THE SAGA OF PRINCE ERIK ‘BRAGI’ RAGNARSON Has Been Added to The Site Under the New Heading The VARANGIANS / UKRAINIANS Book Series – The True History of ‘The Great Viking Manifestation of Medieval Europe’© and the below Post Covers CHAPTER SEVEN:
BOOK TWO: THE SAGA OF PRINCE ERIK ‘BRAGI’ RAGNARSON
A Novel By Brian Howard Seibert
© Copyright by Brian Howard Seibert
7.0 THE SLAUGHTER OF SPEAR ODD (Circa 829 AD)
“And his shield was called ‘Hrae’s Ship’s Round’,
And his followers were called the Hraes’.”
Eyvinder Skald-Despoiler; Skaldskaparmal
(829 AD) Three longships snaked along the bends of Stavanger Fjord and brushed past Rennes Isle before heading out into the North Sea and sailing south down the coast of Thule. Erik called out the cadence of the rowing by stout young men from the district of Lither. His new ship, Fair Faxi, parted the sea for his brother, Roller, in Ragnar’s old longship and the skald, Eyvind Ingvarson, followed up with a third crew of warriors in Brak’s old longship. Erik and Eyvind had matched each other poem for poem the night before and held each other in the highest of regard, and the rising son of Ragnar sensed he would have need of a skald to record the revenge he now planned for his father. And it was an impartial Swedish skald, Eyvind, who captained the third ship, ready to do just that. No Raven Banner fluttered from the masts of the ships as they stealthily slipped along down the coast.
The three ships then sailed east from Thule, cutting dark waves with their forestems, but lost the favourable winds once they hit the Skagerrak Sea. The sails were folded, and the masts were unfooted as a warm breeze blew steady from the southeast. The oars thrummed in unison to a beat set by Erik. The young man stood proud at the head of his newfound ship and barked out the rhythm for a speed he gauged would soon bring them into Oddi’s sea realm. Ragnar’s longship followed in his wake and Brak’s ship trailed. Roller steadied himself against the forestem of his ship and listened as Erik shouted from the afterstem of Fair Faxi.
“Oddi will know when we come,” Erik shouted across the waves.
“You think he travels the waves without a boat?” Roller replied, laughing.
Erik sensed that Oddi would know of their arrival. The captured Danes he had questioned back at The Vik had alluded to some kind of signal system that Oddi had set up to forewarn the Danes of attack. Erik did not know the method of transmitting information, but he surmised from the perusal of Brak’s old charts that a likely signal point in a warning system would be on a small unnamed island off the coast of Gotland, so that is where he had set their course. He would gamble on this hunch and had decided to play it to the hilt. “We’ll approach the isle I told you of from the east and I’ll show you how he does it,” Erik shouted.
The Norwegian ships were anchored off Smaland and their crews waited for sunset, then rowed them toward the isle out of the dusk, beaching the ships on the eastern shore. Erik, Roller and a squad of ten men headed inland, leaving Eyvind in command of the rest. They passed through a forest of oak and beach and they discovered a wooden tower set upon a wooded hill. The tower was a crude four column affair made of timbers from the surrounding woods lashed together to a total height of sixty feet. Several scaling ladders, tied together against the east side of it, led up to a round platform, with a handrail around it and a conical thatch above. Erik saw a lone lookout perched upon a stool in the centre of the platform. He dispersed his men into the surrounding woods in search of further Danes while he and Roller stepped boldly into the tower clearing and addressed the lookout on the platform.
“Hrae!” Erik shouted. “Have you seen three Norwegian ships hereabout?” The lookout stared down at the two Norsemen in shock.
“If not,” Roller added, “you’d better signal Oddi and tell him they’re here, because, believe me, we are.”
“Now, come down from your perch,” Erik continued, his arms akimbo, “and tell us how you signal Oddi, cause we’re just spoiling to meet him three on three.”
“I’ll not come down,” the sentinel shouted in the Norse Danish of Zealand, and, no matter how many times the brothers guaranteed his safety and assured him that they only wanted him to do his job and signal Oddi, he would not come down. By this time, Erik’s men were returning from their search of the surrounding area, so Erik had them gather up wood and pile it round the two wooden columns furthest from the scaling ladders.
