Vikings
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Cnut the Great King of England 1016—35, Denmark 1018—35, Norway 1028—35 and parts of Sweden who had earlier converted to Christianity. Son of Svein Forkbeard. Exiled from England at his father’s death in 1014 and the return of Aethelred. At the end of 1015 with the support of his elder brother King Harald II of Denmark he invaded England with 200 ships and 10,000 men. At the battle of Ashingdon in Essex in October 1016 he routed the army of Aethelred and his eldest son Edmund Ironside. The land of England north of the Thames was surrendered to the Danes — a return of the Danelaw — leaving Edmund with a territory approximating Alfred’s Wessex. Edmund died shortly afterwards and Cnut assumed control of his territories and was crowned King of England in January 1017. His brother Harald died in 1018 and with a predominantly English force he returned to Denmark to claim the throne. By 1028 he was recognized as King of Norway and parts of Sweden too. He standardised the currencies of England and his Scandinavian territories. His daughter Gunnhild married the Holy Roman Emperor, Henry III. He died in 1035 and is entombed in Winchester Cathedral.
Domalde An unfortunate Ynglinga ruler whose reign coincided with a severe famine. His chieftains agreed, according to the Ynglinga saga, that he should be sacrificed ‘for good crops’.
Egil Skallagrimsson A Viking chieftain fom Iceland whose men fought for Aethelstan at the Battle of Brunanburh in 937 and whose exploits prompted one of the finest of the sagas, Egil’s saga.
Eirik Bloodaxe King of Norway and latterly last independent Viking king of the Northumbrians. One of the reputedly twenty sons — and favourite according to the sagas — of Harald Fairhair, King of Norway. On the death of his father he apparently set about murdering his siblings (a Latin text describing his life refers to him as fratris interfactor — ‘brother-killer’) in order to suceeded his father as King of Norway. His reign was so unpopular he was overthrown by his last surviving brother Haakon and fled to England. According to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle he was ‘taken as king’ by the people of Northumbria in 947 or 948. From his capital in York he continued to raid Scotland and territories bordering the Irish Sea. It is thought he died in battle in Stainmore in Cumbria in 954.
Eirikur Thorvaldsson Or Eirik the Red. The subject of the Saga of Eirik the Red, written in the thirteenth century. Around 982, an outlaw with a price on his head, he sailed west from Iceland and explored over several seasons the more hospitable west coast of Greenland. In the spring of 986 a party of settlers between 500 and 1,000 strong left Iceland aboard 25 ships of which only 15 survived the crossing. Eirik became accepted as their leader and by 1000 archaeologists calculate there was a stable population of as many as 5,000 people. His achievements in opening up a direct route — some 2,000 miles — between Greenland and Norway became legendary. Hearing of the exploits of Bjarni Herjólfsson, Eirik’s son Leif Eriksson headed west somewhere between 995 and 1000 with a crew of 35. Historians agree that what they discovered and named ‘Vinland’ was Newfoundland, off the coast of Canada. They over-wintered there before returning to Greenland.
Farulk One of the five named negotiators of the trading agreement between the city of Constantinople and the Rus at the end of the tenth century. The others were Hrollaf, Karl, Steinvith and Vermund.
Floki Vilgertharson The second Norwegian to make landfall on Iceland, according to the Historia Norwegie. It was he who named it ‘Iceland’.
Garthar Svavarsson A Swede who led an expedition to Iceland around the same time as Floki Vilgertharson.
Godfred A powerful Danish king who in AD 808 occupied the trading port of Hedeby in Jutland and, having destroyed the Slavic port of Reric, forcibly transplanted all its merchants to Hedeby. He subsequently commissioned his own Hadrian’s Wall, called the Danevirke, which stretched from the Baltic to the North Sea. He was a constant menace to the Byzantine emperors before being assassinated by one of his own men. It was during Godfred’s reign that a sense of identity, a unified country, first emerged.
Gorm the Old Generally recognised as the first King of Denmark. Claimed descent from Ragnar Lodbrok, father of Ivarr the Boneless. Came to power in 936 and died in 958. His sons were Canute, who was killed fighting in Ireland, Harald ‘Bluetooth’, who succeeded his father as King of Denmark, and Toke. He erected the rune stone to his wife which first mentions Denmark as a nation: ‘King Gorm made this monument in memory of his wife, Denmark’s grace’.
