Thread: Banded Slate Whetstones - Viking Stones

Banded slate whetstones / Viking whetstone

I found this website and thought they were pretty interesting, I always wondered what they sharpened with. I'm sure it's no good for a finisher but maybe they could fit somewhere in a progression.

Either way I plan to pick one up for my knives/swords & for novelties sake.

Those are some cool look'n rocks

Gorgeous but 3 inches in length.
~Richard

I thought that the vikings used a type of Jasper instead of slate (the color on those sugest jasper as well by the way)

pretty cool stones either way!

Originally Posted by Geezer

Gorgeous but 3 inches in length.
~Richard

Ahh, I didn't see length. The price is right though. Less than 30$ isn't bad. They are some of the most colorful whetstones i've seen.

I concur that it looks like no slate that i've handled or seen.

Yea, I've never seen slate like that. I doubt it is slate. When they say "copies" it makes me wonder if it is some manufactured product that is made from slate and then ground up and epoxied together.

I did a bit of research for a friend when we were looking at charnley forest, And trying to place that stone in history. There was a great archeological report on viking burials in Iceland. The report was based there because there is no natural whetstone and it all had to be imported.

Whetstones from Viking Age Iceland - As part of the Trans-Atlantic trade in basic commodities | Sigrid Cecilie Juel Hansen - Academia.edu

It's an interesting if little heavy read, but from the parts I read there are a few common things found in Viking era stone, They seem to be exclusively Schist and Sandstone. There are some stones that are probably Phylites but that's about it. Nothing truly fancy or exotic.

Originally Posted by Iceni

I did a bit of research for a friend when we were looking at charnley forest, And trying to place that stone in history. There was a great archeological report on viking burials in Iceland. The report was based there because there is no natural whetstone and it all had to be imported.

Whetstones from Viking Age Iceland - As part of the Trans-Atlantic trade in basic commodities | Sigrid Cecilie Juel Hansen - Academia.edu

It's an interesting if little heavy read, but from the parts I read there are a few common things found in Viking era stone, They seem to be exclusively Schist and Sandstone. There are some stones that are probably Phylites but that's about it. Nothing truly fancy or exotic.

The Vikings didn't just come from Iceland, did they?! No, they came from various Scandianavian countries including Denmark, Norway and Sweden.

Sandstone is documented as being mined in the Viking Age from the Telemark Mountains in Norway. Ragstone - fine grained scist comes from Norway. Slate whetstones are found in the uppsland region of Sweden and are found as grave ornaments in many old graves - they are well catalogued and a number of scholarly works (dont ask me, use google) exist:



Many whetstones come from the Viking Scandinavia - most appear to me medium and low grade, coarse hones, but some if not exotic in use are truly exotic in appearance.

Regards,
Neil

From the little reading have done the Vikings were very attached to their edged weapons, I'm sure whatever they used to sharpen them allowed them to fulfill their mission.

A little known fact is that when they retired from pillaging and conquering they used the horns off their helmets to make scales for their straight razors!