Saturday, March 14, 2009

The Rhymes of History

Knowing my fondness for the Vikings, a reader sent me a link this morning to an article in The Daily Mail about the recent rethinking of the status of the Vikings in British history.

It seems that those Norse marauders weren’t as bad as we thought — just regular multicultural chappies like us, even if they were a bit rough round the edges.

The full article will appear in tonight’s news feed, but here are some excerpts:

For more than a thousand years they have had a reputation for raping, pillaging and engaging in violent conquests.

But new research suggests that this violent image of the Vikings may be a little unfair.

In fact, some academics claim that the Norsemen were ‘model immigrants’ who lived side-by-side in relative harmony with the Anglo-Saxon and Celtic locals.

[…]

Researchers say the Vikings should been seen as an early example of immigrants who were successfully assimilated into British and Irish culture.

[…]

Dr Maire Ni Mhaonaigh, who is co-organising the three-day conference in Cambridge on the subject, genuinely believes modern-day Britons today can learn from such positive immigration.

She said: ‘Most people’s image of the Vikings centres on their arrival and disruption but that only continued for a very short period of time.

‘Afterwards they started building settlements and interacting with the locals and became assimilated into their culture and influenced them in many ways.

‘As such they provide a clear example of how a particular group came into a sophisticated established society and the resulting interaction was positive.

‘Both societies profited and modern day people can take a lesson from this that two cultures coming together can learn from each other.’

“Arrival and disruption”? Now there’s a euphemism.

That’s not quite how their English contemporaries experienced the Vikings, if you believe their chronicles of the period. The rape, murder, looting, plundering, and enslavement continued for centuries.

If this is supposed to reassure us about Britain’s current experiment in Multiculturalism, it’s a signal failure.

I sent the link to this article to my Viking friends, and Yorkshire Miner — who has “honorary Viking” status because of the many years he lived in Denmark — sent me a long and thoughtful reply. With his permission, I reproduce it below:

Sometimes I despair of this liberal twaddle. It is a last desperate attempt at revisionist history, to make the facts fit the fantasy that Multiculturalism is fine and well and all will turn out for the best, and that these Neanderthal Muslim clowns we have imported from the land of the pure are pussycats just like the Vikings.

Viking longboatThe Vikings were not pussycats; in fact they were the opposite in many ways. While many later were traders and farmers, the early lot were opportunistic thugs.

An example: when I was traveling up to Stockholm in the mid ’70s I stopped at a town in Sweden called Varnamo and wandered into the forest to look at a runic stone. It stood about 12 feet high as far as I remember, and there was a runic inscription running across the top. It went something like this: Ulf and Sven have erected this stone in memory of their good friend Thor who took part in the Danegeld and died fighting at Bath.

Your perfect immigrant and tourist.
- - - - - - - - -
There was fighting during the whole time the Vikings were in England. In fact, the first sea battle fought by the Royal Navy was against the Vikings at Swanage. It wasn’t really a sea battle, as several ships of the opposing fleets — which were quite small — were stranded on the same sand bank by the falling tide, and the crews got off the ships to slog it out on the sand bank itself.

I could go on, but during the 300 years of Saxon-Danish Multiculturalism there was fighting from the beginning to the end, with quite long gaps between Stanford Bridge, the battle Harold fought just before the Battle of Hastings where he defeated Harald Hardrada, which was an extremely bloody affair.

You also don’t divide a country into two parts if the two cultures get on together. This happened in England, with the country being divided by a line drawn along Watling Street, the old Roman road stretching in a straight line from London to Angelsey in Wales. North of Watling Street was called the Danelaw.

If you have a separate law for any part of your country, you have in fact divided it up into two countries. A good present-day example of this is of course Cyprus, and we all know how well the Greeks and Turks get on together. You can imagine what will happen when Sharia law rules the roost in certain areas of our cities.

“Will the Fat Bastard”: this is not a term of abuse for William the Conqueror, because he was fat and he was a bastard in both meanings of the word. His harrying of the North from the Humber to the Tees in (I think) 1069 was pure genocide and ethnic cleansing. All because the Vikings didn’t take too kindly to his way of governing them.

