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Documentary, BBC -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 longships 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 beleaguered Norsemen were attacked by a Scottish army. The outcome of this vicious encounter would mark the beginning of the end of Norse power in Scotland.
Marine archaeologist Dr Jon Henderson tells the incredible story of the Norsemen in Scotland. Visiting fascinating archaeological sites across Scotland and Norway, he reveals that, although the battle at Largs marked the end of an era for the Norsemen, their presence continued to shape the identity and culture of the Scottish nation to the present day. #LastBattleoftheVikings #Vikings #Documentary
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 longships 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 beleaguered Norsemen were attacked by a Scottish army. The outcome of this vicious encounter would mark the beginning of the end of Norse power in Scotland.
Marine archaeologist Dr Jon Henderson tells the incredible story of the Norsemen in Scotland. Visiting fascinating archaeological sites across Scotland and Norway, he reveals that, although the battle at Largs marked the end of an era for the Norsemen, their presence continued to shape the identity and culture of the Scottish nation to the present day. #LastBattleoftheVikings #Vikings #Documentary
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LearningTranscript
00:00Late summer, and under cover of darkness, a powerful armada is bearing down on the British
00:19mainland. It's one of the largest invasion forces to ever threaten our shores.
00:30But these aren't Spanish men of war. They're Norse longships. And this isn't English Channel.
00:40It's the west coast of Scotland. The Battle of Largs in 1263 was the last time Norse invaders
00:49fought on our soil. The final bloody twist in a relationship that was centuries old.
00:59This is the story of the Vikings in Scotland. It's a story of brutal violence and pitiless
01:06warfare. But it's also a story of new technology and exquisite art. Of how the Scotland we know
01:17today was formed, and how the Vikings were right at the heart of that change.
01:32My name is John Henderson. I'm an underwater archaeologist, and my work has taken me across
01:37the globe, exploring sunken cities and lost civilisations.
01:42So that's quite a nice fight. We've got a base of a bow.
01:47I'm fascinated by how ancient peoples exploited the power of the sea. But there's one group
01:53that's always had a real personal draw for me. I grew up near the seaside town of Largs.
02:00It's a place that isn't exactly shy about its Viking past. But the truth behind the battle
02:09that was fought here has largely been forgotten. The Norse connection in Scotland lasted longer
02:14than anywhere else in the British Isles. Whole swathes of the country were effectively part
02:18of Scandinavia. But why did the Vikings come to Scotland in the first place? What lay behind
02:24their astonishing success? And how did their grip on their Scottish territories come to an
02:29end in such a dramatic way? To help answer these questions, I'm going to travel to the Vikings'
02:36Fjord homeland. And learn some of the secrets of their boat building technology.
02:43Can you see the other end yet? I'm going to explore mysterious Viking ruins.
02:49It's a massive engineering operation.
02:56And trace the route of the final invasion fleet. Because the Vikings never really went away.
03:02They didn't just disappear over the horizon. The Battle of Largs 750 years ago might have
03:08marked the beginning of the end for Norse power in Scotland. But the Viking influence remained.
03:14Part of a new nation. Part of us.
03:32I'm beginning my journey into Scotland's Viking past on the Isle of Skye. A team of archaeologists and
03:44divers are on their way to one of the most extraordinary Viking sites in the whole of Britain. And I've
03:50been invited to join them. I've spent a lot of my working life in boats. It's often the only
03:57practical way to get to some pretty remote spots. To begin to understand Viking Scotland, you really
04:04have to change the way you think about geography. It's only recently we've thought of the sea as a barrier.
04:10But for generations, going back to the Vikings and beyond, it was the sea that connected communities
04:16and people. For the Vikings, the sea was a super highway.
04:20I've come here to Rowan Doonan to find out just how the Vikings came to rule Scotland's sea routes.
04:37Archaeologists have been visiting this secluded site for several years. But on this trip, they
04:41brought a new box of technological tricks to help them explore it. This is a remote controlled
04:49aerial drone. It's equipped with a digital camera and can manoeuvre high above the ground,
04:54taking highly detailed images.
04:59That's absolutely fantastic what you've done there. I mean, the resolution you've managed
05:02to achieve. And just to get an aerial view of the whole site, you can really see the connection
05:06between the sea and the loch. It's brilliant.
05:09Yes, and this is a true artificial canal with built sides and cut rock. It's quite remarkable.
05:16It's a serious bit of engineering, isn't it? These people were doing something important.
05:20Yes, absolutely. It's certainly the oldest canal in Scotland, if not in Britain.
05:26But what was the purpose of this complex site? What exactly was going on here?
05:34Could the answers lie below the water?
05:47Originally developed for the offshore oil industry, this is an advanced sonar rig.
