We used to share many videos from a couple Viking era combat reenactors, who worked hard to demonstrate the real fighting skill of the Viking while avoiding injury. If you search our blog, you’ll find many Friday fights. This one is a great example, an unarmored man versus a fully armored man. Who will win?
How do people learn how Vikings really fought? Is it mainly just improvisation from the weapons available or are their period texts detailing their style?
There’s a great deal of research behind it and I’m sure some speculation. Lars could give us some details, like how much may come from the sagas, what we’ve gleaned from images and tablet fragments, and what actual history books may have survived from that time.
There are some descriptions in the sagas, and that’s supplemented with practical experimentation using the kinds of weapons and armor the Vikings had. There are good ways and bad ways to use any particular weapon.
Read the comments in this old post about safety and training. https://brandywinebooks.net/?p=3997#comments