Comparing Viking Age Norway and Denmark, the article examines the primary proposition that as centers of authority become progressively more robust, violence will be proportionately contained. The article introduces a new approach in using indications of violence as a focal point to elicit broader social practices. The disciplines employed in this study – archaeology, osteology, philology, and sociology – are used together in the study of covariance of different indicators across a societal range. The indicators for assessing violence include skeletal trauma and weapon frequency. For assessing the steepness of the social pyramid, we use runestones, indicating variations in social stratification, and monumental constructions as a measure of power to command labor. Among the findings: weapons and interpersonal violence in Norway was much more widespread than in Denmark, and the social pyramid in Denmark was progressively steeper and more complex than in Norway. “Official” executions accounted for the preponderance of violence in Denmark, while rare in Norway. Denmark was evidently a more “civilianized” society than Norway. The comparative research supports the primary proposition. The research, furthermore, suggests that Denmark and Norway were sociologically distinct societies, which accords with recent findings that the respective regions displayed distinct, though still similar, genetic profiles.

中文翻译：

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暴力作为维京社会的一个镜头：挪威和丹麦的比较


文章比较了维京时代的挪威和丹麦，探讨了一个主要命题：随着权力中心逐渐变得更加强大，暴力将得到相应的遏制。本文介绍了一种新方法，利用暴力迹象作为焦点来引发更广泛的社会实践。这项研究中使用的学科——考古学、骨学、语言学和社会学——一起用于研究整个社会范围内不同指标的协方差。评估暴力的指标包括骨骼创伤和武器使用频率。为了评估社会金字塔的陡峭程度，我们使用符文石来表示社会分层的变化，并使用纪念性建筑来衡量指挥劳动的权力。调查结果显示：挪威的武器和人际暴力比丹麦更为普遍，而且丹麦的社会金字塔比挪威更加陡峭和复杂。在丹麦，“官方”处决是暴力事件的主要原因，而在挪威则很少见。丹麦显然是一个比挪威更“文明”的社会。比较研究支持了主要命题。此外，这项研究表明，丹麦和挪威在社会学上是不同的社会，这与最近的发现一致，即各自地区表现出不同但仍然相似的遗传特征。