05:55OK, good position. Just drop it in.
06:02It's a system I've used before in the Mediterranean, but this will be the first time it's been deployed
06:07in an archaeological site in Britain.
06:14Almost straight away, it's identifying some intriguing targets where the canal enters the loch.
06:20So the sonar is picking out these linear features of stones either side of the canal.
06:25Nature doesn't make right angles. See, that's very elbow-shaped.
06:29So I see this as a possible man-made structure.
06:33My most recent research project has been in a sunken city in Greece.
06:54The conditions in this cold Scottish loch couldn't be more different.
06:58The visibility is very bad.
07:03Salt water coming in the canal.
07:07Mixing with the fresh water would create a strange optical effect.
07:12A bit like adding water to whiskey.
07:16This murky environment might be challenging, but it's ideal for preserving finds.
07:21Boat fragments recovered from the loch have been dated to over 1,000 years ago.
07:28And it's not just Viking-era timber that survived.
07:32Just here you can see the froth of a constructed wall.
07:37This is where the Vikings would have lost stone constructed key
07:43for loading and unloading ships.
07:45It's a massive engineering operation.
07:52Rowan Doonan was clearly a site that was regularly used by ships.
07:57Enormous efforts went into constructing and maintaining it.
08:01But just what were the Vikings doing here?
08:04What purpose did this place serve?
08:06Well, I think it's been, at one stage in its career, a Viking raiding base,
08:12where the ships have been able to come right in through the canal here,
08:16up into the loch, where they would have been safe and secure over the winter
08:20for maintenance, for repair, and possibly they were building ships there as well.
08:24You get a sense standing here of a lost world.
08:27Yes.
08:28The nearest road is six kilometres away.
08:30Yes.
08:31We had to get here by boat.
08:32Yes.
08:33Now, it's a lovely, deserted place.
08:36But to the people who lived and worked here, it was the centre of their universe,
08:41a place from which they could sally forth, free as birds, to raid wherever they wanted,
08:47coming back here to live in safety with their ships over the winter.
08:51Coming to this remote place has really brought home to me just how formidable the Vikings were.
09:01They were adaptable, they were tenacious, and they had the engineering skills to match their aggressive ambitions.
09:10Because outposts like Rowan Doonan were just the beginning.
09:15From these scattered beachheads, the rest of Scotland lay within the Vikings' grasp.
09:20The monastery island of Iona.
09:21This is where the Vikings burst into Scottish history with sudden, shocking, apocalyptic violence.
09:25In the early morning of the 24th of July, 825, the unmistakable shapes of Viking longships were spotted.
09:26approaching the island.
09:27The island of Iona.
09:33The monastery island of Iona.
09:35This is where the Vikings burst into Scottish history with sudden, shocking, apocalyptic violence.
09:39Shocking, apocalyptic violence.
09:47In the early morning of the 24th of July, 825,
09:52the unmistakable shapes of Viking longships were spotted approaching the island.
10:04The few monks that remained here knew exactly what would happen next.
10:09The community dedicated to the cult of St Columba was in ruins.
10:17For the past 30 years, Viking warbands had raided the island time and time again,
10:23stealing, burning and killing.
10:26So much so that it was virtually suicide to stay here.
10:30But suicide was something the remaining monks embraced.
10:34As the longships drew nearer, the leader of the surviving group, a man named Blomack,
10:38prepared his followers for martyrdom.
10:45The violent, cursed host came rushing through the open buildings,
10:49threatening cruel perils to the blessed men.
10:52And after slaying with mad savagery the rest of the brethren,
10:57they approached the Holy Father.
10:58But he stood firm and spoke to the barbarians in words such as these.
11:04I know nothing at all of the treasure you seek,
11:07where it is placed in the ground or in what hiding place it has concealed.
11:11But if, by Christ's permission, it were granted to me to know it,
11:17never would my lips relate it to thy ears.
11:20Hereupon, the pious victim was torn from limb to limb.
11:26The account of Blomack's torture and death
11:38has been dismissed by some as Christian propaganda.
11:42But I think it's got the brutal ring of truth about it.
11:45Iona had been bled dry by previous raids,
11:48and you can almost sense the frustrated fury of Blomack's killers
11:51as they search for elusive treasure.
11:53For the chroniclers, the Vikings were the ultimate other.
12:00Their identity was unclear, their motives inexplicable.
12:07All along the coastline of the British Isles,
12:09the Vikings descended like harbingers of doomsday.
12:16Just who were they? Where had they come from?
12:18And what did they want?
12:23It's a breathtaking landscape of high mountains,
12:42plunging waterfalls and deep seaways.
12:45Travelling in the fjords, you can't help but be blown away
12:52by the sheer scale and raw beauty of the Viking homeland.
