The Impacts of Absence and Displacement on Viking Age Childhood

Summary

This is an abstract from the "The Marking and Making of Social Persons: Embodied Understandings in the Archaeologies of Childhood and Adolescence" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Childhood as a part of social and cultural frameworks is varied and fluid, and the space afforded to and occupied by children will vary in multiple ways according to intersecting lines of social identity. The Viking Age is generally recognized as a period of profound social divisions, with social status as a paramount defining line. Gender, ability, kin group, and age also acted to delineate how social personas were created and contained. Here, I wish to discuss the impact of travel on Viking Age childhood. Firstly, the impact that absence in the immediate family may have had on children, when parents or other figures of authority were absent on long-distance expeditions. Secondly, the impact that distance may have had on children themselves who took part in travel. And thirdly, the impact that displacement may have had on children who were brought into slavery. This three-level approach to one influencing factor gives room to examine the definition of childhood in the Viking Age according to social status, as well as how external factors integral to Viking Age cultural realities shaped the experience of childhood.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• The Marking and Making of Social Persons: Embodied Understandings in the Archaeologies of Childhood and Adolescence   •
• Society for American Archaeology 89th Annual Meeting, New Orleans, LA (2024)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 38245.0