A Concise History of the Vikings
© 2016 Copyright Hourly History
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Table of Contents
From the Fury of the Northmen
Retaliation, Royal Ambition, and Bribery
The Viking Age of Exploration and Expansion
Tidings from the East
The End of the Viking Age
The Vikings Come to Christ
The Second Viking Invasion
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Introduction
From the Fury of the Northmen
It was a dark day in 793 AD when Viking ships landed on the island of Lindisfarne just off the shores of England. Accounts from this tragic day report a complete siege of this holy site that left those who were unlucky enough to be unable to escape either dead or in chains. The church was also viciously looted of some of its most valuable possessions. The peaceful monks of the monastery never could have imagined such brutality and disregard for what they viewed as sacred and holy.
This event undeniably left its mark in dramatic fashion on the terrified monks of the Lindisfarne monastery, the memory of which struck so much fear that it made its way into the official church liturgy; with the survivors of Lindisfarne adding at the end of their prayers the heartfelt plea, “From the fury of the Northmen, O Lord, deliver us.” But why were these men from the northernmost frontier of Europe so seemingly ferocious? What caused them to descend out of Scandinavia and terrorize all of Europe?
For much of history the motives behind the Viking raids of Christian Europe have been greatly obscured and misunderstood. The sudden assaults on Christian monasteries in 793 are often just shrugged off as a crime of opportunity or a random act of wanton brutality, but when you take a look at what else was going on in 793 AD, the story starts to get a bit more complicated than that.
Just previous to this first Viking onslaught, during that very same year, the Frankish ruler Charlemagne had made a special alliance with England. This was a frightening prospect for the Scandinavian society that the Vikings came from. At that time the Franks constituted the greatest single fighting force in Europe and the Frankish Empire that Charlemagne ruled over had been tightening its grip on the Norse people for decades.
As early as 743, the Frankish leader Karl Martell had laid waste to the Danish principality of Friesland. This siege was launched on the populace for no other reason than the fact that they were Pagan. And when Charlemagne came to the throne in 768 he would soon follow in these very same intolerant footsteps of persecution. Viewing himself as the inheritor of the Roman Empire, Charlemagne was the most powerful ruler in all of Christian Europe.
As such, Charlemagne had made it his mission to bring Christ to all corners of Europe at any cost. As a consequence he began a long campaign aimed towards expanding his reign in the north, seeking to subjugate the Nordic lands of Denmark and Northern Germany. He was relentless in his goal and under his heavy hand the holy sites and religious adherents of the Norse religion of Scandinavia found themselves under siege.
So it seems that before a Viking foot ever trampled over religious relics in the Lindisfarne monastery, Frankish knights were laying waste to the sacred ground of the Vikings. And among the most traumatic events in this holy war being raged against the Norse was in 772, when Charlemagne ordered to have the holy tree Yggdrasil—an object of great religious meaning to all the would-be Vikings of the region—burned down to the ground.
Yggdrasil; also known as the “world tree,” was believed to hold all of creation in place until the day of Ragnarok, the Armageddon of Norse mythology. As a consequence, from the perspective of the Vikings, Charlemagne just might have set off the first spark in the lighting of the Viking version of the Apocalypse. And seemingly to further inflame this sentiment of destruction and desolation, the Franks weren’t content just to leave the Norse with the empty ground when this sacred tree was torn down; like a giant flag of triumph, the Christian cross was raised in its place on the exact same spot where Yggdrasil had once stood – a message to the Norse people, loud and clear, to let them know exactly what it was that was supplanting their ancestral culture and beliefs.
In response to this religious usurpation, and the burning of Yggdrasil, the Scandinavians decided to fight fire with fire. They responded in kind by torching several churches that had sprung up in their territories. The wrath of Charlemagne would soon strike them again ten years later however, when in 782 he ordered 4500 Pagans in Northern Germany and Southern Denmark rounded up and forcibly baptized. When these religious captives still refused to convert, he had them all beheaded.
As events like this and others were being perpetrated and the reach of Charlemagne encroached closer and closer to the Scandinavian homeland, the Frankish Empire was perceived as a real threat to the Norse people. And so when just a decade after events like the 782 massacre, when word reached the Vikings in 793 that England had essentially become a vassal state to their dreaded enemy, the Franks, the Viking leaders decided to hit back with a preemptive strike that would launch what would essentially be a 200 year long war against Christian Europe.
Chapter One
Retaliation, Royal Ambition, and Bribery
When the Frankish ruler Charlemagne was officially crowned the Emperor of his new Holy Roman Empire in the year 800 CE, he didn’t have room for any new threats or insurgencies. The prospects for a peace however were poor. Just two years prior to his coronation in 798, churches were burned down to the ground on St. Patrick’s island. And then most startling of all for the Franks, in 799 the Vikings had laid siege to the coastal region of France called Aquitaine, stabbing right at the heart of the Frankish Empire.
As a consequence the Franks became determined to make sure that incidents like these would not repeat themselves. To counteract the Viking advance Charlemagne dispatched a whole fleet of ships in the Elbe to protect the region, as well as organizing stronger coastal fortifications for defense. And it seems that these efforts did temporarily hold back the Viking advance; the raids immediately after this were refocused on northern Britain rather than on southwestern France.
Starting in that fateful year of 800, Norwegian bands began establishing themselves in the Orkneys and the Shetlands, part of the northernmost islands of Scotland. These new outposts then became the staging grounds for new campaigns against the monasteries of Iona, giving the Monks of Iona an unpleasant surprise in 802, followed up by an even more brutal siege that occurred in 806 which left 68 monks dead in its aftermath.
