ICR - The standard theme often given for Viking history is that of blond-haired, blued-eyed, burly men exploring, trading, ransacking, and pillaging across Europe, Asia, and the North Atlantic. While historical Viking exploits still entertain history buffs, a pervasive study of DNA extracted from the bones of their burial sites is overturning the idea that a fair Scandinavian complexion was the norm among these people.1
The activities of the Viking Age (793–1066 AD) radically shaped the demographic landscape of Europe—along with its politics, culture, and demographics—in ways that are still playing a major role to this day. Viking explorers developed trading partners and established colonies that stretched across the Atlantic to North America and even to locations in the Asian steppe.
In this new study, researchers sequenced the DNA of 442 different individuals from a diversity of Viking archaeological sites spanning Europe and Greenland.1 The new genetic data was then analyzed together with published data from 3,855 modern individuals of diverse ethnic backgrounds. Significantly, they discovered an influx of non-Scandinavian genetic diversity into specific regions of Scandinavia from both the south and east. The lead scientist of the study stated, "This study changes the perception of who a Viking actually was—no one could have predicted these significant gene flows into Scandinavia from Southern Europe and Asia happened before and during the Viking Age."2
Alternatively, the researchers also documented how..READ MORE
The Institute for Creation Research is a Creationist apologetics institute in Dallas, Texas that specializes in media promotion of pseudoscientific creation science and interpretation of the Genesis creation narrative as a historical event.