I like the bit in the article about them accepting Christianity. Yes, the Vikings did, but not because they were convinced by its theological arguments. The Vikings were polytheistic, and had no problem with believing that different gods ruled different parts of the world. Being a superstitious lot they had no difficulty nipping into the local church to say a quick prayer to appease the Christian god who ruled over these islands, or wearing a crucifix round their necks. A bit of heavenly insurance did no harm, and there is a die in the Danish National Museum for casting Thor’s hammer and crosses at the same time.

There certainly was a lot of interbreeding, but there won’t be this time, and I suspect that when Britain is divided up into different Islamic and Christian kingdoms the solution will be worse than Willie’s escapades in the North — genocide with a vengeance, and not like the more humane expulsion of the Sudeten Germans from Czechoslovakia after the last war.

I don’t really believe that history exactly repeats itself, but I do believe in what Mark Twain said, that it has a tendency to rhyme.

We are living in interesting times, and the pot is coming to the boil. I have never seen such spontaneous anger in the Brits as I saw over the march in Luton. The larger more virulent demonstrations in London over the Danish Cartoons a couple of years ago resulted in huge numbers of letters to the editors of the London newspapers and bemused contempt. The Luton reaction bordered almost on hatred.

I seriously suspect that if the crowd had been larger and more youngsters had been there and the Muslims had not been protected by that substantial cordon of police, there would have been serious riots, and the Muslims most likely would have been lynched.

We are indeed approaching a point of no return.

What lies ahead may be ugly and bloody, and the governments of the West seem utterly clueless as to how it can be avoided.

18 comments:

Unknown said...

Those nice Vikings did a lot for us, say experts

Anonymous said...

If indeed the Luton reaction was that strong and that antagonstic, I take it as a healthy sign that Britain may in fact not be as close to dead as I have feared.

But the fecklessness of European governments is creating a power vacuum which will be occupied by the mob. The only question left open is the identity and makeup of the mob.

If we are lucky it will be a mob of native Christian Europeans. Civilization may that way have a chance to recover.

If it is a mob of mohammedan invaders, what will follow will be societal collapse and cultural desertification.

That it must be ugly is assured by mohammedan arrogance, defiance, unshakable impertinence and commitment to violence.

Only the outcome is in doubt.

The sooner the storm comes, the less human suffering will result.

blogagog said...

"Knowing my fondness for the Vikings"

Quick head's up - Vikings attacked, raided, pillaged, killed and/or raped a lot of people, completely unprovoked, simply out of desire to steal their stuff.

What is it you like about them?

Anonymous said...

Hello Yorkshireminer

Havnt heard from you for a while. Hope all is well.

Civil unrest, followed by a civil war is in the offing, unless our idiot politicains who got us in it, acknowledge their mistake and do something to right the wrongs.

I put this post up in the Daily Express

It is time for media and political leaders to acknowledge that they have made a catastrophic mistake. A totalitarian supremacist ideology such as Islam, and an open society cannot live in peace at the same time and place. Even an open society has to recognise that there are exceptions to tolerance of all. This acknowledgement has to be made with the greatest humility and sorrow, and that if nothing is done, there will be a civil war, and the winners in such cases usually resort to partition, followed by religio-ethnic cleansing. For the good of all, Muslims and non-Muslims alike, common humanity requires a peaceful separation from Islam before it too late..

The lesson has to be learnt yet again, that nation states were formed on the basis of a common culture and language for a good reason - to minimise friction within a population group. A multicultural nation is by default a nation that cannot live in peace with itself, no matter how much we may wish it so. Bosnia is the most recent example in Europe, and other European states are headed that way.


BRITAIN IS NOW HARBOURING A MENACING ENEMY WITHIN

I can think of no situation where a settled and native people have handed over power voluntarily. It will come to force in the end. And one should also bear in mind, that Muslims also want to it come to force in the end, as they know that that is the only way conquest is made legal - by the sacrifice of blood.

It is important in all our messages to the world, be they written or spoken, are made with humility and compassion for all, Muslims and non-Muslims alike. There should never be a question that we are aggressive or warlike. Compassion and avoidance of conflict must be the watch word.

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Czechmade said...

These experts are probably simpleminded politruks.

Anonymous said...

Sad but predictable news from the UK

Minister beaten after clashing with Muslims on his TV show

Baron Bodissey said...

blogago --

That was a jocular reference to my friends in Denmark, Norway, and Sweden. I have no affection for those brutal polytheists from long ago.