“Come down,” Erik shouted, “or we’ll set the tower ablaze.” There came no response from the platform. Erik had his men set the wood piles alight and soon flames were lapping their way up the columns. When the flames were licking at the platform edge and the handrail caught fire on the far side, the sentinel decided perhaps he should try his luck with the Vikings, as they could be no more merciless than the conflagration below him. With a nimbleness born of dire circumstance the watchman swung himself over the platform edge and onto the ladder. He scampered down it with practiced ease and landed in the midst of the Norwegians. Some of the men held him while Roller bound him up.
“How do you signal Oddi,” Erik asked, but the sentinel was as tight lipped in custody as he had been atop the tower. “Lash him to his tower column,” Erik ordered his men, and they pulled him up against the nearest pillar. The Dane could feel the heat of the flames off the burning columns behind him and he could feel the tower quaking as it prepared to collapse in upon itself. Hot cinders drifted down onto his head and shoulders from the blazing platform up above. When his hair began to smoulder, he relented.
“You shall fight Oddi three on three?” he asked excitedly and, when Erik nodded, he went on. “We signal by bonfire at night, one fire for each ship under ten and larger fires for each ten above. Oddi faces his enemies with an equal number of ships, never more, never less. That, he claims, is why he always wins and that is why he needs to know the strength of his foe. Cut me loose and I shall signal him for you.”
“You are the only lookout?” Roller asked.
“Yes,” the Dane stammered. “Now cut me loose and I’ll signal Oddi for you.”
Erik had his men cut the lookout loose, leaving the tower a flaming conflagration, and the Dane led them to a nearby clearing at the top of a hillock that faced out to sea toward the coast of Smaland. The Dane could see the three Viking ships on the beach far below. Along the clearing were stacks of cord wood ready for the making of signal fires. The Dane began directing the men where to build the fires while explaining the signal code to Erik. “For three ships I’d build three smaller fires, while for, say, thirteen I would build one large bonfire and then three smaller ones after it. King Oddi says it’s Roman numbering. And if I put the smaller fires on the other side of the large fire, this number is subtracted from the total. This system King Oddi taught me himself,” the watchman added proudly. So Erik’s men built three woodpiles where the Dane told them to and, when darkness came, they lit the fires.
Erik stared into the nearest bonfire and watched the flames dance in the night, tongues of red and yellow and white splaying crazily between logs that crackled and popped and hissed steam and liquor from their severed butts, grizzled old wounds dripping with sapling gore. “Soon the stalwart oaks of Oddi will be dripping their gore,” Erik mused to his men and he wondered about this path he was on.
The bonfires did their night’s work and set off a chain of signals down the coast of Smaland and Halland all the way to the island of Zealand. When King Oddi learned of the intrusion he assembled a contingent to meet the Norwegians. Erik’s ships searched for signs of Oddi, but they made no contact with him until, while beached on a shoreline in Skane, a landing party led by Roller discovered seven ships of Oddi’s anchored in a sheltered cove just on the other side of a peninsula. Roller discussed what he had found with Erik and Eyvind, adding that Oddi must have seen their ships approach from his hidden position and he was in a quandary as to why the Danes had not attacked them at once.
“He awaits four more ships,” Erik answered. “Oddi always attacks with an equal number of ships. He is expecting seven and he awaits four more.” Erik had the Danish captive brought to their campfire. “Oddi expects seven ships,” he lectured the lookout. The Dane flashed Erik a genuine look of surprise. “You had expected us to find thirteen ships,” Erik went on, “but Oddi has brought only seven.”
“I must have misjudged the watchtower’s location. You had it burning real good,” the Dane admitted. “I didn’t think you were really going to meet Oddi three on three, but were setting a trap for him, so I tried to give my sea-king as much of an edge as possible.”
“But I have set a trap for Oddi and we close it tonight. Seven ships will do. I had hoped for the thirteen but seven will do. We shall attack at dawn.”
Erik had his men lead away the treacherous Dane and then Erik spelled out his plan. “We must now unleash the element that Oddi is professed to control.” Erik, Roller and five picked men set out in the dark of night in a four oared boat. With short silent strokes, they reached the cove where the Danish ships were anchored, instead of beached, due to the quantity of catapult ton-stones that Oddi had them loaded up with. It was ton-stones from Sweden that Oddi had caused to hail down on Hrafn Ketil’s stranded fleet. Normally, longships could endure the blows of the smaller catapults that could be deck mounted, but the triple density of ton-stones gave their impacts greater timber shattering capabilities. Erik sensed that it would be a thousand years before ton-stones would be used as projectiles in battle again.
