The band bases most of their song lyrics on Norse mythology, the Viking Age, and the pre-Christian world. This mythology is an element that emerged in the early 1990s as an ideological off-shoot of black metal in a genre known as Viking metal. The band, however, does not classify itself as a Viking metal band. When asked to comment on the band's genre, vocalist Johan Hegg remarked: "We play death metal. We write about Vikings so, therefore, some refer us to Viking metal, but I have no idea what that is. I can't imagine the Vikings were into metal at all except on the swords and stuff. And musically, I guess they only played these strange lip instruments and some bongos or whatever."

The song "Blood Eagle" from the 2013 album Deceiver Of The Gods tells the story of a torture method from Nordic saga legends. It was performed by cutting the ribs of the victim by the spine, breaking the ribs so they resembled blood-stained wings, and pulling the lungs out through the wounds in the victim's back. Salt was sprinkled in the wounds. The breaking of the ribs can be heard in the first few seconds of the song.

In Norse mythology, Surtr (or Surtur, as in Surtur Rising) is a giant-god (jötunn) blackened by fire, who fought against Freyr at Ragnarök.

In the track list of the "Bloodshed Over Bochum" DVD, The first song on the "Vs The World" album is mistakenly called "Death And Fire", while the correct name is "Death In Fire".

All the songtitles from the "Once Sent From The Golden Hall" album appear more or less in the lyrics of the song "Metal Wrath" on "The Avenger", the next album released after "Once Sent From The Golden Hall".

During Amon Amarth's first US headline tour in 2007, in middle of their setlist, the band would raise their drinking horns to the crowd and sip the drink, they did this in all the cities except in Salt Lake City, Utah, where the venue asked the band not to have alcohol in the horns. The band thought it was ridiculous to drink water from the horns so Salt Lake City did not see those Vikings with their drinking horns on stage.

Formed under the name Scum in 1988, the band was originally a grindcore band formed by Themgoroth (Dark Funeral), Olavi and Ted. When Johan joined the band it resulted in a musical change towards death metal. After a 1991 demo, they switched to the name Amon Amarth in 1992.

When in 1992 Amon Amarth released a demo, The Arrival Of The Fimbul Winter, they sold all 1000 demo discs in less than 12 hours!

Amon Amarth is Elvish (Sindarin) for 'Mountain of Fate' (or Mount Doom) in Tolkien's 'The Lord of The Rings'.