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Can our modern-day gender biases influence our understanding of the past?

Dr Charlotte Hedenstierna-Jonson is a senior researcher in the department of Archaeology and Ancient History at Uppsala University in Sweden. She’s also one of the lead investigators on the Viking Phenomenon research project and she’s been studying a grave found in Sweden in the 19th century, which contained the remains of a high-ranking Viking warrior. For more than 100 years this person was assumed to be male. But when Charlotte and her team carried out a DNA test on the bones, they revealed they belong to an individual who was biologically female. Her discovery shook the academic world.

Produced by Alice Gioia.

IMAGE DETAILS
Reconstruction of the Viking warrior by Tallee Savage.