Genetic studies have shown that even back then there was a healthy mix of blonds, redheads and dark-haired people, just like today. There were, however, more blond Vikings in northern Scandinavia in the area around Stockholm, Sweden, while there were more redheads in western Scandinavia, which Denmark belongs to.
Turns out they didn't much resemble Thor or Ragnar Lothbrok.
It turns out most Vikings weren't as fair-haired and blue-eyed as legend and pop culture have led people to believe. According to a new study on the DNA of over 400 Viking remains, most Vikings had dark hair and dark eyes.
“A lot of the Vikings are mixed individuals” with ancestry from both Southern Europe and Scandinavia, for example, or even a mix of Sami (Indigenous Scandinavian) and European ancestry.
What skin color were Vikings? While most Vikings are believed to have had fair, peach-toned skin and light hair, there may also have been Vikings with darker skin. It's important to understand that when Vikings traveled to distant lands, they often brought back people from those cultures.
Although most Vikings had fair complexions, Viking settlements were diverse, and many Vikings had dark or red hair and brown eyes.
Green is considered by some to be the actual rarest eye color in the world, though others would say it's been dethroned by red, violet, and grey eyes. Green eyes don't possess a lot of melanin, which creates a Rayleigh scattering effect: Light gets reflected and scattered by the eyes instead of absorbed by pigment.
Through DNA testing, it is possible to effectively trace your potential inner Viking and discover whether it forms part of your genetic makeup or not. However, it's not 100% definitive. There's no exact Nordic or Viking gene that is passed down through the generations.
"The examination of skeletons from different localities in Scandinavia reveals that the average height of the Vikings was a little less than that of today: men were about 5 ft 7-3/4 in. tall and women 5 ft 2-1/2 in.
Vikings worked long hours, carrying, and using heavy equipment which contributed to the formation of muscles, even from an early age. Another reason for the significant strength of the Vikings was their diet. Vikings were mostly hunters, not gatherers, due to their cold, harsh environment.
The Vikings were more robust and muscular than the average person, and that was for both women and men. One of the reasons for this is, of course, the hard physical work, that was needed to survive in a landscape like Scandinavia in the Viking age.
It turns out most Vikings weren't as fair-haired and blue-eyed as legend and pop culture have led people to believe. According to a new study on the DNA of over 400 Viking remains, most Vikings had dark hair and dark eyes.
The Viking invaders may have also had a relatively high percentage of B gene, since many of the towns of Britain and western Europe that are linked to the coast by internal lines of communication such as large rivers, have a disproportional amount of blood group B when compared to the surrounding territory.
The genetic legacy of the Viking Age lives on today with six percent of people of the UK population predicted to have Viking DNA in their genes compared to 10 percent in Sweden. Professor Willerslev concluded: “The results change the perception of who a Viking actually was.
It is also known as "brittle bone disease." Ivar the boneless, has blue eyes because he's suffering from 'brittle bone disease' named "Osteogenesis imperfecta" which is characterised by a triad of blue sclera (white portion of the eye), fragile bones and conductive hearing loss.
Most common in Western, Northern, and Central Europe, green eyes often point to German or Celtic ancestry. Currently, they can be found most often in Iceland, the Netherlands, Scotland, Britain, and Scandinavia.
Yet, some scholars also believed that the dark eyeliner helped increase the sexy appeal of the Vikings. This dark powder could have served to protect the eyesight from the sun glare, promising the Viking to see everything as clearly as possible. Another possible purpose was to intimidate the enemies in battle.
A large majority of people in Northern European countries have light coloured hair - blonde, light brown - and light coloured eyes - anything from blue eyes to different shades of grey.
The highest concentration of people with green eyes is found in Ireland, Scotland, and northern Europe. In fact, in Ireland and Scotland, more than three-fourths of the population has blue or green eyes – 86 percent!
Naturally-occurring blond hair is primarily found in people living in or descended from people who lived in the northern half of Europe, and may have evolved alongside the development of light skin that enables more efficient synthesis of vitamin D, due to northern Europe's lower levels of sunlight.
Sweden. Just like its neighbor Finland, Sweden also has some of the highest rates of blond hair throughout the population. About 78% of Sweden's population has blond hair. Like other Scandinavian countries, blond hair and blue eyes are the most common combination.
What blood type did Vikings have? for Vikings is I1, as well as R1a, R1b, G2, and N. The SNP that defines the I1 haplogroup is M253. A haplogroup is a group of similar haplotypes that share a common ancestor.
So where did our green-eyed ancestors come from? Most origins point to areas around the Caucasus Mountains, which link Asia and Europe. That may help explain why so many different countries and continents have had green-eyed populations for thousands of years.
Odin has many names and is the god of both war and death. Half of the warriors who die in battle are taken to his hall of Valhalla. He is the one-eyed All-Father, who sacrificed his eye in order to see everything that happens in the world. He has two sons, Balder by his first wife Frigg and Thor by Jord.
We found that green is the most popular lens colour, with brown coming in a close second, despite it being one of the most common eye colours. Although blue and hazel are seen as the most attractive eye colours for men and women they are surprisingly the least popular.
Scientists believe that it is possible to trace all blue-eyed people back to a common ancestor, who likely had a genetic mutation that reduced the amount of melanin in the iris. Most people with blue eyes are of European descent.