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"I had heard that at the deaths of their chief personages they did many interesting things. . . . If the deceased is a poor man they make a little boat, which they lay him in and burn. If he is rich, they collect his goods and divide them into three parts, one for his family, another to pay for his clothing, and a third for making nabid [an intoxicating drink, perhaps beer], which they drink until the day when his female slave will kill herself and be burned with her master. They stupefy themselves by drinking this nabid night and day; sometimes one of them dies cup in hand." ~ The Kalif of Baghdad during or after 921 from the Risala quoted by Gwyn Jones in A History of the Vikings |