It is only in subsequent historical writing that we find the work of authors who have
begun to contemplate the Viking Age from a safe distance. Much research remains to be
done on perceptions of vikings in later medieval (and especially Latin) historiography.
It is my provisional impression that it is in thirteenth-century writing in particular that
the image of vikings’ impact on England became comprehensively bloodcurdling and
transmitted the received image into modern perceptions. If one studies a standard older
handbook of English ecclesiastical life – I think of Medieval Religious Houses: England and
Wales by David Knowles and R.N. Hadcock ( 1953 ; 2 nd edn 1971 ), for example – one
finds that the sources which underpin notions of the complete destruction of monastic
life by vikings’ actions can be traced to that period (cf. Dumville 1992 : 29 – 54 ). It is not
that Anglo-Norman historians failed to reflect on the Viking Age; rather, it was in the
thirteenth century that larger conclusions were vividly applied to local circumstances.
I think in particular of the historical introduction to the cartulary of Chertsey Abbey
(Surrey), which has almost everything one might expect and seek to find (ibid., 34 ,
n. 17 ). The carefully cultivated Norman self-image, which admitted but rejected
heathen savagery, was blunted among the neighbours (one thinks of Brittany in par-
ticular) and was historically modified in post-Norman England; both recalled such evil
(Dumville 2002 d).
In Ireland, however, a thoroughgoing interpretation of Irish experience of vikings
was achieved by the opening years of the twelfth century (in the text Cocad Gaedel re
Gallaib, already mentioned, which was built on annalistic data but written racily as
narrative: Todd 1867 ; cf. Dumville 1999 : 104 – 5 ). Vikings were the heathen Other who
sought to conquer Ireland and more or less succeeded. The island and nation were
rescued by the heroic scions of an outstanding royal dynasty full of uirtus, and in
particular by Brian Bóruma (‘of the tribute’) who repeatedly defeated vikings, even on
his Good Friday death-day when, Christ-like, he sacrificed himself for his people at the
battle of Clontarf.
All such interpretations coalesced to give the picture of the Viking Age which was a
staple of historical writing until twentieth-century reconsideration, timid at first but
eventually becoming perversely revisionist, brought us – in Danish cartoons (Ramskou
and Bojesen 1967 ) and in English sloganeering (‘traders not raiders’) – to the brief era of
the cuddly viking. The problem of the modern apologists’ syllogism is focused squarely
on the chronicle-evidence (Dumville 1997 : 9 ; cf. Dumville 2002 c: 249 ): ‘We learn of
vikings’ aggression from ecclesiastical writers. Because vikings attacked churches
and churchpeople, ecclesiastical writers were biased against them. Therefore we must
discount their prejudiced testimony. Having rejected it, we possess no evidence that
vikings attacked churches (or, indeed, did anything much else which a chronicler might
report).... Narrow-minded clergy are responsible for the bad press which they have
received.’ Much of this syllogism (belonging to the category which gives logic a bad
name) bears on larger issues. But, in so far as it makes the chronicler central, we are
returned to questions of opportunity, relevance and style. No chronicle tells the whole
story of vikings within its chosen territory: chroniclers did not receive total information;
chroniclers had generic criteria of relevance, although these might develop over time,
and this would cause non-recording of some available information. But style is a matter
which has confounded readers of chronicles, especially chronicles of Gaelic origin. Take
the following sequence from ‘The Annals of Ulster’ in its record for 812 (Mac Airt and
Mac Niocaill 1983 : 268 – 9 ):
–– chapter 26: Vikings in Insular chronicling––