The island of Gotland, over which Hjorvard ruled, had a very dense population, and was, on account of its size and geographical position, a great emporium of commerce, and with its war and trading ships occupied at this time about the same position as the England of our days. Its inhabitants were wealthy, and traded extensively, as their fathers had done, with provinces of Rome, with Greece, and the countries round the Caspian, the Black, and the Mediterranean Seas. From such distant lands as these they brought superb bronze vessels, exquisite glass vases, velvets and silks, beautiful objects of leather, embroidered gold and silver textile material for dress, and many other costly objects which the rich prized very highly, as well as wine.
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AT the period of which I write, the land of the Vikings embraced the islands of the Baltic and those of the small and the great “Belt” leading into that sea, the country known to-day as Scandinavia, which embraces the large peninsula of Sweden and Norway, and the small peninsula of Jutland. The whole land was virtually surrounded by sea. Great fortifications had been built on the southern peninsula of Jutland between the two fjords which enter it from opposite sides, so that no incursion could take place from the land to the south.
The large islands, especially, were seats of great maritime power and wealth. All the tribes were of a common origin and kindred; they had the same customs and religion, practised the same burial rites, intermarried, and spoke the same language which was called the Norranean tongue.
These Vikings, as we have seen, were quite isolated from Central and Western Europe, and formed a world of their own, having much intercourse with the country forming the present Russia. Between them and Rome stood the inaccessible swamps and forests of Germania, inhabited by wild and barbaric tribes. Great, indeed, was the contrast that existed between the Vikings and the tribes of Germania. All these tribes called themselves Norsemen, or Northmen; they were intensely warlike, and had been sea-faring people from immemorial time. The deeds done on the sea in by-gone ages could only be seen or remembered by graves made venerable by the centuries that had passed over them, or by the large tracings deeply engraved upon the rocks, seen to this day, representing sea-fights, raids, and invasions. Like the hieroglyphics of Egypt, they were the mementos of a great past, forever forgotten.