A History of the South Pennines: The Vikings in Britain

A History of the South Pennines: The Vikings in Britain

What this teaching pack offers:

This teaching pack can be split across multiple lessons. Classroom activities and local sites to visit have been included.

The teaching pack is structured as follows:

? Introduction to Archaeology ? The Viking Period in Britain (787 ? 1150 AD)

? Briefly touching upon the 'pre-Viking' Anglo-Saxon Period

? This pack is accompanied by an artefact box containing objects related to these lessons, including: ? A spindle whorl and sheep's wool ? The Viking boardgame `Hnefatafl' ? A hair comb ? Viking coins ? Cloak pin

Please feel free to remove wording or otherwise alter slides when using this in class to suit your lessons.

Before we get stuck in, how does `Archaeology' help us understand the Viking period in Britain?

Studying the past means studying the people here before us that lived in a different way. But, these ancient people left only small pieces of their lives behind, so how do we know how they lived and what they did?

Archaeologists work like detectives looking for evidence. They use this

evidence to build up a picture of the past.

Ancient Vikings didn't write down and record their history in the same way we do today, they used runes to write sagas and passed down oral histories. They were also very good at building and making things. Their religious monuments, epic stories, and even some of their language has survived for thousands of years and evidence of these can be found across the South Pennines.

Remains of personal items and places of worship show how people lived and honoured their gods. Tools and weapons give clues about the way people worked and fought. Bumps and ridges in the landscape show the layout of ancient villages, fields and forts.

Some of the best evidence comes from human remains. Skeletons have been found buried with their possessions and a few bodies have been preserved in bogs.

Vikings in Britain

By Dr Lenore Thompson, Heritage Consultant

For The South Pennines Park

Key Stage 2/3

"Vikings" (It's No Game, CC BY 2.0)

Before we talk about Vikings in the South Pennines of Britain; Who Were the Romans and Where Did They Come From?

Activity When did the Romans live in relation to other cultures around the world?

Cut these out and have the students arrange them along the timeline in the order they think is correct.

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