10. 1066 and the Last Vikings

Even if you can't tell the KeynesTeen Extra NageZ. Easy to get on, you can ask.

“You can tell the story. You can tell the story.”

Just Nagletilts, with the KeynesTeen Extra NageZ, more info's under KeynesTeen.de. It's summer, 1038. We're in Sicily beneath the city walls of Syracuse. Amid the trifling heat and incestant flies, a band of warriors sneaks up, climbing round the rocks and scrub, swords and shields at the ready. There are members of an elite fighting unit, the Varangian Guard, the finest shot troops in the known world, personal hit squad of the Byzantine Emperor Michael IV.

And they are poised to storm the citadel of Sicily's Muslimemia, dislodging the unsuspecting Sarasins from their stronghold in the middle of the Mediterranean.

“Command of the Varangians goes to an immense figure, not just by reputation but in literal snatcher, some say 7 feet tall.”

Hailing from far away Norway, he is the great-great-grandson of the legendary Viking King, Harold Fair here.

Not that his men know it, for this soldier has never revealed his true identity.

To them, he is Harold Sigurdson, though history will record him by his nickname, Harold Hadrada. The presence of Norseman in the Mediterranean is not a recent development, as we know from previous episodes. But neither the pagan Vikings aboard, nor the Christian ones of New, have been able to establish a towhold in the Islamic caliphate until now. The word Hadrada means hard ruler, a reputation Harold won't acquire till much later.

“But with the surface of Harold's in this episode, be warned, it's a useful means of distinguishing him.”

He will acquire other epithets, the thunderbolt of the north, for instance.

Though some prefer another more poignant one, the last Viking. For Harold Hadrada, though he doesn't know it yet, is going to have a significant role in a watershed moment in history, far from the bit part that is often aside. That year will be 1066, and it will mark arguably the end of the Viking age. I'm Ian Glenn, and from the Noiser Podcast Network, this is part 10, the final chapter of Reo Vikings. By the middle of the 11th century, as we had left it in the previous episode,

England is effectively a Scandinavian realm. It has had two recent Danish kings, Sven Faulkbeid and Kanud. Before that came the Danelor, with half of England assigned as a de facto north province. England's society has been heavily influenced as a consequence. Its people and its culture, especially in the north, are a fusion, Anglo-Norse.

Under Kanud, England has become the jewel in the crown of a vast north sea empire, the most populous and wealthiest of his domains. Dr. Pragyevora. In becoming of England, Kanud forms a link between Scandinavia and England. And it's a formal political denastic link that hasn't existed before. We've had cultural ties before.

We've had migration and assimilation, but this is the kind of knitting together of dynasties that we haven't seen. The downside for Kanud is that as King of England, Denmark and Norway is had to spread himself thin. For a while Kanud delegates rule of Norway to his common law English wife, Eftifu.

Meanwhile, Arthur Kanud, from the King's official marriage to Queen Emma, is Regent of Denmark.

“It has left things balanced precariously with regard to the empire's succession.”

Emma, if you recall, is now Queen of England for a second time.

She's been married previously to the late Anglo-Saxon King Ethel Red. The two sons they had together are currently hold up in Emma's native Normandy, out of harm's way. So Emma herself is of Scandinavian extraction and married to both, an Anglo-Saxon King of England, as well as a Scandinavian King of England. And so her offspring, who are part of all of the political goings on, are also partly English and partly Scandinavian. Throwing the exiled sons of the deposed English King Edmund Hanside, who have ended up in Hungary, and things are going to get messy.

Not least because there is another ambitious player on the scene. Oh Godwin of Wessex, an Englishman who is enhanced as credentials through marriage to a Danish noblewoman, a descendant of Sven Falkbeard. One of the things that Canute does is he reorganizes the way in which England itself is carved out. So one of the biggest and most powerful laws that is created is Godwin.

He is from an unknown family before Canute raises him to power, and Godwin becomes one of Canute's most important and most trusted advisors.

In the King's frequent absences, it's Godwin is right hand-man who effectively runs the country. With Godwin's own sons put in charge of the key organs, he has turned governance of England into a family business.

“When Canute dies in November 1035-H41, his eldest sons are the obvious candidates to replace him, but which one?”