12:57There are many theories about what exactly the word Viking means.
13:05One of the most likely is that it comes from the word vic, meaning sea inlet.
13:10But this labyrinth of winding channels and hidden bays
13:13didn't just give these Viking sea radars a name,
13:15it gave them a launch pad.
13:17At the end of the 8th century, the Vikings exploded onto the world map.
13:24Swedish Vikings travelled deep into Russia,
13:26establishing trade routes that extended to the Black Sea and beyond.
13:32From Denmark, Vikings raided eastern England,
13:35eventually carving out their own kingdom.
13:37But the Vikings who first descended in Scotland came from western Norway.
13:50Bergen, Norway's second city,
13:54and centre of fjord country.
13:57From here, the sea journey to Scotland is shorter than it is to the Norwegian capital, Oslo.
14:03It was from these western fjords that Vikings not only raided the Scottish and Irish coasts,
14:10but went on to eventually colonise the pharaohs, Iceland and Greenland.
14:15They even gained a temporary foothold in North America.
14:20But geography doesn't explain everything.
14:22It doesn't explain why the Vikings decided to begin raiding in the first place.
14:26Until recently, the most widely held theory on why the Vikings set out was land hunger.
14:43The steep-sided fjords contained very little farmland.
14:50As the population grew, it simply had nowhere to go.
14:54The only problem with that theory is that the Vikings who raided places like Iona
15:01weren't after land.
15:03The men who murdered Blomack weren't farmers who wanted to settle down and till the soil.
15:08So what was their motive?
15:10Like any good detective story, you just have to follow the money.
15:13Over the last century, the western fjords of Norway have given up some rare archaeological treasures
15:23that give a clue to why the people here first went raiding to Scotland.
15:28These are old silver coins.
15:33Very old silver coins.
15:34In fact, this one dates from 763 AD.
15:37But they're not from Norway.
15:39They're not even from Europe.
15:41These coins come from Baghdad, which from the middle of the 8th century
15:44was the epicentre of a powerful and rich Islamic world.
15:49Baghdad merchants would pay hard cash for amber, furs and walrus ivory from Scandinavia.
15:55But the only problem was that the main trade routes for these goods bypassed the western
16:00fjords of Norway.
16:02And wanting to keep up with the Joneses, or rather the Johanssons, the chieftains of western
16:07Norway looked for their own source of silver.
16:11And they soon found it, not in the bazaars of Baghdad, but in the monasteries of the British
16:16Isles.
16:17The monastery St Columba founded on Iona might have been a deliberately simple and ascetic
16:34place.
16:35But like all monasteries, it accumulated wealth from its important patrons.
16:41Rich and undefended, these religious communities must have been irresistible targets for Viking
16:50raiders.
16:52The ultimate opportunity to get rich quick.
16:55These were brutal times in Scotland.
17:04Raiding and warfare between different groups was common.
17:08Violent death, a fact of life.
17:13Perhaps in some ways, the Vikings were no worse than anybody else.
17:17But what made them unusual was they had no qualms about attacking holy sites.
17:22Christian chroniclers called the Vikings heathens and Gentiles.
17:31Instead of the cross, these pagan warriors were pendants shaped as Thor's hammer around
17:36their necks.
17:38Only people who worshipped the god of storms and thunder would dare desecrate Christ's church.
17:44And it wasn't just silver that brought the Vikings to Scotland's monasteries.
17:55There was another valuable commodity to be found in these scattered centres of worship and
17:59learning.
18:01Human beings.
18:01The island of Inshmarnock, just off Bute in the Firth of Clyde.
18:21Today, it's uninhabited.
18:24But at the time of the first Viking raids, this place was home to a small monastic community.
18:29Nothing remains of the original buildings.
18:44But recently, evocative traces of everyday monastic life in Inshmarnock have come to light.
18:49Like all monasteries, Inshmarnock wasn't just about prayer.
18:58It was about education.
19:00Young novices aged anywhere between 7 and 16 would have studied on this island, laboriously
19:05learning how to write Latin and Gaelic.
19:08But instead of paper or parchment, they would have used this stuff.
19:12Slate.
19:12And there's a lot of slate in Inshmarnock.
19:15The whole island is made of the stuff.
19:18I'm improvising with an old nail.
19:20But the students would have used a metal stylus to scratch the slate pieces.
19:24Actually, not that easy.
19:26But it was more than their ABCs that these young boys carved.
19:35A couple of years ago, archaeologists working on Inshmarnock uncovered two pieces of old slate.
19:40When they were joined together, they revealed an astonishing scene.
19:43And one that must have been part of the everyday world of the boy who carved it.
19:47The centuries haven't been kind to this picture, so we've had it blown up and enhanced digitally
19:54so we can see better what's going on.
