Equality for Vikings as women win right to join Shetland fire festival
WOMEN will take part in Shetland’s Viking-inspired Up Helly Aa fire festival for the first time in January, after decades of controversy on the islands.
The organisers of Up Helly Aa have announced that the long-standing ban on female participation will be ended when the event returns in 2023 after a two-year hiatus caused by Covid-19.
The festival, which attracts visitors from across the world, sees “squads” of people dressed as Vikings march through the streets of the capital Lerwick. Led by the Guizer Jarl, or chief guizer, it culminates in a torch-lit procession and a replica longboat being set alight.
Women have previously been restricted to the role of “hostesses”, organising parties that follow the festivities, despite female warriors having a prominent role in Norse mythology.
But now, there will be no gender restrictions, despite some islanders calling for the ban on women to be maintained on the grounds of tradition.
“We’re delighted,” said Zara Pennington, a member of the Reclaim the Raven feminist group which campaigned for the change.
“The first serious campaigns to change this happened in the 1980s, but women have been trying to get in since they were originally excluded, so this is a multi-generational issue. Some people will be reluctant but I think most people on the island will be accepting. It’s obvious that its time has come.”
The last time Up Helly Aa took place, in 2020, Reclaim the Raven flew a ban- ner depicting a female Viking warrior on horseback which read: “Have you forgotten those that bore you? Act lest the gods should intervene!”
Even applications for girls to take part in a junior procession were turned down previously, and Shetland council ruled in 2019 that their exclusion was not a breach of equalities laws.
But Robert Geddes, the Lerwick Up Helly Aa committee secretary, said there had been a change of heart.
“We felt it was time to give squads a choice over their guizers, including allowing female participation,” he said. “The decision means the festival in Lerwick will have a different dimension, but we have no doubt its essence and spirit will remain the same.”
The other criteria for participation – that guizers in the main parade must be aged 16 or older and have lived in Shetland continuously for five years – will remain the same.
The Up Helly Aa festival dates to the 1870s, when a group of young local men wanted to put new ideas into Shetland’s festive celebrations.
In 2019, fresh evidence emerged to suggest female Viking warriors were more than a myth, after DNA analysis of the bones of a warrior buried with a cache of weapons in
Sweden showed the fighter had been female. A spokeswoman for Up Helly Aa for aa, another group that campaigned for female inclusion, said: “This is absolutely wonderful news and something that members of our community have been asking for over a long period of time.
“We look forward to seeing an inclusive Jarl Squad lead the procession in future.” Bryan Peterson, the Shetland Islands Council deputy convener, said: “It’s an important development and a positive and inclusive message.”