Grimur Kamban First Viking settler on the Faroe Islands, around 800 according to the fourteenth-century Flateyjarbók, ‘the Flat Island Book’.
Guthrum Together with the Viking leaders Oscetel and Anwend, led one half of the breakaway force of the Great Heathen Army, which for ten years terrorised England in the latter half of the ninth century and which had split in two at Repton. He masterminded the defeat of Alfred the Great at Chippenham in the winter of 877/8. Alfred defeated Guthrum’s forces at the Battle of Edington in May 878. The subsequent settlement saw Guthrum baptised a Christian, and the acquisition of territories which became known as the Danelaw, where the Norse legal system held sway.
Gunnbjörn Ulfsson Blown off-course in a storm, visited Greenland in 900.
Haakon Sigurdsson King of Norway in all but name who was overwhelmed by Olaf Tryggvasson in 995.
Halfdan the Black c. 810–60, King of Vestfold in Norway. A Ynglinga, he was founder of the Norwegian royal dynasty and father of King Harald Fairhair.
Halfdan Ragnarsson King of part of Northumbria. Sources are contradictory but he was possibly brother of Ivarr the Boneless, leader of the other half of the Great Heathen Army which first landed in England in 865. Ruler of London 871—2 where he minted coins in his name. He took his army north to Northumbria, where he is described by the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle in 876 as king of part of Northumbria, where he ‘shared out the land of the Northumbrians’ amongst his followers. He died in 877.
Harald II King of Denmark 1014—18. Son of Svein Forkbeard and brother of Cnut the Great.
Earl Harald The twelfth-century Orkneyinga saga describes his voyage from Stromness when bad weather forced him to take shelter in Maes Howe, where he and his party carved graffiti into the stone walls.
Harald ‘Bluetooth’ Gormsson c. 935—985 or 986. King of Denmark from 958 to 985 or 986 and parts of Norway around 970. Son of Gorm the Old. Famous for welding the disparate Danish tribes into a unified whole and uniting them with their Norwegian neighbours. He converted to Christianity in 965 and erected a rune stone in Jelling which states he ‘Christianised the Danes’. He died of wounds recieved in an uprising against him in 985 or 986 and was succeeded by his son Svein Forkbeard.
Harald Fairhair King of Norway between 872 and 930. Son of Halfdan the Black. His rule, according to later sagas, may have caused many of his opponents to seek new lands to settle in Iceland, Orkney, Shetland, the Western Isles and the Scottish mainland. The Orkneyinga saga recounts Harald making a gift of Orkney and Shetland to Rognvald, a chieftain from the west of Norway, whose son Einar was the forefather of the Orkney earls until 1232. His grandson was Olaf Tryggvasson, King of Norway, who invaded England in 991.
Harold Godwinson King of England in succession to Edward the Confessor. Defeated the invading army of Harald Hardrada at the battle of Stamford Bridge on 25 September 1066 and was himself killed by Duke William of Normandy’s forces at the Battle of Hastings on 14 October 1066. William was crowned King of England on 25 December.
Harold ‘Hardrada’ Sigurdarsson 1015—66. King of Norway from 1046. Known as ‘Hardrada’ (hard ruler), he was the last true Viking to attempt an invasion of England. He had served in the Varangian Guard before returning to Norway in 1045 where he seized the throne. Invading England in the uncertainty after the death of Edward the Confessor, he was killed at Stamford Bridge by the forces of Harold Godwinson, Edward’s successor as King of England in 1066.
Harthacnut c. 1018—42. King of England 1040—42 and Denmark from 1035—42. Son of Cnut the Great and his wife Emma, daughter of Richard Duke of Normandy and widow of
Aethelred.
Horik Sole King of Denmark 827—54 (he had taken power in 811 with one of his brothers). Son of Godfred. Although a confirmed pagan, he allowed in 850 the Christian missionary Ansgar to build churches in the Danish towns of Hedby and Ribe.
Ingolfr Arnarson The first Viking settler, originally an outlaw, to put down permanent roots in Iceland. He made his home in 874 in a place he named Reykjavik — ‘smoky bay’. It is likely that monks from Ireland had preceded him but had abandoned the island.
Ivarr the Boneless A king in Ireland who may have been one of the leaders of the Great Heathen Army before it split in two at Repton. Ivarr died in 873 and some archaeologists believe he was interred at Repton.