But the most traumatic instance that the residents of Iona would commit to their memory was the massacre of 825 in which Saint Blathmac was martyred after he failed to produce the treasures and relics that the Vikings had demanded from him. This was a shocking blow to Christendom since the monastery of Iona was the holy site of none other than St. Columba, the Christian missionary who had managed to convert all of Western Scotland to Christianity in 563 AD. The body of this saint and any accompanying relics were revered by his fellow monks as something greater than gold and were guarded fiercely.
It was in his attempts to make sure that St. Columba’s rest remained undisturbed that St. Blathmac became a martyr himself. In the Christian faith of the Middle Ages, it was a widespread belief that a literal resurrection of the saints would occur at the second coming of Christ. It was in this line of thinking that preserving the dead bodies of the Saints became of such a paramount importance.
The dead bodies of the saints were viewed as sacred vessels, and even small aspects of their corpse such as their hair or fingernails were viewed as powerful holy relics that were to be guarded as the greatest of treasures. This was a concept admittedly foreign to the Vikings but once they realized how important these things were for the Christian faithful, being the shrewd plunderers that they were, it was not uncommon for Vikings to steal the dead bodies and artifacts of the Saints and then hold them for ransom.
The monks of Europe’s monasteries knew that this was a grisly but lucrative practice that most Vikings were more than willing to undertake. As a result it was not an uncommon sight during a Viking raid to see the monks fleeing the scene with the corpse of a saint slung over their shoulders. In the case of St. Blathac, the relics that the Vikings were looking for had already been hidden and it is recorded that when the Vikings demanded that he hand them over, St. Blathmac boldly stood firm against this kind of Viking threat and refused to cooperate with them. The priest was then viciously torn to pieces by the berserk Vikings.
These raids and ransoms would continue off and on for the next two decades until a permanent Viking settlement was established in Dublin, Ireland in 841 AD. Beginning as a “longphort” or “raiding base,” much more than a place to launch marauding attacks, Dublin soon became the quintessential trading base of the region, having dealings with continental Europe as well as the Middle East and even North Africa.
Precious metals, weaponry, horses, cattle and fabrics were all traded through this port city. Besides these material goods however, the most dangerous thing that the Vikings traded in was human beings. Whether they were captured in a raid or bought in already existing slave markets, the Vikings had no qualms with selling people as merchandise. They engaged in this trade far and wide, making profits off their human cargo with merchants as far away as Baghdad, Iraq.
Part of the reason why the Irish were unable to mount a strong defense and root out the Vikings who were constantly raiding and enslaving them was due to the fact of the constant conflict between the native Irish Kingdoms. When the Vikings started taking over vast tracts of land in Ireland they found the Irish completely divided, which greatly facilitated the installation of Viking fortifications.
The Irish Kings, presumably getting fed up with being looted and enslaved, did manage to eventually put aside their differences to strike back. Their more unified forces were able to mount a substantial defense and by 873 the Viking Kingdom in Ireland had become unstable. The Vikings abandoned Dublin for easier pickings in England and Frankia. The raiders would not return for another four decades, leading to what the local residents would refer to as the “40 years rest”.
Meanwhile there were new tidings coming from the Vikings’ arch nemesis, the Franks. Charlemagne had passed away in 814 and his empire was handed down to his son Louis the Pious. Louis the Pious then had his empire relegated to his three sons who officially divided their control of the territory between them by the signing of the “Treaty of Verdun”. This seemed to play right into the Vikings’ hands and, engaging in yet another divide and conquer strategy on a much more massive scale, the Norse warriors began laying siege directly to the Frankish homeland itself.
Of these three territorial divisions of the Frankish Empire, it was the domain under the control of Charlemagne’s son “Charles the Bald” that faced the most immediate threat as the Vikings penetrated the Rhine River and began to mount regular offensives into the very heart of France. With the protective fleet and defenses established by Charlemagne largely deteriorated, the Vikings had gained complete access to these waterways, allowing them to launch lightning fast attacks at a moment’s notice without any warning to Charles the Bald and his Franks.
It was the lack of political cohesion during Charles the Bald’s reign that managed to strike him a deadly blow in 843 when rebels of his own Kingdom actually allied themselves with the Vikings to flaunt his lack of authority. This coalition managed to completely seize the French town of Nantes on the Atlantic coast in 843. Just two years later the Vikings managed to march on Paris which they sacked and looted until Charles the Bald agreed to pay them 7000 pounds of silver. In the midst of all of their daring and bloodthirsty attacks the Vikings began to also develop a reputation as men that had a price.
If you had enough money and the price was high enough, you could turn the Vikings away or even convince them to attack other Vikings. Unlike other empires and groups of fighters in the Middle Ages, much of the time the Vikings apparently didn’t have that strong of a solidarity with each other. According to the Viking creed all that mattered was being brave in battle and facing an honorable death. There were no rules that dictated they only fight Franks or other southern Europeans, and as such the wrath of these men from the north could be just as ferocious when directed at each other.
Charles the Bald attempted to use this characteristic to his advantage. As he sought to quell the raging internal politics of his Kingdom, he managed to delve into the internal politics of the Vikings themselves. Playing his own game of divide and conquer by paying one band of Vikings to attack another band of Vikings, the tactics Charles the Bald pioneered did not always work however, as was evidenced in the famous case of 860 when Charles attempted to bribe the Vikings of Weland against the Vikings of the Seine.
