Dan Snow's History Hit - Harald Hardrada

Episode Date: June 8, 2026

Exile, mercenary, Viking king. Harald Hardrada, 'Thunderbolt of the North', fought his way from Norway to Byzantium, from the streets of Constantinople to the battlefields of Sicily. He married a princess, blinded an emperor, and nearly conquered England.Today, Dr Wayne Bartlett joins us to tell the astonishing story of the last great Viking, a man who shook the medieval world before meeting his end at Stamford Bridge in 1066.Wayne's book is called "Thunderbolt of the North: Harald Hardrada, Viking King".Produced by Mariana Des Forges and edited by Dougal Patmore.We need your help! Let us know what you want from Dan Snow's History Hit by filling in our anonymous survey here: https://forms.gle/PvgayWLkWGjYT4St6Dan Snow's History Hit is now available on YouTube! Check it out at: https://www.youtube.com/@DSHHPodcastSign up to History Hit for hundreds of hours of original documentaries, with a new release every week and ad-free podcasts. Sign up at https://www.historyhit.com/subscribe.You can also email the podcast directly at [e-mail]. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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Sign up to join us in historic locations around the world and explore the past. Just visit history hit.com slash subscribe. Hundreds. Perhaps thousands of bodies they strewn across a bloody field in England. Carrying birds picked at the corpses, competing with local people for the riches of the dead. Armands were prized off, rings pocketed, metal and textiles recycled.

Among the fallen, a king felled by an arrow. The fate of a kingdom. decided by a single decisive battle. The year was 1066. But this battlefield was not Hastings. And the king who met his end was not a godwinsome. We are in fact in Yorkshire in the aftermath of the Battle of Stamford Bridge. This was very much the end for King Harold Hardrada.

Hardrada is so much more than just a bit player in one of the most dramatic years of British history, folks. He's sometimes called the last great Viking king. He was a legendary figure whose life reads like an epic drama. He is, without a doubt, one of the greatest and most dramatic characters of European medieval history. Known as the hard ruler, the thunderbolt of the north. Giant in stature, Hardrada had fought his way from exile. to Empire, from the frozen north to the throne rooms of Byzantium and the arid battlefields of the Middle East. His prowess as a warrior made him both rich and powerful. He claimed the hand of the

daughter of the mighty grand prince of Kiev. He was a poet, he was a musician. He ruled Norway for two decades before he embarked on his fateful invasion of England in 1066. This is the story of a king who refused to disappear, and a warrior whose almost peerless ambition and martial skill shook the medieval world. Joining the podcast is Dr. Wayne Bartlett. He's the author of many history books on subjects as varied as the Titanic, Agincourt, Knute and the Dambusters. But he's also author of Thunderbolt of the North, Harold Hadrata Viking King, which makes him the ideal person to talk us through the life of one of the most famous Viking warlords. Enjoy. Wayne, thanks coming on the podcast. Pleasure.

Wayne, is Harold Adrado one of the greatest figures in European medieval history? I think we undersell him here in the UK. I think he is very much underestimated in the UK in particular because our knowledge of Harold is mainly from 1066 from our perspective. The thing about Harold is he was a colossus of his time and he travelled pretty much all over his known world. His known world being perhaps mainly Europe, Scandinavia, obviously, Britain, but also much further east as well, heavily involved in what we now call Russia, right down to Constantinople as it was then, and Byzantium, even into the Middle East and Sicily. So he was involved in so much. Yeah, truly a sort of global figure, really, just remarkable. Tell me where this story begins.

He's born in Norway. He's born in Norway in around 1015 or 1016. dates tend to be a little bit vague back then. But he was born in Rignorike, which is a kind of mountainous part of Norway. At that time, Norway, and indeed all the Scandinavian countries, which we now know, Denmark and Sweden as well, had not quite reached the form they eventually took, but they were fairly well developed into nation states, something which had happened over the past 150 years or so. So, yeah, born into a royal family, effective. and connected very much to some of the great names of Norwegian history, particularly Harold Fine Hare, the first Norwegian king,

who lived about a hundred years or so before him. So very much connected to important people from day one, but really no one could have predicted quite how extraordinary his life would be. Yeah, he's got sort of royal blood in his veins, but it was definitely not certain that he'd end up ruling over anything, was it? I mean, are there defined kingdoms here? Do they sort of come and go with each strong man's arrival and death? Or is there something a bit more settled?

