Vikings didn't use shield-walls

[Imperial Dave]

I guess a definition of shieldwall might be in order to define the parameters of whats acceptable re shields...?

[Mark G]

On the walls themselves, do we have any evidence for arrow defence walls, like the testeudo sort of thing, or just single man and shield lined up ones?

I think the first time I came across the arrow defence ones was in a brad Pitt movie.

[Jim Webster]

On the walls themselves, do we have any evidence for arrow defence walls, like the testeudo sort of thing, or just single man and shield lined up ones?

I think the first time I came across the arrow defence ones was in a brad Pitt movie.

the  Alfred the Great (1969) made a big thing about testeudos and shield walls as part of the battle winning climax

[Imperial Dave]

Put another way, if a shield is sufficiently big to cover the front of a man can this then be said to permit a shieldwall formation of edge to edge (at the worst) shields?

re the arrow defence thing.....direct evidence...possibly but I leave that up to others to ferret out. Practically.....if arrows are coming in, it is inevitable that more than just the front rank will raise shields against them. Its the degree to which there is a coordinated arrangement that is the real question i guess..

[Erpingham]

As we've already deduced, Viking shield sizes are a trade-off between covering enough body and being easily handled.

In "shieldwall" formation, they essentially cover the body.  Doubtless, shields were raised against incoming missiles as per the Franks Casket.  But there is the famous line in the Brunanburh poem about men being "shot over shield". 

As we've already mentioned, our Danish researcher is probably using shieldwall differently to how we, students of medieval warfare rather than historical combat techniques, are using it.  As Duncan put it, the TV construction of a multi-layered, all covering, array of shields is probably his target, rather than a row of men holding their shields in front of them in close-order.  On one rank holding shields in front and others protecting them above, there is a description in the Penguin translation of the Vikings at Stamford Bridge overlapping their shields "in front and above", though another version has this "shield to shield, both in the front and rear ranks."

There remains the question of exactly what combat looked like when two shieldwalls actually contacted.  How rigid was the shieldwall?  We know the idea was to break the wall, but is this to destroy its mutually-supportive cohesion or its physical joined-upness?  I suspect the former, and there was room for a degree of use of the active shield techniques and weapon skills our researcher and the Hurstwic article detail.

Mindful of Nicholas' issue about the lateness of sagas, here is a description of shieldwall fighting of a more contemporary nature

Then one stern in war waded forth, heaving up his weapon,
sheltered by his shield, stepped up against Byrhtnoth.
The earl went just as resolutely to the churl,
either of them intending evil to the other.
Then the sea-warrior sent a southern spear,
that wounded the lord of warriors.
Byrhtnoth shoved it with his shield, so that the shaft burst,
and that spear-head broke so that it sprang out again.
The fighting-warrior became infuriated; he stabbed with his spear
the proud Viking, who had given him that wound.
Aged was the army-warrior; he let his spear go forth
through the neck of the younger warrior, guided by his hand
so that he reached the life of that sudden attacker. (130-42)

Then he swiftly pierced another Viking,
so that the mail-shirt burst—that one was wounded in the breast
through the ring-locks, the poisonous point
stood at his heart. The earl was the happier,
then he laughed, the mindful man, said thanks to the Measurer
for the day's work which the Lord had given him. (143-8)

We'll leave it there with Byrhtnoth on top of his game, but this isn't a rigid lock-shield shoving match .  Poetic license? 

[Dangun]

Aren't nearly all sagas 13th century or later?

Some of the Icelandic sagas date from the 9th and 10th, I think.

[Erpingham]

Aren't nearly all sagas 13th century or later?

Some of the Icelandic sagas date from the 9th and 10th, I think.

I don't think so.  I think the earliest Icelandic historical material is 12th century.  Traditional poetry from early centuries is found in sagas though, which may be causing the confusion.

[Andreas Johansson]

Checking the The Routledge Research Companion to the Medieval Icelandic Sagas, there seems to be a lot of disagreement as to when the sagas were composed, but none of the scholars cited would seem to place any before about AD 1180.

That's the sagas in the form we know them today, of course. Apart from the incorporated poetry Anthony mentions, at least those parts of the historical content that's independently verifiable must have existed previously in some form, whether as texts or oral traditions.

[Erpingham]

Apart from the incorporated poetry Anthony mentions, at least those parts of the historical content that's independently verifiable must have existed previously in some form, whether as texts or oral traditions.

Yes, possibly some written material was used especially in the historical sagas.  And there may have been traditional ways of telling certain tales which became embedded.