The seven catapult equipped ships were arrayed in three columns with three ships anchored and lashed end to end down the centre and columns of two on either side, so the seven Norwegians each picked a ship, Erik reserving Oddi’s mighty dragon ship for himself, and they swam silently to the side of each. The men then augured holes in the ships’ strakes just below the waterline. The gentle lapping of the waves kept the sentries aboard the ships from picking up any noises and soon a near frozen contingent had completed their sabotage and returned to the warmth of their cloaks and their boat. Erik figured a dozen holes per ship should see the fleet up to its decks in water by dawn.
And with the heavy stones the ships were holding, first light found the Danes up to their knees in water bailing for their lives. Oddi’s warriors were all aboard fighting off the waves with buckets and pitchers. So great was the rush to save the ships, that most of the Danes had taken only enough time to buckle sword about waist before swimming out to their foundering vessels. Their spears and their bows, their war axes and their shields, all were left in camp, save for the shields of a few poor swimmers who had employed them as paddleboards in the crossing. The Danes were already cold, wet and exhausted when Fair Faxi cleared the head of the cove with Erik at her forestem, Tyrfingr in his hand, a burnished blade flashing the Danes a warning of their fate in the fast-rising autumn light.
“We need not conjure up a storm to beach the ships of the Danes,” Erik shouted to Roller as the other two ships hove into view and ploughed their way into the cove. Many of the Danes leaped into the waves and swam for their weapons while others remained on board, bailing for all they were worth. Fair Faxi circled the Danish fleet and blocked the path of the swimmers, her crew firing arrows at the distressed Danish warriors. Erik stood at the forestem beside a large basket of arrows and fired the darts off his powerful bow so fast and furious he wore through his bowstring before he was done. Roller and Eyvind’s longships flanked the sinking fleet and fired volley after volley of arrows, the deadly shafts piercing the bailing Danes in the midst of their struggles. The constant thrush of bowstrings and the continual hiss of arrows in flight, followed by their solid thuds and the sickening crush of softer penetrations, soon had the fierce Danish warriors unnerved. Oddi was at the head of his dragonship, leading a group of men in an attempt to set up a catapult, but their attackers were too close and the deck too exposed. When the Norwegians had exhausted their arrows, they pulled their ships alongside the two outer rows of the fleet. They leapt down onto the flooded and bloodied decks of the Danes and slew the survivors of the airborne onslaught. Fair Faxi had by then turned upon the centre column and had swept the deck of the nearest ship, then Erik had his men row upon the centremost vessel, Oddi’s dragonship, which, due to its size, still sat with its deck above the waves, and lashing hooks were thrown over the bulwarks. Boarding planks were dropped across the top strakes and Erik led a well armed crew onto the gore spattered deck of Oddi’s ship. A fierce battle raged up and down the deck planks, for the Danes, though poorly armoured, wielded their weapons with a ferocity as if they followed Odin himself, and Oddi, a true berserk, was at the forestem of his ship, in the midst of a fury and no steel could harm him. Erik fought his way to the foredeck, Tyrfingr wailing out his progress, and Oddi did him the favour of working his way back until the two fell into personal combat.
“Your other ships,” Oddi growled in a voice that sounded more bear-like than human. “Where are they?”
Tyrfingr swept down in a powerful arc as the two traded blows and Oddi’s great two-fisted battle sword shattered under the impact. “There’s always been…just three of us,” Erik shouted and he drove Tyrfingr deep into the bared chest of Oddi. The great Danish sea-king gripped the blade of Tyrfingr in his hands so tightly Erik could not withdraw it and, as Oddi’s life blood spurted out the gore-letting grooves, and he sank to his knees with his efforts, he struggled to speak through the berserker’s rage and his voice cleared as the fury left him.
“You have found favour with Tyr,” Oddi gasped, “but Odin shall possess you in the end.” Oddi grew deathly pale as the rage left him and he grasped Erik’s hand over the hilt of Tyrfingr. “Your first-born shall be named after me and I shall watch over him from Valhall.” Then Oddi let loose of Tyrfingr and Erik pulled his blade free and the sea king toppled forward, and he died face down at Erik’s feet, and the first of the water to wash the ship’s deck ran over to him in a long straying rivulet and it washed away the gore that was pooling about his countenance.