No, it's certainly still quite volatile. Although there were the outlines of what we think of of nation states there, because of the culture, the martial culture of the Viking epoch, it was really very unpredictable how long a king would be king, who would take his place when he died, all of this kind of thing. So it's very much a survivor of the fittest kind of environment. So I think we should think of the basic outlines of a nation state being there, but very, very unpredictable.

Every time the king died, or every time a king was killed even, which was far from unknown, everything tended to go into the melting plot again. So there was absolutely no guarantee of anything when Harold was born, and certainly not that he be king of anything. And in fact, the life story which we'll explore shows that he wasn't actually a king of anything until much later on in his life. And he had some fairly extraordinary adventures

and getting there, but really, really no certainty about any kind of succession on his part whatsoever. So he's a half-brother of the king of Norway, it's King Olaf. He's in the sort of wider royal family. But then their fortunes are upended, aren't they? because Olaf's killed and Harold is exiled? Yeah, and I think that brings us on to a very interesting point, Dan,

in that the greatest medieval Viking king, although Harold is perhaps the best remembered and has the most remarkable storyline, Olaf, his half-brother, was certainly the standout figure of the time at that particular period because Olaf was a Christian king at a time when Christianity was

just being established in Norway and Scandinavia more generally. He wasn't the first Christian king, but things had gone very much up and down. And Olaf's perhaps greatest achievement, really, ironically, was when he was killed. Because when Olaf died in battle, basically what happened fairly soon after is Olaf became a Christian saint, and he's still patron saint of Norway to this day. So they were half-brothers. They shared a mother, but not a father, both sons of a lady called Astor. But Olaf's father was Harold Grendski.

Harold's was a guy called Sigurd Sear, Sigurd's the Pig, which is a very interesting nickname to say the least. So they were connected, but they had fairly separate lives for much of the time, though ironically, Harold was there when Olaf was killed. There was an age difference. Olaf was probably a good 15 to 20 years older than Harold. So they would have seen each other. They would have spent time in each other's company, but very much their own people as well. And so Harold, really after this battle in which King Olaf is killed, Harold Adrada, he's off. He's been exiled at that point. Where's he off to? So during this great battle at Stichlstadt, Harold was.

there alongside Olaf. Harold was only probably about 15 at the time, so pretty young, though not unknown in Viking times for someone in their mid-teams to become something of a warrior. Olaf actually suggested to him, according to the sagas at least, but he shouldn't take part in the battle. He was too young and Harold wasn't having that. During the battle, Harold is quite badly wounded and is taken away to safety by a guy called Rogenwald Brusesson to Sweden. So a fairly tough journey over the mountains, not an easy trip at the best of times, but particularly when you're already wounded. So Harold manages anyway, fortunately for him to get across the mountains into Sweden where he's able to recover. And he spends some time in Sweden, which was often a bolthole for

people making their escape from Norway at the time. There he's able to recuperate a bit before he's now ready to go and set off and have a wider set of adventures beyond there. Those adventures take him to the east and we should say because people who are perhaps not familiar with the Viking world, this world of Scandinavian seafarers and traders, obviously these Vikings, they head west to England, Scotland, Ireland, the islands of the Atlantic, Iceland, Greenland. But they head east just as certainly as well, don't they? And perhaps there's that more associated with the Swedish and the Eastern Baltic Vikings. Their territories to gain wealth and fame are very much to the east, aren't they? And is that whole sort of

world sucks in Harold now, does it? Very much so. I think it's fair to say that Sweden is particularly associated with these voyages to the east. There are some exceptions. I mean, we know Swedish mercenaries were fighting with Canute in England, for example. But there being this long established tradition, if you like, of the Vikings from Sweden making their way across the Baltic down some of the great river systems, the Volga, the Don, the De Nipa, places like this, right down eventually to the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea. And they're basically establishing bases along some of these great rivers, trading centres, places where they could take some kind of refuge as well. They're kind of heavily involved in the formation of very well-known

places, particularly, for example, Kiev in modern Ukraine. And they are helping to set up links between Scandinavia and the Middle East, as we would now call it, particularly even Muslim territories as far away as Baghdad. And there's this trading exchange network going on with things like furs and amber and even slaves flowing from the Scandinavian north down into the Middle East. Vast quantities of silver in particular and spices and things like this, making their way back the other way.