19:56A man has been roped by the neck, and he's been dragged by an armed warrior towards a longship.
20:02In front of them are the partial outlines of two other warriors wearing chain mail and carrying spears.
20:08What this childish doodle reveals is key to understanding why the Vikings came to Scotland.
20:15Slavery.
20:17The Vikings didn't invent slavery in Scotland, but they did turn it into a professional industry.
20:30Before the arrival of the Vikings, slavery was common amongst the different people who lived in Scotland.
20:38But slaves tended to be the byproduct of war, not its object.
20:43The Vikings changed all that.
20:47For them, capturing slaves and selling them on was part of a lucrative trade,
20:51and one which they developed on a mass scale.
20:54Slavery, not silver or land, was the real engine of early Vikings Scotland.
20:59And Scotland's monasteries were the only targets for Viking slavers.
21:15Guarding the entrance to the River Clyde is the vast and imposing shape of Dumbarton Rock.
21:32In the 9th century, this was the centre of the Kingdom of Strathclyde.
21:37You can see why the Strathclyde chose Dumbarton Rock as their capital.
21:43Its steep sides rise more than 70 metres from sea level.
21:46It must have seemed impregnable.
21:48Except that it wasn't.
21:50In 870, Vikings arrived here and surrounded the fortress.
22:01The siege lasted for four months.
22:05Eventually, the water supply ran out and the stronghold was forced to surrender.
22:10The Vikings had hit the jackpot.
22:18So many captives had been taken here on Dumbarton Rock and the surrounding countryside
22:22that the Vikings needed 200 ships just to transport them all.
22:26Most ended up at the great slave market in Dublin.
22:30Others were sold on to merchants around the Irish Sea.
22:33Some may even have ended up as far afield as Spain or North Africa.
22:36And what made all of this possible was the Viking's secret weapon.
22:41A new and terrifying invention.
22:43The longship.
22:51Nothing says Viking as much as the longship.
22:56It's become a potent image of myth and legend.
23:00But here, at a yard in southwest Norway,
23:08a group of experimental archaeologists are investigating the reality behind the longship.
23:14And they're doing it the hard way.
23:16Building a boat from scratch, using only Viking-era tools and methods.
23:21What they're discovering is just how devastatingly effective the vessel was.
23:26The Viking longship of Scandinavia was a stealth weapon of its day.
23:32It was low, it was fast, it was maneuverable.
23:34You can roll that ship more or less silently.
23:37It shows a very low profile, a very low silhouette on the water.
23:41So these were the nuclear submarines, if you like, of the early historical period?
23:44Yeah, the connection is not too far-fetched.
23:46It was a major step forward, weapon-wise, military-wise, tactic-wise.
23:50What have you learned in this project?
23:53Well, firstly, enormous respect for the craftsmanship that the Vikings put down.
23:59What we're doing here is copying bit by bit a 1,200-year construction down to the last details.
24:07And to see the quality of the hull and the quality of the construction,
24:12how the hull planks sort of fit like a symphony that turns into the trademark high prowl.
24:17It's beyond magical, actually.
24:19The secret of the longship's success lies in its refined hull construction.
24:29It's clinker-built, using overlapping planks to create the form,
24:33rather than relying on a heavy internal frame.
24:37This makes the boat light and flexible,
24:40able to survive the steep waves of the North Sea and Atlantic.
24:44Can you see the other end yet?
24:45I can see the end, yes.
24:46Though, maybe not my hammering technique.
24:53Yes.
24:54And now, it will be much harder.
24:59Dear God!
25:01Don't laugh quite so loudly.
25:02Today is a big day at the yard.
25:08They're fitting the elaborately carved figurehead.
25:11Instead of the more familiar dragon's head, this is a coil and snake design.
25:19The researchers have discovered that the high-carved prow was often stowed on deck during sea voyages,
25:25and was only hoisted immediately before a raid to intimidate the enemy.
25:30I love ships and boats, and as an underwater archaeologist,
25:37I'm used to finding pieces of wreckage and the odd bit of timber underwater.
25:41But to see an entire ancient ship like this take shape before my eyes is quite a privilege.
25:46You get a real sense of not only the workmanship that's gone into this,
25:49but also what the ship means as a symbol, what it would have said.
25:53If you saw one of these coming towards you, and they'd raised their dragon prow,
25:57you knew you were in trouble.
25:58The all-conquering technology of the dragon ship brought new territories with an easy reach of the Vikings.
26:12Amongst their first targets, the Northern Isles of Scotland.
26:21By longship, Shetland was just two days' sail away from the western fjords of Norway.
26:26Orkney only a little further.
26:33By the 850s, the islands had been completely overrun by Viking raiders.
