Dragon Lords
The History and Legends of Viking England
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4.0 • 1 Rating
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- £13.99
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- £13.99
Publisher Description
Why did the Vikings sail to England? Were they indiscriminate raiders, motivated solely by bloodlust and plunder? One narrative, the stereotypical one, might have it so. But locked away in the buried history of the British Isles are other, far richer and more nuanced, stories; and these hidden tales paint a picture very different from the ferocious pillagers of popular repute. Eleanor Parker here unlocks secrets that point to more complex motivations within the marauding army that in the late ninth century voyaged to the shores of eastern England in its sleek, dragon-prowed longships. Exploring legends from forgotten medieval texts, and across the varied Anglo-Saxon regions, she depicts Vikings who came not just to raid but also to settle personal feuds, intervene in English politics and find a place to call home. Native tales reveal the links to famous Vikings like Ragnar Lothbrok and his sons; Cnut; and Havelok the Dane. Each myth shows how the legacy of the newcomers can still be traced in landscape, place-names and local history. This book uncovers the remarkable degree to which England is Viking to its core.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Parker, lecturer in medieval English literature at Oxford University, examines the reasons beyond simple violence and plunder that prompted Vikings to travel to England in this scholarly look at early medieval tales of Danes in England. She sets the stage in her introduction and first chapter with a brief historical account of Scandinavian landings in England, from the 787 CE entry in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (considered to be the first record of a Viking landing) through the kingship of Cnut, sovereign of both England and Denmark in the 11th century. Parker then looks at stories of the sons of Ragnar Lothbrok, Siward, Guy of Warwick, and Havelok, drawing on numerous chronicles, hagiographies, romances, and local oral traditions from the post Norman Conquest era. Her methodology is less a connecting of dots than an arrangement of story elements into Venn diagrams, showing how certain concepts recur and overlap, such as literary images of a fighting bird associated with Cnut, or the phrase "Dane's skin," which refers both (apocryphally) to the leather coverings of medieval church doors and to people with a pale, freckled appearance.. She provides excerpts from her sources in both the original tongues and modern English translations. The translations help to make this work accessible, but the narrow topic will limit its audience to those with a specific interest in the regions discussed.