So I think you could almost think of these territories, which we call the land of the Russ, Garthruiki, to give it its precise name. You can almost think of this as being like the medieval equivalent of the world west in 19th century America. You know, not a lot in terms of centralized control, a lot of opportunism going on, a lot of violence, but also a lot of trading as well.

So a place where a young man like Harold can really start to establish his reputation and make his way in the world. So a place for adventurers and Harold was certainly that. And so if you look at Kiev, for example, you've got these ports, these fortresses on the river. They're sort of Scandinavian, people of Scandinavian origin, they're speaking languages that Harold can understand. And they're just surrounded on all sides by other sorts of people, by poles and people of the step. And everyone's just sort of fighting and trading and establishing settlements. And Harold will pass from one sort of friendly hearth to another, will he? Yeah.

Well, for a time, he spent some time at Kiev where the current ruler was a guy called Yaroslav, the Weiss. Yeroslav was himself very connected to Scandinavia. He had previously, for example, giving refuge to Harold's now dead half-brother, Olaf. So he has this long established their reputation for being a place of refuge for people like Olaf and now Harold who are trying to restore their situation after particularly troubling times. And unfortunately, there's not a huge amount in the historical record about what Harold did in Kiev at this time. But we do know that he was probably involved in wars against the polls, as he say, and other people in what we would now call North East. Eastern Europe. We do know that he was involved in that, probably as some kind of captain in Yaroslav's army. And he does, from the little we know, he does make a bit of a name for

himself as a very successful army leader. But it's really when he gets the opportunity to involve himself in the affairs of the Byzantine Empire based on Constantinople, that we really start to see Harold coming into, when I say the historical record, a little bit of caution is needed because we're talking about sagas here, which may be history, may be a little bit of legendary stuff thrown in. Someone's described them as historical novels, which is, I think, a good way of looking at it. But it's really, at this stage, once he makes his way from Kiev to Constantinople, that we really start to find that Harold becomes a much more rounded figure. in the so-called historical record.

And there was a pipeline, wasn't there, for these Rus, these Scandinavian hard men from these river systems of what is now Russian Ukraine, it was quite common for the Byzantines to hire them and use them as enforcers and just, you know, to serve an elite military units? Very much so. The collective name often given to these people is the Varangians. So the Varangians are, if you like, their mercenaries, of Viking descent, which the Byzantine emperor of the day, and this had been going on for

150 years by the time Harold got there, used mercenaries from the Varangians to be, as you say, his enforcers. That could take a whole range of guises. They could be leaders in the army or even the Navy, obviously given the Viking background, pretty useful in that. They could also be a personal bodyguard for the emperor himself. One particular group called the Varangian Guard, they become very heavily linked with the Byzantine emperors as his personal bodyguard. Very important position. Obviously, they're in close proximity to the emperor of the day. So that gives them a position of trust, but also a position of power which it could sometimes potentially abused. And on occasion, they probably did that.

that. So yeah, very much prized warriors for hire, which the Byzantines used, though they're not always completely trusting of them for a very good reason. So it's a little bit of a strange relationship. They're glad to have these people there because of their military martial prowess, but they're also not always completely trusting of them, which may for a very interesting dynamic, to say the least. And so Harold, we hear that he's enormously told. And so Harold, we hear that he's enormously tall. I mean, you talk about Marshall Press. We know he was fighting in the battle in his teens when his half-brother was killed.

He's been fighting for Yaroslav the Wise. He obviously was very wise if he gave Harold a commission in his army. And now he's in the Vrangian Guard. Physically, do we have any sense of, he was just tall and strong and good at fighting, was he? Well, yeah, there are one or two

references to his physical appearance, very, very striking guy. In fact, famously at the Battle of Stanford Bridge, the other end of his life, Harold the King of England, offered him seven feet of ground, of English ground as his kind of grave. So there's a very sort of direct reference to how big and striking he was there. At all the accounts we have with him, they do major on his physical strikingness. But again, we have to be a little bit cautious here because sagas tended to make, to give a modern,

equivalent Hollywood idols of their leading figures is quite normal to say that Harold or whoever the subject matter at the time is, is the most handsome man ever and he's a giant, all of these kind of things. But very interestingly, there is a 10th century account by a guy called Ibn Fadlan, who was an Islamic ambassador from Baghdad who saw the Rus' first hand. And he, himself mentions how striking they were as physical specimens, tall, often the stereotypical blonde, blue-eyed kind of thing, very, very stand-out figures, made even more stand-out by things like their tattoos and their sharpened teeth and things like this. So there is some sort of indirect evidence to say that the Scandinavians generally made a striking

