JUBILEE OF THOR HEYERDAHL: VIKINGS AND AZERBAIJAN

Today, October 6, the world famous Norwegian traveler, ethnographer and archeologist Thor Heyerdahl would have been 95 years old.

 

Vikings originated in Azerbaijan

Thor Heyerdahl visited Azerbaijan many times and amazed many by the sensational results of his researches of petroglyphic drawing  in Gobustan. He called Gobustan reserve an open-air museum  and having studied petroglyphs there came to conclusion  that Norwegians and Azeris has direct kinship. He found similarity  between petroglyphic drawing s of ships with the vessels used by Vikings and concluded that Vikings started they journey to the West from here.

He was supporting his theory with the well known Norwegian legend that the first Norwegian king  Odin led his people from the land called Azer. Heyerdahl was claiming that Udins, the etnical minority in Azerbaijan, are forefathers of Scandinavians. He visited Azerbaijan couple of times in the last 20 years of his life, visited church in Kish – one of the architectural pearls of Caucasian Albania.

The secrets of Kish temple

From the memories of Vilayyat Kerimov, Phd. , Professor, Institute of Archeology and Ethnography :
" The ancient apostolical church in Kish village of Sheki region is foremother of all Christian churches in Orient, it dates at least 1500 years old. It was Heyerdahl who after his first visit of Azerbaijan in 1981 suggested that Norwegians and other Scandinavians could trace the roots of their origin to Azerbaijan. I met with him couple of times every time when he was coming to Azerbaijan, and we work in close contact in 2000 during excavations of Kish temple. As all creative and talented people Mr. Heyerdahl was absorbed by his scientific ideas. He was very charming and energetic despite his age. He was telling me that after his first visit to Gobustan he was under huge impression of what he had seen there, especially of rock inscription left by the commander of Roman legionnairies  Pompey at the dawn of The Common Era. Upon his return he started to study the sources of Scandinavian ancient history with doubled enthusiasm. In particular, he turned to Norwegian mythology that has its own chronology and has real parallels with real history.

According to mythology, Scandinavian god Odin led his people into land that was called later Norway from the place called Azer. In some historical documents dating by XIII century one can even find a location of this country: to the east from Caucasus and Black sea. In XVIII century Norwegian sources officially  mention that "Irishman are descendants of land Azer ".  Heyerdahl was maintaining this theory at international forum after his last visit of Azerbaijan in 2000. "I remember from my schooldays Norwegian legends, he was telling at that forum, that are so  trickily interlaced with Norwegian history that we sometimes can’t distinguish where legend ends and official history starts. Officially recorded history of Norway counts 800 years. Following the mythology, from Odin that led his people to blessed Norway to the first Norwegian king it took 31 generations. Studying this fact I came to conclusion that this is not a myth, one can trace the history of my people from this fact. In anthropology we count on average 25 years for one generation of ruling dynasty. If we multiply 31 generations of existing Norwegian kings to 25 years we would return exactly to the second half of I century A.D.  This is the direct evidence that inscriptions in Azeri Gobustan coincide with the fact of Ireland origin nearly 1800 years ago and descending to the ancient land of Azer ".

I remember that Mr. Heyerdahl used to mention that he doesn’t believe in boundaries between nations and that all nations to more or less extent are historically and genetically interrelated

Written evidence of kinship between Norwegians and Azeris

Famous researcher found written evidence of Vikings origin from Azerbaijan. In the times of feudal wars and conflicts those Norwegian kings defeated in their land fled with some scholars to Iceland taking with themselves valuable ancient chronicles that were later used for writing 5 volume ‘Iceland sagas’.