Always being swayed by a higher payback, the Vikings of Weland then turned around and accepted an even bigger bribe from the Seine Vikings to not attack them. In the end Charles had to offer an even larger amount of money to the Seine Vikings to persuade them to leave in 866. With all the money paid back and forth, the Vikings of the Seine undoubtedly had some heavy long ships as they set sail back to their homeland.
Chapter Two
The Viking Age of Exploration and Expansion
The Viking age of exploration began in earnest in the year 860 when wayward Vikings discovered the small island of Iceland. According to Norse lore the island was discovered completely by accident when a band of Vikings were blown off course on their way to the Faroe Islands north of Scotland. And as the story goes during the first attempt to settle this island the settlers saw a Fjord full of ice and so of course, named the place “Ice Land”.
After these initial first forays, the Vikings launched an official campaign of settlement in 874. This first colonization effort was led by two Norwegian brothers by the names of Ingolf and Leif (Not to be confused with Leif Erikson) who sailed two ships of settlers and livestock to Iceland. As fate would have it Leif would not last very long on the island outpost and was actually murdered by his own Irish slaves who overran his settlement. The colony established by his brother Ingolf however managed to prosper and served as the first of many waves of Viking immigration to come.
With no native opposition, the colonization process was rather rapid and for the most part complete after one generation. And after about 60 years of migration Iceland boasted a population of about 20,000. Most of these settlers came from Western Norway where Norwegian land shortage put the most pressure on young men to venture out and find new territory. Norway being the western most frontier of traditional Scandinavia is of course also perfectly positioned geographically as a launching pad for exploration.
But even while Norway was laying the groundwork for a new colony in Iceland, it was one of their old colonies that began to face a very dramatic shift in direction. At this time new developments were occurring in the kingdom of Denmark that led to the Danish Vikings seizing land in Ireland that had previously been the property of the Norwegians. By the 880s the Danish Vikings were working very hard to usurp much of the Norwegian conquests in the area, an usurpation that the Irish seemed to accept quite enthusiastically, apparently welcoming any change from the heavy handed domination of the Norwegians.
This enthusiasm that was also reciprocated by the Danish Vikings, who even went so far as to make a vow to St. Patrick in order to show their solidarity. When the Danes managed to strike a crushing blow to the Norwegians, the Irish inhabitants were exulted at the news of their defeat, though this exultation soon turned to repulsion after the Irish saw the manner in which the Danish Vikings celebrated their victory.
According to Irish accounts, after the battle messengers from the King of Ireland came to the Danes to congratulate them on their victory, only to be horrified by witnessing the Danes in full celebration with vast cauldrons of meat being boiled over the dead bodies of the just vanquished Norwegian Vikings. The messengers immediately cried out in horror that the Danes “should not do such things”, but such acts were an enshrined custom of victory over a vanquished enemy, and the Danes simply informed the Irish that the Norwegians would have done the same to them had they been the luckier party of the battle.
But ultimately the Danes; luck in Ireland would only hold out for so long, and after just three years the Norwegian Vikings would reclaim all of the Irish territory that they had lost. As a consequence the Danes then turned their focus to a new prize: the northwestern coast of France. In territory that became known as Normandy, a name synonymous with Vikings; which means “Land of the Northmen”.
By the year 911 AD, the Viking presence in Normandy had grown substantially and so recognizing the inevitable, the Frankish ruler “Charles the Simple” decided to officially cede the territory to the Viking leader Hrolf Gongu (Known to the Franks as Rollo). King Charles’ decision to allow the Vikings to annex Normandy came with only a few strings attached. He requested that Rollo defend the territory from other Vikings, install a feudal system to run the territory, and that the Viking leader convert those under his dominion to Christianity, all requests that Rollo faithfully fulfilled.
The fact that Rollo so easily accepted Christianity for himself and his dominion demonstrates a major turning point for Viking society since it was just two centuries previous that the Frankish leader Carl Martel had fought such a bitter ideological struggle against them. It seems that many of the Vikings who previously would have rather died than convert to Christianity had changed their mindset quite a bit through successive generations. The Vikings had now been immersed in Christian society for so long that it was no longer that much of a leap to come to terms with the religion of their southern European counterparts.
The next 50 years that followed were characterized by peace, with the Viking powers content to consolidate their gains in Continental Europe and the British isles. It was shortly after this peaceful period of consolidation that one of the greatest Viking discoveries would take place. It was in 982 that a little known Viking named “Erik the Red”, who had been banished by his own contemporaries on charges of manslaughter, found himself washing up on the shores of Greenland. Erik and his small crew then spent the next three years living off the land, hunting, fishing and exploring.
Erik thought that Greenland had all the trappings for a sustainable new colony as a great place for any Viking to live; the only problem was the rather frigid temperature. Iceland is actually the more temperate of the two lands, but being a shrewd advertiser, Erik decided to call the his new discovery “Greenland”. Erik apparently thought that with such an attractive name that brought to mind lush green pastures, Vikings would come to settle the place in droves.
Besides its low temperature though, the prospect of the wide open plains of Greenland was actually very tempting for many of the farmers of Iceland who were now suffering from overcrowding on their tiny island and in need of new pastures for their grazing animals. Adding to this desire for new grasslands, Iceland had also just suffered a terrible famine ten years before, and so just as Erik imagined, Icelanders were ready to populate this new find. In 986, Erik came back to Greenland with 25 ships filled to the brim with eager settlers and livestock.
