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Did the Vikings Think the Gods Were Watching Them?
By Stephanie Pappas, Live Science Contributor | January 17, 2019 08:02am ET
Today, the name "Thor" likely conjures up an image of a well-muscled Chris Hemsworth playing the Norse-inspired superhero on the big screen. For the actual Vikings, the god of thunder may have similarly been admired for his great feats — but certainly not for his moral fortitude.
New research suggests that Vikings didn't look to their pantheon of gods for moral enlightenment, nor did they expect the gods to punish wrongdoers.
Despite their lack of all-knowing, moralizing gods, the Vikings developed a complex society. That suggests that even belief in smaller deities can spur human cooperation, researchers reported in December 2018 in the journal Religion, Brain & Behavior.
"From the Viking perspective, there seems to be a number of supernatural beings that facilitate cooperation," said study author Ben Raffield, an archaeologist at Uppsala University in Sweden. [Fierce Fighters: 7 Secrets of Viking Seamen]
More:
https://www.livescience.com/64529-vikings-gods-watching-them.html