In the Scandinavian languages even today the word gård simply means ‘farm’, and this is its basic sense—a settled place, a bounded place, even a whole world; in the same meaning of enclosure, it is the root of the modern English ‘yard’. This idea of being inside the wall, as distinct from what is beyond and therefore outside one’s control, is at the core of Viking-Age concepts of settlement and order. It is an insight into their way of thinking.
