Harald Hardrada

Harald Sigurdsson, known as Harald Hardrada, ruled Norway from 1046 until he was killed invading England in 1066. Before taking the throne he spent some fifteen years as a soldier of fortune in Rus' and in the Byzantine Empire, returning home immensely rich. His death at Stamford Bridge is often taken as the close of the Viking Age.

Much of Harald's story comes from Icelandic sagas, above all Snorri Sturluson's Heimskringla, written about two centuries after his death and full of colourful episodes. Contemporary or near-contemporary writers, such as Adam of Bremen and the Byzantine author of the Strategikon of Kekaumenos, confirm the outline of his career, but details such as a romance with the Byzantine empress Zoe or his personal blinding of an emperor rest on saga tradition. Even his famous nickname, roughly "severe" or "hard in counsel", is mainly found in later sagas; some early British sources call him Harald Fairhair instead.

Harald was born around 1015 in Ringerike, in eastern Norway, the son of a local king, Sigurd Syr, and Åsta, who was also the mother of King Olaf Haraldsson, later Saint Olaf. At about fifteen he fought for Olaf at the Battle of Stiklestad on 29 July 1030, a failed attempt to win back Norway from Cnut the Great. Olaf was killed and Harald, wounded, escaped through Sweden to Kievan Rus', where Yaroslav the Wise made him a captain in his army.

Around 1034 Harald and roughly 500 followers went on to Constantinople and joined the Varangian Guard, the emperor's Scandinavian bodyguard. He fought Arab pirates in the Mediterranean, campaigned in Asia Minor and Mesopotamia, took part in the Byzantine attempt to reconquer Sicily from 1038, and fought in southern Italy and against a Bulgarian rising. The sagas also send him to Jerusalem, perhaps escorting pilgrims. In the palace upheavals of 1042 he was briefly imprisoned, then joined the revolt that toppled Michael V. He sent his growing fortune to Yaroslav for safekeeping and that year slipped out of Constantinople against the emperor's wishes. Back in Kiev he married Yaroslav's daughter Elisiv.

Returning west in 1045 and 1046, Harald allied with the Danish claimant Sweyn Estridsson against his nephew, Magnus the Good, who now ruled both Norway and Denmark. In 1046 Magnus agreed to share Norway with him in return for half of Harald's treasure. When Magnus died the next year, Harald became sole king.

He then spent almost every year from 1048 to 1064 raiding Denmark in an effort to take Sweyn's kingdom, burning the trading town of Hedeby in 1049 and winning a great sea battle at Niså in 1062, but he never conquered the country, and in 1064 the two kings made peace on the old borders. At home he broke the power of the Earls of Lade, whose leader Einar Thambarskelfir was killed by his men, and harshly crushed resistance in the Uplands. Historians credit him with a royal coinage, trade with the east, the spread of churches, and possibly the founding of Oslo, which later sagas attribute to him.

Harald claimed England through an old agreement between Magnus and Harthacnut. When Edward the Confessor died in January 1066 and Harold Godwinson took the crown, Harold's exiled brother Tostig joined the Norwegian king. Harald sailed by way of Orkney with perhaps 10,000 to 15,000 men in 240 to 300 ships. On 20 September he defeated the northern earls at Fulford, outside York, and the city submitted.

On 25 September, however, Harold Godwinson arrived unexpectedly at Stamford Bridge and caught the Norwegians lightly armoured, with a third of their men left at the ships. Harald was killed by an arrow to the throat early in the Battle of Stamford Bridge. The survivors reportedly needed only 20 to 25 ships to go home. Weeks later Harold himself fell to William the Conqueror at Hastings, his army worn by the double campaign.

Our 1000 map shows Norway and its neighbours early in his century, and our 1100 map shows the kingdoms of Scandinavia and England after the upheavals of 1066.