It is recorded that at the height of the Greenland population boom there were over 6000 settlers in the land. That figure may not seem like a whole lot, but given the hardship of such far north, semi-arctic real estate, it was quite a feat. This Viking foothold would last until about the 15th century when due to climate change and repeated incursions from neighboring Inuit peoples Greenland’s Viking population died off.
Interestingly enough, it was during this exact time frame of the 15th century that Christopher Columbus reached America. However, if we can believe Viking testimony and legend, a small contingent of Vikings may have reached the shores of North America first, almost 500 years before. The story of the Viking expeditions to America begins with a man named Bjarni who in 985, just a few years after the initial discovery of Greenland, accidentally reached the shores of the northeastern coast of North America.
Bjarni was attempting to reach Greenland to join the onrush of early settlers when the winds of fate, and the quite literal winds of the ocean, pushed him off course. Bjarni would later describe drifting by a coastline that was drastically different from Greenland. Instead of seeing wide open plains and the mountainous glaciers of Greenland, Bjarni claimed that he saw a vast wooded terrain. Fifteen years after this encounter, Leif Erikson (The son of Erik the Red) met up with Bjarni and was intrigued by his account of this undiscovered land.
Leif tried to convince his father Erik the Red to go with him on an expedition but as the story goes his horse threw him off as he approached Leif’s ship. Being superstitious, Erik took this as an omen to mean that his exploring days were over. He told his son, “I am not meant to discover more countries than this one we are now in.” So honoring his father’s desire to remain at home, Leif left without him, setting sail to discover a new world, right at the turn of the millennium, in 1001 CE.
Leif sailed northwest and it wasn’t long before his crew found land. Appearing to be completely barren, Leif and his men named the place “Helluland” which literally translates as “Slab Land” in reference to the giant slabs of granite that made up the landscape of the frozen tundra that his expedition had encountered. Most researchers today believe that this first encounter with North America probably took place off of Baffin Island.
Leif and his men then most likely sailed further south down what is now called the “Hudson Strait” and wound up on Canada’s “Labrador Coast”. It was here that Leif and his crew saw the tall pine trees that marked the vast wooded area that Bjarni had described. The crew then sailed on for a few more days and then made a pit stop on an island just north of the mainland. Many believe this landmass to have been modern day Belle Isle just north of Newfoundland in Canada.
The Vikings then headed directly south of Belle Isle and finally landed on Newfoundland itself. Here Leif’s men were impressed with the plentiful timber and resources that could be extracted from this area. Additionally, one of Leif’s men reportedly found some grapevines, prompting Leif to name the landmass Vinland in commemoration.
Since this time the remains of what could only be termed a Viking outpost have been discovered in this area. Ironically, the only thing that doesn’t seem to make sense about this story is the mention of the grapevines from which Leif’s discovery takes its name. Newfoundland, while warmer than Greenland, is still by no means temperate enough to produce grapes. Where Leif’s men got their grapes from is still anyone’s guess.
By the time Leif Erikson and his men set sail back to Greenland the following summer he was already preparing himself for another voyage. However, his days of being an explorer were cut short when his father passed away shortly after his return to Greenland. Being the eldest son it was up to Leif to manage his departed father’s estate, so it would then be up to others to continue his quest for him. The first to take up the challenge of continuing the exploration of Vinland was Leif’s brother Thorvald.
He was excited about the news he had heard of the new territory and immediately requisitioned 30 men to go with him, back to the same exact spot that his brother Leif had landed. They stayed at this site for the winter of 1002-1003, surviving on the local supply of salmon. Later that year they further explored the coastline and after waiting out another winter they finally pushed on further to the south.
Thorvald’s ship was damaged in this expedition however and they had to stop to gather up some timber to repair the vessel. Soon after this, the expedition team encountered some Native Americans and a skirmish broke out that left Thorvald fatally wounded with an arrow piercing him right under his armpit. After he breathed his last, his men then buried him further up the shore and set sail back to Greenland.
This apparently did not sit so well with one of Thorvald’s siblings; immediately after hearing about the fate of his brother, Thorstein Erikson gathered up another crew and set sail for Vinland to retrieve his brother’s body. But according to the Sagas this mission really never got off the ground; after sailing into gale force winds, the crew shipwrecked onto the western coast of Greenland where they had to seek refuge over the winter months. It was here that Thorstein reportedly contracted a deadly disease and died, ending his mission before it even began.
According to the Sagas another mission was then launched shortly after this one with another group of Vikings. They managed to successfully land in the area of Vinland. According to the narrative they then set up a small colony but they once again suffered severe attacks from Native Americans and they were forced to flee back to Greenland. The next voyage after this one supposedly had none other than Erik the Red’s daughter Freydis at the helm. This mission too ended in a skirmish with Native Americans and the Vikings being driven from the land.
If these accounts are to be fully believed it would seem that European expansion into North America was a bit premature. The Sagas themselves end with this telling message of foreboding, “It now seems plain that though quality of the land was admirable, there would always be fear and strife dogging them on account of those who already inhabited the land.” And so the Viking quests in America and the age of exploration and expansion ended.
