Were Ireland, Scotland and England raided by the same bands of vikings?

by unknown_wizard2183

In history we were told that the vikings came from Scandinavia, which consisted of Norway, Sweden and Denmark. We also know they raided countries nearby such as Ireland, Scotland, England and that they also pillaged the coasts of other countries but never settled such as Spain, France, Portugal and Egypt, but were the vikings who raided Ireland and England from the same place or were they members of different bands? For example did Norwegian vikings invade Ireland and England and Swedish vikings took Scotland or did the vikings of these three countries go to different places from eachother?

y_sengaku

tl; dr: At least for the question in OP's title, the very simplified answer is "yes" (the same Viking band could went raiding across the British Isles), but in detail premises are not so straightforward that some reservations should be mentioned (sorry).

"Norwegian/ Swedish/ Danish Vikings"

It's true that even I sometimes have to employ this division for history course 101 (introductory course for the first-year student, especially not specialized in history) like that, but the ethnicity of pre-modern groups of people and its representation in the primary text is indeed difficult.

Put it simply, in 800 CE, there was at least no "Norway" and "Sweden" either as a unified polity or a culture, and the political border of "the kingdom of the Danes" was almost certainly did not correspond with that of medieval kingdom of Denmark, though some trends could perhaps be found, as I explained before in Just how different were Viking era Scandinavian countries from each other?. So, three medieval Nordic kingdoms were essentially products of the historical development in the Late Viking Age, possibly consequences of intensified communication between their homeland and Europe.

Very roughly speaking, we can see some correspondence between three major expansion routes (Westward, Southward, and Eastward) of the Scandinavians and their origins (those came from later Norway would mainly went westward into the North Atlantic, those from later Denmark mainly went southward, and then those from later Sweden went eastward in waterways in now Russia), but this division should not be regarded as so rigid.

In very simplified explanation, there is also a kind of correspondence between the major routes of expansion and the preferred type of activity that the Scandinavian mainly engaged in abroad (Westward - settlers, Southward - raiders, Eastward - traders), but this explanation is also probably too oversimplified from the point of view of recent academic consensus.

++++

Then, turn our attention to the British Isles in the 9th and 10th centuries. Of these three major expansion routes, Westward and Southward routes certainly overlapped in the British Isles, and both written and non-written (archaeological) evidence confirm the connection between now Norway, Denmark and the British Isles.

The issues at stake, however, are:

  • How can we distinguish the exact composition/ origin of raiders in individual cases based on written evidence
  • Where was their primary "base camps"

For the first problem, I wrote the simple answer before in: Did norwegian vikings settle and conquer england, or was it only the danish that controlled part of England during the viking age? - That is, we should be very careful of translating "Danes" / "Northmen" found in contemporary texts just as ethnic labels. If you really wish to explore the depth of the complexity, the posts in the following recent question thread might be convenient: Did the people of the British Isles refer to the Viking who plagued them as "Northmen"? I'm asking because, well, to the Brits the Vikings were coming from the east.

On the other hand, as for the second one, some raider bands began to winter and keep staying in the British Isles since 840, as I summarized before in the second section of Early Viking attacks on England failed as often as they succeeded. But after a few decades, they seemed to be far more effective. Did viking warriors improve or did viking leaders develop better tactics? Why did the Vikings become deadlier over time?

Famous "Great Army" in late 9th century had been active both in the British Isles as well as across the English Chanel for several years without total disbanding/ return to their original homeland in Scandinavia.

(Now) Dublin in Ireland and the Orkney Isles were preferred examples of such wintering sites for Scandinavian raiders in the British Isles.

unknown_wizard2183

What I'm trying to ask is did the Norwegian vikings, Danish and Swedish vikings go to different countries from eachother to pillage or did they all go to the same ones as eachother but had different territories?