The Valkyries' Loom: The Archaeology of Cloth Production and Female Power in the North Atlantic

Using textiles to understand gender and economy in Norse societies

In The Valkyries' Loom, Michèle Hayeur Smith examines Viking textiles as evidence of the little-known work of women in the Norse colonies that expanded from Scandinavia across the North Atlantic in the ninth century AD. While previous researchers have overlooked textiles as insignificant artifacts, Hayeur Smith is the first to use them to understand gender and economy in Norse societies of the North Atlantic.

This groundbre...