As to the “horned helmets” that is a recent invention. Vikings wore domed helmets that would deflect a falling sword. Imagine how it would wrench your neck to have a falling sword impact a horn on your helmet. Stupid.
The Vikings colonized Iceland, Greenland and America (temporarily), the Isle of Man and other north sea islands, as well as Normandy in northern France. The Normans subsequently conquered Southern Italy, England, Sicily, the Crusader Kingdom of Antioch, and twice came within one battle of beating the largest empire of their age, Byzantium.
Pirates is such an understatement and misdirection that I can only express my contempt for the ignorance of the writer. Hopefully they did the Science part better than the History part, but I have my doubts.
FROM WIKI:
Etymology
The word Viking comes from the Old Norse word “vikingr”, lit. “one who came from the fjords”, from “vik”, meaning a bay, creek, fjord or inlet. By the end of the Viking period, the term referred to pirates or robbers operating by sea, known as “vikingr” in West Norse, and was used as a term for sea-born warfare and harrying in the West Norse “viking”. Though mostly used as a general term for pirates there are instances of another use in some of the Icelandic sagas. There some were considered vikings and to be “going on viking” who sailed out to claim fame and fortune for themselves.[3] This could involve seeking the stewardship of kings, trading in foreign parts and raiding. These names were common mainly in Scandinavia itself, however, and many other terms were generally used in the wider world. These included heathens, northmen, Lochlannachs in the Irish tongue, the people from the north, the Danes, Rus’, or simply the foreigners. These terms, however, were used for the Viking peoples as a whole, and thus never accounted for the class distinction between vikings and other Norsemen nor the variety of the Nordic peoples.[4]
Lately I’ve been studying Viking weaponry and you’re quite right about the horned helmet bidness. Never happened. Likely it was a later costume designer for a Wagner opera that did that, and it stuck.
I’m interested in the actual fighting techniques that they might have used for sword & shield, axes and pole arms. Unfortunately not much in the way of documentation has survived, so it is difficult to say with any precision. Hank Reinhart has done a great deal of research on the topic and has some practical and sensible ideas of how it was done, but much of it is based by necessity on later medieval works, on the assumption that techniques with similar weapons later in time would likely have been similar to the earlier techniques on which they were based.
Anyway... it’s an interesting topic. I think it’s fair to say that Western Martial Arts as a discipline was every bit as practiced with deadly elegance as the better-known and documented Asian varieties.