Retracing the Vikings in the East: A review of Scandinavian-Islamic interfaces

The most common contacts during the Viking Age from a Swedish perspective were to the East. Millions of Islamic coins flowed into Scandinavia from North Africa, the Caliphate, and the Samanid dominion in Central Asia. Their origins differed, and the temporality of the silver stream makes it possible to outline changing interfaces between the actors. Some well known artifacts from the same direction entered Scandinavia. Besides artefacts, Arabic written sources have contributed greatly to our understanding of the actors involved.

This contribution addresses two questions: how are Scandinavian contacts with Islamic regions presented and used in contemporary discourse, and what is the archaeological evidence for these contacts? Four exhibitions and published media have been chosen to demonstrate how connections between Sweden and the East are presented to the public. I also present a critical review of the contacts, by highlighting historical conditions in the region between Eastern Middle Sweden and the Caspian Sea. In this vast area, people who were engaged in the transfer of commodities relied on well-tried routes and routines in a ‘down-the-line’ system, engaging several of these groups. Instead of direct trade with the Caliphate, I argue that Khazars, Volga Bulgars and Finnic peoples were those the Scandinavians primarily interacted with.

Islamic objects were imported into Sweden in the past. However, the influx is dispersed over a long period of time and they were handled by intermediaries, thus giving little evidence of direct interfaces and possibilities for influences from Islam. I agree with Jan Peder Lamm; ‘The finds suggest that the contacts with the Islamic World mainly were indirect, and mainly as a result from an in-flow of minted and un-minted silver’. Therefore, it is essential that we find a way of solving contemporary political contradictions without violating the past.