Chapter Three
Tidings from the East
It was not only in the North and West that Vikings sought expansion of territory and trade. Because while Viking explorers and conquerors were carving a map for themselves in America and Western Europe, Vikings from Sweden were creating massive networks and even whole new nation states in the East. Before the year 1000 CE much of the Baltic lands of the East were mostly covered in uninhabited forest with the indigenous Slavic people’s living in unconnected settlements at the edge of forest landscapes.
The eastern Vikings, taking their long ships down the great rivers that led to the interior of this region, sought to change that. Swedish Vikings managed to utilize this vast network of rivers and as early as 850 had a massive trading network based upon these waterways. It was within this trade network that stretched throughout all of what we consider modern Russia and Ukraine that these Vikings began to create settlements. It was these Viking settlers of the Baltic that became known as the “Rus”, a name from which our concept of “Russia” and “Russian” is derived.
It was just a decade after these trading routes had been established that an interesting development occurred. According to the Viking account, three Swedes known as the “Rus” brothers were called upon by warring Slavonic tribes to bring peace to their region by ruling over them. A representative of these tribes supposedly then petitioned the Vikings with, “our land is large and rich, but there is not order in it. So come and be king and rule over us.”
Admittedly it sounds a bit absurd to most that a group of people would willingly invite someone from outside their country to rule over them, but regardless of how it actually occurred, by 862 one of these brothers, Rurik, became the leader of these Slavonic tribes. It was under Rurik’s leadership that the first Russian state came into existence, mainly centered around the towns of Novgorod and Kiev. It was the city of Kiev in particular that become especially suited for Viking trade between the Byzantine Empire and the Baltic.
This situation proved to be lucrative for the Vikings, and except for some small hiccups such as an 880 rebellion that Rurik’s successor “Prince Oleg” had to put down, the Russian/Viking kingdom seemed to prosper. Oleg and his successors proceeded to expand their dominion in the ensuing years all the way to the Balkans, but having borders that expanded so far to the south inevitably drew the Vikings into conflict with the major power of the region: the Byzantine Empire.
Viking clashes with the Byzantines set in motion a conflict that would come to a head in dramatic fashion, the culmination of which was in the year 907 when Prince Oleg attempted to launch a Viking fleet against a Byzantine one. It was here that the Byzantines showed the Vikings – who had so often struck terror into their foes – a thing or two about being afraid in the form of “Greek Fire”.
The most deadly weapon in the Byzantine arsenal, Greek Fire was a highly flammable substance that worked similar to modern day napalm and was able to burn even when wet. The Byzantines would spray this substance from hoses mounted on their ships and then set it on fire. Any ship caught up in this inferno was quickly destroyed.
The Viking fleet was dealt such a devastating blow that all future attempts of invading the Byzantine coast were abandoned. And then just like the old adage “If you can’t beat them, join them”, the defeated Vikings soon began showing up at the gates of Constantinople not to fight but to be hired on for active duty in the Byzantine military.
For the next hundred years several military treaties between the Byzantines and the Kiev based Vikings would lead to whole contingents of Rus Viking fighters being placed in the service of the Byzantine Empire. The Byzantines were so impressed with the Viking’s military service that they created an elite all-Viking guard in charge of protecting the Emperor himself. So it was that in an amazing twist of fate the Vikings that had previously caused so much turmoil for Byzantium were now the Emperor’s most loyal subjects!
But the most famous Viking of all that would render service to the Byzantine court would be a man named “Harald Hadrada”. Harald was actually from Norway, among the few Norwegians to venture to the lands of the east along with their Swedish Viking brethren. Harald was the son of Sigurd Syr, the ruler of the Ringeske region of Norway. He was also the half-brother of King Olaf the second.
Olaf was eventually forced from the throne in a violent revolt that brought a man named Cnut to power in his stead. Harald came to his brother’s aid but the forces mustered by Harald were soundly defeated and the battle left Olaf dead and Harald wounded. Harald was then forced to flee and became an exile from his own country. It was at this point that Harald Hadrada made his fame in the lands of the east.
He settled for a time in Kiev where he commanded a local army. He then found his way to the throne of none other than Emperor Michel IV of Byzantium. It was here that Harald joined the Byzantine Varangian Guard. After years of serving in several battles far and wide, Harald became something of a legend and was known for his brilliant and sometimes outrageous exploits in battle.
Known to be as shrewd and cunning as they come, one of his most shocking victories in battle was borne out of his cunningly absurd mind. This was especially highlighted in one instance when Harald and his men found themselves in a particularly difficult siege. According to his men’s testimony they were in the middle of besieging this heavily fortified settlement when Harald Hadrada got the idea to fake his own death!
He told his men to place him in a coffin and announce to the city they had just been attacking that the Viking leader had died. Dutifully performing as their leader instructed, Hadrada’s men pretended to be distraught, and informed their adversaries that Harald Hadrada had fallen in battle. Pretending that all was lost, his men then begged the townspeople to let them bury their fallen commander within their town.
The besieged city then literally let their guard down and let the troops march right within their city walls for this supposed last rite of their commander in chief. As the story goes, once that coffin was set down within city limits those poor villagers had the surprise of their life when Harald burst forth out of the coffin with his sword in hand like some marauding Viking zombie! You can imagine how terrified the townspeople must have been to see the man they believed to have fallen in battle suddenly burst forth from the grave right in front of them.
This is exactly what the crafty mind of Harald had imagined happening when he came up with the ploy. As crafty as he was in battle, he was just as shrewd in politics and statecraft – a shrewdness that would come to life in 1045 when the exile finally made the journey back to his homeland to reclaim his throne and set the stage for what would be known as the end of the Viking Age.
