ABSTRACT
Discussion of monetary economy in the Viking Age, focused on coinage, with a bullion economy based on ingots and hack-silver seen as a kind of half-way step towards a fully monetary economy. The silver is then turned into a high-status object, much too heavy to wear, and is then cut up into hack-silver for use as money. If the development of a monetary economy was more advanced in Denmark than in the other Scandinavian kingdoms, it was more advanced still in the Danelaw. Haralds son Hkon, who was brought up as a Christian at the court of Athelstan seems to have attempted to introduce a more Christian Anglo-Saxon style of kingship, but he was unable to persuade the population as a whole to adopt Christianity. The regal coinage in Denmark was more successful than in either Norway or Sweden. Political, economic and ecclesiastical contacts with Germany also remained strong.
