The Vikings Never Lost. They Just Stopped Being Vikings.

Vikings history in 11 minutes: on 8 June 793, dragon-headed ships landed on Lindisfarne, and for the next 270 years a few farming valleys in Scandinavia played the real game of thrones. This animated history follows Bjorn, a Norwegian farmer who goes "a-viking", and his wife Astrid, who holds the keys to everything, from the first raids to the moment the Vikings disappeared. It's for anyone who loves medieval history, Viking Age facts or a good story with the myths stripped out.

CHAPTERS
00:00 – The Raid on Lindisfarne (793 AD)
00:53 – Who the Vikings Actually Were
02:14 – The Real Secret Weapon: Norse Longships
03:09 – Why Monasteries Were Easy Targets
03:46 – The Great Heathen Army & Danegeld
04:53 – Alfred the Great & The Danelaw
05:53 – The Rus: Expanding East to Byzantium
06:54 – Rollo and the Creation of Normandy
07:20 – Harald Bluetooth & The North Sea Empire
08:55 – Christianity and the Fall of Old Gods
09:31 – 1066: Stamford Bridge & Hastings
10:12 – The Lasting Legacy of the Norse

RESOURCES
- Swanton, M. (trans. and ed.) (2000). The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles. London: Phoenix Press. (Lindisfarne 793, Danegeld payments, Ælfheah 1012, Edington 878, 1066)
- Allott, S. (1974). Alcuin of York, c. A.D. 732 to 804: His Life and Letters. York: William Sessions. (Alcuin's letter to King Æthelred of Northumbria, 793)
- Price, T. D., Peets, J., Allmäe, R., Maldre, L. & Oras, E. (2016). Isotopic provenancing of the Salme ship burials in Pre-Viking Age Estonia. Antiquity, 90(352), 1022–1037. https://doi.org/10.15184/aqy.2016.106
- Frank, R. (2000). The Invention of the Viking Horned Helmet. In M. Dallapiazza et al. (eds.), International Scandinavian and Medieval Studies in Memory of Gerd Wolfgang Weber (pp. 199–208). Trieste: Edizioni Parnaso.
- Grieg, S. (1947). Gjermundbufunnet: En høvdingegrav fra 900-årene fra Ringerike. Norske Oldfunn VIII. Oslo: Universitetets Oldsaksamling.
- Crumlin-Pedersen, O. & Olsen, O. (eds.) (2002). The Skuldelev Ships I. Ships and Boats of the North 4.1. Roskilde: Viking Ship Museum.
- Jarman, C. L., Biddle, M., Higham, T. & Bronk Ramsey, C. (2018). The Viking Great Army in England: new dates from the Repton charnel. Antiquity, 92(361), 183–199. https://doi.org/10.15184/aqy.2017.196
- Keynes, S. & Lapidge, M. (trans.) (1983). Alfred the Great: Asser's Life of King Alfred and Other Contemporary Sources. London: Penguin Classics.
- Christiansen, E. (trans.) (1998). Dudo of St Quentin: History of the Normans. Woodbridge: Boydell Press.
- Greenway, D. (ed. and trans.) (1996). Henry, Archdeacon of Huntingdon: Historia Anglorum. Oxford Medieval Texts. Oxford: Clarendon Press. (the Cnut and the waves story)
- Snorri Sturluson. Heimskringla, Vols. I–III. Trans. A. Finlay & A. Faulkes (2011–2015). London: Viking Society for Northern Research. (Harald Fairhair, the two Olafs, Harald Hardrada)
- UNESCO World Heritage Centre. Jelling Mounds, Runic Stones and Church. https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/697
- Scandinavian Runic-text Database (Rundata), Uppsala University. (the Halfdan runic graffiti in the Hagia Sophia)
- Byock, J. (2001). Viking Age Iceland. London: Penguin. (the Althing, founded 930)
- Townend, M. (2002). Language and History in Viking Age England: Linguistic Relations between Speakers of Old Norse and Old English. Turnhout: Brepols.
- Sawyer, P. (ed.) (1997). The Oxford Illustrated History of the Vikings. Oxford: Oxford University Press. (the Rus, dirham hoards, Helgö)
- Price, N. (2020). Children of Ash and Elm: A History of the Vikings. New York: Basic Books.

DISCLAIMER
This is an animated history told as a story. Bjorn, Astrid and Brother Edwin are fictional characters created to carry the story; any resemblance to real people is coincidental. Historical figures (Alfred, Cnut, Halfdan and others) are dramatised, and their spoken lines are invented for storytelling. Research findings are simplified for storytelling (see the sources above); dates and details that historians still debate are presented in their most widely accepted form, and legends such as Cnut and the waves are labelled as legends in the video. It's for entertainment and education only.

#Vikings #History #Animation #VikingAge #MedievalHistory