Viking era left marks on Scandinavian genetics

The Viking Age, which spanned the 8th centuries^The to 11 AD, left a lasting mark on Scandinavians’ genetics today, according to scientists who have also documented the enormous genetic influence of women who arrived in the region during the Norse conquests in Europe.

A study published on Thursday explored the genetic dynamics of inhabitants of Norway, Sweden and Denmark going back two millennia, based on 297 genomes from ancient human remains and data from 16,638 modern Scandinavian men and women.

The findings provided data on migration patterns and gene flow during the Viking age, when the Norse traveled from Scandinavia aboard wooden ships, raided and looted monasteries across a vast region, and even reached North America.

The study found that women from the eastern Baltic region, and to a lesser extent the British and Irish Isles, contributed more to the Scandinavian gene pool than men from those regions over the same period.

“We have no way of knowing from our data the number of women involved or whether these women of East Baltic and British-Irish ancestry were in Scandinavia willingly or unwittingly,” said molecular archaeologist Ricardo Rodriguez-Varela of the Center for Paleogenetics at the University of Stockholm, lead author of the study published in the journal Cell.

Historians have documented the Viking slave trade as seafarers conquered numerous territories and developed extensive trade networks.

“Slaves are one group among many that could explain the patterns. But we don’t know exactly who these people were,” added molecular archaeologist Anders Gotherstrom, of the Center for Paleogenetics and co-author of the study.

The Viking age spanned from about 750 to 1050 AD. The most important early event was a devastating Viking attack in 793 on a Christian monastery on the English island of Lindisfarne, with later attacks on various locations including Paris and Constantinople, and trade contacts as far as the Middle East.

The study showed that British-Irish ancestry was widespread in Scandinavia, starting during the Viking age. The ancestry of the eastern Baltic region — modern Lithuania and parts of western Russia and perhaps Ukraine — was found to be concentrated in central Sweden and Gotland, Sweden’s largest island. Ancestry from southern European locations such as Sardinia was concentrated in people in southern Scandinavia.

“The Viking age is associated with a sharp increase in the flow of goods, customs, technology and people to and from Scandinavia,” said Rodriguez-Varela.

“Scandinavian societies, initially pagan but later Christian, based their economy on smallholding, foreign trade and plunder. The Vikings were the first people to visit four continents,” added Gotherstrom.

It was found that the genetic contribution of outsiders to Scandinavians declined after the Viking age.

The researchers wrote that their findings offered “cautious evidence that gene flow to Scandinavia, originating from the eastern Baltic and, to a lesser extent, British-Irish, had a higher female incidence.”

“The rise of East-Baltic ancestry in these regions during the Viking era is consistent with historical sources attesting to contacts such as tributary and treaty relationships. Therefore, we do not see any evidence, with current data, that women were kidnapped and brought back. during the attacks,” said Rodriguez-Varela.

Men who served as missionaries or Christian monks may also have arrived in Scandinavia during this period, but they may not have contributed much to the genetic pool, the researchers added.

The oldest of the ancient genomes used in the study dated back to the 1st century.^The AD, and the most recent from the 19th century. Some ancient genomes came from people who died aboard the great Swedish warship Kronan, sunk in battle in 1676. Others came from Sandby Borg, the fortress on the Swedish island of Oland where an apparent massacre in the 5th century^Theas well as human remains from ceremonial burials on Viking ships.

“The Vikings were an interesting group of people who existed for about two and a half centuries and impacted the world in ways we still don’t understand,” said Gotherstrom.

Translated by Luiz Roberto M. Gonçalves