S8 Ep822: The conclusion of the Viking Age is often associated with the pivotal year 1066, marked by the death of Harald Hardrada at the Battle of Stamford Bridge. Hardrada was a legendary King of Norway who had lived an extraordinary life, serving as an imperial b

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John Batchelor

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🗓️ 4 May 2026

⏱️ 11 minutes

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Summary

The conclusion of the Viking Age is often associated with the pivotal year 1066, marked by the death of Harald Hardrada at the Battle of Stamford Bridge. Hardrada was a legendary King of Norway who had lived an extraordinary life, serving as an imperial bodyguard in the Byzantine capital of Constantinople where he was rewarded with gold or "embers of the hands." He sought to reclaim the English throne, which had previously been held by King Canute during the era of the North Sea Empire that united England, Denmark, and parts of Norway. While 1066 is a convenient historical bookmark, Barraclough argues it is an Anglo-centric view that ignores the persistence of Norse culture in other regions like Greenland or Russia. The era also featured figures like Harald Bluetooth, who famously claimed to have converted the Danes to Christianity and whose runic initials now serve as the symbol for modern Bluetooth technology. Another symbolic ending occurred much later in 1263 at the Battle of Largs, where King Haakonof Norway faced off against King Alexander III of Scotland. Although the battle was inconclusive, Haakon'ssubsequent death in Orkney led to the Western Isles being ceded to Scotland, marking the end of significant Norwegian political control in the region. 7/8
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0:00.0	I'm John Batchelor, continuing my conversation with Professor Eleanor Baraklov, who is an historian, a BBC broadcaster, as well as working at the Baas Spy University.
0:12.0	The book is Embers of the Hands. It talks about the Viking Age, roughly 750 AD to 1100 AD, but both sides, there's no certainty here,
0:24.0	because the magic of the Viking Age collides with the magic of the Christian conversion process.
0:31.0	We're now going to the geography, and the geography includes a big battle
0:38.4	a big battle
0:39.6	and a and a graveyard
0:42.2	that is a way of talking about the endings we begin with the big battle in ten sixty six
0:48.8	harold
0:50.1	of england
0:51.4	harold of norway and william
0:54.0	of normandy.
0:55.0	We need to establish Eleanor that Normandy is as Norse as anything in England, correct?
1:01.0	Yeah, absolutely.
1:03.0	Rallo was the founder of Normandy.
1:06.0	So we're talking about the Vikings at war with the Vikings, the traditions of all.
1:11.6	Yes, pretty much. Yeah, so Norman literally means Northmen.
1:15.6	What's interesting is it's a bit like when we were talking about further east.
1:19.6	What often happens when the North settled in an area is that they assimilate culturally really quickly.
1:25.6	And so by the time of William the Conqueror, as he,
1:29.1	you know, is shortly to become in our narrative, they are not, they're not Norse in that way.
1:35.9	They don't speak the language. But having said that, if you look at the Bayo Tapestry and how
1:40.9	the Normans are depicted there, their hairstyles are the hairstyles that we
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