impression because of their physical appearance on others who came across them. But there are certainly also accounts which say Harold was just like this stunningly handsome, tall, blonde, striking figure. So very much, as I say, a Hollywood idol of the 11th century. But he wasn't just acting. He was actually doing the business, wasn't he? I mean, you mentioned that he's serving as far as Sicily. There's some accounts here in Mesopotamia. Do we have any kind of reliable information about where he was fighting? Well, they think. Because of the fighting in Sicily are particularly interesting. So he was there along with another prominent leader, a guy called Georgios Moniacas, who was

a Greek, or a Byzantine, we'd just say, the Byzantine's being generally called Greeks at the time. And they had a very much of a love-hate relationship. They were always trying to get one up on each other and show who the top dog was. So the saga accounts describe Harold as being there and being heavily involved in the capture of four major towns on Sicily. Unfortunately, we don't have a detailed description of where those towns were, but if you look at the descriptions of one of the sieges he was involved in, it was probably Syracuse, which is down on the southern part of Sicily.

So he's heavily involved in the fighting there as a leader, heavily involved in this ongoing game of one-upmanship with Georgios, which would continue for a number of years. But where Harold really comes to the fall here is not just for his martial prowess, though that's undoubtedly there, but also if you like his native coming and his eye for a trick to try and capture places which are being stubborn to capture by assault. So the saga writers really bring out this thing about Harold as being a really clever, crafty kind of figure. And I think that's an important thing to emphasise because, yes, a Viking leader was certainly expected to be a great warrior. And Harold was absolutely that. But he was also expected to be something more than that too. As I say, somebody who had a kind of native cunning, which would enable him to capture things by subterfutable. when fighting would not on its own do the trick.

So this is very much part of Harold's all-round character. He exhibits a number of these qualities as well. And then from Sicily, he was subsequently involved in what was described as a military expedition, but I would kind of more describe it as like escort duty to leading members of the Byzantine royal family to Jerusalem, which at that time was obviously a very, very holy place to Christians, as indeed it still remains. But after some time of being controlled by Byzantines, it's now under Islamic control. So Harold is also escorting members of the royal family to Jerusalem on pilgrimage. So he's ranging his activities from Sicily to Jerusalem, as well as closer to home to Constantinople itself.

So very much his reputation is on the rise. He proved very successful in Sicily, especially, which is a real important battleground for the Byzantines. So his reputation is very much established and increasing almost by the year at this stage. You're listening to Dan Snow's history here. More giant Vikings coming up. A lot of people know the expression Byzantine. You get a sense of intrigue in royal corridors of power.

And that's pretty unfair because I think that's true of all empires. But anyway, in this case, it is certainly true that Harold Adirado appears to sort of fall on the wrong side of some sort of palace political maneuvers. And he leaves Constantinople in a bit of a hurry, does he, about eight years after he gets there? Oh, it's an extraordinary story in that it really all kicked off an Easter in 1042, which obviously is a very important time to Christians. and particularly so in Constantinople. Now there's all sorts of subplots going on here. One of which is that he's offered the chance to be in a relationship with the Empress Zoe,

the Byzantine Empress, which allegedly he refuses to take up that offer. So he's associated with that. And then in 1042, there's been a bit of a kind of power struggle going on for a year or so as a new emperor in place, Michael the 5th, who is the adopted son of Zoe, the empress, but as soon as he becomes emperor, he turns on her, imprisons her, that kind of thing. So Michael proves to be a very

unpopular and short-lived emperor. And in 1042 at Easter there was this coup. Harold at the time was supposedly locked up for various misdemeanors, possibly associated. with his non-consumation of the relationship with Zoe, all kinds of other shenanigans. He's locked up in prison. And then during the riots that break out Easter 1042, he escapes in the chaos, perhaps deliberately freed. But what then happens really is part of the Harold story, which is really striking, because the emperor Michael V is deposed along with his main lieutenant, Constantine, and Michael and Constantine are captured and they're hauled out into the streets where they're both richly blinded.

And in the sagas that the suggestion is that it's actually Harold who does the blinding. So, you know, he's right in the middle of these events. but the chaos is still ongoing. There's like power struggles then to see who should be the next emperor. And during this particular chaos, Harold manages to escape from Constantinople on a ship and make his way back to Kiev. So very dramatic set of events where Harold is really right at the middle of things.

