Shield-maiden with family ties, but at first does not usually act directly. She is more inclined to incite her male relatives to action than take up arms herself. Guðrún is no shield-maiden, and Brynhildr mocks her for this, saying, "Only ask what is best for you to know. That is suitable for noble women. And it is easy to be satisfied while everything happens according to your desires." In her later marriages, however, she is willing to kill her children, burn down a hall, and send her other sons to avenge the murder of her daughter, Svanhildr. In the world of
Shield-maiden Neil Price showed that a 10th Century Birka-burial excavated in the 1970s containing a large number of weapons and the bones of two horses turned out to be the grave of a woman upon bone analysis by Anna Kjellström. In 2017, DNA analysis confirmed that the person was female; the so called Birka female Viking warrior, but others including respected scholar of the Vikings, Judith Jesch says that conclusion is premature. While women warriors are a staple of fantasy, they are not often referred to as shield-maidens. Some who are include Éowyn in J. R. R. Tolkien's "The Lord of