Heyerdahl studied Iceland sagas, checked original chronicles stored in Iceland and realized that they tell the same story that exist in Norway only as a oral legend. And the main paint is that their realness causes no doubt in Iceland. In those sagas story-writer Snore is mentioning the land of Azer and telling that the first king of Vikings Odin led his people from Azer.
Further, Heyerdahl brings forward calculations that he had to make to define the date of Viking exodus from Azerbaijan. He tells that chronicles kept in Iceland narrate about life of 31 generations of Norwegian kings up to year 1213.
As we know now there is a bronze plate in Gobustan that exactly tells us the date and what Roman legion reached Azerbaijan. And this date coincides with the date of Vikings exodus from Azer. Heyerdahl establishes what routes followed Vikings leaving Azerbaijan. According to him most likely Vikings left through Caspian sea and further up Volga and after moved to the West through Novgorod and Kiev. It were Vikings that founded and were the first kings in England, Scotland, France, Ireland. Heyerdahl also mentions the very strange feature of Vikings’ advance to the West. Moving West they had to conquer and bend to submission new lands, though while moving Eastwards those lands were always given them as a gift.

Another interesting fact that Heyerdahl mentions is initial fire-worship by Vikings. As Chronicles reveal it was Odin who brought and spread fire-worship. When he was terminally ill he made a will to burn his body on a fire and this burial procedure brought from the land of Azer was prevailing among Norwegians for many centuries till they converted to Christianity.

Azeris in Sognefjord:

There are descendants of Caspian type people living in Norway presently. They descend from people that used to live Kura-Araksinskaya lowland area centuries ago but moved for unknown reasons from Caucasus through Kievan Russia to Scandinavia.  They speak a dialect of Norwegian language. Hans Hunter in his ‘Brief history of races in Europe’ writes: "People of peculiar type live in Sognefjord: dark headed meso and brachycephals of small or medium height with ‘southern’ temperament in their speech and movements, very bellicose… perhaps we are talking about a race of unknown origin"

Following the path of Swedes’ forefather: Viking Ingvar

The descendants of legendary Scandinavians – Swedes – repeated the route laid originally by their famous forefather Viking Ingvar and his troops. The project was called ‘Vittfarne expedition’ headed by Hokan Altrok. "Expedition Vittfarne" which was a scientific expedition to Baku in Azerbaijan in the wake of the Viking chieftain Ingvar the far travelled. The Vittfarne expedition was successfully completed 2004 and brought a lot of new experiences.

Swedes constructed an exact copy of Viking ship that made the way from Azerbaijan in distant XI-th century. The itinerary was laid along the rivers passing through modern Ukraine, Russia, Georgia and finishing in Caspian sea. In 1996 the first stage of expedition was completed – it took Swedish scientists two years  to cover the way from Sigtuna to Dnieper river’s entry in Ukraine.
In 2004 expedition was resumed, this time the itinerary was passing through Black sea. Expedition rounded Crimean peninsula and reached town of Poti in Georgia. Then they continued overland till their boat reached the entry of Kura river and their final destination: Azerbaijan.

Statements by Thor Heyerdahl about put a basis for historical link between Azerbaijan and Scandinavian people, the same goes to Swedish expedition that confirms Heyerdahl’s belief.  It might sound as a joke but we can’t rule out that ‘All roads lead to Azerbaijan’ paraphrase might soon become widely accepted.  After all, it appears that once it was a true fact.

Meeting Heydar Aliyev

Heyerdahl came to Azerbaijan on at least four occasions—1980, 1994, 1999, 2000—the last three of which were upon the invitation of the late President Heydar Aliyev. He was embraced in the Soviet Union despite some of the academic challenges that he faced there. For example, when “Kon-Tiki” was first published in 1951, the book was forbidden until Nikita Khrushchev came to power [1958]. Then it soared to the top of the bestseller lists in all of the Eastern European languages. "Kon-Tiki", thus,       became the first book ever to sell more than a million copies there. In Constantine Pleshakov’s obituary, summarizing the legacy of Heyerdahl, he observed that the Soviet Union was one of the nations that      

            
loved him most and the crazy imaginativeness of his seemingly flimsy expeditions at sea always inspired and gave hope. He was the David daring to stand up against Goliath.          
Below are several extracts from Heyerdahl’s book ‘In The Footsteps Of Adam’, chapter ‘Beyond the Iron curtain’ covering his meetings with Heydar Aliyev.

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