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A thrall (Old Norse
Old Norse

Old Norse is a North Germanic languages that was spoken by inhabitants of Scandinavia and inhabitants of their overseas settlements during the Viking Age, until about 1300....
 þræll; þír, f.
Grammatical gender

In linguistics, grammatical genders, sometimes also called noun classes, are classes of nouns reflected in the behavior of associated words; every noun must belong to one of the classes and there should be very few which belong to several classes at once....
) was a slave in Scandinavian
History of Scandinavia

The history of Scandinavia is the history of the Nordic countries ? Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland and Iceland....
 culture during the Viking Age
Viking Age

Viking Age is the term for the period in European history, especially Northern European and Scandinavian history, spanning the eighth to eleventh centuries....
. Unlike many of the forms of slavery throughout human history, the state of being a thrall could be entered into voluntarily, as well as involuntarily. Slavery
Slavery

Slavery is a form of forced labor where a person is compelled to Labor for another . Slaves are held against their will from the time of their capture, purchase, or birth, and are deprived of the right to leave, to refuse to work, or to receive Remuneration in return for their labor....
 was one of the primary sources of income for the Norsemen
Norsemen

Norsemen is used to refer to the group of people as a whole who speak one of the North Germanic languages as their native language. The meaning of Norseman was "people from the North" and was applied primarily to Nordic people originating from southern and central Scandinavia....
. Thralls were first described by the Roman
Ancient Rome

Ancient Rome was a civilization that grew out of a small agricultural community founded on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 10th century BC....
 historian
Historian

A historian is an individual who studies and writes about history, and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, systematic narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the study of all events in time....
 Tacitus
Tacitus

Publius Cornelius Tacitus was a Roman Senate and a historian of the Roman Empire. The surviving portions of his two major works—the Annals and the Histories —examine the reigns of the Roman Emperors Tiberius, Claudius, Nero and those that reigned in the Year of the Four Emperors....
, who wrote in 98
98

Year 98 was a common year starting on Monday of the Julian calendar....
 A.D. that the Swedes
Swedish people

Swedes are people from Sweden or of Swedish decent. Unlike the United States, United Kingdom, and Australian Censuses, Statistics Sweden does not classify the Swedish population by race or ethnicity....
 (Suiones
Suiones

The Swedes were an ancient North Germanic tribe in Scandinavia. As the dominions of their kings grew, their land slowly evolved into the modern Sweden....
) had no right to carry arms, but that the weapons were locked inside and protected by a slave only to be distributed when they were attacked by enemies.

A person could become a thrall by giving himself up because of starvation
Starvation

Starvation is a severe reduction in vitamin, nutrient, and energy intake, and is the most extreme form of malnutrition. In humans, prolonged starvation causes permanent organ damage and, eventually, death....
, being captured and sold, or being born into a thrall family.






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A thrall (Old Norse
Old Norse

Old Norse is a North Germanic languages that was spoken by inhabitants of Scandinavia and inhabitants of their overseas settlements during the Viking Age, until about 1300....
 þræll; þír, f.
Grammatical gender

In linguistics, grammatical genders, sometimes also called noun classes, are classes of nouns reflected in the behavior of associated words; every noun must belong to one of the classes and there should be very few which belong to several classes at once....
) was a slave in Scandinavian
History of Scandinavia

The history of Scandinavia is the history of the Nordic countries ? Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland and Iceland....
 culture during the Viking Age
Viking Age

Viking Age is the term for the period in European history, especially Northern European and Scandinavian history, spanning the eighth to eleventh centuries....
. Unlike many of the forms of slavery throughout human history, the state of being a thrall could be entered into voluntarily, as well as involuntarily. Slavery
Slavery

Slavery is a form of forced labor where a person is compelled to Labor for another . Slaves are held against their will from the time of their capture, purchase, or birth, and are deprived of the right to leave, to refuse to work, or to receive Remuneration in return for their labor....
 was one of the primary sources of income for the Norsemen
Norsemen

Norsemen is used to refer to the group of people as a whole who speak one of the North Germanic languages as their native language. The meaning of Norseman was "people from the North" and was applied primarily to Nordic people originating from southern and central Scandinavia....
. Thralls were first described by the Roman
Ancient Rome