Elfgifu's first born Sven has died in battle, so next in line Harold steps forward. With the backing of the Northern Owls, Harold's case is strong. Though with Emma the official queen, it is her son, Arthur Canute, who is the choice of the Southern Wessex establishment. He is the one who prevails. Only when it comes to the appointed hour, Arthur Canute is stuck in Denmark, putting down on a region of uprising. It is here, as is assumed, that Harold acquires his nickname Harold Herford. In Arthur Canute's absence, he legs it to Winchester to claim the throne for himself.

Fearing a power vacuum, the Cants live Elders the Wittan, as little choice but to go along with him. And so, Harold Herford, after Danish half-saxon, becomes King Harold the first of England.

Or does he? Notably, when anointed by the Archbishop of Cantebrie, none of the official regalia, the crown, the septer, is used. A suggestion that he is merely a caretaker. There was time wears on, and with half the Canute still a no show, the tougher it becomes for hair-foods opponents to oust him. She, for among those enemies, the Machiavellian queen Emma. She's clearly involved in 11th century English politics. She's also one of the most visually represented early medieval queens, so the fact that she shows up as much as she does,

“reflects just how powerful and important she was. Emma is a formidable character.”

With Arthur Canute out of the picture, Emma is still determined to maintain her family's power. So, she switches her allegiance back to her earliest sons with Ephoret, a surprise move given that she had effectively discerned them. In response to her invitation, a letter purportedly bearing her seal. Princess Edward and Alfred, now of age, Julie set sail from Normandy, ready to advance their claim. They choose to arrive separately, with a political situation on a knife-edge, they have good cause. Sensing he's about to walk into a trap, Edward, the oldest, hangs a U-turn at Southampton, and heads straight back across the channel.

There is a convention that a blind man cannot be king, though he will die days later from his injuries.

With Emma fleeing to Flanders, her part in proceedings never entirely clear, Harold Halfwood's reign seems secure.

But it will be a brief tenure. After four years, he dies unexpectedly aged just 24. Arthur Canute is a contender once again.

“The only way Arthur Canute can leave to take up the kingship of England is to make a lasting peace in Scandinavia.”

It comes by way of a pact with his rival, King Magnus of Norway. In a winner takes all arrangement, the proposed deal goes like this. Arthur Canute and Magnus will live in peaceful coexistence, but should either King die, the other will inherit the sum total of their realm.

Pre to cross the North Sea, Arthur Canute becomes the third official member of the yelling dynasty to be king of all England and Denmark.

Disgusted at Harold Halfwood's attack on his half brother Alfred, his first act is to have halfwood's body dug up, decapitated, and thrown in the sewage of the Thames. It will be recovered later by some fisherman, who see to its rebary home in the Church of St. Clement on Fleet Street, henceforth known as St. Clement Danes.

“Deploying the defense that he was just following orders in the attack on Alfred, Earl Godwin is fortunate to escape a similar fate.”

But in another twist, Arthur Canute's reign proves even shorter than his predecessors. Just two years later, in Lamberth while giving his speech at a wedding, he suddenly drops dead, possibly from a stroke. There is a suggestion Arthur Canute knew his days were numbered, charredless, yet being making contingency plans. It is the surviving half brother across the channel, who is his nominated successor. And thus Edward, son of Arthur Ed, after 25 years in Normandy, is recalled to become king of England.

The house of Wesix is back, Scandinavian rule is over.

“There has been some re-invention of Edward, painted as a pious man he will later be canonised, dubbed the confessor.”

This image will be enhanced by his commissioning of a new cathedral, an abbey to the west of the city of London, a west minister. But if England thinks it as a bona fide English king again, that's also overstating the case. With a half Norman half Danish mother in Emma, and having spent most of his life in Normandy, the French speaking Edward is in reality another outsider. With Earl Godwin having killed his brother most brutally, he would imagine clemency to be in short supply. But Godwin is the Teflon Don, without him the king is powerless.

Further insinuating himself into the royal household, Godwin voice upon Edward a bride is very young daughter, Edith. It is a smart move. Godwin is now the king's father-in-law, directly plugged into the royal bloodline for when the king has a son. Only Edward never does. The growing tension will culminate in a Godwin-led insurrection, with Saxon nobles rejecting Edward's perceived normalisation of the English church.

It will lead in 1051 to Godwin's banishment from the kingdom, along with his sons. The after a year sailing up and down the channel, raiding the English coast, the boys will be back. No one dares resist. And in the end we end up with kind of a herald as the power behind the throne, and Edward, to my mind, pretty much put in his place as a monarch. No matter, in their absence King Edward has been scheming, both to ensure the royal succession and to lock the Godwin's out. In 1051, during the Godwin's exile, Edward is visited by a relative from back home.

