http://nypost.com/2017/09/08/viking-skeletons-dna-test-proves-historians-wrong/



The remains of a powerful viking — long thought to be a man — was in fact a real-life Xena Warrior Princess, a study released Friday reveals.

The lady war boss was buried in the mid-10th century along with deadly weapons and two horses, leading archaeologists and historians to assume she was a man, according to the findings, published in in the American Journal of Physical Anthropology.

Wrong.

“It’s actually a woman, somewhere over the age of 30 and fairly tall, too, measuring around [5’6″] tall ,” archaeologist Charlotte Hedenstierna-Jonson of Uppsala University, who conducted the study, told The Local.

And she was likely in charge.

“Aside from the complete warrior equipment buried along with her – a sword, an axe, a spear, armor-piercing arrows, a battle knife, shields, and two horses – she had a board game in her lap, or more of a war-planning game used to try out battle tactics and strategies, which indicates she was a powerful military leader,” Hedenstierna-Jonson said.”She’s most likely planned, led and taken part in battles.”

The discovery marks the first genetic proof that women were viking warriors, according to science publication Phys.org.

The viking grave was first found and excavated by Swedish archeologist Hjalmar Stolpe in the late 1800s.

But a few years ago, osteologist Anna Kjellström of Stockholm University, noticed its skeleton had fine cheekbones and feminine hip bones, researches said.

They conducted DNA-analysis and confirmed it was a female.

“This image of the male warrior in a patriarchal society was reinforced by research traditions and contemporary preconceptions. Hence, the biological sex of the individual was taken for granted,” Hedenstierna-Jonson and other researchers wrote in the report.

The research was lead by the Stockholm and Uppsala Universities.

cool beans! even if she was an anomoly

I dont think its an anomoly. It is well known in my country that viking women could be warriors. We even have a name for them. They were called skjoldmøer (shieldmaidens). They were just as fierce as the male warriors.

Very interesting moe! They were a race to be reckoned with as we know!
On a lighter note, it's pretty obvious that women would be up front with the guys, I mean, a guy has to eat! Who else would do the cooking
I think it's uncertain just how far they did go, the long ships were big and strong so they could have gone anywhere

yea, and them boots need polishing, too...

Got the Viking game on right now. They are looking pretty good.

Brees need to give it up.

Interesting find MM,

I wonder how many other "discoveries" have been taken as granted?
In science, one should never assume.

This gender discovery and its implications calls the whole Viking culture into question. Was this female's status a common practice?

In a warlike society, female warriors seem likely. I never thought their war boats were strictly male. This opens the possibilities that many things concerning Vikings is assumed.

It also opens other cultural studies for scrutiny of their assumptions.

i always thought they could tell by the skeleton... if that's true, then someone dropped the ball a long time ago...

I think they dropped 2 moe

and then never picked it up...lol...i wonder who/why it was being covered up?

Well, maybe, as those days when men were men and women were to the scientists just assumed that someone of that high status would obviously be a man?

They must have found the skeleton prior to all the techknowlege we have now...But surprises me that someone did not notice that it was a female...as well...

As Moe said women/men skeleton's are different and should have been caught if they took all the bones and laid them out...

But so much was assumed prior to all the sources we have today~~~

Yes, I is strange, I think they tell be the hip bone and don't women have a different amount of ribs?

Yea they should be able to tell by the bones.. But sure back then they did not really know when this was found.. It seems they just assumed since it was buried with tools and horse bones like they buried the men not many woman was buried with the same things..

But did find this...

http://www.exploreforensics.co.uk/determining-sex.html

A common way in which a pathologist and anthropologist might differentiate between male and female is quite simply bone size. This of course is not always accurate but for the most part male bones are larger in size to female bones and are so because of the addition muscle that may build up on the male body through adolescence and into adulthood.

The pelvis area is another good way of differentiating between the sexes. A female will have a larger sub-pubic angle to that of a man and this is obviously indicative of child bearing requirements in the female that are not required in the male of the species. This difference is noticeable across all species in nature where birth is from the womb. The male's sub-pubic area is less than ninety degrees whilst the female's is more.

The area around the pelvic inlet (in the middle of the pelvic bone) is larger in females than in men again with relevance to child bearing. The skeleton of a female who has given birth will be identifiable by the fact that this space will have widened upon the birth of a child and although it will contract it will not contract fully back to its original size.

Also, if there are strands of red hair and a gun, cover her back over, they have attitude even after life!
Yes Txs, your right, female pelvis isn't fused together. But as you say, it was a long time ago and it wasn't expected for a female to hold a post such as this.

It could be that warrior women have just recently been socially accepted and the truth was subdued as a way to maintain the ideal that men were warriors and women were homemakers.
In the 1800's and most of the 1900's it would have been highly controversial and would jeopardize the Man's World power structure.

"This is a woman Viking leader!"
"No, its not."
"But..."
"Its not!"

exactly tom

With that thought process in mind, how many other deductions are wrong based on the accepted cultures at the time?
How many times has a religious mindset changed our historic version of 'the facts'?

History is recorded by the powerful. The victor tells the story.
Accuracy to fact is subject to the writer's agenda.

As we become more scientifically minded, what histories will be rewritten due to facts that were suppressed? What happens to the lessons already learned from that false data? A lesson learned from lies is a false lesson.

There will remain those that choose to believe that only Viking leaders are men. Despite the evidence to the contrary.
Much like religions have believers despite evidence to the contrary.
The inaccuracies are deeply ingrained into the thought process.

i read a book once, a fantasy about magic, and for some reason they were talking about the future and history texts, when the smarter of the two says "we can't go by the history texts any more than we can with the future texts, for the fact the history texts are more misrepresented than the future texts... the history depends on who wrote it and their perspective, while future texts are a vague interpretation of whats to come"...so they cancel each other out and neither could be used for their problem...

Such be the life of the follower only to find out that which they were told that which they were led to believe was nothing more than the babbling of fools.