Glow up

All makeup is war paint, regardless of gender or intent.

That makes modern men remarkably pacifist, and modern women not so much.

I would expect Viking eyeliner to have much the same purpose as it did in Ancient Egypt. Reducing glare might have been more important than making you look nicer.

@Schiffy I'd go the other way. All war paint is makeup, regardless of gender or intent.

Viking men were OBSESSED with their appearances, cleanliness, and maintaining their looks. Women could choose to end marriages on a whim, for one... So a dirty husband was soon an ex. Viking men bathed at least once a week (which was HUGE back then), combed their hair, braided, wore ribbons in their beards, wore the nicest furs they could, and took care of themselves.

@KitsuneRyo Yeah, Christian scholars even wrote complaints about how the pagan vikings would come and seduce their women with their cleanliness.

@ShoggothOnTheRoof Ancient schollar: Those vikings are too clean and pretty, they seduce our women just by posing.
Ancient Scholar II: Then why don't you take a bath?
Ancient schollar: Because ifi do my woman will insisto me bathing at least each season. That is too much :P

@KitsuneRyo Reminds me of Astrid braiding Hiccup hair on How to train your dragon

Go back to almost any old civilization and they used makeup for beauty, utility, status or religious purposes. It only became "female-only" when it turned into a luxury (either due to price or living conditions).

Their makeup is different because G.F. North isn't as into metal as his grandchildren.

@FrankHarr I was thinking his eyelashes remind me of the only Goth Metal band I follow. (Lord of the Lost, Loreley video. Cracking lashes, not at all girlie.)

@Epi #9857171

North's or Norway's?

By the way, the fact that Norsemen were particularly clean is a myth created in 19th century by British scholars (like a lot of misconceptions concerning Middle Ages) who tried to reconcile the grooming practices of the Norsemen with the idea that everyone in the medieval period was dirty. The truth is, that people were always taking care of their hygiene and looks, as well as they could. Vikings were not outliers - depictions, accounts and archeological findings strongly suggest that Gauls, Slavs and Balts put as much importance to their looks as Norsemen did. And yes, they perfectly knew that being dirty is a good way to get sick, especially in the heyday of miasma theory. They simply didn't bathe as often as we do, because heating several dozen liters of water is not a small task if all you have is a fireplace, iron cauldron, bucket and wooden tub, and a river is 10 minutes walk away.

By the way, the relative lack of cosmetics and uniform short hair with lack of facial hair among Western (European) men is really a long-standing fad rather than any norm and is only slightly older than the Great Male Renunciation that happened in early 20th century resulted in the uniformization of male clothing. It is very likely that Georgian dandy or a French noble from the era of Sun King would consider modern male fashion trends an 'unrefined peasant's taste'.

It's called 'war paint'.

@minando unconvinced father: Yeah, right :P

Even within the gender roles of the day (say some types of jewelry was apparantly pretty stricktly female only based on grave goods) calling someone unmanly in an honour culture where everyone was armed is not a way to long life.....

Color pink use to be manly, now it's feminine...
Wearing a dress use to be manly, now it's feminine...
Make up use to be manly, now it's feminine...
Modern time "manly" men would look rather silly in the eyes of men of the "good old times", that modern people so adore...

@atlachan Don't forget about high heels, originally meant for men

'@atlachan' that is because "manly" men assume outward appearance of performing some masculine role without actually performing it. You can poll opinions of, say, modern lumberjacks about manliness of urban soy boys wearing pre-torn pre-stained jeans, work boots, flannel shirts, and carefully styled facial hair.

@atlachan In the Victorian era it was common to dress boys & girls both in dresses. There's pictures out there of Franklin D. Roosevelt as a child looking very much like a little girl, wearing a frilly dress & hat, Mary Jane shoes and long hair. It was largely done out of practicality, reliable zippers and snaps weren't as readily available as they are now and dresses are easier to wear. (And early on, made it much easier to change diapers.) Boys & girls were dressed the same up to about age 7.

'@Manabi' It was a degenerate time. As in, the technical term degenerate. Or dysgenic if you prefer.

@atlachan I think that modern men would mostly just look drab to the old timers. There is no male fashion, now or in history, as un-flashy as the business suit.

@atlachan Wearing a dress wasn't manly, per se, because women also wore them. It's not like women would have worn something else back then, suddenly switching to dresses when men abandoned them entirely. Also, I'm not a clothing historian, but I have a feeling there was some difference between the kind of dresses men might have worn and the kind women did.

@atlachan Well.. pink as an infant male colour.. That was more medieval, and was actually washed-out red (usually madder-dyed). Definitely not Barbie/Candyfloss pink. Kids' clothes were made from the washed-out "we can still make something out of this" pile.. Men wore the bright stuff, with the madder-red cloth tunic and hosen the equivalent of Working Clothes/blue jeans.

I have a lovely old madder-dyed gambeson that occasionally gets me the nickname "mcPink", because it has become washed out over two decades of use, repair, and re-assembly/washing. It looks *proper*..

The light blue for girls is a matter of woad-dyed cloth being cheaper, becoming light blue over washing ( same "can make something out of this" rationale) , and that colour being strongly tied to the Holy Virgin.. Something people took pretty seriously in those days..

Pretty rare seeing Svalbard in comics now a'days

Regular bathing, careful hair- and beardcare, makeup and dressing well... The Nordic men were very careful about their appearance. Of course, viral tweets aren't the most reliable sources, but I will forever be amused by the one that justified attacking a nearby village of Danes because they "threatened the chastity of English women" who just couldn't resist that.

@IcelandicShutIn It wasn't used as a justification for attacking a nearby village of Danes, it was used as a justification for the St. Brice's Day massacre in 1002, which was carried out against a large number of Danes within the Kingdom of England (although it is disputed exactly how extensive it was). The story of the Nordic cleanliness having provoked the massacre is in the Chronicle of John of Wallingford, which was written in the 1200s (but not by John of Wallingfor (died 1214) or John of Wallingford (died 1258)), so there might be some artistic license on the part of the author.

@uruvon

The reason usually given for the massacre was that Æthelred was prompted to it in response to the decade plus of Danish raids and fear that the large Danish population in the north would join the attackers. Although as you say there's a lot of dispute about how extensive it was and even whether it was directed not so much at Danish subjects of the king as against mercenary Danes who had turned on the English.

As you say the idea of a reaction against the 'too clean' Danes is probably artistic license. Especially since that chronicle was written in Norman times so there might have been some desire by the rulers to further degrade their subjects.