Wikipedia: Rus' Khaganate

Kälvesten Runestone 

"The Rus' Khaganate was a polity that flourished during a poorly documented period in the history of Eastern Europe, roughly the late 8th and early-to-mid-9th centuries AD. A predecessor to the Rurik Dynasty and the Kievan Rus', the Rus' Khaganate was a state, or a cluster of city-states, set up by a people called Rus', who might have been Norsemen in what is today northern Russia. The region's population at that time was composed of Baltic, Slavic, Finnic, Turkic and Norse peoples. The region was also a place of operations for Varangians, eastern Scandinavian adventurers, merchants and pirates."
Read the full Wikipedia article.

Rural Settlements in Medieval Norway, AD 400-1400

Courtesy Medievalists.net:

"In the 5th and 6th centuries the three aisled longhouse with a byre and a living section appears to dominate on rural settlements in all regions. From the 7th century onwards the diversity is greater. In northern Norway the longhouse is still built in the 10th century. In eastern Norway the function fragmentation of the longhouse advances step by step until the domination of the two roomed timbered livinghouse from the 12th century onwards. In western Norway this fragmentation also occurs, but the longhouse without a byre also continues to be built, probably until modern times. Alterations in building techniques probably played a limited role in these developments."  The full article may be read at Ruralia.

The Norse in Newfoundland: L’Anse aux Meadows and Vinland

Via Medievalists.net:

Wikimedia Commons

"One thousand years ago, the Old World and the New stood face to face in the Strait of Belle Isle. The landing of the Norse on the shores of North America was not the result of a sudden journey but the endpoint of a step-by-step expansion stretching over two centuries. This expansion began in southwestern Norway, where chieftains and minor kings jostled for power over a growing population. In such a competitive context, migration across the North Sea to the Scottish Isles and the Faeroes was an attractive alternative to staying home. The contemporary development of seaworthy ships, capable of safely crossing open oceans and transporting people, their worldly belongings and livestock, made emigration possible."

Read the full article by Birgitta Wallace at the Newfoundland and Labrador Studies website.

The Enchanted Islands: A comparison of mythological traditions from Ireland and Iceland

Ósvör Fishing Museum at Bolungarvik, Iceland Image from Wikimedia Commons

Originally posted at Medievalists.net. The Enchanted Islands: A comparison of mythological traditions from Ireland and Iceland, by Katarzyna Herd, Master’s Thesis, University of Jyväskylä, 2008: "The later conversion to Christianity did not destroy completely the previous, older cults. In some areas the old stories were erased almost totally, but every now and then a Christian monk, a true follower of a new faith, felt the need to preserve those mysterious legends of his ancestors. That was the case in Ireland and Iceland, where the two major mythologies, the Norse and the Celtic, were written down." Read the full thesis here.