26:38But Orkney was much more than an armed camp.
26:46Geographically, politically and culturally, it was right at the centre of the Norse world,
26:51and it gave rise to a new breed of Viking.
26:54In the famous Orkney Inga saga, there's a fantastic description of one of these Vikings.
27:15A larger-than-life character, called Svein Astleyfarsson.
27:22This is how Svein used to live.
27:24Winter he would spend at home, where he entertained more than 80 men at his own expense.
27:29In the spring, he had more than enough to occupy him, with a great deal of seed to sow,
27:34which he saw to carefully himself.
27:36Then, when that job was done, he would go off plundering in the Hebrides and in Ireland,
27:40on what he called his spring trip.
27:43Then, back home just after midsummer, where he stayed till the cornfields had been reaped
27:48and the grain was safely in.
27:51After that, he would go off raiding again, and never come back until the first month of winter was ended.
27:56This, he called his autumn trip.
28:06Viking colonisation changed every aspect of life in the Northern Isles.
28:10Some of those changes were enduring.
28:13This is the Orkney Yole.
28:16The workhorse of the islanders, this clinker-built, double-ended vessel,
28:20has the Viking longboat in its designed DNA.
28:29You'd be amazed at how much the Norse influenced the Yole.
28:34The obvious thing is the shape of the boat, but also the names have kept on.
28:40The bit of wood on the bottom of the keel is the keeldrite.
28:42The bits of wood for rubbing up and down on the beaches when they were hauled ashore is the dillsquads.
28:51The parts of the joints of the boat, so the honey spot and the heliwell.
28:56All Norwegian words that are still in use.
28:59It's something that survived for over a thousand years from the Norse traditions.
29:04It shows you how successful Norse boat building was.
29:06Yeah, they're obviously fit for purpose.
29:09And you'll find that out if you're in a course sea.
29:13The boat will look after you. You don't have to look after it.
29:21There are few places in Scotland where you can feel the Norse influence as strongly as here in Orkney.
29:29The names of these scattered islands,
29:31Papa Westray,
29:33Shapanse,
29:33Aedi,
29:35Egilse,
29:36reads like a verse from an ancient saga.
29:40Sometimes it seems as if there isn't a square centimeter of this beautiful place that the Vikings didn't carve their names onto.
29:47Even Neolithic tombs like Maze Howe bear the marks of the Norsemen.
30:08In my day job as an underwater archaeologist, I'm used to scrambling about in the silt and sand to find buried fragments.
30:15But here the archaeology is literally spelt out in front of your eyes.
30:23These markings are Norse graffiti.
30:26They might be hundreds of years old, but really it's not much different from something you would read sprayed on your local bus shelter.
30:32This one reads Hermond Hardax carved these runes.
30:38While this one boasts these runes were carved by the man most skilled in runes in the western oceans.
30:44And there's more raunchy stuff as well.
30:49This chamber would have originally been used by the Neolithic people to store the bones of their ancestors.
30:55But the Vikings appear to have found another use.
30:57This reads Thorny, well Thorny bedded, while Helge carved.
31:05The Norse graffiti at Maze Howe is great fun.
31:18But I think these scratches spell out more than just smutty messages or outlandish nicknames.
31:23I think they spell out an attitude.
31:35These people had swagger, they had self-belief.
31:38They had the kind of confidence that only generations of success can bring.
31:42The sporadic Viking raids at the end of the 8th century had developed into an unstoppable onslaught.
31:54No one seemed capable of turning back the Norse tide.
32:02In 839 AD, the Vikings crushed the Picts on the east coast.
32:08Less than 10 years later, they conquered the Gales on the west coast.
32:12All across Scotland, old kingdoms were crumbling.
32:20Populations were on the move.
32:25But out of the ashes of the Viking conquest, new alliances were being formed.
32:31Gallic refugees, flooding eastward, found sanctuary in the remnants of the Pictish Kingdom.
32:37On mainland Scotland, a new culture emerged.
32:41A new nation was born.
32:44It was called Alba.
32:46And if you can trace the origins of modern Scotland anywhere, it's to this fugitive kingdom.
32:50A kingdom united in opposition to, and in fear of, the Vikings.
32:57But Alba wasn't the only kingdom being born.
32:59Across the mountains, the Norse were carving out a new and powerful land.
33:09To the Gaelic speakers of Alba, it was Inish Gaul, the land of the foreigners.
33:15This sprawling territory stretched from the northern tip of the Hebrides through Argyll, the Clyde Islands, Kintyre, to the Isle of Man beyond.
33:26It sat right on the middle of the crucial sea routes, at a time when to rule the water was to rule the world.
33:38The future of these islands and these people, which way they faced, would determine the fate of Scotland.
