When i first heard about the burial at Repton where the remains have a boar’s tusk between the legs i got excited cuz there ain’t owt else it could be other than a packer
For the cis ppl reading this - a packer is basically a prosthetic penis that some trans men and trans mascs will pop down their pants to create a bulge. I know a few butch bulldykes who do it as well
Some packers have functions for sex or to pee thru but all create the bulge and give comfort
Gender affirming for anyone who needs one
Does this make this the remains of a trans man? No
This is grave 511 found near the church in Repton. The remains seem to be that of a cis man age 35 - 45, at least 6ft tall and was buried with a sword in a fleece lined scabbard as well as knives, straps and buckles, and a silver Thor’s hammer pendant. The burial is from approx 873 CE and has been speculated to be the remains of Ivar The Boneless
The remains indicate that he had a spear or sword thrust thru his eye and his dick lopped off, likely in battle. As burial practices were a pretty important part of Viking culture we can see why the boar’s tusk might have been important - burials were a public affair, especially if u were someone important and everything would be symbolic and also to boost morale of those who attended. We can get that the vikings burying this person thought he could cope with one eye in Valhalla but there is a chance he might need a dick so replacing it with a substitute is the best they could do and hoped it would be of some use in the afterlife
The boar’s tusk looks to have been specifically placed between the legs, not placed further up and its sunk over time. It is also suggested with other burials where animal bones were placed specifically that it could be a way of replacing other body parts in the afterlife such as legs and arms (sometimes with wings cuz who the fuck wouldn’t want a sick set of wings in the afterlife to rain down on ur enemies from above!), these remains were also found with a jackdaw humerus placed next to an arm so this could have been a way of symbolising needing Eir to fix the arm or give him a new one.
As a disabled person and as a trans woman i am here for that cuz fuck yeah cyborg me up baby lets replace my dodgy parts with smth exciting
So why is this a thing i’m even writing about? Well its about how it creates the possibility for trans history and its interpretation
This burial shows that that the Vikings had an understanding of gender affirming care (in a very broad sense here) and that if this person was super masculine and valued manhood as a cis man then ofc they would want to make sure he was buried in a way that affirms that. Same way grave goods usually are buried with their owners to affirm them as a person
Even in the current time all sorts of things are given to cis ppl as gender affirming care. I’ve seen binder sold as smth for fat cis men to help flatten chests, packers and prosthetic penii are advertised and given to cis men for a multitude of reasons such as to make their bulges bigger or due to having accidents, minoxidil to regrow hairlines etc.
Claire Ratican writes in her thesis that personhood in the viking age was a considered thing. If u were associated with an object, or animal or other human then that was part of ur personhood and u weren’t considered urself without them. This could be anything from an ancestral sword to a pet pig, or a slave, servant or partner who u were always with. It could be one reason we see animal parts in burials as if that person was associated with boars then having a part of a boar buried with them would be completing there personhood as far as viking society was concerned
So what if we apply that to transness? Well in theory if u were trans and associated with things that were to do with ur transition then we could come to the conclusion that some trans women in the viking age wouldn’t be considered themselves unless they had socks stuffed down their tops or were wearing dresses or whatever they needed to affirm their gender or transness.
Not in a transphobic way cuz that doesn’t mean they wouldn’t be considered women, but that they wouldn’t be considered themselves cuz they would be so associated with those transition related things
Burying someone with animal parts in hope of some analog cyborg afterlife is already a thing so this could (and in my opinion should) make room for considering how intersex & trans ppl would have been buried and given care for the afterlife. If a cis man can be buried with a packer then why can’t a viking trans man? Why can’t a viking trans woman be buried with some tits made of some leather or animal hide?
We know that the burial in Suontaka with the remains of what was likely an intersex trans woman were adorned with what is traditionally women’s clothing and jewelry so we know that intersex and trans women were accepted in some parts of viking age society, and that they were buried in accordance with their gender, or rather their personhood.
I can’t base this of some wide ranging study cuz there hasn’t been one done and there isn’t likely to be one done any time soon. This is pure theorising cuz why the hell not.
Theres loads of bollocks out there about what weapons in what burials denote what gender etc. and yes it was over 1000 years ago so applying modern modes of transness might not fit perfectly into what we know of burials in the viking age, but then again none of the other theories are much better.
Could this provide us with smth to consider when looking for transness in viking age burials? Maybe. Or maybe this will just be smth for the next assassins creed: valhalla DLC. either way its nice to have another way to think about how transness could manifest or be represented in depictions of ancient cultures other than just trans woman must be a witch or seer
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