Search - NOVA: The Viking Deception on DVD

Plain Old Forensics

Jeffery Mingo | Homewood, IL USA | 02/08/2007

(2 out of 5 stars)

"I usually love forensic studies. When they use science to convict murderers, I'm ready to cheer. Some may feel that this work is great for the same reasons. However, I felt that the producers tried to create a shroud of mystery for a question to which they clearly knew the answer. I didn't like the way this documentary pulled the viewer from A to B to C so blatantly.

This work includes a hilarious comic sketch in which Columbus duels with a Viking. Later, they show a pizza maker throwing dough on a Yalie. Still, there doesn't need to be a fight as far as I'm concerned. Even if the Vikings reached North America first, it's still Colombus who introduced the Americas to Europe on a large scale. It doesn't have to be a zero-sum game. This work implied that no one wanted to upset Italian Americans, but surely that or any ethnic group would want the truth to come to light. The work shows a Yalie with a horned hat that the King of Norway gave him. However, almost every work on the Vikings says they did not wear horned hats.

The Yale museum shown looked like a waffle maker. What a monstrosity! How could the school that claims Maya Lin as an alumna have a building so tacky?!"

An intriguing look into the forensics of document forgery

Nicoletta Carlone | Los Angeles | 03/01/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

"A very intriguing look at a the mystery of the Vinland map and its forgery and at the discovery of America by the Vikings before columbus.. This document was produced to look like a Viking map showing America from before the discovery of Columbus and eventually aquired through a crooked Italian book dealer by Yale University. Through various modern forensic tests, modern researchers, scientists and historians conclude that this document is a forgery, it also looks at why this document was forged and the people who might have been behind it. The journey takes us to Spain, and then to Nazi Germany. The documentary only slightly touches on if infact the Vikings actually were here before Columbus, but the general idea from the brief few minutes they cover this subject was, that they did."