Quoth the Walkyrie: I will ask thee, for thou knowest the truth of all these things, of the meed of the Poets, since thou must know clearly the state of the minstrels that live with Harold.
Quoth the Raven: It is easily seen by their cheer, and their gold rings, that they are among the friends of the king. They have red cloaks right fairly fringed, silver-mounted swords, and ring-woven sarks, gilt trappings, and graven helmets, wrist-fitting rings, the gifts of Harold.[12]
As regards social organization, Viking society shows the Germanic division into three classes, thrall, churl, and noble. Their respective characters and occupations are thus described in the Rigsmal:—
Thrall was of swarthy skin, his hands wrinkled, his knuckles bent, his fingers thick, his face ugly, his back broad, his heels long. He began to put forth his strength, binding bast, making loads, and bearing home faggots the weary long day. His children busied themselves with building fences, dunging plowland, tending swine, herding goats, and digging peat. Their names were Sooty and Cowherd, Clumsy and Lout and Laggard, etc. Carl, or churl, was red and ruddy, with rolling eyes, and took to breaking oxen, building plows, timbering houses, and making carts. Earl, the noble, had yellow hair, his cheeks were rosy, his eyes were keen as a young serpent’s. His occupation was shaping the shield, bending the bow, hurling the javelin, shaking the lance, riding horses, throwing dice, fencing, and swimming. He began to waken war, to redden the field, and to fell the doomed.[13]
Both churl and earl were largely represented in those who went to sea, but the nobility naturally preponderated, and it is particularly their exploits which the sagas and poems celebrate. Viking warfare was no mere clash of swords; they conducted their military operations with skill and foresight, and showed great power of adapting themselves to new conditions, whether that meant the invasion of an open country or the siege of a fortified town. Much, however, must be credited to their furor Teutonicus, to that exuberance of military spirit which they had inherited from far-off ancestors. Not all were wolf-coated Bearsarks, but all seemed to have that delight in war and conflict for their own sakes which breathes through their poetry:—
The sword in the king’s hand bit through the weeds of Woden [mail] as if it were whisked through water, the spear-points clashed, the shields were shattered, the axes rattled on the heads of the warriors. Targets and skulls were trodden under the Northmen’s shield-fires [weapons] and the hard heels of their hilts. There was a din in the island, the kings dyed the shining rows of shields in the blood of men. The wound-fires [blades] burnt in the bloody wounds, the halberds bowed down to take the life of men, the ocean of gore dashed upon the swords’-ness, the flood of the shafts fell upon the beach of Stord. Halos of war mixed under the vault of the bucklers; the battle-tempest blew underneath the clouds of the targets, the lees of the sword-edges [blood] pattered in the gale of Woden. Many a man fell into the stream of the brand.[14]
Again:—
Brands broke against the black targets, wounds waxed when the princes met. The blades hammered against the helm-crests, the wound-gravers, the sword’s point, bit. I heard that there fell in the iron-play Woden’s oak [heroes] before the swords [the sword-belt’s ice].
Second Burden: There was a linking of points and a gnashing of edges: Eric got renown there.
Second Stave: The prince reddened the brand, there was a meal for the ravens; the javelin sought out the life of man, the gory spears flew, the destroyer of the Scots fed the steed of the witch [wolves], the sister of Nari [Hell] trampled on the supper of the eagles [corses]. The cranes of battle [shafts] flew against the walls of the sword [bucklers], the wound-mew’s lips [the arrows’ barbs] were not left thirsty for gore. The wolf tore the wounds, and the wave of the sword [blood] plashed against the beak of the raven.