The Vikings are less interesting in history than the popular romance of the Viking Age would suggest. They were the dominant military power in Northern Europe for around 200 years from the 790s to 1000s. Courtesy of their naval technology they were able to raid with impugnity along the coast British and European as well as down rivers reaching as far as the Ukraine and Germany.

The Viking period was a violent one. The interactions of the Norwegians, Danes and Swedes in written history are usually through their raids on Christian monasteries and kingdoms. The raids became more and more permanent over time with Viking settlements in Normandy of modern day France and southern England.

The Frankish, English and Irish kings who bore the brunt of the Danish and Norwegian raiding were Christian. As a consequence there was a constant tension between the heathen culture of the Vikings and the Christian culture of the wealthier towns, cities and kingdoms that the Vikings raided.

There were constant church and neighbouring political attempts to convert and baptise the Vikings. Many Viking leaders did convert for political, wealth and booty reasons, flicking back to heathendom when it suited their purposes just as quickly. The early interactions, and the Vikings' rejection of Christianity it is thought led to the start of raids on the English and Irish monasteries along the coast.

Archeology has been very effective in unearthing how large and wide the trading networks in history were. The Vikings of the Baltic traded as far down the rivers of eastern Europe to Constantinople. These Vikings were known as the Rus. They established themselves as a ruling warrior elite over the Slavs and coveted Islamic silver and coins. It from these Vikings modern Russia gets its name.

The Franks and Anglo-Saxons had to deal with larger and larger raiding groups. Both kingdoms were in trouble from their own infighting between hopefuls for the crown and made easy pickings. It was common to try and raise an army and if that didn't work to just buy the Vikings off with silver and booty. As the years went on the amounts got larger and larger. Often the Vikings would not leave either and instead just wintered where-ever they felt like.

One of the more famous Viking leaders was the Dane, Rollo. The normal modus operandi for the Vikings was to raid, take a city, get as much booty as they could carry and then leave. When Rollo took Rouen in the late 800s he decided to keep it. The Frankish King decided to recognize Rollo as the controlling Normandy and defending it for the Frankish kingdom. In return Rollo was baptized.

The invading armies in England and Ireland did not establish themselves as neatly politically as Rollo did in north-west France. The Vikings did establish settlements that were originally heathen in Iceland and Greenland.

During the 800s the world was gripped by a warm period which made both Iceland and Greenland more habitable than they would appear to be today. By 1200 the warm period had ended and life was pretty brutal for the remaining settlers in Greenland. Ultimately it was abandoned. Iceland remained a viable population and has survived politically over the centuries to the modern nation-state of today.

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