Viking revival

At that point in the Romantic Era, Viking exploits were aggregated and tended to be falsely subsumed under a single category and subsequently romanticized as heroic adventure.

Danish antiquarian Carl Christian Rafn was noted for his early advocacy of the theory that the Vikings had explored North America centuries before Christopher Columbus's and John Cabot's voyages.

Another author who had great influence on the perception of the Vikings was Esaias Tegnér, another member of the Geatish Society who wrote a modern version of Frithiof's Saga, which became widely popular in the Nordic countries, England, the United States, and Germany.

[4] English authors from the 16th century had been aware of the Viking impact on the countryside, though the numerous placenames of Danes Camp[5] is better explained as a modification of dene, or hollow.

[6] Following the 17th-century first flowering of Anglo-Saxon studies, there was a similar wave of enthusiasm for Northern culture in Britain, identifying as Viking remains Iron Age hill forts and even Stonehenge and exemplified by the antiquarian interests of George Hickes, who published a Linguarum veterum septentrionalium thesaurus grammatico-criticus et archæologicus[7] in 1703–05.

[8] During this time, British interest and enthusiasm for Iceland and Nordic culture grew dramatically, expressed in original English poems extolling Viking virtues, such as Thomas Warton's "Runic Odes" of 1748: Rasmus B. Anderson, the founding head of the Department of Scandinavian Studies at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, also founded a publication company, The Norrœna Society, which focused on republishing translations of texts devoted to the history and romance of Northern Europe.

He brought to the American popular attention the idea that Viking explorers discovered the New World and was the originator of Leif Erikson Day.