The National Museum discovers new details regarding Viking hairstyles

Hair parted in the middle and a long goatee.

This is apparently what was fashionable among the elite during the Viking Age a thousand years ago.

A small gaming piece from the Viking Age, which for 200 years has lain hidden in the large collections of the National Museum, reveals telling details about the hairstyles of the Vikings. Provided, of course, that we can trust the way in which they portrayed themselves.

The gaming piece is just 3 cm of height, but it depicts the head and torso of a Viking with a shrewd expression on his face and an unusual, ornate hairstyle.

“It’s exceptional that we have such a vivid depiction of a Viking, even a three-dimensional one. This is a miniature bust and as close as we will ever get to a portrait of Viking,” says Peter Pentz, who is a curator at the National Museum.

He noticed the little Viking in connection with the museum’s current exhibition about Viking Age seeresses, which the figurine is part of.

“When I came across him in one of our storage rooms a few years ago, I was really surprised – he just sat there, looking directly at me, and I had never before seen such a Viking, not in the many years I’ve been at the museum,” he says.

The figurine is now part of new research, ongoing at the National Museum and focusing on figurines and symbolism of the Viking Age, which is published in the journal Medieval Archaeology.

Detailed hairstyle

Viking-Age art is known for its characteristic animal motifs, but it hardly ever portrays humans. For this reason, the figurine is remarkable. Especially because it is not simply an anonymous, symbolic depiction, but one that shows both character and expression.

Moreover, the detailed representation of the man’s hairstyle is special and provides extraordinary insights into Viking-Age coiffure, argues Peter Pentz.

The hairstyle on the figurine, which is partially damaged, can be described as middle parting with a side wave that leaves the ear visible, while the hair has been cropped at the back. The figurine moreover sports a large moustache, a long, braided goatee and sideburns.

“Hitherto, we haven’t had any detailed knowledge about Viking hairstyles, but here, we get all the details – even the little curl above the ear is marked. This is the first time we see a figure of a male Viking with his hair visible from all angles. It’s unique,” says Peter Pentz.

Among the museum’s first objects

Although its discovery is new, the figurine is not. It was, in fact, one of the first objects to be registered at the National Museum more than 200 years ago. The item carries number 589 out of what now amounts to some 2 million museum objects, counting everything from Stone-Age axes, runestones and the Golden Horns of Gallehus to recent items such as contraceptive pills and face masks from the Covid-19 pandemic.

The figurine was found in 1797 in an equestrian burial of a presumed Viking warrior in Viken near the Oslofjord. The burial is from the latter half of the 10^th century, which is the period during which Harald Bluetooth reigned, and Viken was likely within his realm at this point in time.

The gaming piece is made of walrus ivory, which was one of the costliest materials in the Viking Age, and it was part of what may popularly be called Viking-Age chess, known as Hnefatafl. The item represents the most important piece of that game, namely the king.

This board game had its heyday from the 8^th until the 11^th century and was, alongside other things, brought to England with the Viking raids, before it was displaced by chess.