Yes, the Viking Age, when medieval horn-helmeted Scandinavian men ravaged Europe, scribbling mysterious runes and toasting their victories in goblets forged from enemy skulls before bidding farewell in fiery funerals.
Except that's not quite how it went.
It's unclear where the word Viking came from, but in Old Norse, it apparently referred to an act of maritime raiding.
Historians long pinned the start of the Viking Age to a brutal ambush on an English monastery in 793 CE, which the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle described as an onslaught of lightning, fiery dragons, and heathen men.
The more recent discovery of Scandinavian artifacts at a site in Estonia suggests that Viking activity began decades earlier.
But whatever the precise 8th century start, it persisted for the next 300 years.
We don't know exactly what prompted all this Viking-ing.
But volcanic activity in the mid-500s triggered a mini ice age that destabilized Scandinavia.
Its society grew increasingly militarized.
And like many warrior-based peoples, local chieftains legitimized their rule through gift-giving.
