The White Horse King: The Life of Alfred the Great by Benjamin R. Merkle

prescribed by Danish law and were regularly inspected by legal officials to ensure that each and every free Viking male was prepared to play the important role of warrior. Each soldier was required to carry a sword or a battle-axe, a shield, and a spear. Swords tended to be the weapons of the wealthier Viking warriors. The sword blade was generally around two-and-a-half to three-feet long, double-edged, and constructed to be held in one hand. Since swords were already significantly more expensive than axes, they tended to be more ornate. The hilt of the sword was often elaborately decorated with costly metals, figures, and patterns. Some were marked with runic letters, engraved into the blade, which either named the blade or invoked magical powers to give the blade bloody success in battle.
    The less wealthy of the Viking warriors, who could not afford a sword, settled for an axe. Most of these axes were everyday tools and were not reserved solely for battle. They were not double-edged, contrary to many modern depictions. They were single-edged blades, measuring anywhere from three to seventeen inches across the arc of the blade. The haft on which the axe head sat was anywhere from twenty to forty inches long. The shorter the handle, the easier the axe would have been to wield with one hand, leaving another hand free to hold a shield, and the easier to throw as well. Longer-handled axes required two hands for swinging, so the soldier lost the ability to use a shield but added great force and reach to the deadly chop.
    The Viking shield was circular, two and a half to three feet in diameter. The bulk of the shield was constructed of wooden planks, less than half of an inch thick, butted together, bound together by metal bands, and covered in leather. At the center of the shield was a large hole in the wood, covered by a six-inch iron dome called the “shield boss.” Inside the boss a handle was mounted for gripping the shield. The protection offered by the wooden planks of the outer shield was not much use in close hand-to-hand fighting since a few blows of an enemy sword or axe would cut it to kindling. The usefulness of the shield was the protection it offered from the attack of arrows and spears fired as the opposing forces were still closing in on one another. Though the missiles pierced the wooden planks slightly, the shield offered adequate protection from the barrage.
    The shield boss ensured that the point where the Viking gripped his shield was entirely protected, keeping his shield hand safe from harm. The shield boss also offered a second offensive weapon once the clash of close combat had begun. Though the wooden shield would be slowly chopped away in the hand-to-hand hacking, the large iron dome gripped in the fist of the shield hand became a deadly cudgel delivered in the form of a left hook.
    Lastly, each man carried his spear. Though the modern audience tends to think of the spear as a clumsy accessory and not as crucial to the warrior’s arsenal as the sword or shield, this opinion was not shared by the ninth-century Viking. Once two forces had closed on each other, the spear was often the most effective tool for reaching past the enemies’ defenses and striking a lethal blow. The iron spearhead was anywhere from eight inches to two feet in length. It was crafted with a savage beauty, lethally barbed and inlayed with intricate designs in precious metals. The shaft of the spear, cut from the wood of the ash tree, could reach up to ten feet in length. The spears were carefully balanced so that they could be thrown with a deadly accuracy. In open battle, however, most spears were held, rather than thrown, and used for thrusting once the two armies clashed.
    Armor, like the sword, was expensive and therefore available only to those who paid handsomely. It would be possible but rare to find a Viking in a mail “byrnie,” a large mail shirt. The Viking helmet with its iconic horns, ever-present in modern