A 21-year-old first cousin once removed, another of Emma's bloodline.

With his father and mother unmarried, he is nicknamed "unflatteringly" the bastard.

“But it makes little difference to his rank, since the age of seven William the bastard has been Duke of Normandy.”

And there is a certain stubbornness about him, enough to suggest that he's not going to let this proposal slide. For William is the great, great, great grandson of the famous Viking leader, Rolo. Its 1064 were on a desolate foreign shore. An English nobleman has washed up on the rocks. His ship has gone down with all hands. Arrested by soldiers, the man is informed that the place where he is beached is Normandy.

And what business did he end up here? During he might be an enemy spy, he is dragged off to court where he must plead his credentials before Duke William.

“At William's court, the man reveals that he was on his way to Scandinavia to conduct some diplomatic business on behalf of the English crown.”

For he is no mere sailor. Since the death of his father in 1054, he has taken over the family firm, he is now Earl of Wessex. None other than Harold Godwinson, son of Godwin. And he can also count on royal connections, his sister is Queen of England. The apologizing for their heavy-handedness, William explains that he has to be careful.

Normandy has been driven by power struggles. But William is a good soldier and a clever leader it would seem. Slowly, he is united his realm. Come stay a while, William offers to Harold. He will show him. With just six years age difference between them, Harold is 42, William 36, the two men hit it off.

In fact, they get on so well that Earl Godwinson is permitted to accompany William in the campaign against the uppity retains. In return for William's generosity through this lengthy stay, Harold has a parting gift for his host. Well, what exactly happens here depends on what you read. According to Norman sources, though counted by the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, Harold endorses William's claim to the English throne. He swears it upon holy relics and oath before God.

Edward the confessor falls into a coma and dies on January the 2nd 1066. With no successor named officially, the contenders again start jostling. William of Normandy who now claims to have been promised the English crown not once, but twice. The Saxon Noble Edgar, Edgar the Aetherling, or eligible Prince, grandson of Edmund Hanside. The dying king intriguingly had whisked him back from Hungary.

And now in a surprise move, a third candidate declares, Harold Godwinson himself.

Throwing a spanner in everyone's works, Godwinson insists that on his deathbed, the king, his brother-in-law, had revoked all previous pledges and offered the throne to him. Ah, under someone else. Slogging his way up a hillside and Sicily, where we left him at the beginning of this episode, Harold had rather cannot possibly envisage the way things are going to pan out.

“But he is a man for whom life is one big adventure.”

Born in 1015 in rural Norway, he had fought as a teenager alongside heart-brother Olaf the Stout, the ex-King of Norway, the future patron saint, seeking to reclaim his crown. Olaf, by the way, as a warlord in Konutsami, was the one who burnt down London Bridge.

Things did not go well initially, but it was never going to dend Harold's ego.

Lars Brownworth. His present with his half-brother, the battle of Stickless Lod, when King Olaf's kill, he's hiding under a group of corpses, as the enemy soldiers are kind of dispatching the wounded. He drags himself out of their composes, a poem saying, "I'll be back, essentially, my name will be great."

He heads across the Baltic to Starriah, Ladoga, the bustling gateway to the Russian interior.

“Traveling down the waterways, Hadrada will pitch up in the territory of the Kivan Rus, and become a guest at the palace of King Yaroslav.”

He is betrothed in a political engagement to the King's daughter, Ellysif. He's assured of her hand once she comes of age, but only if he can prove himself both in battle and in wealth. And thus, Harald follows the well-worn path of a Viking warrior, Errant, heading for the golden domes of Constantinople. There he will go incognito and become a soldier of fortune, working his way on merit into the Varangian Guard. It will take Harald had rather 15 years to a mass-efficient riches, during which time he will fight battles against nomads in Central Asia.

Take on Arab courses in the Aegean, and addition to his campaigning in Sicily.

In the Middle East, Harald will visit Jerusalem. He will stand guard over the Holy Sepulch, and swim in the River Jordan.

“He goes to Sicily to North Africa, Asia Minor, he takes a bath in one of the fountains of Jerusalem.”

He then sails, west, and supposedly sees Greenland. He's baptized in Ruon. With something of a rock-star reputation, there are also plenty of groupies. An affair with a married Byzantine noble woman, possibly even the Empress herself, will see him thrown in prison. Followed by a dramatic escape and a return to Kiev. There, with his keyven princess now legitimate, and with Harald toting battle scars alongside bags of gold, he can formally take her hand.

