A fair amount of time has elapsed since last I blogged. I have been writing, but I have been attempting to put all my available time into finishing the rough draft of The Bone Goddess. Keeping in mind the necessity of continuity, I have also been continuing the research necessary to carry The Bone Goddess into the fourth book The Red Empress. I am very excited about The Red Empress. In this fourth installment of the Varangian Saga, we will meet Harold Hadrada, the real-life, exiled king of Norway, and for a time, a member of the Varangian Guard. Harold was larger than life, even according to Byzantine records, let alone the Norse Sagas. There is enough written about him that research is easy (by comparison with more obscure historical figures I have included in my work) and he practically jumps out from the page, earning him a rightful place not only in the annals of the Byzantine empire or his native Norway, but English history as well.
Harold was born in Norway around 1015 CE, as Harold Sigurdson, later earning the epithet Hadrada, meaning “hard-ruler” or stern-ruler”. He was so famous in the sagas for his witty comebacks and a complete inability of being brought to heel by his Byzantine superiors, I rather think of him as a light-hearted prankster with a serious disregard for authority than being a “hard-ruler”. He certainly did have a way of thinking outside the box. He was forced into exile when he was only fifteen years old, after defeat in the battle of Stiklestad alongside his older half-brother. He sought refuge with his kinsman, Prince Jarolsav of Kiev, the son of the famous and infamous Prince Vladimir who changed the course of Russian history by taking the sister of Basil II as his bride.
Soon thereafter, he assembled a troupe of around five hundred men and sailed down to Constantinople to join the Varangian Guard. History seems to indicate that he and his men were sent to join the regular forces in Anatolia, fighting the Muslims at the borders of the empire before they could be accepted into the Varangian Guard. Entering the Guard necessitated an entry fee of anywhere from three to five pounds of gold to join its elite ranks, so they may have had to prove themselves as well as earn the fee. According to Sígfus Blöndal, in his book Varangians of Byzantium, he created quite a name for himself by taking down eighty Arab strongholds. They were also sent to fight the Penchenegs, an ever-troublesome group of nomads who were famous for harassing commerce down the Dnieper River in the Black Sea.
We know that at some point he was sent to escort pilgrims and workers destined to reestablish the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem. This church was of some significance as it was supposed to have been built over the site of Christ’s tomb. The cave that was purported to be the holy tomb, was in fact filled in by the Emperor Hadrian to create a flat surface for the construction of a temple to Aphrodite. The church built on the site of the temple had been built, burnt down and destroyed and built again numerous times. In 1027 Caliph Ali az-Zahir (the son of Caliph al-Hakim, the mad caliph from The Plague Casket) gave permission for rebuilding the church. The reconstruction took place under several emperors, starting with Romanos III, the first husband of Empress Zoe Porphyrogenita. Later the church would become the focus of the Knights Templar, convinced that they would find Christ’s tomb beneath the church. Perhaps they were looking for something else? A clue to the Holy Grail? Or perhaps they sought an idea, akin to Gnosticism. The Knights Templar have been connected by various historians to the Cathars also known as the Albigensians, who likewise stemmed from the Gnostic Bogomils of Bulgaria. Did they seek Hermetic mysteries? An actual cup? Clues to the bloodline of Jesus? So many theories have been proposed and exhausted, I will not expand upon it here.
Whatever Harold’s connection to the events at the Church of the Sepulcher may have been, he was soon on to bigger and better things, but this time promoted to the position of protospatharios after his tour in Sicily fighting the Arabs alongside the Empire’s Norman and Lombard allies.
The ethnic unity among the Germanic people of the time must have been strong. One incident serves to illustrate this. The leader of the Lombards, at that time allied with the Byzantines was one Arduin. He sought to keep a magnificent stallion captured from the Arabs. George Maniakes, strategos on this campaign thought the horse was better suited to himself. He demanded that the Lombard relinquish the animal at which Arduin steadfastly refused. So Maniakes ordered him stripped and beaten. The Lombards were horrified at the treatment of their leader and decided to wash their hand of Maniakes and his campaign. Seeing this, the Normans under William deHautville aka Iron Arm also withdrew their forces. Finally, the Varangian Guard under Harold Hadrada seeing that the Lombards and the Normans take a stand, also withdrew, effectively leaving George Maniakes holding the bag. Eventually Maniakes’ endeavor was a failure and Sicily was overrun by the Arabs and it was as if the entire effort had never been.
