Books
John Haywood

Northmen


The violent and predatory society of Dark Age Scandinavia left a unique impact on the history of medieval Europe. From their chill northern fastness, Norse warriors, explorers and merchants raided, traded, and settled across wide areas of Europe, Asia and the North Atlantic from the late 8th to the mid-11th century.

THE VIKING CHRONICLES narrates their story region by region, focusing on places where key events were played out, from the sack of Lindisfarne in 793 to the murder in Iceland in 1241 of the saga-writer Snorri Sturluson. Such episodes are fascinating in themselves, but also shed crucial light on the nature of Viking activity – its causes, effects, and the reasons for its decline.

In 800 the Scandinavians were barbarians in longboats bent on plunder and rapine; by 1200, their homelands were an integral part of Latin Christendom. John Haywood tells, in authoritative but compellingly readable fashion, the extraordinary story of the dawning, the high noon and the long twilight of the Viking Age.

569 printed pages
Copyright owner
Head of Zeus
Publication year
2015
Publisher
Head of Zeus
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Quotes

  • bblbrxhas quoted4 years ago
    According to the saga, Yngvar died in 1041 aged twenty-five, in which case he would have been no more than six when he set out from Sweden.
  • bblbrxhas quoted4 years ago
    The two Rus raids on the Caspian had created a very strong impression on the Muslim world. Ibn Miskawayh thought them formidable fighters, ‘they do not recognise defeats,’ he said, ‘no one turns back until he has killed or been killed.’ Another writer, Marwazi, praised their courage, saying that one Rus ‘is equal to a number of any other nation’. He was grateful that the Rus fought on foot, ‘if they had horses and were riders, they would be a great scourge to mankind’.
  • bblbrxhas quoted4 years ago
    Magnus was the last Scandinavian king to be killed on a Viking raid. Many of Magnus’s closest advisers thought he was reckless in battle, but he always had an answer, ‘a king is for glory, not for long life’: it was a fitting epitaph for a Viking Age kingship.

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