Vikings : the North Atlantic saga / edited by William W. Fitzhugh, [and] Elisabeth I. Ward

Includes bibliographical references and index.

I.Viking Homelands -- Scandinavia in the Viking Age -- The Scandinavian Landscape: People and Environment -- Farming and Daily Life -- Religion, Art, and Runes -- Shamanism and the Vikings? -- Political Organization and Social Life -- From Warrior to Trade Economy -- Ships and Navigation --II. Viking Raiders -- The Viking Age in Europe -- The Eastern Route: Finland in the Viking Age -- "Laid Waste, Plundered, and Burned": Vikings in Frankia -- Viking Expansion and Cultural Blending in Britain and Ireland -- III.Vikings in the North Atlantic -- Sagas of Western Expansion -- The North Atlantic Environment -- Vikings in the Faeroe Islands -- The Archaeology of Landnám: Early Settlement in Iceland -- The Icelandic Commonwealth Period: Building a New Society -- Eddas and Sagas in Medieval Iceland -- IV. Viking America -- 1000 A.D.: East Meets West -- Skraeling: First Peoples of Helluland, Markland, and Vinland -- A Norse Penny from Maine -- The Viking Settlement at L'Anse aux Meadows -- Jasper Cores from L'Anse aux Meadows -- An Introduction to the Vinland Sagas -- Greenlanders' Saga -- Erik the Red's Saga -- V. Norse Greenland -- From Vikings to Norsemen -- Life and Death in Norse Greenland -- The Farm Beneath the Sand -- Greenland and Europe -- Natives and Norse in Greenland -- The Demise of Norse Greenland -- The Norse Legacy in Greenland -- VI. Viking Legacy -- Celebrating the Viking Millennium in America -- The Old Norse Dream -- Reflections on an Icon: Vikings in American Culture -- Stumbles and Pitfalls in the Search for Viking America -- The Newport Tower -- Sagas and Science: Climate and Human Impacts in the North Atlantic -- Travel the Viking Trail: Tourism and Viking Heritage.

"Celebrates and explores the Viking saga from the combined perspectives of history, archaeology, oral tradition, literature, and natural science. The book's contributors chart the spread of marauders and traders in Europe as well as the movement of farmers and explorers throughout the North Atlantic and into the New World"--Back cover