All Viking Archery You’ve Seen Is Wrong — Proven by Science

But for many years, I knew something was wrong. Years ago, I visited some reenactment Vikings after studying historical images – and I was surprised they didn’t shoot like in the pictures.
They told me it wasn’t possible, and that the images must be an ‘artistic mistake.’

The next day I tried the method, and it worked. As a painter, that explanation made no sense – why would artists deliberately paint something everyone knew was wrong? I also know it’s harder to depict a bent arm than a straight one, and much harder to draw a man running. So the theory of an artistic conspiracy, where every image of Viking archery is wrong, is a far less likely explanation than that the images are simply correct. There are even historical texts that support these depictions.

Together with Viking historian Kim Hjardar and physicist Knud Erik Meyer, we began investigating a few years ago to see if we could investigate whether the images were accurate. We can now show that the method – with the arrow held low on the right side, using a pinch grip, and the archer running – clearly matches the pictures and historical sources.
Of course, there may have been other Viking archery methods: some probably copied thumb ring shooting from travels in the East, and others may later have begun using the hige three-finger draw. But there are no historical sources for that.

We’ve discovered much more, and I know there will be many questions about our findings.
I’ll make a podcast later to answer them all. Traditional three-finger archer Klaes Andersen will collect the questions and ask me critical questions.

Best regards,
Lars Andersen