As the coins afford us an insight into the relations of our forefathers towards the east, so they give us also important hints as to the connection of the North with the west of Europe. It is a fact, established beyond all doubt, that the inhabitants of the North carried on trade with the countries of the west; but at the close of paganism, this connection assumed more and more of a warlike character, and instead of peaceful merchants vast hordes of rude Vikings landed on their coasts. Numerous English and Dutch coins of the tenth and eleventh centuries which are met with here in the North, sufficiently testify the fortunate expeditions of the Northmen to the west; and in modern times coins have been discovered which were probably struck by leaders of bands of Vikings, Thus among others a coin has been found which bears on one side the head of the French king, Charles the Bald, while the reverse presents the name of a northern Sea king Cnut. On another coin, also of Cnut, is the name of the English king Alfred the Great. Cnut must therefore have visited both England and France in his expeditions. Some of the coins are only inscribed with a northern name; for instance the coins of King Sigfred, who was probably the same with that King Sigfred who with his Northmen, according to the testimony of old chroniclers, made important conquests in France, and was particularly distinguished for his daring attacks on Paris. These and other similar coins serve in an important degree to confirm and to explain the statements of the chronicles as to the expeditions of the northern Vikings into the west of Europe.
Since foreign valuables and wares must infallibly have been introduced with foreign coins, we have consequently, with reference to the antiquities of the iron-period, to determine between 1. The purely Roman or antique objects; 2. The east Roman or Byzantine; 3. The eastern; 4. Those derived from western Europe; and lastly, 5. Those of which it
by Professor Soderberg in 18445, under the title of "Vägledare i Wisby Ruiner, jemte Förord om Gothland och Wisby," &c. Wisby, 1845.—T.