And is the hold of his ship full of the booty that he'd acquired over years and years of serving the emperor? Well, apparently from what we can make out, how would it be very, very good at sending back wealth that he'd acquired already during his nearly 10 years of service with the emperor? So he's, if you like, been taking out an insurance policy here. He's been sending as much wealth as he can get out back to Kiev with the result, the time he does get back there. He's already a very rich man. In all probability, because of the chaotic events in which he left Constantinople, I don't think he would have taken a lot with him because the primary consideration was to get people, his supporters, and obviously himself away. I'm sure there might have been some

portable wealth going with them, but the main focus was, hey, let's just get out of here as quickly as we can. And in fact, there were two ships that left Constantin. at the same time. And Constantinople at the time was protected by this huge chain which stretched across the waters of the golden horn, stopping people from coming in and out. And Harold comes up with his trick very much in keeping with his overall persona, but he gets all his people on one of the ships. And when they reach the chain, he gets them all to run to the front of the ship when the ship is resting on the chain, with the extent if you like,

it almost topples over onto the other side of the chain. So they're able to make good their escape that way. The other ship with him, unfortunately, tried the same thing, but it didn't work, and the ship capsized, and I think pretty much everybody on it was lost. So it's a fairly chaotic evacuation from Constantinople,

though allegedly he did take with him a young princess called Maria, who allegedly there was a relationship or a possible relationship with her. But he dropped her off soon after because he already had other romantic considerations back in Kiev. She would have complicated matters enormously if she'd have gone with him. So all a bit chaotic, I think, very much again in keeping with the story of Harold and his life more generally. Gosh, I hope they didn't snap their rudder off. They must have had their steering withdrawn when they went over that chain. Nasty. As a sailor in me does not like that story.

It makes me feel very nervous. Right. So he makes his way back up these rivers. This is a maritime story speaking of boats. Without getting off that boat, pretty much, you can make his way all the way up to Kiev, right? Through the Black Sea, up the rivers of what is now Ukraine and back to Kiev. Yeah. I mean, interestingly, along these river systems, there were various narrows which they had to

negotiate. and quite often they would have to literally take their boats out of the water and carry them around because the water was not deep enough or it was too rocky to actually sail them across. So this is one of the more extraordinary things I think of the Viking story. Though actually you do see it in, for example, in Celtic stories in Scotland as well. But from time to time where there's a piece of land which is blocking the passage, for whatever reason. The Vikings would literally lift their boats out of the water,

carry them for a mild or so, and then plonk them back in on a piece of water on the other side. So they're kind of like these narrows that they have to negotiate. And that's part of the extraordinary story of the Rus. They did have these ships, which were amazing, fairly shallow seaboard. So that made them fairly useful in river systems. As you say, they had,

steering odds, which they could actually take off when they needed to. But from time to time, they would literally carry the ships around obstacles before depositing them back in the water again. And he gets back to Kiev and there, well, tell me about his romantic entanglements there that you alluded to earlier. Yeah. So part of the story is that when he first reached Kiev all those years before he went to Constantinople, he became attracted to the daughter of Yaroslav, the wise, a young lady called Elisif or Elizabeth, as we might anglicise it. And it's a bit like an ancient Greek legend, really. When he asked for the hand of Elishe, Yaroslav says, well, young man, you don't really have a lot to offer me at the moment.

Go out and prove yourself, undertake all these adventures, make me rich, that kind of thing. And if you achieve all of that and you come back, then yes, you can murray. my daughter. So this is kind of what happens now. Harold comes back. He's been very good, as I said, in sending back wealth to Kiev, of which he would have, I'm sure, generously contributed directly to Yaroslav, some of it. He certainly proved himself. He's shown himself now to be a really outstanding military leader, somebody that Yaroslav would very much want as a prominent general in his armies. So having a bit like the ancient Greek hero proved himself, Harold is now worthy to marry Elisuf, Ritchie Judy does, having kept his side of the bargain, the Erasov now responds in kind.

