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Post by Gunnar Wolfgard on Feb 26, 2019 13:18:58 GMT
How did we go from women warriors in history to video games? Hope video games are not going to become the new source of information. I'll leave that one to you guys because I outgrew playing games a long time ago. But are you telling us Jordan is wrong about those games ?
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Post by Deleted on Feb 26, 2019 13:22:15 GMT
I didn’t intend to seriously start a debate, but I’m actually glad we are discussing this with different viewpoints without attacking each other. Perhaps, also not using gaming references as any evidence at all? My one and only contribution, aside from noting women fighting as men, would be topical to this board based on swords. The instance of Kady Brownell. The only woman known to have been officially discharged from the federal army and later pensioned after the American Civil War. www.newspapers.com/clip/2267270/kady_brownell_vivandiere/www.accessible-archives.com/2011/03/kady-brownell-the-heroine-of-newbern/There were, of course, other possible instances and as we were regarding cavalry, here is a possible trooper.
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Post by Gunnar Wolfgard on Feb 26, 2019 13:27:32 GMT
Yep, that looks like a woman to me.
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Post by nerdthenord on Feb 26, 2019 13:58:09 GMT
How did we go from women warriors in history to video games? Hope video games are not going to become the new source of information. I'll leave that one to you guys because I outgrew playing games a long time ago. But are you telling us Jordan is wrong about those games ? Slightly off topic yes😆. The train of logic seems to be that modern pop culture will confuse future historians. As for saying Jordan is wrong, I’m just saying some details he mentioned were inaccurate. No worries though. It’s all good. It’s funny actually now that I think about it. The old histories and sagas probably aren’t a whole lot more accurate than modern “historical” video games.
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Post by Jordan Williams on Feb 26, 2019 16:04:55 GMT
How did we go from women warriors in history to video games? Hope video games are not going to become the new source of information. I'll leave that one to you guys because I outgrew playing games a long time ago. But are you telling us Jordan is wrong about those games ? Slightly off topic yes😆. The train of logic seems to be that modern pop culture will confuse future historians. As for saying Jordan is wrong, I’m just saying some details he mentioned were inaccurate. No worries though. It’s all good. It’s funny actually now that I think about it. The old histories and sagas probably aren’t a whole lot more accurate than modern “historical” video games. Shoulda made my comment more clear. Women soldiers in BFV (and the mission in Norway, forget the name), Black Germans in BF1 (sure they are "based" on colonial soldiers fighting for the Germans, but they're garbed in European front attire and on the western and eastern fronts. If they want to use this excuse - they should have had some missions regarding colonial Germany and it's own little war). Less wrong, more misinterpreted because I made a bonehead comment. Gunnar Wolfgard boy you really jumped at that didn't ya. Read above. @edelweiss not using games as evidence for historical women fighting, but more as a comment of how some folks want to rewrite some parts of history to make them fit our modern views better, hence my thoughts on instead of the future generations being told there were 0 female soldiers in the middle East, I think it would be more likely that it would be portrayed as equal numbers of each opposite gender fighting.
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Post by AndiTheBarvarian on Feb 26, 2019 16:17:17 GMT
Back to topic! The grave is located in Birka. Is a viking still a viking at all when he (or she) is not on a viking??
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Post by Deleted on Feb 26, 2019 16:47:38 GMT
Back to topic! The grave is located in Birka. Is a viking still a viking at all when he (or she) is not on a viking??
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Post by Cosmoline on Feb 26, 2019 20:07:14 GMT
Yep, that looks like a woman to me. Folks in earlier times don't seem to have noticed this kind of thing. There are many examples of women-as-men participating in war. For Vikings it could be they simply treated certain women as men, and certain men as women. We don't know. We probably never will.
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Post by Cosmoline on Feb 26, 2019 20:09:21 GMT
@edelweiss not using games as evidence for historical women fighting, but more as a comment of how some folks want to rewrite some parts of history to make them fit our modern views better, hence my thoughts on instead of the future generations being told there were 0 female soldiers in the middle East, I think it would be more likely that it would be portrayed as equal numbers of each opposite gender fighting. Of course, this sin has ALWAYS been happening, long before modern video games. The image of vikings as fur-clad "berserkers" is absolute hogwash historically. But people will cling to it very hard because it matches the image they want to have.
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Post by RufusScorpius on Feb 26, 2019 20:58:38 GMT
I didn’t intend to seriously start a debate, but I’m actually glad we are discussing this with different viewpoints without attacking each other. How is is possible to have a debate unless we have different viewpoints? Nobody needs to be upset or attack others simply because we don't rubber stamp an idea. The only thing I ever ask from a debate is that if you disagree with me, then state your position and WHY you support it. It's the "why" of a point of view that I'm interested in discussing I have changed my position on certain topics once I was introduced to information that I didn't previously had that changed the context of what I thought I knew. Doesn't happen often, but it has been known once in a while. As for science, real science that is, it's based on skepticism and never taking any data or theories as "final". There is always something else new to learn. But, alas, science needs funding and funding comes from "shocking discoveries" and sensationalism. Our responsibility is to question the answers and never stop looking for more information.
