[books 2012] The Hammer and the Cross

[inulro]

54. The Hammer and the Cross: A New History of the Vikings by Robert FergusonI recently put a specialist academic textbook about the conversion of Scandinavia on my wish list, and someone bought it for me. At that point I realised I've probably forgotten most of what I knew about the basics, so I grabbed this from the library

Comments

[kest]

I keep hearing about more things that Diamond had wrong, which is very educational on one hand, but I think I no longer trust a single word he says.

[inulro]

Having a MA in medieval history focussing on the Vikings in the Celtic world, his claim about Greenlanders having a taboo about eating fish rang a lot of NOT RIGHT bells. But I was a bundle of fibro brain fog at the time and completely unable to do even the basic research that would have verified my feelings.

[inulro]

And speaking of which, there's a new book out that claims that he (and everyone else) was completely wrong about Easter Island being completely degraded in the pursuit of bigger and better giant stone heads. I haven't read it yet - I was waiting for the paperback, which might be out now.

[kest]

Yeah, that's one of the things I was thinking of. Apparently his timeline is slightly off, and it is more likely that the deforestation of the island happened due to the arrival of explorers and the non-native rats in their ships, which then ate the seeds of the trees. Or something like that.

Also, I read a fascinating (due to subject matter - it was pretty dry and academic) article that argued that what he (in Guns, Germs, and Steel) and all my elementary school teachers said about the native americans lacking natural immunities is probably wrong. That there may have been some lack of natural antibodies that contributed to the devastating impact of smallpox, etc. but there were also a lot of other factors, including droughts (leading to starvation), wars and violence (both between tribes and from the europeans), and stress from the above factors that led to lowered immune systems. And of course the fact that they were being deliberately infected. (Happy Columbus Day! :/ )