Claus Feveile/Birch Archaeometry
Posted on 06/18/2026 1:39:57 AM PDT by SunkenCiv
Live Science reports that a new study of Viking coins from the Damhus hoard, a cache of 226 pennies unearthed in Denmark near the site of the Viking town of Ribe in 2018, suggests that they contain silver recycled from Islamic coins. The 1,000-year-old coins, known as pennies, bear a face on one side thought to represent the Norse god Wodan or Odin, with a stag on the reverse. Thomas Birch of the National Museum of Denmark said that each coin would have been enough to buy ale, bread, or simple tools. Analysis of the coins also shows that when the dies used to stamp them were worn, they were replaced with similar ones, Birch added. At least 30 dies had been used to make these coins, and likely hundreds of thousands like them, at a single mint in Ribe. Twenty-five of the coins were also examined with X-ray fluorescence to analyze their chemical compositions. Trace elements detected in the silver suggest that more than half of the metal in the coins came from Islamic silver coins known as dirhams. The Islamic coins are thought to have been melted down outside of Scandinavia, and transported to Ribe in the form of ingots. "If these coins are being minted in the hundreds of thousands, that's a huge quantity of Islamic silver," Birch explained. Read the open source academic paper on the research at Archaeometry. To read more about what coins can reveal about the ancient Norse, go to "Hoards of the Vikings."
(Excerpt) Read more at archaeology.org ...
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"Heads? Tails? WTH is this?" [tr. from an old Viking inscription]
SO WHAT???? WTF IS WRONG WITH THESE PEOPLE?
The 1,000-year-old coins, known as pennies, bear a face on one side thought to represent the Norse god Wodan or Odin...
Denmark? WTH is this?
If it's Tuesday this must be Belgium, if it's Wednesday this must be Rome.
So what? It's historically interesting.
WTF IS WRONG WITH THESE PEOPLE?
What's wrong with which people? Who said there was anything "wrong" with anyone?
Don't be so hypersensitive.
“The Islamic coins ...”
Exactly how does metal proclaim it’s political ideology ... ?
Headline is annoying ...
RE: “… that each coin would have been enough to buy ale, bread, or simple tools”
Damn… I remember when a handful of pennies got me a comic book, a bunch of cherry string licorice, and a Mountain Dew…
But… Ours were copper not silver…
And I love the fact that these were taken from the Saracens (musloids) and melted down, then re-struck…
Re “… actly how does metal proclaim it’s political ideology…”
Metallurgical identification- the silver itself probably came from a specific region and can be identified through various testing means.
Not so much political as much as regional; and the area it came from was under control of the muzzies.
“Islamic silver” is an interesting concept. I would tend to assume that most “Islamic” silver was stolen from other people and recycled. Even if the silver was originally mined in a part of the world now inhabited by Muslims, it was likely first mined and used by an earlier, now conquored, culture.
I don’t have a sense of how this shakes out with regard to gold and silver, which have been endlessly recycled, but what is rattling around in the back of my mind is the sort of detective work the gemnologists have been able to do with various precious and semiprecious stones. Experts in other fields have done similar analysis on wood, fabrics, and other artefacts that demonstrate very distant trade relationships in remarkably early times. Is that kind of traceability possible with gold and silver, given that so much of it has been melted, mixed and reused multiple times?
Viking raiders stole stuff from everywhere they traveled, why should this surprise anyone?
They raped, robbed, looted, burned setting the bar for future the NSDAP, BLM, ISIS and other terrorists around the globe to admire.
Wild guess, the composition was compared with that of known coins, and that was the best match. Because of impurities or additions, it’s sometimes possible to date coins, which is convenient. Analysis of this kind can also identify modern counterfeits of modern or ancient coins.
Vikings traded extensively with the Islamic world, primarily through the Volga River trade networks connecting the Baltic Sea to the Abbasid Caliphate. This commerce was largely fueled by the Vikings' intense demand for Islamic silver coins (dirhams) in exchange for furs, amber, and slaves.
The Vikings were so willing to go anywhere once they heard that there was money to be found there. First, they heard there was money ripe for the taking just across the sea in England so they went and - lo and behold - there were monasteries with gold and no defenders! Then they heard that the Byzantine Empire had riches beyond belief and that Constantinople was the richest city on earth. So they tried to plunder it but Greek Fire stopped them. So then then went even further into Islamic territory and Sicily. So its no surprise that they had Islamic silver. I wouldn’t be surprised if Vikings had Indian metals or jewels either.
bttt
So, Islamists invaded, Vikings defended, won, and took the spoils.
I wish the US would adopt the same.
It means the Vikings slaughtered a shit ton of “Musselmen” to get all that silver. Winning!
They also enslaved many Continental Europeans and British Islanders and sold them to the Islamists. The silver these coins were minted from could have been payment and not stolen.
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