Naddodd Or Nadd-Oddur, a Norwegian who, according to the Historia Norwegie, first set foot on Iceland around 850 or 860. Probably headed for the Faroe Islands, he was blown far off-course.
Lord of Kivik According to archaeologist Sir Barry Cunliffe a sixteenth-century BC chieftain who led his band of warriors on an epic journey, scenes from which were later carved on the stones of his burial chamber.
Olaf Guthfrisson King of Dublin, co-leader with the Scots king Constantine, a Welsh contigent under Owain and the Britons of Strathclyde of an invasion force which was convincingly defeated by Aethelstan and his half-brother Edmund according to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle at the Battle of Brunanburh in 937.
Olaf Sigtryggsson Cousin of Olaf Guthfrisson, King of Dublin, ruled Dublin and a swathe of surrounding territory between 950 and 980 until his defeat by Máel Sechnaill II brought Viking supremacy to an end.
Olaf Tryggvasson 960s—1000, King of Norway 995—1000. Grandson of Harald Fairhair. Exiled as a child, he was brought up amongst the Rus. He was a formidable warlord. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle records his invasion of England in 991 with a fleet of 93 Viking ships. His forces defeated the English army at the Battle of Maldon and Aethelred agreed to pay Danegeld of 10,000 pounds of silver. This was to increase dramatically in future years until twenty years later, in 1012, it was 48,000 pounds. 60,000 English coins of the period have been found in Scandinavia by comparison with only 10,000 in England. In 994 he returned again with Svein Forkbeard, now King of Denmark.
Olaf the White Ruled Dublin with his kinsman Ivarr c. 853 to 870, when Ivarr the Boneless ruled alone until his death in 873.
Oleg of Kiev A leader of the Rus who moved their capital from Novgorod to Kiev, on the banks of the Dniepr. The emergent state was to become known as Russia. In 907 he set out to attack Constantinople. Faced with a force many times the size of the expedition of some forty years before, the inhabitants sued for peace, which established Rus trading rights in the city.
Ongendus A powerful Danish king who, according to written records, violently opposed the attempts made by the Frankish Christians to convert him and his people in the early decades of the eighth century.
Riurik The eldest of three brothers of the Rus who, according to the Russian Primary Chronicle (also known as the Tale of Bygone Years), compiled about 1113, went to rule the tribal federation of Slavs in north Russia at their invitation and established a capital in what is now Novgorod (the ‘new fortress’), beside the Volkhov River, in 860. Riurik’s brothers Sineus and Truvor founded towns also but within a short time died, leaving Riurik to rule the Slavs alone.
Rodolf Or Rothlaibh, His long port, a Viking fortress beside a river, probably Dunrally near modern-day Vicarstown in County Laois, was described in the Annals of the Four Masters as being destroyed in 862. In 863 the Rhine Valley was targeted by a Viking fleet, and it was possibly the same Rodolf who in 864 exacted tribute from the Frankish King Lothar II to prevent his followers from further depravation. According to some scholars Rodolf was the son of Harold, a former King of Denmark who was expelled in 827 and settled in Frisia.
Rollo Charles the Simple, King of France from 893, ceded the town of Rouen and a tranche of surrounding territory to Rollo, a Viking leader of either Norwegian or Danish descent, in about 911 in return for feudal allegiance. This territory was to become the land of the Northmen — the Nor manni that is known today as Normandy. Rollo’s descendants became Dukes of Normandy and in due course, through his great-great-great grandson William, kings of England.
Sihtric King of York. Married the sister of Aethelstan, King of the Angles. Died in 927.
Snabjærn Galti An outlaw who led a party of adventurers to Greenland about 980. The survivors headed back to Iceland after enduring the extreme rigour of a Greenland winter.
Svein Asleifsson Born before 1135, described in the Orkneyinga saga as making annual raiding trips to the Hebrides and Ireland, returning home to Gairsay in the Orkneys for the yearly round of farming duties, perhaps behaviour typical of many Viking raiders.
Svein Forkbeard 960—1014, King of Denmark after the death of his father Harald Bluetooth in 896 or 897, and first of the Viking kings of England. Involved in continual raids against England in the first decade of the tenth century, he commanded a fleet which invaded England in 1013. He drove Aethelred into exile in Normandy and was proclaimed King of England on Christmas Day 1013 but died a few weeks later. Father of Cnut the Great.