When the great Sea-King Oddi had fallen, all fighting stopped as both sides witnessed his death. It would be a most famous death and poems and songs would be composed about it and all who had witnessed it would share in this fame, so the remaining Danish warriors did not bother to take up their weapons after that and allowed themselves to be taken into captivity and were bent over their shields and penetrated from behind. Of the seven ships under Oddi only his great dragon-ship remained above the waves and carried any survivors. The rest had been boarded and their crews slaughtered, for so bravely had the Danes struggled that the crews of the smaller ships had fought to the last man. Erik ordered the captured Danes taken aboard his father’s longship and they all left the deck of the great dragon ship. When the waves reached the oar-ports the ship quickly slid beneath the surface, taking King Oddi to a watery grave. A great calm swept across the cove as seven awkward fingers, ship’s masts, clawed up at the firmament and announced to the gods ‘this is where King Oddi has fallen’.
Following the destruction of Oddi’s fleet, the Norwegian ships set sail south for the island of Laeso in search of much needed supplies. There, they found a people groaning under the burden of Frodi’s taxation and facing winter with hardly more rations than they themselves possessed. It was while resting at Laeso as guests in the leader’s greathall that Erik experienced a forewarning of his father’s death, and he expressed his fears to Roller and Eyvind. “Last night, in a dream, I saw Hraegunar’s fylgja and by this I know that father is soon to die,” he explained. “He will be in need of his longship, and Eyvind should be there to recite him a drapa of our victory and Hraelauger…you should be there with your mother.”
“While I agree,” Roller started, “that Eyvind should return home, I must insist on going on with you, Hraerik. Someone must cover your back and who else, but a brother can do this?”
“Aye,” Eyvind agreed. “Hraegunar will be needing a drapa of this great slaughter and his longship for his burial howe, but those are things that I can provide.”
“I had hoped,” Erik said, “to find Frodi’s twelve berserks with Oddi and to have destroyed the whole lot in one fell swoop, but my trap fell short half a dozen ships and now I find I must face them on their own ground, in Frodi’s royal house at Liere. My plans become too dangerous to share. The news of Oddi’s destruction is by now up and down the coast, for such is the way news travels hereabouts and I might be better off to go it alone. The Danes could hardly suspect one ship of destroying Oddi’s fleet.”
“As usual, dear brother, your argument is good. Eyvind should take both ships back to Norway, sailing father’s ship back home and sending Brak’s with the captives on to the Vik and King Gotar.”
Everyone agreed to this plan, so Eyvind took the supplies and the captives and the two longships north, while Erik and Roller resumed their southward journey in Fair Faxi. They had thanked the Jarl and his wife and daughter for their hospitality, sparing them any pillaging, and off the north-east coast of Zealand, the now famished Norwegian crew sighted a herd of cattle grazing by the shore. Erik surveyed the coastline, then sent some men ashore in a four-oared boat with orders to slaughter a cow. They returned with three carcases. Erik had the beef hauled aboard and they set off on their way once again while Erik upbraided his men for their greed. “One cow might not be missed,” he explained, “but three head shall be noticed very quickly,” then Erik wondered if his men could have known it was exactly three cows that he needed. Erik’s anger was soon to be justified, but for now they were content to row a safe distance from the site of their crime and set to boiling the meat of one cow in the ship’s huge kettle. When they were dressing down the carcases, Erik had the men strip and clean the small intestine of one. Into this he inserted a length of horse-hair rope and, as the sheath shrank, they became as one. Erik coiled the length of intestine and always kept it nearby and, every once in a while, he would study its condition until his men thought this behaviour quite curious. Once again, they resumed their journey southward and soon Erik sighted a half dozen fast twelve-oared boats closing in on his ship as they followed the Zealand coastline. The local cattlemen, on learning of the theft, assembled a small fleet of vigilantes and set out in search of the pirates. Erik instructed his men to lash meat hooks to three ropes, then he gaffed the two remaining carcases and cast all three lines into the sea. With the submerged beef trailing, Erik allowed the vigilante boats to overtake Fair Faxi.
