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Couple Have Traditional Viking Wedding Which Included A Blood Sacrifice

Couple Have Traditional Viking Wedding Which Included A Blood Sacrifice

It's thought to be the first proper Viking wedding in 1000 years

Rachael Grealish

Rachael Grealish

Even though there are some weird ways to get married - just look at Don't Tell The Bride - most people still decide to go down a more traditional route.

One Norwegian couple took the traditional wedding to a new level when they decided to exchange vows in an authentic Viking ceremony - complete with longboats, a pagan priest and even a blood sacrifice.

Elisabeth and Rune Dalseth opted to ditch their conventional Christian upbringing in favour of a ceremony inspired by weddings that took place 1,000 years ago.

The couple swapped the standard bridal car for two authentic longboats and decided to get married on the banks of a Norwegian lake dressed in full Viking matrimonial attire.

PA Real Life/Patrick Aguilera

Keeping with tradition, the ceremony incorporated a 'blot' ritual - a cauldron of pig's blood is put on a pile of stones, then dripped over small figures representing the gods, and then blotted onto the forehead of the couple.

In true Viking style, the pair celebrated right into the night - surrounded by 130 guests, all dressed in full costume - swigging honey-beer and dancing to traditional Norse songs.

27-year-old Elisabeth said: "We danced to live music that our ancestors danced to over a millennium ago."

Her and Rune, 36, are part of a 6,000 strong movement of Norwegian Viking revivalists - and even named their six-month-old baby after the legendary Viking hero Ragnar Lothbrok.

Elisabeth and Rune are keen to challenge the horned helmet-wearing seafarers' reputation for violence, rape and pillage.

Rune, who owns his own carpentry company, said: "Vikings were no more terrible than any other group of people living at that time."

The pair met back in 2016, when the world of paganism and Vikings was unknown to Elisabeth. Rune, who'd been a pagan for two years, introduced the world of Vikings to her.

PA

She said: "Rune completely opened up a new world for me, and I soon fell in love with the people and the spirituality of it."

A year later Rune popped the question at a Viking festival, near Oslo, and the pair got straight onto planning the spectacular event.

Rune explained that friends from the movement, which works to preserve and continue pagan rituals, were keen to be involved in what would be the 'first Viking wedding since the downfall of the fierce warriors nearly 1,000 years ago'.

He said: "We had two longboats built, they were made by a local shipbuilder.

"The traditional dress is not easy to find, so another friend helped us with that.

"Finally, a man who we had met at a festival one year agreed to be the gothi - the equivalent of a priest - for the ceremony."

As both Rune and Elisabeth are from Christian backgrounds, the pair faced doubt from their parents.

Rune explained his mum was initially unsure about the whole idea.

"I come from a very Christian family," he said. "When I announced that we were not going to have a Christian wedding my mum was a little unsure about it.

"But I think she has now come to accept it. She can see how happy paganism makes me and how it has helped me get my life together.

"Before I was a Viking, I didn't have a wife, a baby and a house - now look at me."

In the end, the pair had the Viking wedding of their dreams - longboats, pagan priests and a blood sacrifice included.

Featured Image Credit: Credit: PA Real Life/Patrick Aguilera

Topics: News, Norway