How Did the Vikings Wear Their Hair?

Few images haunt the imaginations of schoolchildren more than the discovery in their history books of the Vikings' mysterious longships, with carved dragon heads mounted on their prows, emerging from a morning fog on a desolate coast or river to prey on a still-sleeping village. The popular portrayal of the men aboard these ships harkens to a more primal likeness of humanity, one in which weather-beaten marauders with long, flowing locks of unkempt hair and immensely dense beards unleashed unimaginable ferocity on their victims for no greater purpose than to enrich themselves and to satisfy their carnal desires.

Modern revisions to Viking history have painted a starkly different picture of what life may have been like for Scandinavians during the Viking Age to the image popular culture has retained. We have since learned that they were cleanliness-oriented, bathed weekly, and paid particular attention to their appearance. We know that women decorated their clothes with colorful beads, …