History
Welcome to History!
A community dedicated to sharing and discussing fascinating historical facts from all periods and regions.
Rules:
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Post about history. Ask a question about the past, share a link to an article about something historical, or talk about something related to history that interests you. Discussion is encouraged.
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No memes. No ads. No promos. No politics. No spam.
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No porn.
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We like facts and reliable sources here. While sources like Quora/Reddit/Wikipedia can be great tools for quick searches, we do not allow such user-generated content as primary source. What’s wrong with Wikipedia?
NOTE: Personal attacks and insults will not be tolerated. Stick to talking about the historical topic at hand in your comments. Insults and personal attacks will get you an immediate ban.
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It wasn't even a job description, it was an activity.
No one "was a viking" people would just "go viking" for a while and then come back.
For mainland Europeans, they only encountered Norse while they were viking, so it makes sense that they became known as "the vikings" as a misnomer.
A bunch of them settled in mainland Europe too, they just didn't call themselves vikings then and it was kind of like Superman putting on glasses. They just assimilated and got tossed in the genetic shuffle.
I don't see a distinction between what you said vs a job. Like "I was a sailor with the Navy."