Chapter Four
The End of the Viking Age
When Harald Hadrada returned to Norway in 1045 it was a land torn asunder. The once great and powerful ruler King Cnut had died ten years before and the management of the Kingdom had passed into the hands of the deceased King Olaf’s bastard son, “Magnus the Good”. Olaf was Harald Harada’s half-brother that had died in battle 15 years before, during the event that had exiled Harald in the first place.
When Harada had arrived in Norway in the midst of all of this political intrigue he was certain that his claim to the throne as Olaf’s half-brother was stronger than any claim Olaf’s illegitimate children may have had. He set out to stake his claim and the tensions of Norway’s political climate grew even more turbulent as a result – so much so in fact that Norway was soon on the verge of civil war between the two factions.
Ultimately the cooler head of Magnus prevailed. In order to prevent a cataclysmic conflict, he entered into agreement with Harald Hadrada to share the Kingdom with him in exchange for a large amount of Harald’s wealth. Apparently desiring power much more than his money, Harald readily agreed to this substantially large pay out that Magnus the Good had requested; in this way the shedding of blood was avoided.
Harald supposedly handed over half of his wealth to him, but historians are not quite sure if it was a check that Magnus was ever able to cash. As fate would have it, less than a year later after striking this deal, Magnus was dead. It would be easy to jump to the conclusion that Harald Hadrada had Magnus disposed of somehow in order to consolidate all of the Norwegian kingdom under his control, but the truth is no one knows for sure what happened to Magnus the Good, and probably never will.
What we do know is that immediately after the death of Magnus, Harald Harada, whose very last name means “Hard Rule”, set out to live up to that title by brutally crushing his opposition and spending the next 15 years trying to expand his territory by conquering Denmark. This is a major turning point that began the historic march toward the end of the Viking Age.
In all the years previous the three main Viking powers of Norway, Denmark and Sweden were content to divide the spoils of the world between each other without too much conflict, but by the time of Harald Harada’s “Hard Rule” they were at each other’s’ throats. By the year 1065 at the age of 50 Harald Harada – known whimsically as the “Last Viking” – would set the ball in motion that would lead to the end of the Viking Age.
In 1065 it was Britain’s turn to face political turmoil when King Edward the Confessor died suddenly without an heir to the throne. Due to this political vacuum that was created, three men rose up to claim the right to lead England. These men were Harold Godwinson of England, William of Normandy and of course, Harald Harada of Norway. All three of these men would face off against each other in a near apocalyptic battle over who would sit on the throne.
Harald Hadrada, not one to take any chances, left for England with a massive fleet of 300 Viking long ships. As soon as he landed on the northern coast the first battle in this war of succession began against the English army in what is known as the “Battle of Fulford Gate”. For this initial skirmish it seemed that fate was on Harald’s side as the English force was easily routed and sent packing. Instead of bothering to chase after the fleeing remnants of the English battalion, Harald immediately sacked the town of York.
Meanwhile another English battalion of men were marching north towards Harald Hadrada’s position under the leadership of Harold Godwinson. Not realizing that reinforcements were on the way, Harald Hadrada had instructed most of his troops to guard their ships on the coast while he and his smaller regiment plundered the countryside and camped out at Samford Bridge. As a result, when Godwinson confronted Harald Hadrada, he not only had a much smaller force but his unit was also much less equipped than they normally would be, as his main force had been left behind guarding his ships and supply lines on the coast.
It was in this ill-suited fashion that Harald Hadrada’s depleted force made their last stand. All Harald could do was quickly dispatch messengers to alert the rest of his men and desperately hope that his small force they could hold off Godwin’s superior army until his reinforcements could arrive. The reinforcements did eventually find their way to the battle but by the time they showed up, Harald Harada was already dead with an arrow in his throat. Harald Harada’s invasion force was then subsequently destroyed, and of the 300 long ships that had sailed to the British Isles only 25 of them managed to head back home.
Ultimately though Hadrada’s death would be somewhat avenged in the form of another Viking descendant, William of Normandy. Coming from the Viking colony of Normandy, William faced down Godwinson at the infamous “Battle of Hastings”. It was after this battle that William of Normandy rose victorious and the Norman conquest of England began just as the age of the Vikings drew to a close.
Chapter Five
The Vikings Come to Christ
Many historians are amazed at how rapidly the Vikings switched their ancient ancestral beliefs over to Christianity, but the roots for a successful Viking version of Christianity may lie in the Vikings’ own ancestral belief system itself. At first glance you may think that the two faiths are worlds apart, but digging a little bit deeper, historians have noted that there are actually many commonalities that Norse Mythology has with Christianity.
Even the creation story of Genesis is repeated in similar fashion in the Norse creation myths. Echoing the Christian text, Norse lore maintains that in the beginning, “all was without form and life, and darkness was on the face of the deep”. A seemingly direct parallel to the first few lines of the Christian book of Genesis until the creation Saga reads further to reveal that a giant named “Ymir” burst forth from this “deep” and engaged in a life and death struggle with Odin.
Despite this divergence, eventually the Norse people learned to look past some of the most glaring contrasts and began to recognize many elements of their own belief system within the Christian religion that they encountered. One aspect that was familiar to many Vikings is the Catholic concept of a “Father God” in which they identified the supreme deity from their own pantheon “Odin”. And when Catholic missionaries mentioned that their Father God had a son named Jesus, the Pagan Vikings identified Jesus with Thor, the valiant son of their own god Odin.
