How Were Thralls Used?

Since we don’t have any contemporary written sources, and the Old Norse sagas and poetry must be considered problematic as to a valid description of slaves life in the Viking Age, we have difficulties in reconstructing how slaves were used in Viking-Age society. Therefore, comparative analyses with neighboring societies with written sources, and societies on a similar “stage” as Viking-Age Scandinavia, become important. We have a couple of very important Arabic sources from around AD 900, which empazise how Rūs (Scandinavians?) took concubines. The chapter also discusses the sexual exploit of young women within this Scandinavian slave society.