WHY A VIKING SHIP?

Hi, Rover used to use a winged Viking rovers head as their emblem. but over time they
progressed to the Viking ship. The head emblem can be found on the P4,s and earlier
models.

Colin
 
Probably a case of a UK company donning rose tinted glasses as sufficient time had elapsed since the viking days of old when those Norse men murdered and raped their way in to English social history and so into mythology.
I guess its all about timing, if you were to use a current day analogy it is very unlikely that you would find a USA company adopting as their logo a 747 and a skyscraper.......what too soon? :LOL: its amazing how time and distance make a difference.
Perhaps you can blame the likes of Henry Treece and Rosemary Sutcliffe for this social anomaly though I believe the use of the viking head by the rover company predates these Authors by a considerable margin in time and indeed the term Rover is a direct reference to piracy and all that it implies.... where else but in England does one glorify the misdeeds of the past.


Graeme
 
The original meaning of roving is to travel extensively so a rover would denote a traveller, rather than simply a pirate.
So you could go a 'roving on your Starley bicycle originally & then your Rover, when the company changed name.

But the viking & later their ship is obviously a representation of the infamous 'Sea Rovers' of old as Graeme pointed out, so Rover was probably chosen for the travelling connotation but it also had decorative possibilities badge-wise & really came into it's own in the motoring age, especially that of the bonnet mascot.
 
ghce said:
Probably a case of a UK company donning rose tinted glasses as sufficient time had elapsed since the viking days of old when those Norse men murdered and raped their way in to English social history and so into mythology. . . . where else but in England does one glorify the misdeeds of the past?
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Hey - fair's fair - most of us have some (very dilute) Viking blood in us, no sense in being ashamed of it!
I apologise if my next remark is offensive, because it isn't intended to be, but surely it would only have been the equivalent of a pre-War NZ company calling a product "Pakeha" to imply power and control?
Political correctness didn't exist then. When William Lyons started making cars he used the name of his existing business, SS, being the initials of Swallow Sidecars.
However later in the 30's he adopted a motif which was almost a crib of the Shutzstaffell runes, an organisation admired by many at that time in the market he was aiming at!
Lyons besides being a talented designer/stylist was a consummate salesman.
After WW2 SS Cars became Jaguar and did very well until they fell, like Rover, into the hands of British Leyland, boooo!

John
 
smokin1942 said:
Hey - fair's fair - most of us have some (very dilute) Viking blood in us, no sense in being ashamed of it!


John
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ghce said:
raped their way in to English social history and so into mythology. . . . where else but in England does one glorify the misdeeds of the past?
Click to expand...

Yes I imagine there is quiet a bit of Norse blood in the population of the UK as in my above comment and likewise by default myself as well as I seem to suffer from a genetic trait that has a direct link to its known Norwegian progenitor.

Your comment re Pakeha is not offensive to me however the word itself is offensive to me, NZ Maori must have had a good laugh (and still do) at the stupid ethnic European Kiwi inhabitants that accept this insult word as an accepted usage word to describe themselves however the same ethnic dilution has occurred in their population and there are no true Maori in the world now as all have a huge component of European ancestry with many Maori being just as white as my purebred European genes that denote me.

Graeme
 
The Rover name dates back from when John Kemp Starley produced a tricycle upon which he believed the owner could 'rove' anywhere. Shortly afterwards JKS developed the 'safety' bicycle- i.e. chain drive to the rear wheels, and both wheels approx. the same size. The name was so appropriate that the company name was changed to the Rover Cycle Company (or similar).

The name of the company went through a few changes, but always the word Rover predominated, so the cycles and later motorcycles and a bit later cars all bear the brand Rover.

The emblem as fitted to the bikes was shield-shaped, and some of the early cars had a shield shaped radiator, Perhaps the shield had an influence, but certainly post WW1, the name Rover started to be associated with the likes of Eric the Red and his compatriots, renowned as being great rovers. In the 1920's there were quite a few stories, often as boy's books, of the exploits of Viking rovers.

I think it has been lost to history who suggested the conjunction of the Rover product name with Vikings, but once it happened it stuck.

Dane.
 
Hey, that's a good link TRM - I'm no great fan of the Mail so wouldn't have seen it.

That article was well worth reading!

Thanks

John
 
My granddad on my mothers side was born and bred in the Western Highlands village of Ullapool and on that basis I must have some Viking in me?...
 
smokin1942 said:
Hey, that's a good link TRM - I'm no great fan of the Mail so wouldn't have seen it.

That article was well worth reading!

Thanks
Click to expand...

Welcome. I just googled it as I knew there was a study carried out a few years ago for the BBC.
 
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