Brave Heroes

Welcome to Norse heroes!

Sigurd

The Dragon Slayer

Sigurd is the great dragon-slayer of Norse and Germanic heroic legend. He kills Fafnir, gains a cursed treasure, understands the speech of birds and rides through fire to meet the warrior woman Brynhild. His victories make him famous, but they cannot protect him from magic, broken promises and family betrayal. The Norse version of his story survives in poems of the Poetic Edda and the later Volsunga saga. I think Sigurd is exciting because his greatest enemy is not really the dragon. It is the web of choices surrounding the dragon’s gold.

Fun fact: Carvings of Sigurd’s story appeared on rocks, church doors and crosses across northern Europe.

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Brynhild

The legendary Valkyrie

Brynhild is a warrior woman, Valkyrie and tragic heroine in the Norse Volsung legends. Odin sends her into enchanted sleep after she gives victory to the wrong king. Sigurd wakes her, and they exchange promises, but magic and deception separate them. She is later tricked into marrying Gunnar and discovers that Sigurd crossed the flames in Gunnar’s shape. Her grief and anger help destroy them both. I find Brynhild unforgettable because she is wise enough to explain runes and fate, yet she is trapped by other people’s bargains.

Fun fact: Brynhild’s teaching includes “ale-runes”, “wave-runes”, “speech-runes” and “thought-runes”.

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Beowulf

The Mighty Hero

Beowulf is the hero of the longest surviving Old English epic poem. He travels from Geatland to Denmark to fight Grendel, dives into a deadly mere to face Grendel’s mother, and many years later battles a treasure-guarding dragon. Although Beowulf belongs to English literature rather than the Norse Eddas, his story takes place in the Scandinavian world and shares Germanic heroic traditions. I love its monster fights, but the poem is really asking what makes a good leader and what happens when even the strongest hero grows old.

Fun fact: Beowulf contains more than three thousand lines, but nobody knows its original title.

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Ivar the Boneless

The Cunning Viking Strategist

Ivar the Boneless was a Viking leader who became famous during the ninth century. He is especially linked with the Great Heathen Army, which invaded Anglo-Saxon England in 865. Ivar was a real historical person, but stories written long after his lifetime added dramatic details that are difficult to prove. Even his unusual nickname is a puzzle. That mixture of history and legend makes him fascinating, although it also means we have to be honest about what is certain and what is not.

Fun fact: Historians still debate whether the Ímar in Irish annals and Ivar the Boneless in later Scandinavian tradition are definitely the same person.

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Leif Erikson

The Explorer Who Crossed the Atlantic

Leif Erikson was a Norse explorer who reached North America around the year 1000, centuries before Christopher Columbus crossed the Atlantic. Norse sagas call the new region Vinland. Archaeologists have also found a genuine Norse settlement at L’Anse aux Meadows in Newfoundland, Canada. We cannot match every ruin to every line of the sagas, but together the evidence shows that people from the Norse world really did cross the North Atlantic. That achievement is incredible when you imagine the distance, cold water and wooden ships involved.

Fun fact: Scientists identified a rare solar event recorded in tree rings to date date Norse timber.

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Lagertha

The Legendary Shield-Maiden

Lagertha is a famous shield-maiden from a medieval Danish history written by Saxo Grammaticus. According to Saxo, she fought beside the hero Ragnar, saved his army from defeat and later became a ruler in her own right. She is thrilling to read about, but there is an important warning: historians cannot confirm that she was a real person. Unlike Leif Erikson or Ivar, Lagertha is known from one literary account written centuries after the time in which her adventures are set.

Fun fact: Lagertha wins not one but two battles for Ragnar.

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