Rolf Krake said...

Raping, looting, pillaging, plunder were noble traits at the time, ahem, 'Go Europe' had some fun attached for the adventurer, at least the killing rate was 30 to 1.
Funny thing, otherwise they didn't steal, it was considered dishonorable.

Today the 5 million Danes would have to do 300 per 1 against 1,5billion.

Lets see what stuff they are made of when push comes to shove, as things are heading.

blogagog said...

Ah, today's vikings. I like them too! :)

Decatur said...

Yet again, a pathethic and transparent attempt to assure the increasingly restless natives that all is well and their lives are still being enriched by mass immigration of hostiles. - Just look how well the Vikings adapted “Britons today can learn from such positive immigration.” So that’s all OK then.
Government on both sides and the Far Leftist agitators in particular are seeing the results of their policies coming to fruition. They now know as sure as the rising of the sun that this genie will not go quietly back into the bottle. Like us they’ve all seen the placards, the hate and the threats to slaughter us; the nightmarish vision of Caliphate Britain is staring them in the face and I suspect they are not sleeping well. Government and their lackeys can continue to rage against the citizenry as much as they like, but when shameful incidents like the Luton protests against the military take place it bodes ill for them because British people are starting to speak up, loudly. One might very well object to war, in which case a ‘No to War’ placard would suffice. Government is faced with a dilemma; admit their policies were wrong and accept the woeful truth that they are responsible for destroying thousands of years of history within a few decades or they can submit; they can plough ahead with the EuroArabic alliance project which they now know will lead to totalitarianism and just hope that they will be the dominant partner in that alliance.
“Britons today can learn from such positive immigration”. Indeed they can.

joshua said...

We are in the beginning of the end times. I think most people around the world have this feeling that something is imminent. They can't put their finger on it, but their "gut" tells them that things are going to change once things get set in motion. It is time to repent, get right with God, and trust in Jesus. We are dealing with more than just some people who want power or money. We are talking global control, a one world government. You don't have to be a Christian to see this. The Hague, the UN and the Durban conferences, the Muslim countries wanting to ban any critcism of Islam and call it a ban of hate against religion. Run the earth and watch the sky! He will return like a thief in the night. Be ready!

filthykafir said...

Joeblough: Reluctantly, sadly, I agree with every sentence you wrote. The tragedy will unfold, and the sooner the pot boils over the quicker the eruption will be over, and with less scalding of the body politic.

I came of age in the early 1960's -- before the hippy-dippity pacifist nonsense got up a full head of steam. We never imagined it all would come to this: I am prepared to back, support, and even participate in the revolution to re-establish the constitutional republic, here in the U.S. or across the sea. My generation (and I share the guilt) was possibly the blindest in American history -- to fail to recognize in time, let alone stop, the current crisis.

I don't imagine "We're sorry" will quite cover the damage? How 'bout "The check's in the mail?"

Afonso Henriques said...

Yeah, it's really sick.

Here too, they have presented the muslims and the Jews as eternal victims, good people who just happened to persecuted by the bad Hispanic Catholic people.
And the Vikings... now it's "interesting" among PC and elitist/leftist types to highlight seafaring peoples who had little to nothing to do with us, and that came here to suck our richesses, as if they were somewhat part of the Nation:
Carthageneans, Phoenicians and Vikings. That's who they highlight. The Greeks, magically are unimportant.

What is interesting is that while the Germanic Vikings came here and destroyed, looted and killed (both muslims and Christians), everybody speak nice of them as the good barbarians, people with great navi technologies and somewhat intelligent and strong.
Meanwhile, they downplay the Suebi and the Visigothics who both contributed imensly to the formation of the people and culture here.

For instance, when I went to a large Roman site in ruins, they said the place was "destroyed and harrassed by the Barbarian Suebi".
What they fail to explain is how the city of Conimbriga (one of the greatest cities and seat of an arcebishop of the Catholic Church during the time of the Suebi and Visigothic Barbarians) ceased to be seat of the Arcebishop, was emptied and was eventually completed forgoten. All this in the IX century (while the city was the third biggest in the West of the Peninsula during the Barbarian Germanic rule). Which magically coincides with the early-middle muslim period in Central Portugal. I also believe the same happened to Merida but when I can't remember exactly.