“Hoi! Longship!” the leader of the vigilantes shouted in Anglish Danish. “Prepare to have us pull alongside.”
“One boat only,” Erik replied in Anglish, and he had his men raise their left bank of oars.
As the leader’s boat pulled up alongside he shouted, “Who are you and what is your business in King Frodi’s waters?”
Erik looked down upon a handsome young officer of the royal Danish navy and said, “I am Hraerik Bragi Boddason of Norway. Liere is our destination and merchanting is our business.” He paused a moment then added, “And you sir…you look like you’re out to correct some mischief.”
“Quite true, I fear. We are investigating a cattle theft which occurred up the coast. Have you seen anyone who might be responsible?”
“Not hereabouts, but we did see three Viking ships north of here three days ago. At first, we thought they might attack, but they looked as though they were off to some mighty battle. That is of course conjecture, and I’m sure you have speculations of your own that I think a short inspection of our ship might clear up. A boat has few corners in which to hide a beef, sir.” Erik thrust down his hand and the two captains locked arms and Erik yarded the Dane up into his ship as though he were a child.
“That it does, sir,” the Danish officer said, straightening out his gear. “And fewer yet in which to hide three, for that is how many were slaughtered.” The vigilante walked partway down the ship’s deck then stopped and returned to the foredeck. “You seem to be totally lacking in supplies altogether, sir, and you’ve three lines slung off the far side of your ship,” the Danish officer said, squinting his eyes suspiciously. “And that coil you have by your feet,” he added, “looks to be fresh calf’s gut.”
“As for supplies,” Erik explained, “we find that good silver buys us fresher meals than makes salty stores. Your Sea-King Oddi, assured us that supplies could be purchased from the local farmers, but, alas, it seems that no one has enough to spare with winter coming on.”
“You’ve met up with King Odd?” the Dane asked excitedly.
“Why again, three days ago plying up the coast of Skane with six more ships in tow. He spoke highly of your farmers and cattlemen. He had little good to say for sailors and merchants, I’m afraid.”
“That sounds like Odd all right. There is a rumour up and down the coast that Odd’s fleet was destroyed by three Viking ships. I was sent out from Liere to investigate this tale and I thought the three missing head might lead me to three pirate ships.”
“Oddi dead?” Erik exclaimed in astonishment. “These waters turn out to be more dangerous than your sea-king, Oddi, had forecast.”
The Danish captain put his hand to his chin in heavy contemplation. “You’ve yet to explain that fresh calf gut at your feet or those three lines over your bulwark,” he said sternly.
“Why, the calf gut is said to be the very rope that hanged King Vikar,” Erik said, matter of factly. “I have found it in my merchant travels and now wish to present it as a gift to your King Frodi, if he will see me.”
“If you’ve seen Odd, I’m sure King Frodi shall be very anxious to speak with you. Now the lines?”
“Why, we fish for the Midgard Serpent, sir,” Erik explained. “I don’t believe that Thor has slain the earth girding worm, so I always have lines let out that I might catch the beast.”
“You seem well steeped in the ancient lore, but, if there is only one serpent, why have you let out three lines?”
Erik took up a great battle axe, walked over to the bulwark and hacked away two lines. “We can catch the worm with just one line, if you wish,” Erik replied. The Dane had followed him over and quickly began yarding up on the last line when Erik added, “We may very well have caught the great serpent already,” and Erik raised the axe up high as though ready to strike the worm a mortal blow. “You draw up the line and I shall smite the beast.”
“There doesn’t seem to be a beast on it,” the Dane replied. “Perhaps you’d best proceed to Liere and leave the serpent for Thor to deal with. Meantime, I seem to have three serpents of my own to deal with…the Vikings who may have slaughtered King Odd. They must be true berserks to have caused King Frodi so much grief.” He backed away from Erik, always keeping his eyes upon the uplifted axe, and he climbed back over the top strake and jumped into his boat. “You shall no doubt be in Liere before me so let the authorities know what you’ve told me of King Odd. Tell them you’ve spoken with Lieutenant Einar Cuff of King Frodi’s navy.”
The Danish boats began rowing north up the coast and Fair Faxi continued her southward journey.
