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Children of Ash and Elm

A History of the Vikings

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Children of Ash and Elm

By: Neil Price
Narrated by: Samuel Roukin
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About this listen

The definitive history of the Vikings - from arts and culture to politics and cosmology - by a distinguished archaeologist with decades of expertise

The Viking Age - from 750 to 1050 saw an unprecedented expansion of the Scandinavian peoples into the wider world. As traders and raiders, explorers and colonists, they ranged from eastern North America to the Asian steppe. But for centuries, the Vikings have been seen through the eyes of others, distorted to suit the tastes of medieval clerics and Elizabethan playwrights, Victorian imperialists, Nazis, and more. None of these appropriations capture the real Vikings, or the richness and sophistication of their culture.

Based on the latest archaeological and textual evidence, Children of Ash and Elm tells the story of the Vikings on their own terms: their politics, their cosmology and religion, their material world. Known today for a stereotype of maritime violence, the Vikings exported new ideas, technologies, beliefs, and practices to the lands they discovered and the peoples they encountered, and in the process were themselves changed. From Eirík Bloodaxe, who fought his way to a kingdom, to Gudrid Thorbjarnardóttir, the most traveled woman in the world, Children of Ash and Elm is the definitive history of the Vikings and their time.

©2020 Neil Price (P)2020 Recorded Books
Expeditions & Discoveries Medieval Military Scandinavia Viking Norway History

What listeners say about Children of Ash and Elm

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an Incredibly well done intro to Viking beliefs

the detail on Viking culture and worldview in this book is unparallelled in my opinion. narration is also excellent.

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Long book but good

Fab narrator, enjoyable deep content for an academic history book. Loved it, it took a week to get through.

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Excellently Narrated and Fascinatingly Told

The absolutely gorgeous narration carried me through this long, exhaustive and intense retelling of Viking history. While slightly convoluted and a tad bogged down with dates and timelines in the later third, the majority of this book was utterly compelling and engaging to this complete novice in Viking history. Cannot stress enough what a wonderful job the narrator did.

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great and informative listen

A nuanced and interesting exploration of the Viking legacy. Everything from the foundation for the viking way of life and their religious beliefs to the conscription of Viking warriors into the Byzantine Empire and original European settlement of the New World.
Neil Price analyses the primary sources and archaeological evidence and gives an honest account of these things as opposed to the often exaggerated retellings.

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Great story, mixed performance

Fascinating history well told, but the otherwise well chosen reader was let down by disconcertingly odd or poor pronunciation of several ordinary English words (as well as many non-English) that jarred in the listening. Otherwise a very enjoyable well researched and well written book.

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Brilliant book- But extremely difficult to listen to if you speak Swedish.

This book was absolutely fascinating and engaging. A well done balance between academic text and engaging narrative for a general audience. But goodness gracious was it difficult to remain engaged when so many Swedish words and place names were pronounced incorrectly. Especially since much of the book consists of Swedish place names when referring to archaeological sites. Just unbelievably disappointing that the reader wasn’t adequately informed on pronunciations. The letter Ö was consistently pronounced “oo” and Gotland was pronounced Goatland? Absolutely brilliant if you can ignore this however, and aside from the Swedish words, the narration was fabulous and deeply engaging.

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grät book brought down by the reading.

fascinating and well written (as you might expect of the author). The pronunciation of Scandinavian locations and words was a constantly distraction as I tried to figure out what was meant. in every other way the narrator was excellent, so I can only assume they were not given a good guide to pronunciation.

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New perspective on ancient times

Liked everything about the book - the narration was excellent and the exploration of issues fascinating and beautifully written

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Woke washed.

Warped with woke ideology. Don’t even waste your credit or money. Can’t trust anything they say.

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