Afonso Henriques said...

"Quick head's up - Vikings attacked, raided, pillaged, killed and/or raped a lot of people, completely unprovoked, simply out of desire to steal their stuff.
What is it you like about them?"

Oh come on! Everybody likes the Vikings!!!

Though all the others could as well stayed in Scandinavia. Well... but the ones who burned muslim Lisbon to the ground and the others who helped us pushing the moors southwards. And even the Viking King who was killed by a poor priest in Galiza after he had killed the higher Catholic authority in the Peninsula, that priest actually became the Arcebishop/Cardinal. Hm... like the moors, they left some amazing stories and legends here but in the end, you are damn right!.

Anonymous said...

There were some assimilation; the word "knife" have Old Norse origins. :)

Zenster said...

joeblough: The only question left open is the identity and makeup of the mob.

The predictive eassys of El Inglés have left little doubt as to this end result. The high population of cultural traitors and outright civilizational deconstructionists stand as glaring testimony to the already existing power vacuum.

Once these treasonous scum are deposed, then the battle royal will begin in earnest. At present the only thing that militates against a certain European victory is the preparedness and proactive nature of its Muslim colonists.

Fortunately for the indigenous Europeans, Muslim preparedness does not extend all the way to those nuclear weapons which will more than likely decide this struggle's final outcome. In that respect—along with its other fatal shortcoming of incompetent military leadership—Islam has so characteristically overreached itself.

If we are lucky it will be a mob of native Christian Europeans. Civilization may that way have a chance to recover.

One can only hope that Europe's Christians will know better than to "turn the other cheek" which, to Islam, is the equivalent of baring one's nape for the sword. Due to Islam's spectacularly successful masquerade as a true religion, there is the distinct chance that Christian charity might be its own undoing.

I have already had heated debates with Catholics and Christians who insist that Islam's ostensibly Abramaic roots qualify it as an authentic religion.

Islam's congenital inability to distinguish church and state make it a default statist entity. Only under true separation of church and state can any belief structure emerge as a spiritual force and not one of coercive or legal control.

If it is a mob of mohammedan invaders, what will follow will be societal collapse and cultural desertification.

As has been the historical case with every single other culture that Islam has absorbed over the last millennia plus.

That it must be ugly is assured by mohammedan arrogance, defiance, unshakable impertinence and commitment to violence.

This cannot be overstated.

Islam seeks the death of untold billions of people. It cares not if they are infidel or Muslim. All that matters is for Islam to claim its global caliphate. The historical record lists hundreds of millions who have already perished along Islam's bloody borders.

It is incumbent upon all civilized cultures to recognaize Islam's retrograde nature so that, for once and all time, decisive action is taken against any further reversal of our world's progress away from the Iron Age Muslim mentality.

Only the outcome is in doubt.

Let us pause for one moment to consider what a monstrous debt Islam owes to the West's Politically Correct Multicultural Transnational Globalist traitors who have made this civilizational conflict both possible and probable. Lamp posts and piano wire are too good for them.

The sooner the storm comes, the less human suffering will result.

This is the ultimate bottom line. All too often we have heard cries about the mounting butcher's bill. Clearly, not enough people are scrutinizing the abattoir's balance sheet.

Sean O'Brian said...

Most Vikings only lived in a few centres. They would have been holed up on their own like the Belgians in the Congo.

In Waterford (in Ireland) they appear to have been all slaughtered or kicked out.

Annals of Waterford:

853AD : Smith, in his history of Waterford, gives this date for the foundation of the City, by the Viking king, Sitricus.

1014 '23 April' : Defeat of Máel Mórda mac Murchada and Viking forces by the armies of Brian Boru marks the beginning of the decline of Viking power in Ireland.

1031AD : Waterford burnt to the ground.

1037AD : Waterford burned by Diarmuid Mac Maol na mBó, King of Leinster.

1088AD : The City was burned by the people of Dublin.

1088AD : The Annals of the Four Masters recorded that, on this date, there was a great slaughter of the foreigners [emphasis mine] of Waterford City.

[end]

I wouldnt imagine there was too many of them left after the city was burned to the ground three times in 60 years.