Chapter 8: LANDING AT LIERE (Circa 829 AD) of BOOK 2: THE SAGA OF PRINCE ERIK ‘BRAGI’ RAGNARSON shall follow on next Post or may be found under Heading of The VARANGIANS / UKRAINIANS Book Series – The True History of ‘The Great Viking Manifestation of The Middle Ages’© in Book Two: The Saga of Prince Erik ‘Bragi’ Ragnarson.
Note: This website is about Vikings and Varangians and the way they lived over a thousand years ago. The content is as explicit as Vikings of that time were and scenes of violence and sexuality are depicted without reservation or apology. Reader discretion is advised.
The VARANGIANS / UKRAINIANS or The Nine Books of Saxo’s Danish History Per Brian Howard Seibert
BOOK ONE: The Saga of King Ragnar ‘Lothbrok’ Sigurdson
King Ragnar ‘Lothbrok’ Sigurdson’s third wife, Princess Aslaug, was a young survivor of the Saga of the Volsungs and was a daughter of King Sigurd ‘the Dragon-Slayer’ Fafnirsbane, so this is where Ragnar’s story begins in almost all the ancient tales (except Saxo’s). In our series, we explore this tail end of the Volsungs Saga because King Sigurd appears to be the first ‘Dragon-Slayer’ and King Ragnar ‘Lothbrok’ would seem to be the second so, it is a good opportunity to postulate the origins of Fire Breathing Dragons and how they were slain. King Ragnar would lose his Zealand Denmark to the Anglish Danes of Jutland, who spoke Anglish, as did the majority of Vikings who attacked England, which spoke both Anglish and Saxon languages, sometimes mistakenly called a common Anglo-Saxon language. The Angles and Saxons of England never really did get along, as shall be demonstrated in the following books. King Ragnar assuaged the loss of Zealand by taking York or Jorvik, the City of the Boar, in Angleland and Stavanger Fjord in Thule from which he established his Nor’Way trade route into Scythia.
BOOK TWO: The Saga of Prince Erik ‘Bragi’ Ragnarson
Book Two of the Nine Book The Varangians / Ukrainians Series places The Saga of Prince Erik ‘Bragi’ Ragnarson from Book Five of The First Nine Books of the Danish History of Saxo Grammaticus (c. 1200 AD) about King Frodi ‘the Peaceful’ into its proper chronological location in history. In 1984, when I first started work on the book, I placed Prince Erik’s birth at circa 800 CE, but it has since been revised to 810 CE to better reflect the timelines of the following books in the series. Saxo had originally placed the saga at the time of Christ’s birth and later experts have placed the story at about 400 CE to correspond with the arrival of the Huns on the European scene but, when Attila was driven back to Asia, the Huns didn’t just disappear, they joined the Khazar Empire, just north of the Caspian Sea, and helped the Khazars control the western end of the famous Silk Road Trade Route. Princes Erik and Roller, both sons of Ragnar ‘Lothbrok’, sail off to Zealand to avenge their father’s loss, but Erik falls in love with Princess Gunwar, the sister of the Anglish King Frodi of Jutland and, after his successful Battle Upon the Ice, wherein he destroys the House of Westmar, Erik marries Gunwar and both brothers become King Frodi’s foremost men instead, and the story moves on to the founding of Hraes’ and Gardar Ukraine.
BOOK THREE: The Saga of Prince Helgi ‘Arrow Odd’ Erikson
Book Three, The Saga of Prince Helgi ‘Arrow Odd’ Erikson, recreates Arrow Odd’s Saga of circa 1200 AD to illustrate how Arrow Odd was Prince Helgi (Oleg in Slavic) Erikson of Kiev, by showing that their identical deaths from the bite of a snake was more than just coincidence. The book investigates the true death of Ragnar ‘Lothbrok’ by poisoned blood-snakes in York or Jorvik, the ‘City of the Boar’, and how his curse of ‘calling his young porkers to avenge the old boar’ sets up a death spiral between swine and snake that lasts for generations. The book then illustrates the famous Battle of the Berserks on Samso, where Helgi ‘Arrow Odd’ and Hjalmar ‘the Brave’ slay the twelve berserk grandsons of King Frodi on the Danish Island of Samso, setting up a death struggle that takes the Great Pagan Army of the Danes from Denmark to ravage Norway and then England and on to Helluland in Saint Brendan’s Newfoundland. A surprise cycle of vengeance manifests itself in the ‘death by snakebite’ of Helgi ‘Arrow Odd’.
