Interaction with Arab world

The ‘Arab world’ in this relationship extended beyond Arabia. Baghdad was the centre of the Abbasid caliphate, while important supplies of silver came from Muslim-ruled Central Asia. Cities such as Samarkand and Tashkent minted silver coins that travelled through trading networks towards Scandinavia. Goods did not necessarily pass directly between their producer and their final buyer: merchants and markets along the route helped move them onwards.

Northern goods exchanged for silver

The Rus supplied products that were valuable in Muslim markets. Furs, including sable, squirrel and fox, were important exports. Black fox fur was especially prized for caps and coats. Amber, a fossilised tree resin found along the Baltic coast, was another desirable northern product. Merchants also sold honey, wax, hides and weapons.

Trade included enslaved people, captured from eastern European populations. This was not simply an exchange of harmless luxury goods: some of the wealth gained through Viking commerce depended on capture, coercion and the sale of human beings.

In return, the Rus particularly wanted silver dirhams. Ibn Rustah, writing between 903 and 913, described Rus merchants selling animal skins and keeping the coins they received in their belts. His account shows how closely the pursuit of silver was connected to their trading activities.

Why the weight of silver mattered

Viking traders valued coins chiefly for their silver rather than their stated monetary value. They used portable balances to weigh it. A coin could therefore be cut into pieces, melted into an ingot or made into jewellery without losing its usefulness as a store of wealth. Cut coins and pieces of silver jewellery could later be used as hack-silver payments.

For example, a merchant could pay with part of a coin and a fragment of an arm-ring if their combined silver weight met the agreed price. This helps explain why a silver hoard might contain broken objects as well as complete coins.

The supply of Islamic silver increased greatly during the tenth century. The Samanid dynasty, ruling in Central Asia, became a major supplier of dirhams as silver deposits supported extensive minting. Coins found in Scandinavia demonstrate the reach of these connections. Their inscriptions can identify where and when they were minted, although a coin alone cannot reveal every stage of its journey or the goods exchanged for it.

Ibn Fadlan and encounters on the Volga

Ahmad ibn Fadlan offers an unusually detailed eyewitness account of interaction. In 921 he left Baghdad as part of a delegation sent by Caliph al-Muqtadir to the ruler of the Volga Bulgars. The Bulgar ruler had requested help with a fort and a mosque, as well as instruction in Islam. In 922, Ibn Fadlan encountered Rus merchants on the Volga.

He described armed men carrying axes, swords and knives, and women wearing jewellery that displayed wealth. He also watched merchants pray and offer sacrifices to wooden figures, asking their gods to send buyers with plentiful silver. Trade and religious practice were therefore connected: the merchants sought divine help for commercial success.

Ibn Fadlan witnessed a ship cremation for a Rus leader, during which an enslaved woman was killed and burned with him. Such observations reveal that encounters between these societies exposed striking differences in beliefs and customs, not just opportunities to buy and sell.

His reactions also need interpretation. He criticised the Rus practice of washing in a shared basin, judging it against Muslim expectations about cleanliness. His account is valuable because he was present, but it describes particular people and encounters through the eyes of a Muslim observer—not every Viking community.

Contact sometimes produced religious change: some Rus adopted Islam. However, many continued their existing religious practices. Commercial interaction did not mean that the two societies became culturally identical.

Peaceful trade, violent encounters and changing connections

Peaceful trade was the usual relationship, but it was not the only one. Rus forces also raided Muslim communities around the Caspian Sea during the tenth century. In 943, a Rus expedition attacked and occupied the prosperous trading town of Bardha’a. Such attacks brought violence and plunder rather than mutually agreed exchange.

Towards the end of the tenth century, the flow of Islamic silver into Scandinavia declined as the Samanid state weakened and its silver supplies diminished. Western European coins became more important in Denmark instead. This was a change in trading connections, not evidence that all Viking trade suddenly ended. The movement of coins, goods and people had nevertheless linked the northern and Islamic worlds and left evidence of both commercial cooperation and cultural encounters.