Viking kings

[quaraga]

wow nice! (though i'm still annoyed that my 5th grade history textbook stated that leif erikson was theking of the vikings where i insist that there must have been at least one other self-proclaimed king)

[gormadoc1]

Quaraga, your textbook must be wrong because the Vikings did'nt have kings until later on in the Dark age, sure they had leaders of villages and clans (groups), but the Vikings built up a wonderful system of democracy.

[wobnam]

The Norse/Scandinavian countries had loads of kings during the viking age.

[gormadoc1]

The Norsemen had no kings until later on in the Dark age, they had Governers of areas that would meet to discuss business of the times.
The Vikings wern't a nation anyway.

[wobnam]

Olav Tryggvason, king of Norway 995-1000
Harald Hardråde, king of Norway 1047-1066
Halfdan Svarte, king of Vestfold
Harald Hårfagre, first king of Norway 872-930
Vikar Haraldsson, king of Agder
Sigrød Haraldsson, king of Trøndelag 935
Eirik Blodøks, King of Norway 933-935
Gudrød Halvdansson Veidekonge, king of Vestfold, Romerike and half of Vingulmark
Olav den Hellige, king of Norway 1015-1028
Håkon den Gode, king of Norway 935-961
Tryggve Olafsson, king of Viken

Just to mention a few.

[Bruce N H]

Hey all,

I split this thread since these posts were going off in a different direction.

Bruce

[gormadoc1]

Thanks Bruce, and wobnam, where's your information from? where's your evidence?
In most cases the the Leaders you are refering to appear as the so called 'Governers' that I refer to.
I admit that the Scandanavian countries had Kings from the tenth century onwards, some leaders like Cnut were the kings of England at one time as well; but the point I'm trying to make is that when the Vikings started off, they were only leaders of areas.
So I guese we can reach a compramise, they started of as leaders, then became Kings.

[wobnam]

Many rulers of smaller areas in Norway before Harald Hårfagre unified it into one kingdom in 872 were called kings (though others were called chiefs, counts, "small kings" etc). I don't know why your sources call them what they do.

Most of my (limited) knowledge on the subject comes from Heimskringla, a collection of Old Norse kings' sagas written by Snorre Sturlason in 1230. A simple google search will probably give you loads of "evidence", though.

they started of as leaders, then became Kings

Is a king not a leader?

[Bruce N H]

Ahem,

Charles VI the Beloved, King of France 1380-1422
Henry VI of England
O, how this discord doth afflict my soul!
Can you, my Lord of Winchester, behold
My sighs and tears and will not once relent?
Who should be pitiful, if you be not?
Louis VI the Fat, King of France 1108-1137
John VI of Portugal, King 1816-1826

Need I go on? Proof positive that there were VI-Kings

Bruce

[Shadowviking]

What in Hel are you on about? You've been shown of list of Viking kings and you just stumble on blindly stating your misinformed opinions.
Does this help? Or will you just ignore that too?

[Aimsworth]

Well.. I HAD started writing out a post about Haraldr Hárfagri/Harald Hårfagre... but it looks like Wobnam & Shadowviking beat me to it... but basically, Harald Hårfagre (Wiki), was the first King of Norway starting somewhere around 872. Well within the 'Viking Age' (Wiki) that spanned the eight to eleventh centuries.

For additional source reference you can check out the Heimskringla ({Old Norse} {T-Eng} {Alt. T-Eng}), that was written down by the infamous Snorri Sturlson (Wiki).

Check it out, it's a nice... 'light' read... hahaha

[Maedhros]

the Vikings built up a wonderful system of democracy.

There's not much to say that wobnam hasn't already, but I'll just give you the modest suggestion that whenever you read about things such as "wonderful systems of democracy" in the medieval, you have most likely met what we'd call an anachronism, or just plain old romantization for that matter.

[gormadoc1]

I think you'll all agree with me that their were no Viking Kings before 850AD.

Europe was in a Dark age, Democracy was quite scarce, of course the church was at the head of this at the time and it continued until about the 16th century.
The Vikings started of as a groups of raiders, they settled and conquered lands in mainland Europe around the 8th century.
When Denmark, Norway and Sweden became kingdoms in the 10th century, it was because the raiding leader's decendents had settled and establihed a community thus creating Kings.
A good example is when in 911AD, the king of France made the viking cheif of Normandy a Duke in return for the Cheif converting to Christianity, this is how the cultures of the noresmen became kingdoms. The Duke's decendents later became the Kings of England in 1066 until 1154, when the Platagenets took power.
So you see the Vikings were like the Celts you could say, settlers, but their events happened a bit later than other cultures.

[Shadowviking]

I think you're contradicting yourself a bit now.
And I see you've edited "until later on in the dark ages" into your earlier posts... real classy.

[gormadoc1]

Well shadowviking, we can all get carried away with moment sometimes, can't we.
May I just say that contradicting may be 'pushing the boat out' a litle bit, you see explanations are needed in some cases.
I'll take the 'classiness' remark as a compliment, so thank you.
And I forgot to add earlier that there is no need for opinions in history, sure monks did it for centuries but you still believe them, right , I'm not pushing my opinions at people I'm stating mere fact, unfortunetley you have to dig around a bit for facts, as primary and secondary sources become confused. God cannot change the past, but historians can