Interesting, so he gets his girl after years of planning. That's amazing. But he doesn't want to spend any more time in Kiev, does he? He's keen to get home. The thing is that there is this underlying plot line, if you like, in the sagas about Harold that he always wants to be king. It's his destiny to be king. And he wants to go home. He wants to become king in his own country. So by now he's probably about 30-ish, 30 years old. That's pretty much in the prime of life back then when life expectancy was generally a bit shorter than it is now. So he now feels that it's his moment of destiny and it's now time to go back home. home and become king of Norway. The only problem with that is there's already a king of Norway

in the shape of his nephew, Magnus, the illegitimate son of Harold's half-brother Olaf. So there is no kingdom to inherit. But there are other Scandinavian territories which are also attractive outside of Norway, in particular Denmark. Denmark and Norway have always had a fairly complicated history and at various times, Denmark's owned large parts of Norway and vice versa. So he's kind of thinking, as a good opportunist, well, ideally I'd like to be king of Norway, but hey, that may not be immediately possible, but there might be something else for me here. So he then makes his way back north, originally to Sweden, again, you know, a nice bolthole, sort of on the sidelines a bit where he could make his plans closer to.

home before he then introduces himself to affairs in Denmark. So he now finds himself caught up in the freeway fight, basically, involving himself, his nephew Magnus, and the current claimant to the king of Denmark, a guy called Sven. For a few years now, there's this ongoing kind of menagerie in a military sense where Harold is quite cleverly or deviously. depending on which way you want to put it, taking size in this dispute and changing size from sides to side at any given moment,

depending on what's to his immediate best advantage. So this is what he does. He goes back, he's on the lookout for an opportunity, and it's really Denmark initially, which is the battleground by which he starts to stake his claims to be a Scandinavian king. So he's got lots of cash,

he's got followers, so he can be a military, present straight away. I'm sure because of success, you attract more followers. Yeah, that's very much the case. And I think he's also seeing himself as the guy who holds the balance of power in Scandinavia. Because Sven, for example, the guy who wants to be king, who is king, by some measures in Denmark, he's an amazingly persistent character. He keeps getting beaten in battle. Down but not out, I think, is the best way of putting it. He's never quite eliminated from the struggle completely. He goes away to lick his wounds, again quite often in Sweden, which has this nice kind of neutral position.

Recovers his strength, goes back, attacks Denmark again. Magnus in the meantime is quite often being successful in Denmark, but again, he's not knocking Sven out of the fight. So Harold sees his role, I think as being someone who holds the balance of power, but he also sees that as a means to an end. By deploying that balance of power in a particular way, he can strengthen his own position and gain his own person advantage from that. And he does that really quite astutely by, as I say, occasionally changing sides when he thinks the moment is right. So someone you'd certainly respect for his power, his wealth, the number of men he'd brings with him, but someone I'm sure that you would never actually trust.

Exactly. In the end, he ends up ruling, doesn't he? How has he come to take charge? Yes, very interesting story here because Magnus, as I said, is his nephew. So they're kind of blood relatives. And even then, there was a little bit of a kind of mark of shame, if you like, by trying to get one over on your own family. Didn't stop it happening quite a lot,

but at least superficially, you're supposed to be supportive of your own family. So the compromise which is reached is that Magnus and Harold will be joint kings. That kind of sounds a pretty strange idea, I guessed, in modern ears, but it wasn't unheard of in Viking society for two brothers or cousins or whatever to actually agree to share out power to some extent. And Magnus and Harold are bringing two quite different things to this equation.

Magnus is bringing legitimacy. He seems to have been a fairly popular king. His father, Olaf, as I said, was made a saint. So he's a hugely symbolically important figure. So Magnus brings this air of legitimacy. to the arrangement, but it's not particularly rich, whereas Harold, of course, is very rich. So he's bringing wealth and he's bringing international prestige as well. Harold by now is like an international figure, you know, well known across much of Europe. So he brings that cachet to

the agreement. This agreement was made. They became joint kings, but that arrangement didn't actually last too long because maybe after a year, no more than two years, Magnus is taken ill and suddenly dies. Still a fairly young man. Harold then, by default, becomes the king of Norway and indeed Denmark without any kind of sharing with Magnus. You might think there's a little bit of funny business going on with Magnus dying so conveniently, if that's the right way of putting at it, and leaving the throne clear of any rivals. There's no actual real evidence to say that happened, but of course one always has to be a little bit suspicious,

as modern police would be when someone has a motive. You're always like to be a bit of a suspect in those circumstances. You're listening to Down the Science History. Talk about Harold Hardrada. More after this. Don't go away. Was the important king in Norway's history? Does he help to forge Norway itself? Well, I think that's a very interesting question because I would say he has a degree of significance, but he would certainly not be the most significant king in terms of shaping the country.

