so, from the perspective of black metal, true masculinity is achieved through exploring the dark sides of man's nature – warfare and killing. Cultural historian Nina Witoszec found that within Norway, images of nature are often symbolic with cultural affiliation to Norway. Witoszec traces the roots of this ideal to Tacitus's German-heathen identity narrative which romanticized the Germanic people as superior through their connection with nature, and whose brutality and belligerence opposed the apathetic and decadent Roman elite. Within black metal, Norse imagery is used to build a view of natural and authentic masculinity to counter the oppressive force of the Judeo-Christian tradition. History Bathory The roots of Viking metal are generally found in Scandinavian metal, particularly the death and black metal scenes of the late 1980s. Inspired by the Viking themes used by Manowar, some bands identified with the Vikings far more completely than Manowar. At the forefront of this movement stood the Swedish band Bathory. The band's fourth album Blood Fire Death, released in 1988, includes two early examples of Viking metal – the songs "A Fine Day to Die" and "Blood Fire Death". The cover to Blood Fire Death even features The Wild Hunt of Odin, a painting by Norwegian artist Peter Nicolai Arbo which depicts the Norse god Odin on a Wild Hunt. Bathory followed up on this Viking theme in 1990 with the release of Hammerheart, a concept album fully devoted to Vikings. Like its predecessor, this album features a Viking-themed painting, this time The Funeral of a Viking by Sir Frank Dicksee. Following up this release were 1991's Twilight of the Gods, titled after Wagner's opera of the same name, and Blood on Ice, recorded in 1988–1989 but released in 1996. Hammerheart is considered a landmark that introduced the metal world to the Viking metal archetype. With this album, Quorthon, the band's founder, inspired a generation of Nordic teens, and seeded a deep anti-Christian sentiment which culminated in the violence and hate crimes committed by members of the Norwegian black metal community in the early 1990s. The artistic choices by Quorthon contain völkisch elements which emphasize a return to heathen Europe rather than a "destructive" Christianity. Quorthon later explained, in the liner notes to Blood on Ice, that his shift to Viking themes was an intentional move away from Satanism: Bathory's Viking metal features Wagnerian-style epics, ostentatious arrangements, choruses, and ambient keyboards. Mulvany notes