Professor Stefan Brink. So, a Viking man equaled a warrior, and no one epitomises this ethos more than Harald Hardrada.

“When he left Constantinople, he had assembled a huge fortune.”

You needed this kind of wealth to be able to build up your power base. Dr. Elena Barakloff. Harald often gets pinned up as a poster child for the end of Viking age. And when we think of the typical characteristics of the Viking age, so things like raiding and warfare, and runes, and travel, and trade, and schuldic verse, and international settlements,

Harald has all of this. He's a really incredible character.

Though no sooner has he reappeared in Kiev, than word reaches him that Norway isn't turmoil. Conuit has died. Adrada's half-English nephew Madness, son of Olaf, is the new Norwegian king, but the situation would seem to be fluid, and so Harald had raided boards his long ship, the serpent, and hedge north. For Magnus, his uncle's return is welcome.

Harald brings charisma, military experience, and much needed cash, so much so that he's willing to share the crown with him. The typical fashion Magnus falls ill and dies. In 1047 Harald Hardrada becomes the outright king of Norway. Rooling as Harald III, it's an anti-climax after a decade and a half of swash buckling. Harald compensates by taking it out on his citizens.

It is where he gets the nickname Hard Rooler. Fifty years old now, he earns for just one final adventure, one last hurrah. And it is in January 1066, with the arrival of a ship from the west, that the opportunity presents itself. News that English Monarch Edward has died, does not seem of immediate importance. Nor the fact that a certain Earl Harald Godwinson has controlled the Saxon nobles into appointing him, the New King of England.

More intriguing is the fact that this news is delivered by an emissary of one tostig Godwinson, the New King's very own brother. The siblings have fallen out in spectacular fashion. Tostig has been deposed as the Earl of Northumbria. Having failed to incite the dainst to invade and overthrow brother Harald, Tostig is turning instead to Norway.

Remember the treaty that had been signed he asks, the one between Magnus and Arthur Canood.

Arthur Canood pre-deceased Magnus.

“Thus, Adrada has inherited both Magnus' and Arthur Canood's possessions.”

By that logic, it is also the case that it is he, Harald Hadrada, who is the rightful heir to the North Sea Empire, Norway, Denmark and England. Harald wanted to be King of Denmark, and in the long term, probably sought to restore Canood the Great's North Sea Empire in its entirety. However, that did not succeed and accepting he could not conquer Denmark, Harald switched attention to England. He eventually gets bored, you know, and goes out as the Viking should invading England.

In the fields on the quiet, Harald Hadrada starts assembling a huge invasion fleet.

The decision of the Whitton to back Harald Godwinson, who will rule as Harald II of England, is not a unanimous one. The return of Edgar Aethaling has certainly muddied the waters.

“But English Kings were elected, not there by divine right.”

While convention dictates the eldest son will inherit the crown, the lack of a clearly designated heir leaves things wide open. The Saxon elders take stock. There have been three Viking kings this century, they figure. Four, if you can't Harald Careful, it has caused no end of turmoil. Throw an Edward the Confessor ostensibly Norman, and the country has been under foreign dominance for the best part of 70 years. A likely challenge from Duke William poses the possibility of yet more overseas vassalage.

This is no time for weak leadership, better the devil you know.

“Harald Godwinson ticks all the boxes. He is English, well half English, a proven soldier, and he has the running of the country down to a tea.”

He is to the brother of Queen Edith, so part of the royal family. And it's in this context that Harald Godwinson has himself elected in crown, but it is quite clearly a coup of some description. He seems to be elected and consecrated king on the same day, possibly at the same ceremony at the same mass as the Requiem and of the funeral of Edward the Confessor, which is really undue hast. Across the channel, news of Harald's accession is greeted with howls of outrage by William treated as an act of betrayal. He too begins assembling a massive invasion force.

The three way tussle is on. So in terms of that, that then creates this situation which William says, "What no, no, not so fast. I've got my claim, and Harald Harbrada equally says, "Wow, you know, the rules of Norway and Denmark have often ruled England might make right." Try to say no to me in 8,000 men. This may, on the noise of podcast network, real Vikings concludes as the epic excursions of the Norsemen culminate in a monumental showdown. On short history of, we'll witness the world-changing events of the Spanish Civil War and uncover the real James Bond.

