Vikings
Eoghan Lavelle (efl@indigo.ie)
Tue, 26 Jan 1999 22:48:12 +0000
To Viking Ships 100, 101, 1927, 54, 39
Last November Bruce Johnson, in a message about the Ship Name Registry
update, drew our attention to, among other things, the fact that the most
popular BSA Ship name is "Viking". I found this very interesting because
there was a strong Viking input into Irish history. Dublin and many of our
most important coastal towns were founded by Vikings. About 10 years or so
ago we celebrated the Millenium of the foundation of Dublin as a city,
based on archeological evidence of organisation, defensive walls and issue
of currency by King Sitric, known as "Silken Beard".
We had some "difficulties" with the Vikings at first, but eventually they
settled down and became as civilised as we were - some people may not
consider this much of a compliment!
I have tried find out if the name "Viking" is used by Sea Scouts in Europe.
Britain
I know of only one Sea Scout Group called Vikings - 14th Richmond, no
web-site. I have also found a number of Venture Scout Units called
Vikings, but they all seem to be part of "land" groups rather than Sea
Scouts.
Denmark
Vikingerne Vedbaek Sospejdere -
http://www.fys.ku.dk/~bysse/vikingerne/english/index.html
Netherlands
No "Vikings" found but there is a group called "Leif Erikson" in Voorschoten -
http://www.geocities.com/Yosemite/1175
Ireland
One group sometimes refered to as "Vikings" but not so named officially.
They use a Viking theme regularly and wear a Viking helmet logo on the
neckerchief. On appropriate occasions they also dress as Vikings and make
up their rowing skiff as a Viking longboat with shields along the gunwale,
a dragon figure-head and a square sail set when the wind is aft. 5th Port
of Dublin Sea Scouts are based on the north side of Dublin Bay, curiously
enough very close to the site of the Battle of Clontarf (1014) which
finally broke the power of the Vikings in Ireland. They have a web-site -
http://ireland.iol.ie/~tasht
Eoghan Lavelle
8th Port of Dublin Sea Scouts
Dunlaoghaire, Ireland
To leave Seascout-Net, send the following message to <listserv@seascout.org>:
UNSUBSCRIBE seascout-net
