The vikings: Did you mean...?

Bjorn Ironside (also spelt Björn Ironside; Old Norse Bjǫrn Járnsíða) is a legendary Viking who in the stories surrounding him raids alongside his brothers and his father, the Viking chieftain Ragnar Lothbrok. While the legends mentioning...

Cwenthryth of Mercia (also given as Cwoenthryth, 9th century CE) was the daughter of King Coenwulf (r. 796-821 CE). Little is known of her actual life but she later became infamous in the 12th century CE through the legend of St. Kenelm as...

You may know him from the TV series Vikings, but Bjorn Ironside is a legendary Viking known from the medieval stories and historical sagas of raiding alongside his father Ragnar Lothbrok and his brothers, with the most well known being Ivar...

In Norse belief, the soul of the deceased might wind up in any one of a number of afterlife realms. There was Valhalla, the realm of Odin where the dead warriors drank, fought, and told stories, Folkvangr ('the Field of the People'), the...

Elements of Norse mythology abound in The Lord of the Rings, and none is so compelling as the ring itself. The One Ring is reminiscent of magic rings in Norse lore, especially Odin's Draupnir or Andvaranaut from the legend of the Volsungs...

Lagertha (also spelt Lathgertha or Ladgerda) is a legendary Viking shieldmaiden known from Saxo Grammaticus' early 13th-century CE Gesta Danorum. In this work, written in Latin and concerning Danish history, she is the first wife of Ragnar...

Runes are letters in the runic alphabets of Germanic-speaking peoples, written and read most prominently from at least c. 160 CE onwards in Scandinavia in the Elder Futhark script (until c. 700 CE) and the Younger Futhark - which illuminated...

Hedeby (Old Norse: Heiðabýr; German: Haithabu) was an important stronghold in Viking Age Denmark from the 8th-11th centuries CE and, along with Birka in present-day Sweden, it was the most important Viking trading center in Europe. During...

Aethelred ruled as Lord of the Mercians from c. 881 to 911 and was a key military leader in the fight against Viking conquest and settlement in England. To defend Mercia, he allied himself to the powerful Kingdom of Wessex under the leadership...

Norse mythology, the stories of gods and heroes from in and around the Viking Age (c. 790 - c. 1100 CE) in northern Europe, has provided us with some of the most famous figures in world mythology. Here, in this collection, we look at such...