On real survival stories, a remarkable tale of escape from a devastating earthquake in China and an extraordinary encounter with a humpback whale. And in Sherlock Holmes' short stories were amidst the misty expense of Dartmoor for one of Conan Doyle's most beloved works, the Hound of the Baskowills. Get all of these shows and more early and ad-free on Neiser Plus.

And by the way, a short history of ancient Rome, Neuser's first book is out now in paperback available in all good bookshops.

At nearly 70 meters long, the Bayer Tapestry is a remarkable work of embroidery. It depicts the events of 1066 from a Norman perspective. It was likely commissioned by Duke Williams' half-brother, Bishop Otto. As the tapestry shows, the spring of that year is a whirl of shipbuilding and preparation. The better to transport 10,000 Norman's, their horses, arms and equipment across the English channel.

With bad weather throughout the summer, however, the Norman fleet can never put to sea.

“Maybe Haley's comet, which appeared in the skies over Easter, was a good omen for England after all.”

Going into September, William ships sit at the mouth of the som river, while his men kick their heels, waiting in vain for favourable conditions. On September 8, knowing that no fool would attempt to cross in the squars of autumn, and with many of his own troops obliged to return to help with the harvest, Harold Godwinson stands his men down. A Norseman of the old school, Harold Hadrada needs no such thing as favourable conditions. For the sons of men who navigated the ice flows all the way to Canada, launching long boats into the North Sea in September is Charles Play.

Around 300 Norwegian vessels slide into the water, carrying at least 8,000 warriors. By the middle of the month, having stopped on route in the Northern Isles, Harold Hadrada is glimpsing the rugged coastline of Nathumbria, the old Viking playground. When his long ships enter the mouth of the tide, it must seem like a throwback.

“Not just for the older locals, who can remember the raids of Sven forkbied, but to the beginning of the Viking era itself.”

Just up the coastline's lenders far, it was here nearly 300 years earlier that the Vikings first hacked their way ashore. With little resistance encountered, Harold Hadrada uses the rivers of the Humberestry to navigate inland and get within proximity of his target.

Yorvick, York, capital of the North, the second most important city in England.

Faced with the flusteredurs of Northumbria and Mercia, who hastily muster the militia, Hadrada's men sweep all before. On September the 20th at full foot on the river Moose, just south of York, he wins a stunning victory.

“His men with their long hair and battle axes smashed their way through the local militia like a blast from the past.”

Harold Hadrada has judged things well. The North, he knows with its Viking heritage, remains scornful of southern Wessex rule. There's a lot of sympathy. And there are others eager to join the pile on itching to settle old scores. Tastic has arrived with a contingent of flamish mercenaries, and he can call on the support he boasts of King Malcolm III of Scotland. Harold Hadrada's numbers swelled to around 12,000. On September the 24th, Hadrada enters York. Job done is troops begin to celebrate. The Ale flows.

Down in London, completely blindsided, a panicked Harold Godwinson throws together a patchwork army and young snore. It will have to cover over 200 miles of difficult terrain and at lightning speed, should it wish to see off the Norwegian threat.

But Godwinson's troops move at an incredible lake, 35 miles per day, through forest and swamps and along crumbling Roman roads.

In four days, the English army is at Tadcaster, within reach of the enemy, and with some stunning intelligence received. Hadrada has released half of his army. They have sailed back towards the coast, ready for their next move. There on the long roads sits not just his army supplies, but most of its armor. The Norwegian King Meanwhile is ventured off to transfer hostages. Harold Godwinson is a good strategist. He's proved it in campaigns against the Welsh and the Scots. Capitalising on Norwegian split forces, and with the added incentive of putting one over on his brother Tostig, he will cut off Hadrada's contingent before they can ship out.

There's a pinch point on the river Durland, just east of the city, an old Roman crossing. On the 24th September, 1066, Harold and Tostig and their army had a decisive victory which led York to surrender to their forces.

Today, the Battle of Stamford Bridge is marked by an unassuming monument, a rock with a plaque attached.

“It sits at the end of a cul-de-sac on a housing estate, a tract of 1970s semis, all paid driveways, satellite dishes and a row of pull-down garages.”

The course of the river has shifted over time, but beyond the estate, the flat unremarkable landscape is probably little changed. It seems a curiously sedate scene for a showdown of such bloody intensity. For the Battle of Stamford Bridge is one of absolute slaughter.