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Post by bebut on Feb 26, 2019 21:51:15 GMT
That is the point I am trying to make. We can't simply find something, then make up an entire world around one piece of evidence. Nor can we judge the past, or look at it in any way, with the eyes of our modern society. Introducing our personal or social bias into what happened a thousand years ago is simply wrong. We have to look at history within the context of when it happened and how the people that were living in those times looked at the world and what their societal norms were. As far as a female Viking warrior/soldier, I reserve judgement on what it means in the larger context of Viking society. Have females fought wars as battlefield soldiers in the past? Yes, of course. Have females been successful commanders/rulers of warrior societies? Also yes. Was it common enough to say past societies were inclusive and gender neutral where all inhabitants were co-equals? No, of course not. How much was "common" and how much was not remains to be seen. But the broader brush of history shows that women as warriors was not very common at all as can be seen in artwork and mass graves of the times. Let's just try to avoid forcing the past to fit our expectations of the present. If previous societies had been gender neutral we would not be here to talk about it. Our species would be extinct.
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Post by Timo Nieminen on Feb 26, 2019 22:05:49 GMT
I'm not sure of how many others think this way; but I am more wary of this being more based in politics, or to prove an agenda or a point than in wanting to find the truth of the matter. Frankly, I just expect all science reporting to be based on sensationalism and varying levels of misunderstanding of the source material. It's all written on a ridiculously tight schedule and "shocking" "discoveries" sell, simple as that. Always read the actual studies and ignore what the articles claim they say or imply. In this case, the "eastern clothing" and the "horse archer" are from the actual study. IMO, these are very weakly supported suggestions. The clothing - mostly not preserved - is "interpreted as a kaftan of eastern fashion" on the basis of surviving decoration: "bands of imported silk that had been embroidered with silver brocade". The horse archer suggestion, "probably a mounted archer", comes from (a) the many weapons (thus a professional warrior), (b) the horses, and probably (c) possible eastern clothing.
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Post by Timo Nieminen on Feb 26, 2019 22:12:45 GMT
Bows were used for war (as well as sport) among the Norse, they were just rarely a decisive factor and not fashionable with the warrior elite. [...] It just wasn't generally seen as particularly prestigious or noteworthy. Which is true, but it should be noted that "not fashionable" doesn't mean that the elite didn't use bows. Multiple kings are described as using bows in battle: Olav Trygvasson in 1000, Magnus Barefoot in 1098. Also heroes in sagas, most famously Gunnar in his last stand in Njal's saga. More kings are recording as being killed by arrows than killing by arrows (two kings in the Year of the Three Battles alone: Harald Hardrada and Harold Godwinson).
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Post by zabazagobo on Feb 26, 2019 23:05:02 GMT
Back to topic! The grave is located in Birka. Is a viking still a viking at all when he (or she) is not on a viking??
Yes, exactly
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Post by Cosmoline on Feb 27, 2019 0:47:33 GMT
Although she may have been a warrior, I find it hilarious that even some of those who fancy themselves scholarly (Matt Easton anyone?) try everything in their power to establish that HEMA is for women, and try to cite historical examples to argue that point. There are far and few examples of warrior women (Joan D'Arc, a single saint depiction in a treatise, etc.). To address the I.33 reference, nobody in that text would be considered a "warrior." While some clerics did fight and some bishops had their own armies, the Church remained strongly against the mixing of the two roles. The fighting demonstrated is in plain clothes, whereas actual military combat was by this point entirely in harness. The weapons used--sword and buckler--were the equivalent to sidearms. So the analogy would be to a handgun instruction book, not to a warrior training manual. And in that context there's no reason to believe Walpurgis was anything other than what she appears to be--a young noblewoman getting some defense instruction from clerics. Clerics being safer than the local militia leader, and the Priest apparently being a noted sword fighting expert. What the text shows us is that sword skills in the period and locale were not exclusively limited to males of the knightly caste. We can also infer this from the many period paintings showing heavily armed peasants both in revolt and in peace.
It's also problematic to refer to the students of Liechtenauer or Fiore in period as "warriors." They were young knights and squires--members of the nobility or at least gentry. They filled a role that included combat but also encompassed law enforcement, animal husbandry, farming, accounting and judicial roles. When France lost so many of her knights at Agincourt, she lost not just fighting men but adjudicators, land owners, farming experts and investors. There's no modern equivalent to them. And if we go back to the Viking era, it's likely we're even further away form anything recognizable. This is compounded by how few primary sources there are for anything in the "dark ages." Most of what happened then and why will likely always remain a mystery. And each generation seems to fill the dark space up with its own vision of what they prefer. In the 50's the vikings were portrayed as absurd, oily he-men besting the foppish anglo-saxons. Now they've been given an overhaul where they keep the preposterous furs but fight alongside units of shield maidens. They're still fulfilling our fantasies of living as barely civilized and part animal. We don't want to see them dressed in the perfectly tailored and well-made tunics and gowns that the evidence shows they made. We don't want to see them showing off their bling. They're our fantasy of what was right and proper. What we've lost by becoming civilized. But the *REAL* vikings? I don't think we even want to know what they were.
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Post by theophilus736 on Feb 27, 2019 12:58:19 GMT
Solid post Cosmo.
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