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    1. There are a number of these recorded. It’s basically down to Volga vikings creating a trade link between Scandinavia and Constantinople which connected it to Muslim lands

    2. hadtoputsomething on

      Constantinople was one helluva good spot to do contract work, “have axe will travel” types were made into the elite Varangian Guard in Constantinople, just some Norse Dudes protecting the Byzantine Emperor.

      Could have traded, looted, or been gifted that ring and wore it back home with pride or showed it off like: “Hey Sven, while you were here raiding in the Baltics and freezing your sweet rolls off, I nabbed this off a fella who thought his Sabre was mightier than my Axe!”

    3. I mean, the Norse did travel to north Africa and even to the middle east, maybe it is just one guy who converted, maybe there was a slice of time where we had a Muslim Viking

    4. skeleton949 on

      “Oh hey look at the cool ring I looted. Not sure what it says, but I like it.”

    5. Jimbeaux_Slice on

      I’ve read anecdotally that there was a Viking oral tradition that traced their lineage back to the Middle East (which, yes duh everyone is from there, but a lot of cultures just made some shit up) and so there was a lot of motivation to sail to the Middle East specifically for trade versus raiding. But, no I can’t remember where I read it so it’s probably BS.

    6. Flakes4058 on

      Didn’t some Vikings raid in the Mediterranean? I could be wrong about that, I know there was a Norwegian crusade (I think?), could this have come from those?

    7. There’s a Rune stone in the Stockholm airport that tells the story of a group of Vikings that went down to Persia 

    8. the-bladed-one on

      Some Viking: “huh, that weird looking guy on that ship with the robes sure sounded pretty foreign. Nice ring though”

      (Assuming it was taken in battle, but it was almost certainly a trade good)

    9. Fun fact! Some of the most accurate descriptions and tales of how ancient Vikings actually were, are from Arabic traders and travelers! Other than The Sagas, Viking didn’t really write a lot of history, and A lot of European accounts left a lot out or just described them as monsters, probably because they got raided a lot more!

    10. Sir-Toaster- on

      If Christian Vikings are a thing, then Muslim Vikings aren’t exactly far fetched

    11. Beermeneer532 on

      I mean the vikings pretty famously got all the way to constantinople from basil onwards

    12. WolfsmaulVibes on

      for the people known for both trading AND plundering, this isn’t surprising

    13. United-Reach-2798 on

      Fun fact! No its still disputed with some Arabic linguistics saying its inscription is pseudo Kufic and doesn’t mean anything as the community note on said post said

    14. Unable-Doctor-9930 on

      Vikings would often trade slaves for sliver and other valuables. Often with the Arabs.

    15. YOUTUBEFREEKYOYO on

      The trade network back then was alot bigger than most people know.

    16. Flashbambo on

      Vikings would have had plenty of interactions with Muslims throughout their history, so hardly surprising.

    17. thicc_llama on

      The Vikings went as far as to what is modern day Turkey and Iran, so not surprising.

    18. CataphractBunny on

      Media really went all-in with this and declared Vikings were muslim. And not all white. 😂😂

    19. Hairy-Ball5246 on

      If I recall correctly, it I read somewhere that it didn’t actually say “Allah”, it was just Arabic looking scribbles and gobbledegook.

      If so, it leads to the much more interesting conclusion that not only did Scandinavian Vikings have trade routes with the Middle East, but that goods from the Middle East and in their stylings were so sought after that people were making ripoffs in some medieval version of Chinese ripoffs of American luxury products.

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