32 Facts About Eric Bloodaxe

Eric Bloodaxe ruled as King of Norway from 932 to 934, and twice as King of Northumbria: from 947 to 948, and again from 952 to 954.

The sagas usually explain it as referring to Eric Bloodaxe's slaying of his half-brothers in a ruthless struggle to monopolise his rule over Norway; Theodoricus gives the similar nickname fratrum interfector.

Eric Bloodaxe's son was known as: Henricus or Haericus [Latin form] and brother as Ragnald or Reginaldus [Latin form].

The account of Heimskringla, which claims that Harald had enjoyed the company of eleven consorts before Ragnhildr, and that of Egils saga are at variance with the suggestion elsewhere that Eric Bloodaxe was one of the oldest, if not the eldest son of Harald.

Saga tradition is unanimous that Eric Bloodaxe did cohabit with a woman named Gunnhild.

Eric Bloodaxe's name occurs in a handful of Egill's lausavisur.

An early suggestion is that the name for the king in York in the Life of Cathroe has been erroneously supplanted for Eric Bloodaxe's predecessor Amlaib Cuaran, whose wife Dunflaith was an Irishwoman.

Eric Bloodaxe's rule was reputedly harsh and despotic and so he fell rapidly out of favour with the Norwegian nobility.

At this propitious time, Haakon returned to Norway, found a nobility eager to accept him as king instead and ousted Eric Bloodaxe, who fled to Britain.

The Norse sagas differ in the way they treat the manner and route by which Eric Bloodaxe first came to Britain after he was forced out of Norway.

When Eric Bloodaxe's rule became intolerable, he was driven out and slain on an expedition in Spain.

The jarldom of Orkney, the former Viking base subjected and annexed by Eric Bloodaxe's father, came to loom large in these stages of the literary development.

Eric Bloodaxe sealed the alliance by giving his daughter Ragnhild in marriage to the future earl of Orkney, Arnfinn, son of Thorfinn Turf-Einarsson.

The Northumbrians preferred to appease the English king, renounced Eric Bloodaxe and paid compensation.

Eric Bloodaxe's reign proved of a short duration, since in 954, the Northumbrians expelled him, too.

We do know that in 952, the same year that Eric Bloodaxe began his second term at York, Wulfstan was arrested and stood on trial in Iudanbyrig on account of several unspecified allegations which had been repeatedly brought before Eadred.

Eric Bloodaxe's sudden appearance in the Chronicle, first noted by the D-text, is a puzzling one, lacking any information as to how or why he emerged on the scene.

The Chronicle gives no explanation, but it seems as if the abdications of Amlaib and Eric Bloodaxe are described as essentially northern affairs, apparently without much West-Saxon intervention, let alone invasion.

King Eric Bloodaxe was treacherously killed by Earl [] Maccus in a certain lonely place which is called Stainmore, with his son Haeric and his brother Ragnald, betrayed by Earl [] Oswulf; and then afterwards King Eadred ruled in these districts.

The comes Osulf who betrayed Eric Bloodaxe was high-reeve of the northern half of Northumbria, centred on Bamburgh, roughly corresponding to the former kingdom of Bernicia.

Eric Bloodaxe clearly benefited from his murderous plot against Eric.

Eric Bloodaxe's death receives a grander treatment in the synoptic histories and sagas.

Collingwood and later still by Frank Stenton, who speculates that Eric Bloodaxe might have attempted to regain the kingdom or was fighting off pursuers.

However, scholars today are usually less prepared to colour the sober records with details from the sagas, preferring to take the view that Eric Bloodaxe was assassinated in exile.

In sum then, it looks as if Eric Bloodaxe, expelled and heading in a north-westerly direction, was about to cross over into Cumbria, when in a bid for power, his official Osulf had him killed through the agency of Maccus.

Towards the end of its portrait of Eric Bloodaxe, Fagrskinna cites the Eiriksmal, an anonymous panegyric written in commemoration of Eric Bloodaxe's death and according to the saga's introduction, commissioned by his widow Gunnhild.

The figure that Eric Bloodaxe became in the Norse sagas is a heady mix of history, folklore, and political propaganda.

Eric Bloodaxe is usually portrayed as a larger-than-life Viking hero, whose powerful and violent performances bring him many short-term successes, but ultimately make him flawed and unpopular as a ruler and statesman.

One of the richest sagas to deal with Eric Bloodaxe and his affairs in England is Egils saga, which is a rich if problematic source for skaldic poems surviving from the 10th century.

All that happened shortly before the death of Harald Fairhair and King Eric Bloodaxe's killing of his brothers to secure his place on the throne.

Eric Bloodaxe set up the pole of spite in the cliff-face and left it standing; he faced the horse's eyes on the land, and he rist runes upon the pole, and said all the formal words of the curse.

Egill was shipwrecked on a nearby shore and came before Eric Bloodaxe, who sentenced him to death.