Of course besides these superficial similarities on the surface the main differences between these two religions were still tremendous. Nevertheless, it was a common practice and strategy among the early Christian missionaries when attempting to convert a Pagan population to find these similarities no matter how exaggerated they may be and use them to entice the Pagan believer into becoming a Christian. So it was in the case of the Vikings that Christian monks used the importance that the Vikings placed upon the Father and Son relationship of Odin and Thor as a means to smooth over their conversion process.
It became a great tool for these Christian missionaries to be able to take the concept of Thor being the valiant son and use it as a reference point to insert Christ into their belief system. Although the peace that Jesus taught stood in stark contrast with most aspects of the warrior god of Thor, Christians were able to find some kinship and common ground between the two deities in the Christian Book of Revelation. It was here that a reference point had been developed and the Christian missionaries used this to point out that Christ was a figure of strength and in the end he would vanquish his enemies, just as the conquering figure of Thor was said to do.
Another parallel that the early Christians found by preaching the Book of Revelation to the Vikings was that many basic concepts in this apocalyptic book matched beliefs that the Vikings already had about the end of the world. In very similar terms, the Viking concept of “Ragnarok” describes a prophetic future calamity to befall mankind – a concept that the Viking warriors held very close to their heart. They strongly believed that the battles they fought in this world were only a shadow of the greater events to come. Ragnarok is the Viking version of Armageddon and just like the Book of Revelation it focuses on a final apocalyptic battle between the forces of good and evil.
Additionally, just like the Book of Revelation, Ragnarok had graphic depictions of natural disasters and calamites leading up to the final showdown between the forces of light and the armies of darkness. Ragnarok contained very powerful imagery for the Viking people, and when the Christian missionaries realized just how important this Norse prophecy was, they were able to use it as a key to unlock the door of Christianity in the minds of the Norsemen. The man that is most well-known for transmitting these ideas of Christ to the Vikings is that of Ansgar, “The Apostle of the North”.
Ansgar was officially consecrated in 832 by Pope Gregory IV as Archbishop and Papal Legate to the Scandinavians. It was Saint Ansgar who, during a mission in Sweden, was supposedly able to convince his Viking congregation that Jesus was “stronger than Thor”. It was during a regular church meeting that a heated discussion broke out among the locals as to whether or not Ansgar and his brethren should be allowed to continue to preach the gospel in their lands.
Many of the local Vikings claimed that bringing Christianity to Scandinavia would only bring bad luck and the wrath of the old gods down upon their country. According to the account, this discussion went back and forth until one of the Viking leaders, an old and much respected man, stood up and declared with authority that Jesus was stronger than Thor. According to the account, from that simple proclamation from a Viking elder, Ansgar and his mission were allowed to stay and continue to preach about Christ. This was yet another ideological milestone and testament to indicate that the Vikings, who 100 years before were purposefully targeting monasteries as places to unleash their rage, were now growing increasingly ambivalent about the Christian faith.
From this point on Christianity began to seep into the culture more and more. This is most evident when you take a look at the grave markers from this period. Most graves have a mixture of both Christian and Norse tradition, with many displaying both the Christian cross and Thor’s hammer. As one old Viking was reported to have commented, “You never can be too sure”. Almost like buying an additional insurance policy, Christ was just seen as one more righteous protector to add to the Norse pantheon. At this stage in the Christianization of the Vikings, instead of discarding their old religion outright, they simply incorporated Christ into it. For their part, this was an incorporation that the Christian missionaries encouraged, since to them, partially Christian Vikings were certainly better than non-Christian Vikings. It would be many more years before the Old Norse gods would die out completely.
For most of the Viking world, conversion to Christianity was a gradual evolution, but there were still some more drastic last-minute forced conversions that were taking place. These usually occurred more out of political expediency than anything else. It was quite common for a Viking leader to make some sort of deal with a Christian one over land or some other political matter that had nothing at all to do with Christianity, but as part of the bargain the Viking was convinced to convert himself and possibly all of his subjects to Christianity.
As mentioned earlier, this was precisely the case with the Normans when their leader Rollo forced their conversion due to a special clause in the treaty he signed with the Franks. One of the most famous of these forced conversions of a Viking authority was that of King Guthrum, whose Danish army was defeated by King Alfred the Great in 878. King Guthrum and his Vikings had been laying siege to England and threatened to swallow up all of King Alfred’s territory, but in a major reversal of fortunes Alfred gained the upper hand and forced the Viking leader to sign a peace treaty. One of the major tenets of this treaty was the demand that King Guthrum and thirty of his men be baptized and convert to Christianity.
According to the account of this event, King Guthrum not only accepted the terms, he especially requested for King Alfred to be his Godfather during his baptism! These strange reversals in ideology became more and more prevalent as the years wore on, and the old gods that the Vikings had fought so hard for during the burning of the Yggdrasil tree in 777 became an increasingly distant memory of their past.
Along with the commercialization and taxation of the Viking Kingdoms it comes with some irony that it was the man that the modern “Bluetooth” is named after, “Harald Bluetooth” who would shake things up the most. King Harald Bluetooth upon being converted by the German missionary Poppo, was baptized in 963 CE. According to the account, supposedly the missionary had amazed Bluetooth, during a so-called “trial by fire” exercise, by holding a heated lump of iron in his hand without sustaining any noticeable burn or injury. By engaging in this drastic activity, Poppo was a Christian who was once again attempting to indicate to the Vikings that Jesus was stronger than Thor. When Poppo emerged unscathed from this event, Bluetooth apparently took this to mean that the religion of Poppo was true and quickly agreed to convert. Soon all of Denmark succumbed to Christianity as well.
