Even Joan of Arc, a French national hero often associated with warfare, was never involved in actual combat and was merely a national symbol.

The fact is, there simply isn’t any credible evidence of woman warriors in European history.

Sacred Texts from the Perspective of Men and Derogatory to Women

Ancient texts, including Konungsbók Eddukvæða, are from the perspective of men, with sections such as the Hávamál only referring to women in derogatory terms. This includes Stanza 84 ("Meyjar orðum skyli manngi trúa né því er kveðr kona því at á hverfanda hvéli váru þeim hjörtu sköpuð brigð í brjóst um lagit" which translates to "In the words of a maid noone should trust, nor in what a woman says, for their hearts were shaped on a potter's turning wheel, and fickleness placed in their breath"), Stanza 90 ("Svá er friðr kvenna þeira er flátt hyggja sem aki jó óbryddum á ísi hálum" which translates to "The love of women whom are deceitful in spirit is like riding a smooth-shoe horse on slippery ice"), Stanza 102 ("Mörg er góð mær ef görva kannar hugbrigð við hali" translating to "Many a good maid, if you look closely, is fickle-minded towards men"), Stanza 113 ("fjölkunnigri konu skalattu í faðmi sofa svá at hon lyki þik liðum" which translates to "you must not sleep in the embrace of a woman skilled in magic so that she locks you in her limbs"), or Stanza 118 ("Ofarla bíta ek sá einum hal orð illrar konu fláráð tunga varð honum at fjörlagi ok þeygi um sanna sök" translates to "Deeply bitten by the word of a bad woman I saw a man, her deceit crafty tongue was the death of him, and yet the charge was not true").

No “Gender Equality” in Viking Culture

Men and women each had their role in Viking society. The role of women never was warfare or raiding, which remained the exclusive realm of men. As Annalee Newitz, Tech Culture Editor at Ars Technica, accurately points out, “the overwhelming preponderance of evidence suggests that women in the Viking world were expected to run households, serve the men, and bear children.”

Stanza 81 of the Hávamál also gives a good glimpse of how women were seen - at times merely as a domestic commodity - as well as the natural order of things in ancient Norse society: "At kveldi skal dag leyfa konu er brennd er mæki er reyndr er mey er gefin er ís er yfir kømr öl er drukkit er" which translates to "The day must be praised in the evening, a woman, when she is cremated, a sword, when it is proven, a maiden, when she is given away, ice, when it is crossed, ale, when it is drunk."

From a realistic perspective, the very forces of nature make the artificial modern “gender equality” utopian paradigm simply unrealistic and impractical in an ancient culture. A woman simply cannot bear and take care of children, breast feed, look after the homestead, or even the men, if she is engaged in raiding and other combat activities.

Furthermore, the the worst possible insults for an actual Viking and warrior invariably involve being compared to a woman. Vagn Ákason is known to have said: "En eigi býð ek yðr með minna kappe, enn svá, at Sigvaldi jarlsson berist við oss, ef hann borir, ok sé hann úragr karlmaðr, ok hafi heldr manns hjarta enn berkykvendis", which roughly translates to "I challenge Sigvaldi jarlsson to do battle with us, unless he is a coward with the venomous heart of a woman rather than that of a man."

In Old Norse, the main insults also all revolve around comparing a man to a woman, or challenging his masculinity. "Sansorðinn" is used to describe an effeminate male demonstrably and willingly sexually used as a whore by one or more men. "Mare" means woman and is highly derogatory when used for a man. "Argr" refers to a coward, and emasculated as well as effeminate man.

Although women in Norse society enjoyed more freedom in contrast to the rest of medieval Europe which saw females like cattle or property, the fact remains that there still was no gender equality in an hypermasculine Norse culture defined by gender polarization.

Women Biologically Unsuitable for Combat

Biological facts also stand in the way of woman warriors fighting men warriors at home or abroad. Indeed, the reality is, women simply are no match to a male warrior.

For starts, hundreds of thousands of years of evolution have made women react to threats by tending and befriending, in stark contrast to men who respond by fighting or flighting. Higher levels of oxytocin further prompt women to seek kinship when exposed to an enemy, in contrast to men who enter competitive mode.

Women also lack in sufficient levels the very hormone that is associated with aggression, muscle growth, denser bones, and other typical-male features essential for combat: Testosterone. After all, women just don’t have a hypothalmic pituitary testicular axis.

Less white matter in women’s pre-frontal cortex also make them analyze dangers and situations slower than men. A thicker paretial section of the brain also means women cannot visualize multi-dimensional objects as well as men, making the dodging of swords, axes, and other medieval weapons quite challenging. Moreover, women have thinner retinas and more P-cells best at analyzing colors and textures, in contrast to men having thicker retinas and larger M cells, better suited at tracking movement, an essential survival skills when confronted to a moving aggressor.

Women have 40% less muscle mass than men in the upper body, and 33% less in the lower body. They have less dense bones and weaker tendons and ligaments, as well as a weaker facial bone structure that doesn’t handle impacts, blunt force, and trauma to the face that well. With lower red blood cell counts, lower hemoglobin, and lower circulating clotting factor than men, women take longer to heal from injuries. A less evenly distributed blood flow in their body also makes women far more sensitive to environmental factors, including cold. The activation of the right amygdala in women’s brain even makes them more reactive to pain.

With a larger deep limbic system than men, women are more sensitive to emotions. Women also synthesize serotonin slower than men, making them prone to far more severe PTSD and depression than men following traumatic events.

Overall, biology makes women simply unsuitable for combat.

No Viking Woman Warriors

Without rigorous scientific method, without language knowledge, without historical and cultural context, or essentially without facts or evidence, it is simply ludicrous to even remotely suggest that findings associated with the Birka grave relate to a woman Viking warrior, let alone prove the existence of woman Viking warriors.

Even assuming the remains were that of a woman, which has not been scientifically and reasonably established, burial with weapons does not imply warrior status, let alone prominent warrior status. As a matter of fact, it could be the contrary, as it was customary during the Viking age to bury slaves with weapons, so they could bring them to their dead owner in the afterlife.

Archaeologist Søren Sindbæk of Aarhus University asked Science News: "Have we found the Mulan of Sweden or a woman buried with the rank-symbols of a husband who died abroad?”. We very well may have. Or as archaeologist Davide Zori of Baylor University points out, "it's possible, albeit unlikely, that the woman's relatives buried her with a warrior's equipment without that having been her role in life."

Ultimately, finding bones buried with weapons simply does not even suggest, and even less so proves, the existence of women Viking warriors.

Judith Jesch further wrote on this matter: "I have always thought (and to some extent still do) that the fascination with women warriors, both in popular culture and in academic discourse, is heavily, probably too heavily, influenced by 20th- and 21st-century desires.”

In other words, the modern reference to women warriors in an otherwise hypermasculine Viking society is yet another revisionist attempt at rewriting history to accommodate the inclusive ideology of the day. It has no basis in reality whatsoever.