33:50The Vikings and their descendants had put down roots.
34:01By 1000 AD, the Hebrides were as Norse-speaking as Orkney.
34:05But at the same time, a sea change was underway that would fundamentally affect Viking identity.
34:18The island of Iona is dotted with ancient grave slabs and stone crosses.
34:23Amongst them is a fragment of an inscription that speaks volumes.
34:27It's written in ruins and it's been carved on the edge of a stone with a Celtic cross on it.
34:36And it looks like it's been smashed.
34:38You might think that a marauding Viking has come in and vandalised the symbol of Christianity.
34:44And then to add insult to injury, he's carved his name on it.
34:48But nothing could be further from the truth.
34:50This isn't casual graffiti like we've seen at May's Howe.
34:54This is something quite different.
34:55The runes are incomplete, but we can read Cali, son of Olvia, has laid this stone over his brother, Fugle.
35:06So it was a Norseman that had commissioned this stone.
35:09He'd seen the Celtic cross design and he wanted it for his brother.
35:13He then arranged for his brother to be buried on the island of Iona,
35:17the very island that had been ravaged by his ancestors.
35:20The Vikings had become Christians and now Iona was their sacred ground.
35:32It was an astonishing transformation.
35:34Before the arrival of the Vikings, Iona had been at the epicentre of Christianity in Northern Britain.
35:48The Vikings had destroyed all that.
35:50But now, under the protection of its Norse rulers, Iona had risen again.
35:59A place of pilgrimage and sanctuary.
36:01The spiritual heart of Inish Gaul.
36:09The Vikings had stopped being Vikings.
36:11They were Christians now, not pagans.
36:14They were settlers now, not just hit-and-run raiders.
36:18And although the Norse-speaking peoples of Inish Gaul had deep roots in the Scandinavian world,
36:23they were very much their own people, with their own identity.
36:29This was a wealthy, sophisticated, connected culture.
36:34And from it came one of the most famous treasures of medieval Europe.
36:39The Lewis chessmen.
36:44So these amazing pieces were actually found on a beach in Lewis.
36:47And the argument was that it was a merchant just passing through from somewhere else.
36:51That is what a lot of people have believed ever since the discovery.
36:56That these are such wonderful pieces.
36:59Lewis is such a remote part of the world that clearly they don't belong.
37:03But that begs the question, where is Lewis remote from?
37:08Because Lewis was actually fairly central in the extended Scandinavian world.
37:13It was on the main trade routes that would take you from Greenland,
37:17where a lot of the walrus ivory to make these was coming from,
37:20back through Iceland, over to the west coast of Norway,
37:24which is a fairly likely place for these to be manufactured.
37:27And then down to Dublin and further afield.
37:31So Lewis was fairly centrally positioned.
37:34And on top of that, we do have evidence for important people,
37:40people of high status, living in Lewis.
37:44So it's not too difficult to imagine that there was somebody with money, resources and status
37:51to have splendid gaming pieces like the ones in front of us.
37:55Well, I think probably like many people, one of my favourites is this little guy here biting his shield.
37:59I agree with you on that, you know. It really is fantastic, isn't it?
38:04It's a reference to a cult in the Scandinavian world, the cult of the berserkers.
38:08Guys who were so psyched up before they were into battle that they had to bite the shields in order to hold themselves back.
38:16So what kind of force do you think the islands could have mustered at this period?
38:20If we're talking about all the islands, all the way from Lewis, right down to, and including the Isle of Man,
38:2710,000 plus, and the ships to put them in. And as you can imagine, 10,000 guys like this, that was a very considerable power.
38:44For centuries, the military and naval might of Inish Gaul had given its inhabitants a kind of independence.
38:52Neither Norwegian nor Scottish, the Hebrideans straddled identities
38:56and allegiances, maintaining a foot in both camps while belonging to none.
39:03But as the 13th century dawned, that was no longer possible. Now, it was time to choose sides.
39:16When the Vikings first began raiding across the North Sea, there was no King of Norway and no King of Scotland.
39:22Four hundred years later, both countries had been united under powerful and ambitious kings.
39:33Hawken IV of Norway and Alexander II of Scotland were born within a few years of each other.
39:40They came to the throne around the same time, and they were both absolutely determined to expand their authority.
39:47The problem was that both men regarded Inish Gaul as a line within their sphere of influence.
39:58And nowhere did the political fault line run deeper than amongst the islands of the Firth of Clyde.
40:04At the beginning of the 13th century, this was frontier territory. The mainland was Scottish,
40:13but the islands of Bute and Cumbrae just over there were Norse. It was a war just waiting to happen.
40:19The struggle to control the Clyde Islands spiralled into battle over the whole of Inish Gaul.