Harold himself was more than a little prideful. However, he may have been able to blame Maniakes for eventually being charged with embezzling and was thrown in prison. More than likely Maniakes wanted him out of the way. All this came to a head when Michael V overstepped his bounds and underestimated his step-mother Zoe’s popularity with her subjects. Outright revolt took over Constantinople in 1042 and in the ensuing scuffle, Hadrada and his associates were released from prison and championed Zoe and her return to the throne. As for Maniakes himself, he revolted against Emperor Constantine IX in that same year and was killed in Thessalonica by troops loyal to Constantine. That however is a story for another day.
For his part, Harold was by now restless. The ever-ineffable Zoe had taken on her third husband Constantine IX. Harold had heard that his minor nephew had been set on his throne back home on Norway and he was anxious to set sail. Zoe forbade him to leave. Once Harold set his mind to something however, there was no going back. The sea chains were stretched across the Bosporus to block his escape. Harold had his men put their weight into the stern of their longships and the graceful vessels were rowed in such a way that the bow rose over the sea chains. Then they moved their weight to the bow and “jumped” the chains, two ships of the three escaping into the Black Sea and headed to Kiev. Harold later reclaimed his throne and had many more “grand adventures” finally laying claim to the English throne, the last “Viking King” before he met a fateful end at the battle of Stamford Bridge in 1066.
When Harold of England was told that Harold of Norway was on his way to invade England, he declared that he would “give him just six feet of English soil; or since they say he is a tall man I will give him seven!” This event marked the true and final end of the Viking Age. Harold and all his men fell at Stamford Bridge, the bridge itself according to legend held heroically by a lone berserker against the English defenders, before he too succumbed to the thrust of an English spear. Later, the exhausted, yet victorious English turned southward to Hastings. They were in turn defeated by William of Normandy, a Norsemen only once removed by the French language and the Catholic religion, but himself a descendant of Viking invaders of France only a few generations before. Who better than a man like Harold Hadrada, larger than life and occupying “seven feet of English soil” to mark an end that was so studded with memorable heroes?
Of any book in my personal library, Maria Kvilhaug’s Seed of Yggdrasil is the most breathtaking in its depth, scope and insight. A graduate of the University of Oslo and a long time scholar of Germanic culture and myths as well as a scholar of the Norse language, Ms. Kvilhaug presents a fascinating foray into the Norse myths as you have never seen them. I found myself murmuring as I read this book “Well that makes sense!” as she explored the myths from the perspective of an open-minded scientist and historian. When you see the myths, not as stories but as allegories, things begin to click into place. When you begin to see evolutionary flow in the stories, you then realize that all of it was intended to be allegory, as any religion founded in Nature, is.
Today I’d like to address a few commonly held myths that, whenever I come across them, never fail to annoy me. One of them is the myth that medieval peasants were all walking around with a mouthful of rotten teeth and stinking breath. Nothing could be further from the truth. Honestly, he probably had a better set than you do. The main reason for this was a lack of sugar. Your average peasant wasn’t attached with a diehard addiction to a bottle of carbonated sugar water such as the average modern in western civilization. In fact, aside from honey (a rare delicacy) or the occasional apple or wild berries, he may never have even tasted sugar. Sugar was so rare, it was used only in very sparing amounts by the wealthiest individuals. In fact it was not widely distributed in Europe until the late medieval era and even then it was prohibitively expensive. You might live your entire life and never taste a gram of the stuff. The main problem with medieval teeth was the consumption of stone ground bread. The grit that found its way from stone querns used for grinding grain into bread, could be problematic and would eventually wear down even the best set of teeth over time. However, dental caries affected less that twenty percent of the population of medieval western Europe (and perhaps even less in earlier Europe, if skeletons of early Anglo Saxons in Britain have anything to say on the matter), compared to nearly ninety percent at the turn of the twentieth century and the estimate that dental caries affect over half of America’s teen population today. Also, halitosis was not considered something that must be born with patience. Mouthwashes did exist, containing such herbs as sage, rosemary, pepper, mint, and parsley, many of which also have significant antibacterial properties, in addition to making the breath smell sweeter. Used enough over time, they may have also been very beneficial for oral health. While they may not have used toothbrushes, it was common enough to clean the teeth with a piece of linen and some burnt rosemary
