Welcome to the Updated Viking Answer Lady Webpage!

I finally decided that it was high time to update the look of the Viking Answer Lady website, and simultaneously to re-research and update some articles.

The History and Evolution of the VAL Website

I originally wrote the oldest articles for the Bear Necessities, the newsletter of the Barony of Bjornsborg, an SCA branch. My Laurel made me do it... the chronicler needed submissions desperately, and Kemreth assigned a regular column to me as a way to help produce articles for the newsletter.

I first webbed my old articles around 1990, using my old back issues from the Bear Necessities for the content. Later, I did a major upgrade in 1998, but didn't touch the old content.

Some Viking-Themed Fun

There's a new Viking Age themed crossword available!

The New Look for the VAL Website

The new look all started with a dream... I dreamed about the way the head banner at the top of the page should look, popped out of bed, and several hours later I had combined about 20 photos of stormy seas, a photo of reconstructed Viking houses, a photo of one of my painted lead miniatures I used to play D&D with, a photo of a Viking ship under sail, and the 1872 painting Åsgårdsreien (The Wild Hunt) by Norwegian artist Peter Nicolai Arbo... all of these went into the banner art.

Scripts and Cookies: The Viking Answer Lady Website uses JavaScript and a little PHP to make it go. I've tried to always provide text navigation and nav items that will function without scripts because I know some of my readers aggressively turn off all access to script execution in their browsers. If there's something you can't get to with scripting turned off, let me know. I may not be able to fix everything but I will try. This site uses one cookie to keep track of your preferred font size, called page_style, which may be blank or else contains a single value of textSizeSmall, textSizeLrg, or textSizeXLrg. I'm fairly sure that the pages all display fine without allowing the cookie to be set, but you probably won't be able to effectively use the font-changing tool without the cookie. This cookie collects absolutely no personal data.

As always, I will continue to take questions. However please take the time to at least scan through the various sections of this website -- almost 80% of all questions I receive are for things that already exist on the website.

A Note for Students

Please note that the Viking Answer Lady will not do your homework for you. I already know the answers, so I wouldn't learn anything, and if you get the answers handed to you without having to think about them, why you won't learn anything either. Truth is, most of the time the answers you need are in the textbook for your class -- be sure to look there first before asking me for the answer.

So please, avoid sending in questions like this one that I actually received:

Dear Viking Lady,

I need to know everything about the viokings their culture and ships and prove that they were the first dicoverers of the USA. And hurry, it's due Thursday, hurry.

I do not answer questions quickly most of the time -- it takes me a certain amount of time to look up the answer, even if I have a book here at my home that has the answer, and longer if I have to drive 40 miles to find it in the nearest college library. So it won't help you to panic the night before an assignment is due and write me for the answer -- it is typically at least two or three days before I get it, and sometimes much longer.

Still, it is the Viking Answer Lady's goal to encourage more people to learn about the Viking Age, and some of the very best questions that I've been asked come from schoolchildren. So, what can the Viking Answer Lady do for students? I can direct you to books and other sources where your answers may be found. I can give you hints that will allow you to use your school library's card catalogue more effectively. I can direct you to other websites with related information.

The Viking Answer Lady was chosen as best "Vikings" site on the Web in the April 2000 issue of the net, the UK's biggest Internet magazine.