Thorfinn Karlsfeni Led the third expedition from Greenland to North America c. 1010 (after Eirik the Red and his brother Thorvald). Three ships and several hundred settlers set sail. After three years a combination of severe winters, attacks from hostile natives and tension between Christians and pagans amonst the group caused the settlement to be abandoned and the survivors returned to Greenland. The remains of this settlement were uncovered on the eastern coast of Newfoundland by archaeologists in the 1960s though the site of’Vinland’, thought to be further south, still remains to be discovered.
Thorgeirr The ‘law speaker’ of Iceland who proclaimed in 1000 that the country would convert to Christianity to prevent hostility between pagans and Christians.
Thorkell the Tall A Jomsviking, or mercenary, Torkell led a force of Vikings which ravaged eastern England until Aethelred paid them off with 48,000 pounds in weight of silver. In 1010 his men raided Canterbury and carried off many high-status captives including the archbishop, who was beaten to death. Apalled, Thorkell abandoned his colleagues and served Aethelred instead, helping defend London against an attack by Svein Forkbeard in 1013.
Thorvald Brother of Eirik the Red. Following the exploits of his brother led an expedition to North America where he was killed by the skraelingar ‘ugly people’ — either North American Indians or Inuits.
Turgesius Or Thorgils, a Viking warrior described by Cogadh Gaedhel re Gallaibh, or ‘The War of the Irish against the Foreigners’, as conducting a reign of terror through Ireland and who was eventually captured by King Máel Sechnaill, sewed into a sack and thrown into the waters of Loch Owel, near Mullingar.
Vladimir the Great Succesor to Riurik as ruler of the Rus. After sampling Christianity, Islam and Judaisim, in 988 he had statues of the old pagan gods torn down and thrown into the River Dneipr and converted his subjects to Christianity.
CHRONOLOGY
793
According to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle the first of the Viking raids on England. Lindisfarne Abbey on the coast of Northumberland is destroyed.
795
First recorded raids on the Irish coast. Skye, Iona and Rathlin are raided.
800
Godfred reigns as King of Denmark, until 810. He sets up a new trading centre at Hedeby and extends the system of defensive walls, the Danevirke, to protect his territories.
c. 800
Grimur Kamban the first Viking settler of the Faroe Islands.
802
The monastery at Iona is burnt and in the following years monasteries in Scotland and Ireland are abandoned as the Viking attacks intensify.
806
Vikings return to Iona for the third time and nearly 70 members of the community are killed.
810
A large Danish fleet attacks Frisia, a coastal region just south of Denmark.
A Danish king, Horik the Elder, a son of Godfred, is mentioned for the first time in chronicles.
835
The Thames estuary raided.
836–7
Fleets of Viking ships begin to travel inland in Ireland via the rivers Boyne and Liffey on the eastern seaboard.
840s
Vikings begin to over-winter in Ireland. They go on to found towns such as Dublin, Limerick, Arklow, Waterford, Wexford and Wicklow.
841
A fleet of Viking ships raids the Seine valley in northern France.
Vikings over-winter for the first time in Dublin.
841
First references to a Viking settlement in Dublin
844
Monasteries in the Midlands of Ireland raided.
845
Horik the Elder sails up the Elbe with a fleet of 600 ships and destroys Hamburg in retaliation for the attack by the Holy Roman Emperor, Louis the German, on the Viking allies, the Obrodites, a Slavic tribe which had migrated from Ukraine to Germany.
Vikings under the leadership of Ragnar Lodbrok threaten to attack Paris but are bought off with 7,000 pounds of silver.
848
Bordeaux captured after a siege.
850 or 860
Naddod, a Norwegian, first sets foot in Iceland.
852
First raids on the Welsh coast begin.
853
Olaf first Viking King of Dublin; reigns until c. 870.
853–1052
Twenty kings of Viking origin rule Dublin. They do so again 1072–4 and 1091–4.
859
Björn ‘Ironside’ Jarnsida and his brother Hastein sail down the River Loire with a fleet of 60 ships and, via the French and Spanish coasts and the Straits of Gibraltar, enter the Rhône and from there raid settlements along the coasts of France, Italy and North Africa.