At the time, for example, Olaf, his half-brother, his dead half-brother, would probably have been a much more significant influence because he kind of reinforced Christianity in the country. and he became a figurehead. Ironically, he was much more effective when he was dead than when he was alive, which sometimes, unfortunately, for some, is the case. So I think Harold was kind of more like a typical, if extreme example of the Scandinavian king of the time.

He was pretty ruthless, very much primarily interested in his own personal ambitions and well-being. So I'd say he may be strengthened things which had already started. But I wouldn't have said in terms of his place in Norwegian history and of the Norwegian crown, he was by any means the decisive figure. There were others, I think, who were more important in forging Norway than he was. But he attempted to recreate that Knut empire, didn't he? Because he invades Denmark a few times.

It's almost like the Scandinavian version, even if a lot shorter of the Hundred Years' War, in that it just keeps flaring up and then calming down for a little while and then flaring up again. And in the end, it never reaches a resolution, really. This is a war that's ongoing in Harold's time for a decade and more. And as I said about Sven, he's this really irritating person, the dog who would not lie down, if you like. Harold keeps winning battles against him, but he's actually unable to win the war because as soon as he leaves Denmark to go back to Norway, Sven, whose escape, will be back again and they have another go. So what this war is doing is just sucking resources and energy out of both that

obviously Sven, but even Harold to a great extent as well. Unless you can actually catch the catch Sven and completely eliminate him, this is a guy who's not going to go away. So eventually, I think the war comes to a kind of rather uneventful halt because basically people are running out of energy and momentum and they just don't seem to be getting anywhere with it. So at the end of it all, Sven is kind of like the last man standing. Sven, despite losing so many battles, stays as the king as Denmark, and Harold focuses more on his core kingdom, if you like, in Norway, until obviously at some stage the possibility of other pickings, particularly in England come along as well, to distract him. So it's just exhaustion, I think, which leads to a halt

to this war in Denmark. Well, let's come on to those events at the end of his career and life. Harold Hydraada is sick now one day and a message comes to him saying, but the confessor King of England died without children, and Harold spots an opportunity. Yeah, and one of the most significant figures here is Harold Gobwinson, Harold now King of England, his brother Tostig, he's like in exile, he's fallen out with Harold Gobwinson. He was the Earl of Northumbria,

and he very much wants to restore his position. in England, and he senses a mutual opportunity in collaboration with Harold Hardrada. So he'd also been in discussions, of course, with William Normandy as well. But anyway, he sent the message to Harold Hardrada saying, hey, there's this really wealthy kingdom, which a Scandinavian king, Knute already had control of half a century before. there was a very tentative claim as a kind of successor of Canute through various machinations that Harold Hardrida could say, well, you know what? I'm the rightful king of England.

So he'd not really shown much evidence previously of pushing that claim home. But he suddenly thinks himself, I think, hey, there's a great opportunity. There is this wealthy kingdom. It's all a bit of a mess. There's lots of turmoil going on. you know, the Normans might get involved. What a great opportunity to really make a name for myself. So for someone of Harold Hardrida's personality,

this is kind of just too good a chance to miss. So eventually he thinks, okay, let's go for it. Let's see if I can become the next king of England. And so he heads over at the North Sea. He meets up with Tostig and they land on the northeast coast of England. They push into what is now Yorkshire. and there's a crushing victory. Another great military success for Harold Hardrida just outside York.

Yeah, so there's this great battle at a place called Falford, which is literally just a couple of miles from York. And actually, still a very interesting place to visit. You can still kind of trace bits of the battleground there. So he has this battle against Edwin and Morka of Mercia, who basically are there to try and resist this. initial invasion led by Harold Hardrida along with Tostig. And there's this battle just outside York, in which eventually Harold Hardrada's army

wins this crushing victory, creating huge amounts of carnage in the process. They win this fight. York, which is a hugely important place at the time, was the Viking York, had been the capital of the Viking kingdom before Northumbria become assimilated into England. So York is now open. He forces the city to surrender on terms which are very favourable to him. He thinks, oh, this is great. I've got this victory.

