Facts about Viking Jewelry
When you remember the Vikings, all that crosses your minds is the savage with huge swords and long sharp spears without thinking of the jewelry that they made. In their jewelry making processes, the Vikings used some high-value metals like gold and silver to make nice rings, necklaces and bracelets. The mixture of these two precious metals made bronze that was used to make brooches which were pieces of jewelry for women during those days. The Vikings also used the pieces of jewelry that they made for other needs other than making the community look beautiful. Therefore I will discuss some truths never known by many people in the current world regarding the Viking pieces of jewelry.
To being with, these Viking pieces of jewelry were worn by both men and women in the society irrespective of their class. This is because the jewels were used to identify the people in the community and this helped there to be tight security as people knew each other. Wealth was identified in these pieces of jewelry as the wealthiest had unique but similar features. Others were used mostly by the women to fasten their clothes so that they can maintain their dignity in the society. It was simple to spot a rich person in the society to show them respects as they had unique pieces of jewelry.
There were those Viking ornaments that were made to portray the true image of the community, and a perfect example was their readiness to face any forthcoming wars by Thor’s hammer. Other ornaments were made to symbolize different occurrences in the community like the death and celebrations of wedding. The most astonishing fact regarding these Viking jewelry is that these proofs were found in burial and hoard sites. The Vikings lived for so many years ago, and therefore the existing evidence can be used to imagine how their lives were during those days.
The Vikings were unique people because they never did something that was not in their culture, that is they did not wear earrings or fingerings even though they used to meet the Slavic people who used to wear. They were aware that earrings and fingerings existed, but they were never bothered to wear them. Even though the society did not wear these pieces of jewelry, those who wanted to wear could not be victimized.
Most of these jewelries were used as their means of exchange. Therefore when people visited the market, they could use these ornaments to pay for the goods and services as they were made of silver.