To achieve any kind of success till reinforcements arrive, Harold had rather as men must put up a valiant stand.

But without its armour, limited in weaponry and not to mention hungover, the odds are against it. The King of Norway has been ambushed.

“On the morning of September 25th, according to Chromaclerce, Norway's Stirlison, before battle commences, an English rider can't attack it for a party with a grada and tostig.”

He proposes a deal to tostig, withdraw his army and he can have back his all-erbum, Northumbria.

And what can you offer my King, asks tostig, meaning hudrada, comes the reply, seven feet of English ground, meaning a grave.

Later reports claim it was Harold Godwinson himself, who was the messenger, approaching and disguised. Needing to withdraw eastwards, the Norwegian's must retreat over the old wooden bridge, but it means that they can be settled, pending. Despite a protective shield wall and thewithstanding of attack after attack, the Norwegian's and their allies are no match for the English.

“The heroic rear guard, according to legend, is mounted by a lone Norse warrior, who stands on the bridge swinging his axe, taking down 40 Englishmen single handedly.”

But even he, in the end, is overwhelmed. An English soldier floats underneath on a barrel and impills the warrior on his spear, thrust up through the slabs. In the battle, tostig is killed and crucially, so is Harold Hadrada, fell with an arrow to the throat. King Harold Godwinson gives clemency, so comprehensive has been the routing of the Norwegian's, that the survivors are permitted to take to their ships. Only 24 vessels are needed to spirit the survivors away, out of the 300+ that had landed just days before.

The Norse threat has been seen off. And Harold Godwinson is back in control of the entirety of England. Kingdom secure, the epochal battle for its soul seemingly won, Godwinson's men to exactly as Hadrada had done, take to york for some rest and recuperation. The revelry will be short-lived. Only two days later, a rider arrives from Dan's hathbearing some astonishing, unthinkable news. William of Normandy, defying certainty that a channel crossing was no longer possible, as begun landing his army on the shingle of pevency, Sussex.

Famously, after marching his men north and fighting one epic battle, Harold Godwinson will have to repeat the trick, a 240-mile about face. He musters his exhausted soldiers and begins the long-slog south, but the Normans he will find are a different proposition. William is an experienced general. He is assembled and alliance of troops not just from Normandy, but from all over northern France. He is well equipped with arches. He has a new weapon to deploy in the crossbow, and his battlefield tactics are based unlike the English on the use of cavalry.

And there is something else that William has on his side. God, William's mission to take the throne of England comes with people blessing. The banner of Rome flies prominently, old swan on holy relics are not to be broken.

He will beat Harold Godwinson he determines by drawing him towards him, fighting the battle on his terms.

Near the coastal town of Hastings, he builds a makeshift wooden fortress, from which his man will range out to harass a local population. It is the bait to real Harold Godwinson in.

“He's missed most the campaign in season, that's why he needs this decisive battle, because it's September.”

The weather is getting worse, I mean we know what the weather is like in England at that time of year. It's not going to get better for armies and over winter he's going to start starving. His army needs a decisive victory. He needs to win a big big battle and ideally kill or capture Harold. On October 14th, as the Norman's weight, English troops start appearing through the woodlands. The established themselves are nearby Senlach Hill, at present day battle East Sussex.

With a half mile shield wall in place, they have the upper ground and strategic advantage. But it is an army running on empty. The battle of Hastings is an astonishing confrontation, one that asks all day long. But eventually the Norman's prevail.

“By evening Williams' cavalry is chopping down the English stragglers.”

There is no question of Harold Godwinson being allowed to live either. This battle must have a definitive outcome. And so Harold, King of England, will die alongside his brothers, Geath and Leo Fein, all directly targeted, no court a given. In a simplistic interpretation of the Bayer tapestry, King Harold is killed with an arrow in his eye. One of thousands dying under an archery blizzard.

It is something backed up by some contemporary sources. The resource was suggested that he is butchered by Williams' knights, maybe even by William personally.

What is never in doubt is that the carnage is on a biblical scale.

“A landscape of corpses, guts and limbs around 4,000 English and 2,000 Norman's lying dead.”

It is one of the interpretations of the origin of the name Senlack. The hill the English had musted on. Sornlack, the lake of blood. On receiving the news of Harold's death, a king of just 10 months, the Saxon nobles rushed to a point Edgar Eathling, still a teenager in his place. But he is unable to press his claim.

After a scorched earth blitz creek through southern England, William moves on to London. He will be crowned in Westminster Abbey on Christmas Day.