One other aspect that many historians argue when it comes to the Christianization of the Vikings is that in the midst of all of these drastic conversions, much of the incentive for the Vikings to convert was as much financial as it was ideological. Because one of the most glaring and fundamental problems of the Scandinavian Viking kingdoms at the time was the fact that they had no ability to raise taxes and revenue internally among their communities, it was often this lack of revenue that led many Viking kings to raid their neighbors in the first place.
Once the Christian Bishoprics were established as effective centers of administration, the kings of Scandinavia no longer had to raid a neighboring village in order to raise the money to build a castle. These centers of administration allowed them to collect regular revenue from their subjects in the form of taxes, allowing the Viking kingdoms to have a reliable means of funding. However, not everyone would take this new form of tax collection well.
It was in Denmark under the rule of Cnut IV that a wide scale revolt took place over the tithing system that this Viking monarch initiated in 1086. The whole community of Denmark, nobles and peasants alike, rose up in fury over King Cnut’s enforcement of tithes to pay for the construction of new monasteries in his kingdom. His subjects felt betrayed, and for many of the protesters, Cnut’s actions were a double slap in the face.
In their eyes, their sovereign monarch was forcing them to pay what they considered to be a foreign tax in order to build centers of what was still held by many to be foreign influence. His subjects were also deeply insulted at the fact that Cnut hadn’t used the traditional regional assemblies that normally establish this kind of endeavor. Unlike much of Europe at the time, most Norse communities had maintained a democratic aspect in their society through their use of what they called an “Althing”, which was essentially gathering of a local democratic body of all the free men of that region where they discussed local legislation.
It was the abandoning of this democratic tradition that angered the Danes more than anything else. They were frustrated that their King had gone completely over their heads to install these foreign institutions without even asking how they felt about it. It was Cnut’s refusal to consult with his own people that led to his death and removal from the throne. However, even amidst all of this turmoil, Cnut seems to have gotten the last laugh as he was canonized in 1188 as a Saint for his efforts of Christianizing Denmark. His remains were permanently enshrined in an immense cathedral that was paid for by Danish taxes.
This event was then commemorated by the whole nation participating in a three day fast in his honor. And so it was, 100 years after the fact, that Cnut finally had his way. As mentioned, one of the chief complaints against Cnut IV was the fact that he refused to address the general assembly with his plans, but with an issue as contentious as converting Vikings to Christianity, perhaps he didn’t express these special interests of his to the assembly for good reason.
If we can take anything from the efforts of one of his Viking contemporaries in the Faroe Islands, telling an Althing assembly you want to convert everyone in your Kingdom to Christianity could be a very dangerous affair. It was Sigmund Bresstisson who sought to covert this Viking island stronghold to Christianity.
He was completely up front about it and announced his plans at the next meeting of the Althing in the Faroe capital of Torshavn. This session of the Althing would prove to be very bad for his health however; as soon as the words came out of his mouth he was nearly killed by an angry mob. Althing or no Althing, Scandinavia converted with very different levels of success and reactions to the new faith.
Conclusion
The Second Viking Invasion
Whether it is completely merited or not, the Vikings have undoubtedly gained a historic reputation for being among the most fierce and warlike people that have ever existed. It is this image of the bloodthirsty horned Viking trampling all over Europe that stands in direct contrast with the Vikings’ modern day descendant: the Scandinavian. On quite the contrary, today the modern homelands of the Vikings are considered the most peaceful places of the world. When people think of peace, they think of Scandinavia.
They think of the Oslo Peace Accords or even better the Nobel Peace Price. Even Copenhagen has launched the comprehensive “Copenhagen Peace Research Institute”. Today when people think of the Scandinavian countries the last thing they think of is war, but yet the specter of the axe-wielding Viking remains. So how is it that a region of the world can hold such a stark dichotomy and have such a drastic transformation in global reputation?
By all accounts the beginning of modern Scandinavia began with the Kalmar Union. This was a political union of the three kingdoms of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden. The catalyst for this union was to block German expansion to the north and the influence of the Hanseatic League. The Hanseatic League had grown to dominate maritime trade and threatened to completely block the old Scandinavian trade routes in the Baltic; many feared that this stranglehold would ruin the Scandinavian economy, so a united front appeared to be the best solution.
The Kelmar Union ultimately dissolved in 1536 but its ramifications are still felt today and from its ashes rose the “Nordic Council” in 1955 that created a passport-free zone in Scandinavia before the Schengen Agreement ever existed. It could be said that it was the Kelvar Union that created the first kind of universal sentiment towards the whole of Scandinavian welfare. From this legacy has sprung one of the most fair and just societies on the planet with social and health programs that are the envy of the entire world.
Scandinavians are known to have achieved the impossible. They have somehow managed to attain some of the highest standards of living in the world while keeping a very small gap between the rich and the poor. The Scandinavian ideals that have become so popular are beginning to wash up onto the shores of the rest of the world. It seems we are in the midst of a second Viking invasion. The long ships and battle axes may have been left behind, but the Scandinavian trends and ideals that can be traced all the way back to Viking society are still quite an effective invasion force for our hearts and minds.
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