According to the article I read about it (I don't have access to the publication of the study itself) authors examined the bones of 14 Norse burials in England and found that 6 of them were female, some of which were buried with weapons or shield, which indicates that the method of identifying skeletons' sex by burial goods may be inaccurate. The authors suggest that this may mean that a large fraction of the overall Norse invasion of/immigration to England were women.
I've looked through previous AH posts but haven't found anything addressing this find, and many posts reference Judith Jesch's 1991 book Women in the Viking Age, which seems to at least mostly agree with the idea that raiding and warring was an overwhelmingly male activity in Viking times and that women warriors were probably uncommon.
My question is especially focused on what this means for the field of Norse/English history--first off, I should ask if the findings are largely considered valid. If they are, does this challenge the methodology of sexing remains by grave goods, or is it thought that the invasion of England may have been exceptional in its inclusion of women warriors?
This came up on my Facebook as well. The study is rather clear in it's intentions that it is discussing migrants, revealing that almost half of them were female (something the previous studies had missed because they were buried with weapons and thus must have been men). Certainly, in that regard, it should be a major challenge to the methodology of determining sex by burial items (who knows, there might be dozens or hundreds more)!
The author of the study notes his surprise when linking to the USAToday article, and does not comment one way or the other on whether these women were warriors. Just because they are buried with weapons does not automatically mean that they were warriors and without contextualisation (this might just be a deviant burial policy) to make any judgement is speculation - although it does make for intriguing speculation!
The author does not seem to have picked up on this 'warrior-woman' theme in his recent monograph: Shane McLeod, The Beginning of Scandinavian Settlement in England: The Viking 'Great Army' and Early Settlers, c. 865-900, (Brepolis, 2014). Which one might expect the author, and certainly the publisher, to push if it was a viable argument. That said, this is his first publication so he might not want to court controversy so early in his career (especially when it can be saved for the juicy pop-history market).
GreenReaper is dead on. There is nothing in the article to indicate that these women were "warriors." Thats just popular journalism spin.
In answer to your question of whether the findings are valid, I see no reason to doubt them. Early Medieval Europe (the journal in question) is a pretty major journal and is peer reviewed by some of the most important folks in the field.
It certainly challenges the validity of sexing remains purely by grave goods, and is indicative of the new push to use forensic techniques in archaeology.
The inclusion of women in Scandinavian "invasions" of the British Isles during the second half of the ninth century fits well with the overall understood pattern of Scandinavian activity.
c. 800 to c. 840 we see a raiding activity, generally seasonal and small in scale.
c. 840-860 or so we begin to see longer more active invasions as Scandinavian raiders spend much more time on land, often building forts and even wintering in Francia and the British Isles.
By the 860s and on raiding has in many cases turned firmly to attempts at settlement and long-term non-seasonal activity beyond Scandinavia. We see large groups (or armies) which seem to have as their primary goal not quick wealth and a return to Scandinavia but rather on-going inhabitation of the areas they have invaded. If things go sour and they are defeated in battle or if they are persuaded to look elsewhere by payments this generally just means a shift of venue not a return to Scandinavia. It makes sense, then, for their to have been not only the warriors we so commonly think of but also their families, with the goal of permanent settlement. This is especially true in England, but we are also more and more uncovering evidence of a Scandinavian presence on the Continent thanks to modern techniques and further research.
Just came across these and thought they might be of interest.
http://historical-academy.co.uk/blog/2014/09/05/viking-warrior-women-or-misrepresenting-research/
http://600transformer.blogspot.co.uk/2014/09/warrior-women-more-thoughts-on-alleged.html