Dragon Lords: The History and Legends of Viking England

Parker, lecturer in medieval English literature at Oxford University, examines the reasons beyond simple violence and plunder that prompted Vikings to travel to England in this scholarly look at early medieval tales of Danes in England. She sets the stage in her introduction and first chapter with a brief historical account of Scandinavian landings in England, from the 787 CE entry in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (considered to be the first record of a Viking landing) through the kingship of Cnut, sovereign of both England and Denmark in the 11th century. Parker then looks at stories of the sons of Ragnar Lothbrok, Siward, Guy of Warwick, and Havelok, drawing on numerous chronicles, hagiographies, romances, and local oral traditions from the post–Norman Conquest era. Her methodology is less a connecting of dots than an arrangement of story elements into Venn diagrams, showing how certain concepts recur and overlap, such as literary images of a fighting bird associated with Cnut, or the phrase “Dane’s skin,” which refers both (apocryphally) to the leather coverings of medieval church doors and to people with a pale, freckled appearance.. She provides excerpts from her sources in both the original tongues and modern English translations. The translations help to make this work accessible, but the narrow topic will limit its audience to those with a specific interest in the regions discussed. (Sept.)