: One thing you neglected to mention is that the viking
: warrios would go berserk for a damn ggood
: reason...they were given drugs before battle to MAKE
: Them go insane. I believe they took magic mushrooms,
: but my memory has been known to fail me :)
They ate a species of hallucinogenic mushroom that grows primarily in Scandinavia.
"They plundered gold and valuables, raping, killing and burning. This violence, even by the standards of heathens of those times, was exceptional. Alcohol was hard to produce and instead they used the "magic mushrooms", which are today available in Dutch coffee houses, before battle and slaughter. Hundreds of different types of mushroom grow in the Swedish forests. "Going berserk" comes from the Swedish for 'bare sark', a sark being the knee-length shirt or tunic worn by Vikings. 'Berserk' therefore means being naked. This ferocity may have had a purpose since the Vikings often had to return the way they had come."
-from "http://www.travis.se/ahometemp/vikings.htm"
-Doom 0^)