Ancient Rome was a civilization that grew out of a small agricultural community founded on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 10th century BC....
 historian
Historian

A historian is an individual who studies and writes about history, and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, systematic narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the study of all events in time....
 Tacitus
Tacitus

Publius Cornelius Tacitus was a Roman Senate and a historian of the Roman Empire. The surviving portions of his two major works—the Annals and the Histories —examine the reigns of the Roman Emperors Tiberius, Claudius, Nero and those that reigned in the Year of the Four Emperors....
, who wrote in 98
98

Year 98 was a common year starting on Monday of the Julian calendar....
 A.D. that the Swedes
Swedish people

Swedes are people from Sweden or of Swedish decent. Unlike the United States, United Kingdom, and Australian Censuses, Statistics Sweden does not classify the Swedish population by race or ethnicity....
 (Suiones
Suiones

The Swedes were an ancient North Germanic tribe in Scandinavia. As the dominions of their kings grew, their land slowly evolved into the modern Sweden....
) had no right to carry arms, but that the weapons were locked inside and protected by a slave only to be distributed when they were attacked by enemies.

A person could become a thrall by giving himself up because of starvation
Starvation

Starvation is a severe reduction in vitamin, nutrient, and energy intake, and is the most extreme form of malnutrition. In humans, prolonged starvation causes permanent organ damage and, eventually, death....
, being captured and sold, or being born into a thrall family. The first was considered to be the most shameful way of entering slavery and was the first method of acquiring slaves to be forbidden. The most common way of acquiring thralls remained the capture of prisoners in foreign
Foreign

Foreign may refer to:*Foreign corporation, a corporation that can do business outside its jurisdiction*Foreign key, a constraint in a relational database...
 countries or the buying of such captured foreigners. As in the Roman practice of slavery
Slavery in ancient Rome

The institution of slavery in ancient Rome reduced those held to a condition of less than persons under Roman law. Stripped of many rights, including the ability to marry, slaves were the property of their owners....
, thralls in Scandinavia could be of any ethnic origin. Furthermore, a thrall had a certain social status, but to a lesser degree than other classes in the society, regarded somewhat like a domestic worker
Domestic worker

A domestic worker, domestic, servingman, servingwoman, or servant is one who works, and often also lives, within the employer's household....
.

The thralls were kept as livestock
Livestock

Livestock is the term used to refer to a domesticated animal intentionally reared in an agricultural setting to produce things such as food or fibre, or for its labour....
 and their master
Master (form of address)

Master is an English language title....
 had the power of their life
Life

Life is a characteristic of organisms that exhibit certain biological processes such as chemical reactions or other events that results in a transformation....
 and death
Death

Death is the permanent termination of the biological functions that define a life organism. It refers to both a particular event and to the condition that results thereby....
. A thrall might be a human sacrifice
Human sacrifice

Human sacrifice is the act of killing human beings as part of a religious ritual . Its typology closely parallels the various practices of ritual slaughter of animals and of religious sacrifice in general....
 in the funeral of a Viking chief
Viking funeral

The Norsemen often Cremation their dead in ship burials, known from archaeology, sagas, Old Norse poetry, and notably from #Ibn Fadlan's account. The Norse funerals that took place on land have permitted archaeologists to study the varying funeral traditions of Viking age Scandinavians....
. A child born by a thrall woman (a thir) was a thrall by birth, whereas a child born by a free woman was a free person even if the father was a thrall.

When Christianity
Christianity

Christianity is a Monotheistic religion #Christian view religion centered on the life and teachings of Jesus as New Testament view on Jesus' life....
 arrived in Northern Europe, there was increasing demand for non-Christian slaves, and the Scandinavians had a de facto monopoly
Monopoly

In economics, a monopoly exists when a specific individual or enterprise has sufficient control over a particular product or service to determine significantly the terms on which other individuals shall have access to it....
 on trading them because of geographic access to large non-Christian populations.

The verb "enthrall" (literally, to make into a thrall or enslave) is a linguistic remnant of this institution, though it is now mainly used as a metaphor.