40:31Over the next decades, forces loyal to Alexander and Hawken fought a vicious running battle in the islands.
40:39But Alexander's obsession with winning the Hebrides was to prove fatal.
40:43In 1249, Alexander sailed up the west coast with a powerful fleet.
40:55It was the last journey he would ever make.
40:58King Alexander dreamed a dream and thought that three men came to him
41:03and inquired whether he meant to invade the Hebrides.
41:07Alexander answered that he certainly proposed to subject the islands.
41:11The spirits bade him go back and told him that no other measure would turn out to his advantage.
41:18The king related his dream and many advised him to return.
41:22But the king would not, and a little after, was seized with a disorder and died.
41:29In Norway, King Hawken could now turn his attention to some of the other Norse colonies.
41:44In 1261, the Norse community in Greenland acknowledged him as king.
41:49The following year, the independent-minded colony of Iceland also submitted.
41:58The Norwegian kingdom was now at the height of its power.
42:01This is Hawken's Hall in Bergen.
42:17When it was completed in 1261, it was one of the largest and most imposing buildings in the whole of Norway.
42:23For Hawken, the completion of this architectural wonder must have felt like the crown and glory
42:32in a career which had seen the Norwegian kingdom grow larger and more powerful than ever before.
42:37He must have felt supremely confident.
42:40But this was also the exact moment that a new king of Scotland made his move in the Norse territories in the Hebrides.
42:46Like father.
42:52Like son.
42:56Alexander III wasn't content with diplomacy.
43:02The 21-year-old king backed up his claim on Inishgal with a brutal show of force.
43:09Ordering armed raids deep into Norse-speaking areas.
43:17This wasn't just a land grab.
43:20This was ethnic cleansing.
43:26They burned villages and churches.
43:29And they killed great numbers both of men and women.
43:32The Scots had even taken the small children and raising them up on the points of their spears.
43:38Shook them.
43:40Till they fell down to their hands when they threw them away lifeless on the ground.
43:46This was an outrage which Hawken couldn't ignore.
44:03In the spring of 1263, a large fleet left the Norwegian coast.
44:08At its head was the flagship of King Hawken himself.
44:17Hawken was a battle-hardened veteran.
44:19But at the age of 59, he was already an old man by the standards of his day.
44:24His son Magnus had voiced concerns about him taking personal command of the fleet.
44:28But for Hawken, this was unfinished business.
44:31The chance to crush Scottish ambitions in the Hebrides, once and for all.
44:40Hawken had enormous military resources he could call on.
44:43Hawken, he didn't hesitate to send out the order.
44:52In Orkney, his already powerful fleet was joined by local forces.
44:56It must have seemed an invincible armada.
45:02But already, there were ominous signs.
45:06While King Hawken lay in Ronaldsville, a great darkness drew over the sun,
45:12so that only a little ring was bright round the sun.
45:15And it continued so for some hours.
45:18In the Middle Ages, everybody knew that solar eclipses were powerful omens.
45:26But did this particular sign in the sky spell disaster for the Scots?
45:31Or was it Hawken's expedition that was doomed to failure?
45:44Hawken led his fleet down through the Hebrides.
45:48Island by island, territory by territory,
45:51he demanded and received the allegiance of the Lords of Inishgal.
45:58Troops and vessels swelled Hawken's invasion fleet.
46:05By the time he reached the disputed territories of the Firth of Clyde,
46:09he had 120 ships and up to 20,000 men under his command.
46:14It was a force that rivalled the Spanish Armada over 300 years later.
46:22But if Alexander, King of the Scots, was daunted by Hawken's show of force,
46:27he showed no sign.
46:29It was a reversal of the usual stereotypes.
46:32The young man, patient and wily.
46:36The old man, hot-headed and given to impulse.
46:44Alexander, based just down the coast in air, settled in for a waiting game.
46:48He knew he stood no chance of defeating Hawken at sea.
46:51But if he could just stall long enough,
46:53then the autumn weather might do what his own naval forces couldn't.
46:56Hawken sent envoys to demand that Alexander withdraw his claim.
47:07Alexander spun out the negotiations.
47:13Furious, Hawken decided to ratchet up the pressure
47:16and sent part of his fleet to attack along Loch Long and Loch Lomond.
47:21Meanwhile, he moved his main force inshore near Largs.
47:28He was now just a stone's throw away from the mainland itself.
47:32Still, Alexander held his nerve.
47:37Then, on the 1st of October, the weather broke.
47:41The storm was so sudden and so powerful
47:50that survivors could only imagine that it had been conjured up by sorcery.
48:03Hawken's fleet was scattered, with several ships driven ashore,
48:07right under the noses of the local militia.
48:11The next morning, Hawken managed to get ashore with a thousand men
48:19to salvage the ships and their cargo.