BOOK FOUR: The Saga of Prince Ivar ‘the Boneless’ Erikson
Book Four, The Saga of Prince Ivar ‘the Boneless’ Erikson, reveals how Ivar ‘the Boneless’ Ragnarson was actually Prince Eyfur or Ivar (Igor in Slavic) Erikson of Kiev and then King Harde Knute ‘the First’ of Denmark. By comparing a twenty year lacuna in the reign of Prince Igor in The Hraes’ Primary Chronicle with a coinciding twenty year appearance of a King Harde Knute (Hard Knot) of Denmark in European Chronicles, Prince Igor’s punishment by sprung trees, which reportedly tore him apart, may have rather just left him a boneless and very angry young king. Loyal Danes claimed, “It was a hard knot indeed that sprung those trees,” but his conquered English subjects, not being quite as polite, called him, Ivar ‘the Boneless’. The book expands on the death curse of Ragnar ‘Lothbrok’ and the calling of ‘his young porkers to avenge the old boar’ when Ivar leaves his first son, King Gorm (Snake) ‘the Old’, to rule in Denmark and his last son, Prince Svein (Swine) ‘the Old’ to rule in Hraes’, further setting up the death spiral between the swine and snake of the ‘Lothbrok’ curse.
BOOK FIVE: The Saga of Prince Svein ‘the Old’ Ivarson
Book Five, The Saga of Prince Svein ‘the Old’ Ivarson, demonstrates how Prince Sveinald (Sviatoslav in Slavic) ‘the Brave’ of Kiev was really Prince Svein ‘the Old’ Ivarson of Kiev, who later moved to Norway and fought to become King Sweyn ‘Forkbeard’ of Denmark and England. But before being forced out of Russia, the Swine Prince sated his battle lust by crushing the Khazars and then attacking the great great grandfather of Vlad the Impaler in a bloody campaign into the ‘Heart of Darkness’ of Wallachia that seemed to herald the coming of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse and included the famed 666 Salute of the Army of the Impalers. The campaign was so mortifying that the fifteen thousand pounds of gold that the Emperor of Constantinople paid him to attack the Army of the Impalers seemed not nearly enough, so Prince Svein attacked the Eastern Roman Empire itself. He came close to defeating the greatest empire in the world, but lost and was forced to leave Hraes’ to his three sons. He returned to the Nor’Way and spent twelve years rebuilding Ragnar’s old trade route there.
BOOK SIX: The Saga of Grand Prince Valdamar ‘the Great’ Sveinson
Book Six, The Saga of Grand Prince Valdamar ‘the Great’ Sveinson, establishes how Grand Prince Valdamar (Vladimir in Slavic) ‘the Great’ of Kiev, expanded the Hraes’ Empire and his own family Hamingja by marrying 700 wives that he pampered in estates in and around Kiev. Unlike his father, Svein, he came to the aid of a Roman Emperor, leading six thousand picked Varangian cataphracts against Anatolian rebels, and was rewarded with the hand of Princess Anna Porphyrogennetos of Constantinople, a true Roman Princess born of the purple who could trace her bloodline back to Julius and Augustus Caesar. She was called ‘Czarina’, and after her, all Hraes’ Grand Princes were called ‘Czars’ and their offspring were earnestly sought after, matrimonially, by European royalty.
BOOK SEVEN: The Saga of King Sweyn ‘Forkbeard’ Ivarson
In The Saga of King Sweyn ‘Forkbeard’ Ivarson, Prince Svein anonymously takes the name of Sweyn ‘Forkbeard’ in Norway and befriends the Jarls of Lade in Trondheim Fjord in Norway as he expands the Nor’Way trade route of his grandfather, Ragnar ‘Lothbrok’. He had come close to defeating the Eastern Roman Empire, and still felt that he was due at least a shared throne in Constantinople. He used the gold from the Nor’Way trade to rebuild his legions and his Hraes’ cataphracts and though his brother, King Gorm ‘the Old’, was dead, his son, Sweyn’s nephew, King Harald ‘Bluetooth’ Gormson had usurped the throne of Denmark and had hired the famed Jomsvikings to attack Prince Sweyn in Norway, setting up the famous Battle of Hjorungavagr in a fjord south of Lade. King Sweyn ‘Forkbeard’ would emerge from that confrontation and then he would defeat King Olaf Tryggvason of Norway in the Battle of Svolder in 1000 AD, in an engagement precipitated over the hand of Queen Sigrid ‘the Haughty’ of Sweden. Later he attacked England in revenge for the following St. Brice’s Day Massacre of Danes in 1002 AD and he fought a protracted war with the Saxon King Aethelred ‘the Unready’ that could only be described as the harvesting of the English for sale as slaves in Baghdad and Constantinople. With the help of his son, Prince Valdamar of Kiev, and the legions and cataphracts of Hraes’, he conquered England on Christmas Day of 1013, but victory was not kind to him.
