed.
04:15Brutal economics. The Domes Day book later records the practice continuing under Norman rule.
04:23Population studies in Yorkshire show sudden gaps exactly where the Norse settlements stood.
04:29The bones at Repton confirm it. The great army's camp of 873 to 874 contained skeletons.
04:38Only 63 were women. Women do not vanish unless they are carried away.
04:44Isotope analysis proves the truth. The women were not local. They came from Ireland, Scotland,
04:50Wales. Those buried were the fortunate ones. Dead from childbirth or disease. The rest disappeared into
04:58the slave routes. Viking Dublin was not just a port. It was a hub of human trafficking.
05:06Weekly ships arrived with fresh captives. Women were sorted by age. The young sent to Norse farms as
05:13breeding stock. The older shipped east, into Islamic slave markets along the Russian rivers.
05:19Dendrochronology, the study of tree rings, reveals the scale. Dublin's waterfront was rebuilt continuously
05:27from 841 to 970. Over 60 years of expansion. Not for fishing, not for fur. For slavery.
05:38Warehouses built of stone, designed to hold 200 captives at once. Drainage channels cut into
05:45floors, not for rain, but for human waste. These were not temporary holding pens. They were long-term
05:53storage facilities. Human stock rooms. Arabic chroniclers of the 9th century described Viking
06:00slave caravans reaching Baghdad. Women fetched premium prices. Pale-skinned captives were treated as
06:07rare luxuries. Displayed like exotic goods. The Vikings understood their buyers and supplied them
06:14with ruthless efficiency. The eastern slave route stretched over a thousand miles, through Novgorod
06:21and Kiev, down the Dnieper. Rune-carved ship manifests list slaves alongside amber and furs. About 20 women
06:30per ship. Standard cargo. But captivity was not the worst fate. Nor was forced marriage. Nor ritual sacrifice.
06:39The most terrifying fate awaited those who resisted. In 914, Irish forces retook Dublin. The Annals celebrate
06:48victory. They say nothing about what was found outside the walls. Archaeology fills the silence.
06:56Punishment pits. Stone-lined holes designed for slow death. Inside, women with legs broken to prevent escape.
07:06Arms shattered to prevent suicide. They were not killed quickly. They were kept alive to suffer.
07:12Each pit was six feet deep. Too narrow to lie flat. Too shallow to stand. Victims died crouched in agony over
07:21days. Sometimes weeks. Viking law codes confirmed the punishment. Any slave woman who harmed her master was
07:29to be buried alive. But never sealed. Enough air to breathe. Not enough to live. Soil layers confirmed
07:37prolonged death. Some pits contained sharp stones to tear flesh. Others held standing water to drown
07:45slowly. The goal was not death. It was instruction. Other captives were forced to watch. Defiance had
07:52consequences. By 919 Norse civil wars ended. Expansions slowed. The slave economy did not. It became
08:02organised. People were delivered on schedules. Merchants promised delivery dates for human beings.
08:09Byzantine trade records preserved the details. The Rus-Byzantine Treaty of 944 lists slave prices by
08:18category. Young women commanded the highest value. Pregnant women sold at a discount. Children under 10
08:27were nearly worthless. The market had rules.
08:31If you enjoyed this video, be sure to share your thoughts in the comments, like and share it. And
08:37don't forget to subscribe to our channel so we can bring more such insightful and informative videos to
08:43you. Remember, the joy of spreading knowledge is best when we're all together. Supply chains. Predictable
08:51profit. In 937, the last great Viking invasion of Ireland ended at Brunenberg. The victory was decisive.
09:00What they found afterward was worse. Portable breeding pens. Engineered cages with iron fittings.
09:08Chain sized for children. Modular frames. Assembled and dismantled for travel. Mobile slave markets that
09:15marched with the army. Each pen held a dozen adults or 20 children. Wear marks proved constant use.
09:24This was not random cruelty. It was logistics. For the Vikings, war was not only conquest. It was harvesting
09:32people. Women were not collateral damage. They were the objective. Captured. Processed. Distributed.
09:40Every Norse settlement had holding pens. Every harbour had processing sites. The system was everywhere.
09:48In 954, Erik Bloodaxe fell. The last Viking kingdom in England collapsed.
09:54The slave networks did not. They were absorbed. Christian rulers inherited them and renamed them.
10:02Monastic records suddenly describe indentured servants. In massive numbers.
10:07These were not contracts. They were the same women. Slavery. Rebranded.
10:14In 1066, Harold Hardrada died at Stamford Bridge.
10:18The Viking Age ended. Archaeology reveals what the chronicles hide.
10:23Mass graves of women. Dated to Viking defeats. Executed. Erased. At Repton, a sealed grave dated 986
10:33was uncovered. 236 bodies. All female. Blunt force trauma. Strangulation. Poisoning.
10:41Isotope testing revealed the truth. These were not captives. They were Norse-born.
10:47The Vikings' own wives. Their daughters. They knew exactly what awaited them.
10:53And they chose death over capture. Thank you for watching.
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