William the Conqueror may try to dress his claim up in much more gentle terms as I am a second cousin of the confessor,

but he is also just a fog with a big army. So realistically, in 1066 we have three thugs with big armies claiming it. Neither I suspect deep down or nice human beings. If there is anybody we should be feeling sympathetic for, it is Edgar Eathling, who has been promised the throne almost certainly, been brought over to England with the prospects of it, who is just a bit too young and loses out completely.

The history of England will be indelibly altered, not just in language culture and architecture, but in its governance. It will take around six years for William to fully subdue the country, the Norman Yoke will weigh heavily. It will include a tantamount genocide, the harrying of the north, in which three quarters of the Northern English population is killed or displaced. With it, England's old Viking heartlands are laid waste, and William's new assets will be inventoryed in a ledger.

The Doomsday Book. The old os will be replaced by a Norman nobility, a class of barons. England's land will be concentrated in the hands of just a few favorites, who will watch over it from massive castles.

conquering Sicily becoming a dominant force in the Crusades, and eventually invading Ireland too.

“Harold Hadrada, Harold Godwinson, William the bastard, in a turf war between a Viking, a half-fiking and a Viking descendant,”

a northman of some sort was always going to win.

It is the demise of Harold Hadrada that is often cited symbolically as the end of the Viking era. A few figures, a personified idea of the Viking age so completely as Harold Hadrada. As a result of that, his death is sometimes seen as the end-point of the Viking age, but that's a really tricky thing, because of course that's from a very Anglo-centric perspective, and the whole point of the Viking age is that it was chronologically very long,

but also geographically absolutely vast spreading but it's height from contact with the edge of North America, all the way to the Byzantine Empire and Baghdad.

1066 is generally seen as the end of the Viking age in Britain,

but the interlinking between Britain and Scandinavia from sort of the lowest levels of power to the highest levels

“was so complete and so complex, that pretty much all of the key players of these momentous events in 1066”

had some sort of Scandinavian background. So whether we can really, in real terms, talk about an end to the Viking age, is perhaps a little bit questionable. Professor David Aesari, sometimes the date given for the end of the Viking age is 1066,

kind of course to the historical Norman Conquest. But that was accomplished from Normandy descendants of Rolo and Scandinavian men, who got on ships that if you look at the Bayou Tapestry, look at like the Viking ships of the Viking age. What we do see is a reorientation of English politics.

It is no longer a realm reaching across the North Sea, but one facing south, to be governed by a francophile, francophone aristocracy. But of course in 1066, no one knows it's going to be lasting, and William's greatest threat throughout the remainder of his reign actually isn't English rebels. The threat is from Denmark, and what keeps William awake at night is the threat of the Danish king.

And indeed, there is eventually an invasion attempted, which isn't successful. Naturally, the Danes right up until about 1100 have ambitions and realistic ambitions on England. A Danish army, backing Edgar Eathling, will take York in 1069. Continuing the attacks, the Norwegian king Magnus Bearlegs, will raid places like Dublin, Anglesy, and the Isle of Man into the 12th century.

But it's, uh, closing in narrowing window, if you will, of opportunity.

“So in that sense, I think it goes out with a splutter, the Viking age will not with a bang.”

There's not this moment at Stamford Bridge or Hastings that spells the end. Actually, the scale slowly decreases, and eventually, this kind of navians become a part of mainstream European culture. And by the time we reach 1100, I would say, we are in a different society in Scandinavia. So I would put the end of the Viking age to the 1100.

When Scandinavian kings are Christian, when they're raising taxes on their population, rather than trying to convince them to get on to open ships and go raiding and trading and settling. And they really become part of Western Christendom, in a way that they weren't before. In the British, or Anglo Celtic Isles, Shetland and Orkney will persist under Scandinavian control.

It is not until 1472 that they are seeded to the Scottish Crown. In year of a wedding dowry for his daughter, the King of Denmark and Norway hands them over. The Northern Isles look like Norse language, norn, will not die out until around 1850.

Unlike the Greeks or the Romans, history has never fully given the Vikings their due.

It is only relatively recently that we have come to appreciate to embrace the scale of their achievements.

There is a burgeoning revivalist movement, as communities across the Northern Hemisphere once touched by a Norse presence,

“come to celebrate a Viking heritage that had for so long been scored.”