You know, I'm just going to go and rest up for a few days and then I'll carry on, presumably head further south, than become king of England. So everything is going really, really well. One, this crushing triumph, everything in the garden is really. Rosie and Harold now seems to be, certainly could well be, you know, in a fairly short space of time, the next King of England. So Forlford is a stunning victory, a crushing victory, and that Harold thinks, is that for the time being? But it's not because in another one of the great stunning battles of English military history,

King Harold of England marches north, a lightning march north, surprises Harold Hardrador's troops just outside Stanford Bridge in East Yorkshire. And there is a battle at which Harold Hardrata is killed. Astonishing. He knew the minute he saw the dust rising from the approaching English Army news in trouble. He did. And I think you can kind of put yourself quite easily in Harold's shoes here because he's expecting to go into York later in the day,

take the formal surrender of the city. And the initial impression, so the saga suggests, is when he sees this big cloud of dust initially, he thinks his all the officials from York coming out to greet him, saying, you know, okay, you're the boss now. Come on in. His army is there, apart from a part of it, left back to guard the ships, which are a few miles away. They seem to be having a pretty good time, presumably knocking back the mead a bit, if you like. According to the accounts, they don't even have lots of their armour with them. So they are totally unprepared for what is about to hit them, which is, as you say, this amazing march by Harold Godwinson, a couple of hundred miles in the space of a few days.

To be honest, I think, can easily be underestimated as a military feat in its own right, was an incredible quick, rapid march. And in the fight that follows, Harold is caught off guard, his men are caught off guard, and eventually they are over. overwhelmed. And at the height of the battle, Harold is allegedly hit by an arrow in his throat, which basically knocks him out. And effectively, the battle is over, though. The killing seems to have gone on for some time after that point. So a very dramatic day in English history, certainly. Well, what an extraordinary, extraordinary career that stretches from the Middle East to northern England comes to an end in that field in Yorkshire. And in some ways it's the end of the Viking Age as well, isn't it?

I mean, Scandinavians do, they are around in the reign of William I, but in terms of large-scale raids and incursions into England to Scotland, that's the end of not just Harold Hardruder's life, but the Viking Age. It's a very good question, and it's really hard to give a definitive answer to, because, for example, there were several major raids against England, which largely disappeared from memory, if you like, by Danes actually in the reign of William I. And there is the odd wannabe leader subsequent to Harold. He still makes a bit of a name for himself, this extraordinary guy called Magnus Bearlegs in the north of Scotland. And you even have a battle between the Norwegian

king and the Scottish king at Largs in the 13th century, where Scotland is still a bit of a battleground between Scandinavians and Scots. But I think that's the Scottish king at Largs in the 13th century, but I think the Viking age was already ending when Harold was there. And I think what you see with these ages, if you like, these labels that we give things, they're often not decisive one-off events. They're like more gradual transitions to a different age. And I think Harold Hardrada is definitely part of this transition period where the great warlords of former centuries are now becoming proper established medieval style kings. And Harold has a very important part in that process.

And he was certainly one of the last raiders to have all this extensive international raiding going on. So I think if we want to give the label of the end of the Viking age to anybody, it probably belongs more to Harold Hardrida than most other people. So Norway is now a very, very important. much becoming an established a European country, as is Denmark, as ultimately will be Sweden. Sweden, for whatever reason, seems to be a bit later with these things. But yeah, very much the end of one period of medieval history in Scandinavia and a transition to a quite different one, which follows

on from it. Very true, very true. And also important to remind me that there's a lot of Scandinavian activity going on in Scotland in the centuries to come. But yes, it feels something. somehow, feel somehow a bit different from the Viking Age. Thank you so much for coming on the podcast. That was great. What a life. Wayne, you've written Thunderbolt of the North, Harold Hardrada, Viking King. So I urge everyone to go and check that out. Thank you very much for coming on the podcast. Absolutely pleasure, Dan. Great to catch up. And so, folks, Harold Haraldas' extraordinary life came to an end. Not in the blazing triumph, he'd spent decades chasing, but in defeat and death in Yorkshire. It's probably fair to say that he'd

travelled further, he'd fought harder and he'd seen more of the known world than almost any other man of his age. He'd been a Viking prince, a mercenary in Byzantium, a king in Norway, and finally, acclaimant to the English throne. His death really did mark the end of one world and the opening of another. It helped to set the stage, of course, for William of Normandy, successful invasion, only days later. In England, the age of the Vikings had passed, and medieval England would be remade in the image of another invader. Thank you for listening, as ever, folks. If you've enjoyed this episode, then make sure you hit subscribe so you never miss an episode. If you want to tell us what you would like to hear and see on Dan Snow's History, please look for the link for our listener

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