#and with berk's past with dragons there's the likelihood that stoick became chief because his own father died | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

kingofthewilderwest · 5 years

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hey! I don't know that much about viking culture so i'd like to ask- since Zephyr is the chief's firstborn child.. is she going to be the next chief(I don't know the term for female chief hah) because she's the firstborn or is it going to be Nuffink because he is boy?

Heya! I’m not knowledgeable about Viking culture either, so both of us would just have to Google it. Or, we can check out posts that @dyannehs has already written about Viking culture and/or how it aligns with the HTTYD world (sorry for @ ing you yet again whoops - I’m not trying to make more work for you, just let people know about the work you’ve already done!). This post in particular might be good info about whether or not women could be chiefs!

From what I know, I’d say that if you wanted to mirror what actual Viking society did, Nuffink would be much more likely. BUT. Berk is its own separate culture with trends that differ from past historic Viking culture. So sometimes I like to look within the HTTYD series itself for guesses on what’s most likely.

One thing we can notice is that in “Portrait of Hiccup as a Buff Young Man,” there are portraits of chiefs next to their son. As Stoick and Hiccup get painted, Stoick says, “This portrait’s gonna take its place alongside all the other chiefs and their sons.” All the pictures are, indeed, a male Viking chief with one son. It’s meant to record a line of succession: after all, I highly doubt that every single generation would compose of one father with exactly one son. No, the Viking chiefs would easily have had multiple kids, there would have been girls as well as boys, and I’m sure some father had a daughter as their eldest child. But given as the portraits here are of one father with one son, the implication is that this line of succession is passed from father to son in Berk.

In HTTYD 2, during Stoick’s flashback, we can look to see who was in the meeting of chieftains. It’s all men. Beards everywhere. The absence of women doesn’t prove women can’t be chiefs, but the fact we see only men puts it in much higher likelihood only men were chiefs in the Barbaric Archipelago, and that if a woman rose to power, it was an exception to the norm. (For an instance of women as leaders: one of the warlords in THW is a woman, after all).

THW also gives us a few hints of how the Hairy Hooligans of Berk, specifically, thought of leadership. Gobber urges Astrid to marry Hiccup and lead alongside him. While Hiccup is the chief, the concept here in THW is that Astrid, as the chief’s wife, would play an enormous leadership role in Berk society too. There’s a sense of co-rulership for the married couple - at least for Hiccup’s reign.

We can also look to other tribes in the DreamWorks Dragons franchise. It’s to note that we see an overwhelming majority of male chiefs. Oswald the Agreeable from the Berserkers, Dagur the Deranged from the Berserkers, Alvin the Treacherous from the Outcasts, etc. But we also see a few cultures in the Barbaric Archipelago diverge. The Defenders of the Wing and the Wingmaidens are both communities in which women are leaders. For the Wingmaidens, of course the leadership is all women, given as the community is all women. For Mala, there’s some tradition about marriage, in which a man must pass the Trials to become the next king and, as implied, marry the current queen. But the Defenders of the Wing aren’t Vikings - their clothing and separate culture tell us that - and the Wingmaidens are a unique organization that isn’t society’s norm for everyday tribes. It’s an indication that in this world women aren’t unheard of as rulers, but it’s also an indication from outside of the Viking culture itself.

Now, the HTTYD books are a separate timeline, but you can look at those, too, if you like. Of the leadership we know in the HTTYD books, we have: Stoick the Vast (male chief, Hairy Hooligans), Mogadon the Meathead (male chief, Meathead Tribe), Norbert the Nutjob (male chief, Hysteric Tribe), Alvin the Treacherous (male chief, Outcast Tribe), and Big-Boobied Bertha (female chief, Bog-Burglar Tribe). We can also look at the lineage of kings from Grimbeard the Ghastly and the previous tribe leaders for the Hairy Hooligans. The Hooligan family tree in the eighth book shows leadership passed through (usually) the eldest son. Stoick isn’t the firstborn; he has two elder sisters; but Stoick became leader. And Snotlout, Stoick’s nephew through his younger brother Baggybum, is the one who would be next-in-line to Hooligan leadership if Hiccup were passed over.

What about Big-Boobied Bertha and the Bog-Burglars? What about Luna, Queen of Dragons? Dragon societies aren’t human societies, so that’s different. And the Bog-Burglar Tribe appears unique from the other tribes, in that it’s written as a warrior woman tribe. So Bertha proves that Viking women chiefs aren’t impossible in the HTTD world of the Barbaric Archipelago, at least for that tribe, but the rest of the information I’m seeing - books and DreamWorks franchise both - supports the concept of son inheriting father’s rule.

But ya know what. Hiccup is a revolutionary of his own. He knows how strong women are as leaders. He’s met Mala. He’s seen Astrid in action. He’s interacted with Atali and Minden. He knows about Bertha and Camicazi. This is the kid who brought dragons - Berk’s worst enemy - into the heart of their civilization, and created peace. Hiccup is a part of his society and culture and time, of course, but he’s also someone who pushes the world forward in new ways. If Hiccup finds Zephyr the best candidate for chiefdom, do you really think he or Berk would protest to the concept? Do you think Astrid wouldn’t support the same thing? Berk’s been through wilder shifts. I imagine they can support a woman ruler.

So I mean. Heck. I say headcanon what you want. It can be fun to look to culture of the past for inspiration. It can be a cool way to flesh out storytelling in HTTYD fanfiction. I love seeing that material incorporated! But we are also dealing with a fictional culture. The evidence around us in the HTTYD universe itself is heavily skewed with male leaders, but it does technically show women leaders like Queen Mala, Queen Luna, and Chief Bertha. So I mean, why not Zephyr as Chief of Berk if she’s cut out for it? Until we’re told otherwise, the territory’s open.

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