From the giant long ships preserved at Osberg and Ross Kild, do the excavations of York, to Ross or Meadows in Newfoundland, now a world heritage site. Modern archaeology and scientific advances give fresh insight into the craftsmanship and societies of the old Nordic world. In language and place names and family names, even our days of the week, the Vikings walk with us still.

And in popular culture, the Norsemen, once the Hulicans of the High Seas, and now its heroes. The interest for Vikings kicked off in Victorian England, and then it spread that we have it in Germany the 19th century and the Wagner Opera, and this fascinating for this world and especially this mythology. And then of course, this warrior aspects to the Vikings was emphasized and misused in Germany by the Nazis,

which led to a situation where Viking studies got a bad reputation.

But after the Second World War, we had a settlement of this legacy and in the special 1960s,

there was this trend of changing the view of the Vikings from this brute warriors to the rather peaceful trading Scandinavian, who went abroad as explorers.

“The truth is of course somewhere in between.”

But the legacy has just exploded in the last 34 years in the public culture, with this fascination for this old Norse mythology and this warrior ethos, which has led to all these films, key vissaries etc.

I think the legacy of the Viking age is one really of a Europe transformed,

but also interconnected in new ways. Those kinds of trade links and that kind of wide networks, so these closer links between the British Isles and Scandinavia, closer tied between Scandinavia, the Baltic through to the Dnieper River to Ukraine, Russia, through to the Mediterranean and so on. They settled the North Atlantic Islands, the Faros, Iceland, Greenland.

These are big landmasses that were not inhabited by humans, and it's a really testament to their exploration capacity that this was accomplished during the Viking age. In fact, Iceland today is still a flourishing Scandinavian population that charts its origins as golden age to the Viking age. Britain was a series of kingdoms before the Vikings get there. The one unified England you can say came out of the crucible of the Viking age.

The Viking bases in Ireland that link Ireland into the northern archipatribe that leads all the way over to the Caspian Sea in the Black Sea. Those towns grew up during the Viking age. Professor Elizabeth Row. So the Vikings settle in Normandy. Normandy gives us William the Conqueror, William the Conqueror, changes English and British history, so that's a huge line of impact right there.

We can also see the Viking since Scandinavian traders settling in what's now Western Russia and Ukraine. This was the center of power for that part of the world for this combined Norson Slavic culture. Keef was the center of power alone before St. Petersburg was founded in much less Moscow, and so Russian attempts to control Ukraine. This goes absolutely back to what Vikings were doing in that part of the world.

“I think there's something really romantic about the Viking, the world that is lost.”

These are the great rags to riches, stories of medieval Europe. I mean, you literally have people starting life as 13-year-olds going to war without any prospects and no land and no money and no hope. And then ending life as a kick. And so there's something inspiring about these people as well.

They embodied this very human drive to explore the unknown to go where others haven't gone before.

Dr. William fits you. To me, it's discovery, it's geographical discovery, it's also personal discovery.

“And I think that there's so much to see and think about in the Viking period that relates to our modern times, you know, to our exploration of the universe and things that are coming on ahead of us.”

They were remarkable people, brave and ingenious. It's July the 20th, 1976, 11.53am, coordinated universal time. We're at the Christy Plenisher, Greek for gold and plain, and the surface of Mars, a planet that has been untouched for 4.5 billion years. In a blaze of retro rockets, a small mechanical craft of sense. It's a lander, dispatched from a parent orbiter, and it swings into position under a retarding parachute,

“falling softly with the reduced gravity into the Martian dirt.”

Pretty shortly, we'll begin transmitting the first images of the red planet back to Earth. The craft was meant to land on July the 4th, timed for the American by Centennial.

But, after 140 million miles, 11 months in space, and some tricky terrain to navigate, that was wishful thinking by the White House.

Instead, mission control has done the next best thing, putting the lander down on the 7th anniversary of the first moon landing.

“The lander will soldier on for six years, or 2245 Martian solar days, sending back vital scientific data,”

paving the way for future missions into the Great Unknown. When it came to naming this craft, NASA had to find something appropriate, something that conjured not just a staggering feat of engineering and navigation, but conveyed a certain doggedness, a devil may care attitude and hurling itself out into the void. What better word than Viking, or Viking one, to be precise, for like those long ships of old,

another one is always on its way.

Thanks for listening to Real Vikings. I hope you enjoyed the show. Now you've finished, discover your next immersive history podcast at www.noiser.com The home of the Noiser podcast network. That's www.noiser.com

www.noiser.com