Of monarchs and hydrarchs: a conceptual development model for viking activity across the Frankish realm (c. 750-940 CE)
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Date
26/11/2018Item status
Restricted AccessEmbargo end date
26/11/2028Author
Cooijmans, Christian Albertus
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Abstract
Despite decades of scholarly scrutiny, the politico-economic exploits of vikings in and
around the Frankish realm (c. 750-940 CE) remain – to a considerable extent – obscured
by the constraints of a fragmentary and biased corpus of (near-)contemporary evidence,
conveying the impression that these movements were capricious, haphazard, and
gratuitous in character. For this reason, rather than selectively assessing individual
instances of regional Franco-Scandinavian interaction, the present study approaches the
available interdisciplinary data on a cumulative and conceptual level, and combines this
with the innovative use of GIS to detect and define overall spatiotemporal patterns of
viking activity. Set against a backdrop of continuous commerce and knowledge exchange,
this overarching survey demonstrates the existence of a relatively uniform, sequential
framework of wealth extraction, encampment, and political engagement, within which
Scandinavian fleets operated as adaptable, ambulant polities – or ‘hydrarchies’. By
delineating and visualising this framework, a four-phased conceptual development model
of hydrarchic conduct and consequence is established, whose validity is substantiated by
its application to three distinct regional case studies: the lower Rhine-Meuse-Scheldt
Basin, the Seine Basin, and the Loire Basin. As well as facilitating the deductive analysis
of viking activity for which primary evidence has thus far been ambiguous or altogether
absent, the parameters of this abstract model affirm that Scandinavian movements across
Francia were the result of prudent and expedient decision-making processes, contingent
on exchanged intelligence, cumulative experience, and the ongoing individual and
collective need for socioeconomic subsistence and enrichment.