The Volga Trade Route

Secrets of the Viking Sword

PBS Airdate: October 10, 2012

NARRATOR: The Vikings didn't invent crucible steel. In fact, there's no evidence that anyone in Europe knew how to make it until the industrial revolution in the 18th century. But for more than 500 years before the Ulfberht, warriors elsewhere had been fighting with crucible steel weapons.

Swordsmiths across Central Asia produced some of the greatest swords of all time, known as Damascus steel blades. Curiously, they were made from material similar to the Ulfberht.

ALAN WILLIAMS: Damascus steel is a separate class of crucible steel, which is similar in chemical composition, but the crucible steel was cooled very slowly, so the iron formed large crystals. And with careful forging these large crystals form a surface pattern on the blade.

NARRATOR: These unusual swords exhibited many of the same superior qualities as the Ulfberht, but if the Vikings didn't know how to make crucible steel, then where did they get it?

Clues can be found in artifacts excavated from Viking graves, in Scandinavia, as early as the eighth century.

GUNNAR ANDERSSON: The Buddha was found on an island west of modern-day Stockholm. It originates from India, northeast India. And it tells us, of course, that trades with the Far East existed. The ring is the same thing, there. It's this written inscription that says "Allah."

NARRATOR: Thousands of artifacts from the east have been uncovered from Viking graves. Islamic coins were even commonly traded in Scandinavia.

FREDRIK CHARPENTIER LJUNGQVIST: You could go, mostly by river and lakes, all the way from Lake Mälaren, here in Sweden, to northern Iran. The route was known as the Volga trade route.

The interesting thing is that the most Ulfbehrt swords are dated from exactly the same time when the Volga trade route was open, that is from the early 800s to the mid-1,000s.

I think it's very likely that the steel that you find in the Ulfberht swords originated from Iran. I would guess that you bought it from friendly trading connections in Iran, paid with furs and other Nordic commodities, and took it back on your small ships that you used on the rivers.

Secrets Of The Viking Sword

PRODUCED AND DIRECTED BY

Peter Yost

ASSOCIATE PRODUCER

Frauke Levin

EDITED BY

Anna Auster

CAMERA

Mark Knobil

NARRATED BY

Jay O. Sanders

HIGH SPEED CAMERA

Evan McIntosh

ADDITIONAL CAMERA

Christine Nesheimer

ADDITIONAL EDITING

Jared Dubrino

ANIMATION

Jung Yuen Shin

PRODUCTION MANAGER

Edna Alburquerque

ASSISTANT EDITOR

Mara Auster

ONLINE EDITOR

Jared Dubrino

COLORIST

Björn Bellenbaum

AUDIO MIX

Patrick Donahue

SOUND DESIGN

Brian Bracken

PRODUCTION ASSISTANTS

Ankur Agrawal
Sarah Ashey
Amy Augustino
Cassie Gomez
Joseph Ettinger
Gianna Keiko Rankart

LOCATION PRODUCTION ASSISTANTS

Mandy Johnston
(US)

Pablo Antonio Labañino
(Sweden)

Alexander Leise-Hansen
(Denmark)

John Nolen
(US)

Magnus Roekenes
(Norway)

Dominik Zalewski
(Poland)

HISTORICAL REENACTMENT

Slavs and Viking Festival at the Open Air Museum, Wolin, Poland

VIKING FIGHT SCENES

The Jomsvikings/ Phil Burthem
Silverwolf Viking Group/ Maxim Makarov
ARMS AND ARMOR REPLICAS
Albion Swords
CAS Hanwai
Crescent Moon Armoury
Kult of Athena

ARCHIVAL MATERIAL

Prof. Ulrich Dilthey and his Simulation Research Group at ISF - Welding and Joining Institute of RWTH - Aachen University, Germany
NASA's Earth Observatory

SPECIAL THANKS

The National Museum of Denmark, Copenhagen
Sankt Cyriakus, Gernrode, Germany
Robert C. Cammarata
Alban Depper
Dermix
Ann Feuerbach
Alfred Geibig
Martin Glicksman
Craig Johnson
Peter Johnsson
Lee Jones
Anna Kjellström
Agnieszka Klosowska
Kram Janettee
Marena Wellness and Spa, Międzywodzie, Poland
Robert "Joey" Marmorato Jr.
Cain Maxwell
Graham McCartney
Mikkel Pauli Mønsted
Michael Notis
Jeffrey Pringle
Neil Price
Elena Ryabova
Katarzyna Schirmacher
William R. Short
Anne Stalsberg
Rohit Trivedi
Slawomir Uta
John Verhoeven
Roland Warzecha

FOR NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC TELEVISION

PRODUCTION MANAGER

Johnita "Jaye" Moran

PRODUCTION COORDINATOR

Laura Beth Ward

POST PRODUCTION MANAGER

Brett Reinke

RESEARCHER

Todd Georgelas

FOR NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC TELEVISION

SENIOR EXECUTIVE PRODUCER,
NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC SPECIALS

John Bredar

NOVA SERIES GRAPHICS

yU + co.

NOVA THEME MUSIC

Walter Werzowa
John Luker
Musikvergnuegen, Inc.

ADDITIONAL NOVA THEME MUSIC

Ray Loring
Rob Morsberger

POST PRODUCTION ONLINE EDITOR

Spencer Gentry

CLOSED CAPTIONING

The Caption Center

MARKETING AND PUBLICITY

Karen Laverty

PUBLICITY

Eileen Campion
Victoria Louie

SENIOR RESEARCHER

Kate Becker

NOVA ADMINISTRATOR

Kristen Sommerhalter

PRODUCTION COORDINATOR

Linda Callahan

PARALEGAL

Sarah Erlandson

TALENT RELATIONS

Scott Kardel, Esq. Janice Flood

LEGAL COUNSEL

Susan Rosen

DIRECTOR OF EDUCATION

Rachel Connolly

DIGITAL PROJECTS MANAGER

Kristine Allington

DIRECTOR OF NEW MEDIA

Lauren Aguirre

ASSOCIATE PRODUCER

POST PRODUCTION Patrick Carey

POST PRODUCTION EDITOR

Rebecca Nieto

POST PRODUCTION MANAGER

Nathan Gunner

COMPLIANCE MANAGER

Linzy Emery

BUSINESS MANAGER

Elizabeth Benjes

DEVELOPMENT PRODUCERS

Pamela Rosenstein
David Condon

COORDINATING PRODUCER

Laurie Cahalane

SENIOR SCIENCE EDITOR

Evan Hadingham

SENIOR PRODUCERS

Julia Cort
Chris Schmidt

SENIOR SERIES PRODUCER

Melanie Wallace

MANAGING DIRECTOR

Alan Ritsko

SENIOR EXECUTIVE PRODUCER

Paula S. Apsell

A Production of NOVA and National Geographic Television in association with Pangloss Films, LLC.

© 2012 NGHT, LLC and WGBH Educational Foundation

All rights reserved

Image

(map of trade route)

© WGBH Educational Foundation

Gunnar Andersson

National Historical Museum, Sweden

Fredrik Charpentier Ljungqvist

University of Stockholm

Alan Williams

The Wallace Collection, London