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Berserkers and Other Shamanic Warriors
Ritually costumed “weapons dancers” on a Migration Period bronze plate from Öland, Sweden
The shamanism of the pre-Christian Norse and other Germanic peoples took several different forms. Among the most common of these forms, especially for men, was the attainment and use of an ecstatic battle-fury closely linked to a particular totem animal, usually a bear or a wolf, and often occurring within the context of certain formal, initiatory military groups.
http://norse-mythology. ... ic-warriors/ |