Fishy tale

Vikings invading Scotland in the 9th century did not just come to pillage and
plunder - they came to stay

The Vikings invading northern Scotland in the 9th century did not just come
to pillage and plunder - they came to stay, say archaeologists.
They compared information on diets taken from analysis of human bones with
counts of fish bones found in middens on Orkney. This showed that there was a
widespread change in both diet and fishing methods at that time.
The finding is important because it shows that the Viking invasion did not
just lead to a change in the ruling class, but also the influx of a foreign
peasant class.
Fish supper

Picts in Shetland and Orkney caught fish species found close to the shore.
But Norsemen from Scandinavia fished from boats for offshore species such as
cod, and they ate proportionally more fish in their diet than did the Picts.
By tallying the different species of fish bones in the rubbish heaps of
settlements, the team found evidence of changing eating habits: a large
increase in bones from deep-sea fish.
One of the team, James Barrett at the University of York, told New Scientist
that the transition also shows up as a change in the kinds of fish caught.
"These are the kinds of offshore fish eaten in Norway, not eaten in Scotland.
There's a definite overall shift in diet."
Moving on

A diet rich in fish also leaves traces deep within bones, in characteristic
carbon stable isotope signatures. Examining bones from Orcadian graves, the
team found that Viking bones revealed a greater reliance on fish than did the
Pictish bones.
Migration has been an unfashionable way to explain changes in the way people
lived in the past.
But this evidence, says Barrett, shows that Vikings - probably
peasant-fishers, as well as a ruling elite - settled in this region. "It puts
migration back on the map," he says.
More at: Antiquity, (vol 75, p 145)