48:21That was when the Scots pounced.
48:32Hawken's bodyguard got the king back to the safety of the fleet.
48:35But on the shore, the Norsemen were collapsing in disarray.
48:43Those on the beach imagined they were routed.
48:46Some, therefore, leaped into their boats and pushed off from the land.
48:51Others jumped into the transport.
48:54Their companions called upon them to return,
48:56and some returned.
48:58Though few, many boats went down.
49:02Hawken's bodyguard went down.
49:13Finally, a longship managed to get ashore to reinforce the beleaguered rearguard.
49:18The Norsemen made a stand.
49:19The Scots retreated.
49:23The Battle of Largs petered out into a long-distance and sporadic shooting match.
49:38Neither side had won.
49:40There was no decisive victory.
49:43Just the usual grim reckoning of warfare.
49:58But if the skirmish fought on the Clyde coast didn't decide anything,
50:02then the aftermath would.
50:15Over the following days, there was a window in the weather.
50:18Hawken's men returned to the shore to retrieve the dead and burn the stranded boats.
50:24But what would the king's next move be?
50:32Hawken's options were actually very limited.
50:39Winter was approaching.
50:41Supplies were running low.
50:43His men were getting restless.
50:49At a council of war, Hawken agreed that the fleet should disperse,
50:53and the troops returned to their scattered homes.
50:55He himself would overwinter in the Norse stronghold of Orkney.
51:05In the spring, he would reassemble his forces and wreak bloody revenge on Alexander.
51:12Publicly, Hawken was impatient for a rematch.
51:19But privately, he was perhaps relieved to reach the safe haven of Orkney.
51:25The king of the war, Hawken was nearly 60 years old.
51:36He'd been king for 46 years.
51:39Quite simply, he was exhausted.
51:47The king was tired.
51:51He was sick.
51:51He probably knew he was dying.
52:03Here, at the cathedral in Kirkwall, Hawken visited the shrine of Saint Magnus.
52:11It was the pious action of a man who knew the end was near.
52:15An obsession with the Hebrides had already destroyed a Scottish king, Alexander II.
52:31Now it claimed the life of a Norwegian one.
52:34On the 16th of December, 1263, Hawken IV died.
52:39Hawken was buried here in Saint Magnus Cathedral.
52:47Then, in the early spring, his body was disinterred
52:50and taken back to Norway.
53:02Hawken was the last Norwegian king to mount a military assault in Scotland.
53:06His son, Magnus Lawmender, wasn't interested in continuing the fight.
53:21Magnus had his own problems at home to deal with.
53:23Better peace with honour than a draining foreign war.
53:27Better cash on the table than blood on the ground.
53:29For nearly five centuries, longships had set sail from the western coast of Norway
53:39to raid, trade and colonise in Scotland.
53:44Kingdom had been pitted against kingdom.
53:48People against people.
53:50It was a history of slaughter and slavery.
53:58But also of rich cultural exchange and artistic marvels.
54:04In the end though, all that was nothing compared to cold, hard cash.
54:11Inish Gaul was up for sale.
54:20In 1266, Magnus accepted an offer of 4,000 marks from Alexander
54:29and renounced Norway's claim on the islands forever.
54:41The Norse Age was coming to an end.
54:44And for the descendants of the Vikings and the Hebrides,
54:46things were beginning to change too.
54:48Although the Battle of Largs had not affected their culture or their identity,
54:52it was to Scotland, not to Norway, that they now looked for royal protection.
54:58The long, slow process of becoming Scots had begun.
55:01Over the next few centuries, Inish Gaul, the land of the foreigners,
55:18would become the heartland of a new Gallic power.
55:26But it was a power that owed everything to its Norse ancestors.
55:30An archipelago bound together by the sea and the ships that sailed on it.
55:34The Viking crews that once launched hit-and-run raids from bases like Ruandunan and Skye,
55:46were part of a long and epic history.
55:48Of course, there was enormous brutality and destruction.
55:56You can't just wish it away.
55:57But in places like these, you get a glimpse of something else.
56:04Today, Scottish islands like Skye might sit on the outer rim of Europe.
56:15But in the age of the Norsemen, they were right at the centre of things.
56:19They were at the centre of a network of contacts that were beginning to criss-cross the globe.
56:26The Vikings were pushing the boundaries of the known world.
56:29And I like to think that that questing, inquisitive spirit
56:33is part of what makes us, as an island people, who we are today.
56:49The Vikings are working the whole world.
57:01The Vikings are quite true.
57:05The Vikings are quite true.
57:07The Vikings are quite true.
57:09They are switching from the same direction.
57:13And they are taking a look.
57:15The Vikings are the ones that are...
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