In terms of the case in hand, it seems unlikely that things like descriptions of fights between heroes and villains represent detailed recollections.  The fighting styles may therefore be contemporary with composition.  How different these were to techniques a couple of hundred years before becomes a question.  On saga fighting, the weaponry usually seems the same as we know from Viking times and the shields all seem to be the round bossed type, not kite shields, so perhaps none too different.  In terms of armies and their forms, the 13th century accounts found in sagas seem to fit well enough with earlier material e.g. Anglo-Saxon. 

For example, take this from the early 11th Century Maldon poem

Then Byrhtnoth encouraged his warriors there,
riding and ruling, directing his soldiers
how they must stand and keep that place, and gave them
instruction as to how they should hold their shields
correctly, fast with their hands—that they should fear nothing.
When he had fortified his fyrd-men graciously,
then he alighted amid the ranks, where it most pleased him,
in the place where he knew his most loyal hearth-guard to be.

And compare with the early 13th century St Olaf's Saga

So when the farmers had been assigned to detachments, then the landed men
spoke, telling the men in the army to take note of their positions, where each
was placed and under which banner each was now supposed to be and in
which direction from the banner and how close he was placed to the banner.
They told men to be alert now and quick to get into formation when the horns
sounded and a war call rang out, and then to advance in formation,

Quite similar ideas of order and structure and the role of commanders seem to be expressed.

[Andreas Johansson]

Then Byrhtnoth encouraged his warriors there,
riding and ruling, directing his soldiers
how they must stand and keep that place, and gave them
instruction as to how they should hold their shields
correctly, fast with their hands—that they should fear nothing.

Tangentially, this sort of instruction - which impressionistically is rather common in pre-battle encouragement - makes best sense if some/many/all of the troops addressed are unaccustomed to fighting, or at least organized warfare: seasoned veterans might well think they bloody well know how to use their shields, thank you very much. If Halsall and others are right that levies were largely a feature of defensive warfare, while offensive operations were largely the perserve of more professional warriors, and if the reports bear some relation to what was actually said rather than being wholly conventional, such instructions should disproportionately be found in the mouths of defending commanders.

Any up for a literature study?

[Erpingham]

I agree that we are looking at a type of instruction to non-professionals (fyrd in one case, peasant rebels in another).  We can add this third example from William of Malmesbury regarding Henry I :

For, though the nobility deserted him, yet was his
party strong; being espoused by archbishop Anselm, with
his brother bishops, and all the English. In consequence,
grateful to the inhabitants for their fidelity, and anxious for
their safety, he frequently went through the ranks, instruct-
ing them how to elude the ferocity of the cavalry by op-
posing their shields, and how to return their strokes. By
this he made them voluntarily demand the fight, perfectly
fearless of the Normans.

These are fyrdmen again.

My main reason for quoting it though was the implication of organisation.  Men are formed up in a set way - they are not a mob of cavourting individuals.

[Nick Harbud]

Aren't nearly all sagas 13th century or later?

Some of the Icelandic sagas date from the 9th and 10th, I think.

I thought Snorri Sturluson wrote them all from the comfort of his bath... 

[Erpingham]

While we are talking of instructions about shieldwall fighting, here is another, admittedly 13th century, example from The Kings Mirror

If you are fighting on foot in a land battle and are
placed at the point of a wedge-shaped column [swynfylking] it is
very important to watch the closed shield line [skjaldborg] in the
first onset, lest it become disarranged or broken. Take
heed never to bind the front edge of your shield under
that of another. You must also be specially careful,
when in the battle line [fylking], never to throw your spear, un-
less you have two, for in battle array [fylking] on land one spear
is more effective than two swords.

Admittedly a late example of a shieldwall but technically pretty much the same as earlier examples, I'd suggest.  Note the emphasis on the order of the shieldwall.  Also the technical detail of how to overlap your shield.  I'd interpret this as don't get the right edge under the shield of the man on your right - that way you can manoeuver it freely.

[Dangun]

Checking the The Routledge Research Companion to the Medieval Icelandic Sagas, there seems to be a lot of disagreement as to when the sagas were composed, but none of the scholars cited would seem to place any before about AD 1180.

I should have been more precise - composition and publishing may have occurred on different dates.
But the general point is we might wan to privilege the earlier compositions which described historical events as opposed to the later compositions of fictional events.

[Andreas Johansson]

If another tangent be excused, fylking is a derivative of folk, and thus likely shares an etymology with fulcum, phoulkon.