They arrived from the North. Legends soon claimed they felt no fear. Bold, proud, and ambitious, these pioneers stormed history. “Vikings: Journey to New Worlds” takes us on a stunning voyage. We travel to the rugged coasts they explored: Greenland, Iceland, and Newfoundland. For centuries, “Viking” meant terror. Yet, this documentary reveals a more complex picture.
Vikings: Journey to the New World – 3 Key Challenges Read More »
Dr. Sam Willis takes us on an extraordinary journey through Britain’s rich and tumultuous history of invasions that spans thousands of years.
Invasion! with Sam Willis episode 1 Read More »
Vikings episode 2: Neil Oliver heads out from the Scandinavian homelands to Russia, Turkey and Ireland to trace the beginnings of a vast trading empire that handled Chinese silks as adeptly as Pictish slaves. Neil discovers a world of ‘starry-eyed maidens‘ and Buddhist statues that are a world away from our British experience of axe-wielding warriors, although it turns out that there were quite a few of those as well. Neil Oliver’s Vikings episode 2 Shield-maiden A shield-maiden was a female warrior from Scandinavian folklore and mythology. It has long been debated whether shield-maidens were fictional
Neil Oliver’s Vikings episode 2 Read More »
The Last Battle of the Vikings: Nowhere in the British Isles was the Viking connection longer-lasting or deeper than in Scotland. Hundreds of years after their first hit-and-run raids, the Norsemen still dominated huge swathes of the country. But storm clouds were gathering. In 1263 the Norwegian king Haakon IV assembled a fleet of 120 long-ships to counter Scottish raids on the Norse Hebrides. It was a force comparable in size to the Spanish Armada over three centuries later. But like the Armada, the Norse fleet was eventually defeated by a powerful storm. Driven ashore near present-day Largs,
The Last Battle of the Vikings Read More »
The Normans episode 3 – Normans of the South: Professor Robert Bartlett explores the impact of the Normans on southern Europe and the Middle East. The Normans spread south in the 11th century, winning control of southern Italy and the island of Sicily. There they created their most prosperous kingdom, where Christianity and Islam co-existed in relative harmony and mutual tolerance. It became a great centre of medieval culture and learning. But events in the Middle East provoked the more aggressive side of the Norman character. In 1095, the Normans enthusiastically answered the pope’s call for holy war
The Normans episode 3 – Normans of the South Read More »
The Normans episode 2 – Conquest: In the second of this three-part series, Professor Robert Bartlett explores the impact of the Norman conquest of Britain and Ireland. Bartlett shows how William the Conqueror imposed a new aristocracy, savagely cut down opposition and built scores of castles and cathedrals to intimidate and control. He also commissioned the Domesday Book, the greatest national survey of England that had ever been attempted. England adapted to its new masters and both the language and culture were transformed as the Normans and the English intermarried. Bartlett shows how the political and cultural landscape
The Normans episode 2 – Conquest Read More »
The Normans episode 1 – Men from the North: In the first episode of a three-part series, Professor Robert Bartlett explores how the Normans developed from a band of marauding Vikings into the formidable warriors who conquered England in 1066. He tells how the Normans established their new province of Normandy -‘land of the northmen’ – in northern France. They went on to build some of the finest churches in Europe and turned into an unstoppable force of Christian knights and warriors, whose legacy is all around us to this day. Under the leadership of Duke William, the
The Normans episode 1 – Men from the North Read More »
Vikings episode 3: Neil Oliver explores how the Viking Age finally ended, tracing the Norse voyages of discovery, the first Danish kings, and the Christian conversions that opened the door to European high society. He also uncovers the truth about England’s King Canute – he was not an arrogant leader who thought he could hold back the waves, but the Viking ruler of an entire empire of the north and an early adopter of European standardisation. Vikings episode 3 Cnut the Great Cnut Sweynsson, known as Cnut the Great or Canute, was King of Denmark, England
Vikings episode 1: In the first programme, Neil begins by discovering the mysterious world of the Vikings’ prehistoric ancestors. Neil Oliver heads for Scandinavia to reveal the truth behind the legend of the Vikings. The remains of weapons-filled war boats, long-haired Bronze Age farmers and a Swedish site of a royal palace and gruesome pagan rituals conjure up an ancient past from which the Viking Age was to suddenly erupt. Vikings episode 1 Viking Age The Viking Age (793–1066 AD) is a period in the history of the Scandinavians, during which they expanded and built settlements
Viking Women: The Vikings changed Europe forever, yet half of them have almost completely disappeared from collective memory: the women. Quite unjustly so, as they played an important role in the world of the Vikings and performed extraordinary deeds. Viking Women part 1: Sigrun’s Wrath and the Discovery of Iceland Viking women commanded ships and settled colonies. They took up arms and negotiated with emperors. Their traces can now be discovered all the way from America to Kiev. Without their biographies the period of the Vikings stays incomplete. This is the story of Sigrun, in Norway, in
Lost Viking Army – Great Heathen Army: Forty years ago, hundreds of skeletons were unearthed in a mass grave in an English village. Bio-archaeologist Cat Jarman believes these bones are the last remains of the “Great Heathen Army,” a legendary Viking fighting force that invaded England in the ninth century and has long been lost to history. Armed with the latest scientific methods, Cat’s team uncovers extraordinary human stories from the front line, including evidence of women fighters and a lost warrior reunited with his son in death. Great Heathen Army The Great Danish Army, known
Europe’s Last Warrior Kings: the year is 1066. The place is England. King Edward the Confessor has just died and with no true heir to succeed him, three power-hungry warlords set their eyes on the crown. In the coming months, the country will endure three invasions that will end a chapter in Viking history and change the shape of England and Europe forever. Revisit the remarkable year when a real-life drama played out, one full of political schemes, family betrayals, and bloody invasions that culminated in the epic Battle of Hastings. Europe’s Last Warrior Kings Part 1
Europe’s Last Warrior Kings Read More »