vikings

The North Sea Empire of Cnut Imagine that Cnut lives until he is 60 and dies around 1055, he is succeeded by Harthacnut/Cnut III, who is a much more competent ruler and lives until 1081, being succeeded by his own son, also imagine that somehow the If the North Sea Empire survives and remains...

In a land already on the very fringes of the Catholic world but now completely cut off from the Old World thanks to the little ice age, how would the Catholic church and its institutions develop in a successful Vinland scenario without any communication with Rome or even Scandinavia? How...

I was reading about the Norse invasions of Britain, and how many of them settled there, and how the Old Norse language influenced the dialects of Northern England, but as far as I can tell, they never settled in numbers great enough to permanently leave behind the Norse language after the...

Wikipedia's statement on viking relations with the iberian statelets. There were raids of course, with the article mentioning the idea that Asturian King Alfonso III built his naval fortifications due to the viking threat. So I'm curious, given that Vikings created communities all over the...

In 870 CE the stronghold of Alt Clut (now Dumbarton Rock) fell after a four month siege to a Viking army from Dublin, led by Amlaib and Imar, the ruler of Dublin and his brother, respectively. Alt Clut was the center of a small but wealthy Brittonic kingdom and controlled access to the lowlands...

Another Vinland WI thread I guess, but rather than the endless discussions (if you could call them that) of whether Vinland would become a veritable China overnight that bypasses Newfoundland altogether or forever be condemned to be a bunch of poor fishermen and shepherds, there was even that...

Inspired by the Vikings TV show (not historically accurate of course), where a character named Floki discovers Islam and is fascinated by it during a raid on Algeciras. He appreciates their devotion to Allah and his amazement at it even brings him to question his own pagan beliefs. What if then...

It may seem a bit far fetched, knowing the tumultuous history of the island, but is there any chance that Great Britain could be an independent unified state, and if so, how could they change history? Right now it is hard to imagine Britain as anything different than it currently is. The three...

I seem to remember coming across a map somewhere about what the Vikings believed the Americas to look like, it depicted about four continents with the bottom one connecting to Africa, the northern most one being Greenland and the Canadian islands and the middle two are from Newfoundland and...

The Bubonic Plague OTL reached Norway in the late summer of 1349. At this time, the King of Norway held domains in Greenland and Iceland. OTL, the Black Plague did not reach Iceland until 1402-1404 and it is debated whether or not it reached the Norse settlements in Greenland. What if, as a...

A page from “History of Viking Scandinavia” Published 1998 The first Jews in Scandinavia The sources are scant about the first Jews in the Norse Realms. Oral tradition referenced in writings by Tsaphonim rabbis claim that the first permanent Jewish settlement was in Jutland fleeing from the...

IOTL, Viking raiders led by al-Rusi (name prior to conversion still unknown) raided al-Andalus in 844. However, as he was there he, along with the rest of his crew was inspired to convert to Islam due to interactions with the locals. With their new-found religious zeal, they came back to around...

What we today know as the Kingdom of Sweden was, back in the Middle Ages, a rather cloudy area in regards to historical knowlege. The consensus between historians seems to be that Sweden was divided between a plethora of local leaders and jarls who might have answered to a high king of sorts. Or...

I've been thinking about how a group of Vikings under Rollo were given land in Northern France and became the Normans over time. I also remembered that the Vikings would also raid the south of Al-Andalus. This got me thinking that maybe in an alternate timeline, an Andalusia ruler might have...

793 Raid on Lindisfarne begins the Viking Age 794 Discovery and Settlement of Faroe Islands by Norse explorers 796 Discovery of Iceland by Floki 800 Settlement of Iceland begins 810 Discovery of Greenland 812 Discovery of Markland (OTL Labrador) 815 During an exploration of the Greenland coast...

First off, i'd like to know what exactly were the OTL conditions that resulted in the aggressive expansion of the Pagan Scandinavians during the High Middle Ages. How can they be butterflied away so we're left with a scenario in which the Viking invasions never happen, saving much of Europe from...

Let's say that the band of Paleo-Indians which were the first humans to reach the Americas all die in a snowstorm while crossing Beringia, leaving the New World/the Americas uninhabited until the Na-Dene and Eskimo-Aleut peoples migrate from Siberia on boats, the Vikings land in Vinland, and the...

What could be some short- and long-term scenarios for South-Britain following a Danish victory at the battle of Edington?

What would have happened if Æthelwald had been able to incite the East Anglian Danes as he had planned? Would Edward have been able consolidate and expand his father Alfred's holdings or would Ragnvald Sygtryggsson still have taken York all the way to the mouth of the Mersey and lay the...

1035: OTL coastal Massachusetts "Fleeing the violent skrælings of the north, and not deterred enough to leave, Thorfinn Karlsefni departed south in the early years of the 11th century. He and his settlers traveled down the east coast of the newly discovered land until they reached a great bay...