Painting of Vikings in ships

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Illustration of a viking king and solider

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This Viking ruler begged to be dismembered – but his rival had something far worse in mind. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

A stained-glass window depicting a medieval figure in St Magnus Cathedral, Orkney.

Viking

This Viking warlord had a magical banner that promised victory. But it had a secret curse

A portrait of Alfred the Great, Anglo-Saxon king of Wessex

Medieval

The Vikings mutilated and maimed their defeated enemies. So why did Alfred the Great spare their leader?

An illustrated tree growing from a ring of sea, its branches hung with three golden crowns, with a robed king standing on the left shore and a Viking-style warrior with a shield standing on the right shore, facing each other across the water.

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The Vikings brutalised our ancestors. So why do the English still love them?. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

A statue of the Norwegian king Olaf Tryggvason stands atop a tall stone column, holding a cross-topped orb above the skyline.

Viking

He was one of the greatest Viking warlords – and his death is still an unsolved mystery

Composite image of Norwegian footballer Erling Haaland wearing a Viking helmet and the Norway national team shirt, standing with his hands on his hips against an illustrated background of Viking longships filled with oarsmen. The image links Haaland and Norway’s modern 'Viking row' football celebration with historical depictions of Viking seafarers.

Viking

Norway’s ‘Viking row’: the real history behind the World Cup football chant

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How Orkney became the centre of Viking Age violence. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

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Olaf Tryggvason: life of the week. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

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What was it like to be a Viking in the Great Heathen Army?. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Norse women loading and assisting in the maintenance of a Viking longship.

Viking

What were Viking women doing while their men were on violent raids?

Composite image of two early medieval helmets: the ornate Sutton Hoo helmet on the left and a simpler Viking helmet on the right.

Medieval

The Anglo-Saxons were terrified of Vikings. But were they really so different?

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Aud the Deep-Minded: life of the week. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

A skull found in the Wandlebury excavation

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This morbid Viking Age death pit is more mystifying than it first seemed – here’s why

Viking

Season 7Alfred vs the Vikings

Carved stone runestone showing a Viking longship with figures and decorative patterns.

Viking

Meet the mysterious leaders of the Vikings’ most fearsome army

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Beyond the podcastAlfred vs the Vikings

Composite image showing a medieval cesspit excavation alongside historic coins found within the deposit.

Medieval

From health to wealth, here are the strange secrets medieval toilets reveal about life in the Middle Ages

An illustration showing a Viking wearing a silver helmet that comes down over his eyes, holding a circular shield and an axe. Behind him is a large yellow building with arches, tall purple trees and a few other Vikings running along a path

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It was an "extravaganza of brutality": how the Vikings menaced the Mediterranean. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

This 12th-century tapestry detail from Skog Church in Hälsingland, Sweden, depicts key figures from Norse mythology. Odin appears on the left, one-eyed and carrying an axe beside the sacred tree on which he sacrificed himself; Thor stands at the centre with his hammer, Mjölnir; and the fertility god Frey holds an ear of corn.

Viking

Thor was the Vikings’ “archetypal masculine god” – so why did he dress as a bride?

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Inside the Viking battle of the genders. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

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Everything you think you know about Vikings is WRONG. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

This illustration depicts Viking ships arriving in Britain. Though produced centuries after the earliest raids, it reflects how the impact of Norse invasions remained vivid in medieval memory and manuscript culture.

Viking

Forget the longships: this is the overlooked story of how the Vikings dominated eastern Europe

This 6th-century matrix from Torslunda, Sweden, was used to create helmet plaques depicting armed figures — likely berserkers — wearing horned helmets with bird motifs and animal masks. Such imagery evokes the warrior culture later embraced by Viking champions like Thorkell the Tall, a famed Jomsviking commander known for his fierce loyalty and shifting allegiances during the early 11th century.

Viking

Who was Thorkell the Tall? The pragmatic Viking warrior who fought for (and against) all sides

Painting of Rurik and his brothers in helmets and chain mail, holding weapons beside a wooden longship with a carved animal-head prow.

Viking

Why does Putin think Ukraine should be Russian? It’s all to do with the Vikings

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How did the Vikings shape Russia and Ukraine?. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

This 1877 painting by Oscar Wergeland depicts Norwegian settlers arriving in Iceland in 872. Fleeing the unification of Norway under Harald Fairhair, these early migrants laid the foundations of a unique Norse society on the island’s volcanic shores.

Medieval

Could you survive on the Vikings’ furthest frontier? Here’s the dark reality of Norse life on the edge

Juliet Stevenson as Emma of Normandy in BBC drama King and Conqueror (Photo via BBC)

Anglo-Saxon

Emma of Normandy: not just a two-time queen consort of England

This illustration from the Arnamagnæan Collection in Denmark depicts Eric the Red, the Norse explorer who founded the first Norse settlement in Greenland around AD 985.

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A thousand years ago, the Vikings had a shock encounter with Native Americans that ended in disaster

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Erik the Red: life of the week. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

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In his mother’s womb, he was fated to avenge his father – how was pregnancy understood in the Viking age?

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