BOOK EIGHT: The Saga of King Canute ‘the Great’ Sweynson
Prince Valdamar ‘the Great’ Sveinson of Kiev, who had supported his father, King Sweyn ‘Forkbeard’ of Denmark in attacks upon England left his ‘Czar’ sons in charge of Hraes’ and took over as King Valdamar of England, but the Latin Christian English revolted against his eastern name and Orthodox Christian religion and brought King Aethelred back from exile in Normandy and Valdamar had to return to Hraes’ and gather up the legions he had already sent back after his father’s victory. His half brother was ruling in Denmark and his sons were ruling in Hraes’ so, in 1015 AD Grand Prince Valdamar ‘the Great’ of Kiev was written out of Hraes’ history and in 1016 the Latin Christian Prince Canute ‘the Great’ returned to England to reclaim his throne. He defeated Aethelred’s son, King Edmund ‘Ironside’ of England, at the Battle of Assandun to become King Canute ‘the Great’ of England and later King Knute ‘the Great’ of Denmark and Norway as well. But that is just the start of his story and later Danish Christian Kings would call his saga, and the sagas of his forefathers, The Lying Sagas of Denmark, and would set out to destroy them, claiming that, “true Christians will never read these Sagas”.
BOOK NINE: The Saga of King William ‘the Conqueror’ Robertson
The Third Danish Conquest of Angleland was seen to herald the end of the Great Viking Manifestation of the Middle Ages, but this, of course, was contested by the Vikings who were still in control of it all. Danish Varangians still ruled in Kiev and Danes still ruled the Northern Empire of Canute ‘the Great’, for the Normans were but Danish Vikings that had taken up the French language, and even Greenland and the Newfoundland were under Danish control in a Hraes’ Empire that ran from the Silk Road of Cathay in the east to the Mayan Road of Yucatan in the west. “We are all the children of Ragnar ‘Lothbrok’,” Queen Emma of Normandy often said. Out of sheer spite the Saxons of England took over the Varangian Guard of Constantinople and would continue their fight against the Normans in Southern Italy as mercenaries of the Byzantine Roman Empire. They would lose there as well, when in the Fourth Crusade of 1204, the Norman Danes would sack the City of Constantinople and hold it long enough to stop the Mongol hoards that would crush the City of Kiev. It would be Emperor Baldwin ‘the First’ of Flanders and Constantinople who would defeat the Mongol Mongke Khan in Thrace. But the Mongols would hold Hraes’ for three hundred years and this heralded the end of the Great Viking Manifestation. The Silk Road was dead awaiting Marco Polo for its revival. But the western Mayan Road would continue to operate for another hundred years until another unforeseen disaster struck. Its repercussions would be witnessed by the Spanish conquerors who followed Christopher Columbus a hundred and fifty years later in the Valley of the Mound Builders.
Conclusion:
By recreating the lives of four generations of Hraes’ Ukrainian Princes and exhibiting how each generation, in succession, later ascended to their inherited thrones in Denmark, the author proves the parallels of the dual rules of Hraes’ Ukrainian Princes and Danish Kings to be cumulatively more than just coincidence. And the author proves that the Danish Kings Harde Knute I, Gorm ‘the Old’ and Harald ‘Bluetooth’ Gormson/Sweyn ‘Forkbeard’ were not Stranger Kings, but were Danes of the Old Jelling Skioldung Fridlief/Frodi line of kings who only began their princely careers in Hraes’ and returned to their kingly duties in Denmark with a lot of Byzantine Roman ideas and heavy cavalry and cataphracts.
SeiberTeck: 'The Varangians Series' 