Нордијци су били сјеверногерманска етно-лингвистичка скупина из раног средњег вијека, која је говорила старонордијским језиком.[1][2][3][4] Језик је припадао сјеверном огранку германских језика и претходник је савремених германских језика Скандинавије.[4] Током касног 8. вијека, Нордијци су започели велику експанзију у свим правцима, што је означило почетак викиншког доба. У англофоним научним дјелима од 19. вијека, нордијски поморски трговци, досељеници и ратнице се често називају Викинзима. Идентитет Нордијаца изведен је у њихове савремене потомаке,[5] Данце, Исланђане,[lower-alpha 1] Ферјарце,[lower-alpha 1] Норвежане и Швеђане,[6] који данас углавном користе назив ’Скандинавци’ него Нордијци.[7]
Због погодности, израз „Скандинавци” се обично користи као синоним за „сјеверногерманске народе”, иако Исланђани и Ферјарци не насељавају Скандинавију. Израз је према томе добио више култрни, него географски смисао.
Fee, Christopher R. (2011). Mythology in the Middle Ages: Heroic Tales of Monsters, Magic, and Might: Heroic Tales of Monsters, Magic, and Might. ABC-CLIO. стр. 3. ISBN 978-0313027253. „"Viking" is a term used to describe a certain class of marauding Scandinavian warrior from the 8th through the 11th century. However, when discussing the entire culture of the Northern Germanic peoples of the early Middle Ages, and especially in terms of the languages and literatures of these peoples, it would be more accurate to use the term "Norse." Therefore during the Middle Ages and beyond, it therefore might be useful to speak of "German" peoples in middle Europe and of "Norse" peoples in Scandinavia and the North Atlantic.” McTurk, Rory (2008). A Companion to Old Norse-Icelandic Literature and Culture. John Wiley & Sons. стр. 7. ISBN 978-1405137386. „Old Norse' defines the culture of Norway and Iceland during the Middle Ages. It is a somewhat illogical concept as it is largely synonymous with 'Norse'... The term 'Norse' is often used as a translation of norroenn. As such it applies to all the Germanic peoples of Scandinavia and their colonies in the British Isles and the North Atlantic.” DeAngelo, Jeremy (2010). „The North and the Depiction of the "Finnar" in the Icelandic Sagas”. Scandinavian Studies. 82 (3): 257—286. JSTOR 25769033. „The term "Norse" will be used as a catchall term for all North Germanic peoples in the sagas...” Leeming, David A. (2014). The Handy Mythology Answer Book. Visible Ink Press. стр. 143. ISBN 978-1578595211. „"Who were the Norse people? The term Norse is commonly applied to pre-Christian Northern Germanic peoples living in Scandinavia during the so-called Viking Age. Old Norse gradually developed into the North Germanic languages, including Icelandic, Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish.” Kennedy, Arthur Garfield (1963). „The Indo-European Language Family”. Ур.: Lee, Donald Woodward. English Language Reader: Introductory Essays and Exercises. Dodd, Mead. „[T]he pages of history have been filled with accounts of various Germanic peoples that made excursions in search of better homes; the Goths went into the Danube valley and thence into Italy and southern France ; and thence into Italy and southern France; the Franks seized what was later called France; the Vandals went down into Spain, and via Africa they "vandalized" Rome; the Angles, part of the Saxons, and the Jutes moved over into England; and the Burgundians and the Lombards worked south into France and Italy. Probably very early during these centuries of migration the three outstanding groups of the Germanic peoples—the North Germanic people of Scandinavia, the East Germanic branch, comprising the Goths chiefly, and the West Germanic group, comprising the remaining Germanic tribes—developed their notable group traits. Then, while the East Germanic tribes (that is, the Goths) passed gradually out of the pages of history and disappeared completely, the North Germanic, or Scandinavian, or Norse, peoples, as they are variously called, became a distinctive people, more and more unlike the West Germanic folk who inhabited Germany itself and, ultimately, Holland, and Belgium and England. While that great migration of nations which the Germans have named the Volkerwanderung was going on, the Scandinavian division of the Germanic peoples had kept their habitation well to the north of the others and had been splitting up into the four subdivisions now known as the Swedes, Norwegians, Danes, and Icelanders. Long after the West Germanic and East Germanic peoples had made history farther south in Europe, the North Germanic tribes of Scandinavia began a series of expeditions which, during the eighth and ninth centuries, in the so-called Viking Age especially, led them to settle Iceland, to overrun England and even annex it to Denmark temporarily, and, most important of all, to settle in northern France and merge with the French to such an extent that Northmen became Normans, and later these Normans became the conquerors of England.”