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A port of transit and an outpost in Sweden of the Silkroad to northern and western Europe!
Alas, Birka in central Sweden,
"the town of the Vikings", might not have been inhabited by "Vikings" at all, in spite of the popular view,
nor was it governed by the local "king" or his retinue. The development of Birka would then eventually be
understood as a consequence of the development of the Silkroad to the North.
This route of trade, mainly of silk and silver, went from the turkic Khazarian empire in the southeastern
Europe along the Volga river system and across the Baltic Sea, to the Frankic and Anglosaxon kingdoms
and, at a later stage, to the German-Ottonian kingdom, in the northwestern Europe. Its era of prosperity,
during a couple of hundred years from around 770 to 970 AD, was abruptly cut off by an attack from the
Kievan realm, duly followed by a cataclyzmal change of the existing economical, social, mercantile as
well as political positions and structures in northern Europe.
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