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Berserkers (or Berserks) were ferocious Norse warriors who had sworn allegiance to the Viking god Odin. They worked themselves into murderous fury before a battle.

The term berserker comes from Norse "berserkr", meaning literally " bear shirt", but alluding to wearing the "clothes" of a bear, i.e. to be bear-like in rage and strength, usually in battle.

The origin of berserkers is unknown, although Tacitus mentions groups of Germanic warriors with berserk-like fury.

It appears that berserkers were religiously-inspired warband s or warrior societies . Norse sagas mention berserker gangs with twelve members where new applicants had to go through a ritualistic or real fight to be accepted. Some berserks also took names with björn or biorn in them in reference to a bear. This is likely to be the source of names such as Beowulf and Bödvar Bjarki.

Berserker bands' fearsome reputation and the sight of raging warriors charging headlong into battle surely had a demoralizing effect on the opposition. However, allies were wary of them as well because berserkers could decide to pillage a friendly village on their own and rape their women.

Many northern kings used berserkers as part of their army of hirthmen and sometimes equivalent to a royal bodyguardA bodyguard is a person who protects someone from personal assault, kidnapping, assassination and acquiring confidential information. In the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, most bodyguards are former or current police officers, or sometim. It may be that at least some of those warriors just adopted the organization or rituals of berserk warbands or used the name as a deterrent or claim of their ferocity. It is doubtful any king would have accepted a band of homicidal maniacs as his closest men.

In 1015 King Erik of NorwayThe Kingdom of Norway is a Nordic country west of Sweden on the Scandinavian Peninsula. It has a very elongated form and has an extensive coastline along the North Atlantic Ocean, where Norway's famous fjords are found. In addition to Sweden, it borders R outlawed berserkers. IcelandThe Republic of Iceland is an island nation in the northern Atlantic Ocean, located between Greenland and Scotland, northwest of the Faroe Islands. Lydveldid Island ( In Detail) (Full size) National motto: none Official languageNone. Icelandic de facto''.ic Christian law banned berserkers as heathens and sentenced them to outlawry. By the 1100s organized berserker warbands had disappeared.

Berserkers are reported to have worn bearskins in battle as the thick fur would have worked as leather armor. Bear worship was not unusual in northern Germanic areas. "Possessed" by the spirit of the bear, they might have believed that they had its strength and ferociousness and could even take on the animal's shape. In that respect, they are the basis of fantasy characters like Beorn in The Hobbit.

Warriors of the Varangian Guard (Norse warriors working for Byzantine Empire) also followed bear rituals.

Berserkers fought with crazed or drugged strength, heedless of danger. They worked themselves up into a bloodlust – berserker rage – before battles, banging their helmets with their weapons, biting their shields, and howling. They were said to be immune to pain (or even immune to weapons) in battle. In their fury they would attack their enemies but also everything else in their path, sometimes even their own people and allies.