The Alternative History of Iceland: What If Vikings Had Conquered the World?

The year 1066 is remembered for the Normans conquering England, which was to be the last successful invasion of that country (so far). Just a few weeks earlier, however, Vikings from Norway also invaded England but were repulsed at Stamford Bridge. What if they had succeeded? Could a Viking Empire have come into being? And would something close to modern-day Icelandic have become the world language?  

Hosted by historians and The Reykjavík Grapevine founders Valur Gunnarsson and Jón Trausti Sigurðarson

Transcript

1.         What If Vikings Had Conquered the World?  

Could Icelandic ever have become the global lingua franca, a world language instead of English? Surely, it‘s a question everyone has asked themselves at some point, and the answer is that it very nearly did. 

After centuries spent raiding Christian kings, Vikings were poised by the 11th century to establish kingdoms of their own — both in their Scandinavian homelands and the lands they had taken to settle in. Smaller statelets in Denmark and Norway were being unified and Viking presence in England was strong. A North Atlantic Empire was within reach, with the main language of it undoubtedly being Old Norse — a language to which today’s Icelandic remains close. Then in 1066, just as it was coming into being, everything came crashing down. 

            Traditionally, the Viking Age was considered to have lasted from 793 to 1066, bookended by the attack on Lindisfarne monastery and the last Viking invasion of England. However, this is a very Anglocentric timeline, as we know for a fact that the first Viking raids both in the Baltic and even on the British Isles took place well before 793. Moreover, Viking societies existed, albeit somewhat altered, into the 13th century on the periphery in the North Atlantic Islands. Even in present day Ukraine, the kingdom they founded survived until 1240, although thoroughly Slavicized by that point.  

These days, most scholars consider the Viking Era to have lasted from roughly between 750 and1100. But if any single date can be considered the end, there is no getting past the events of 1066 when not one but two climatic battles took place in England that would determine the fate of the North Atlantic World. It was the Viking Ragnarök. But what if things had gone differently?  

            The title of “Last Viking” has sometimes gone to one Haraldur Sigurðsson. Whether one agrees with the moniker or not there was hardly anyone more Viking than he. Haraldur traversed nearly the whole of the Viking World, from the river Derwent in England to the Dnipro in modern day Ukraine, and further afield to the lands of Byzantines and Lombards and Saracens. He is best known by his nickname, Haraldur Harðráði, or Harald Hardrada, which has variously been translated as “Hard-Ruler” or “Hard-Council” or simply “the Ruthless.” If the Viking Age did in fact end with him, it went out in appropriate style. 

            Haraldur Hardrada is represented in the TV show Vikings: Valhalla (2022) and even if the chronology and many of the events are nonsensical, most of the characters were real. At least if the Sagas are to be believed. 

Haraldur Hardrada first appears in the written record at the battle of Stiklestad in Norway in 1030. His half-brother was one Ólafur Haraldsson, also known as Ólafur Digri, which can translate as Olaf the Stout or even Olaf the Fat. He was previously best known for being responsible for London Bridge falling down during Danish prince Canute’s invasion of England in 1016, thus inspiring more English nursery rhymes than most Vikings did.  

In 1030, Olaf was fighting against his own as he was attempting to Christianize Norway, conveniently making himself king in the process. Allied against him were the relapsed pagans of northern Norway, supported by Canute, now known as “the Great,” who had become king of Denmark and England and also claimed the Norwegian throne. In the Vikings TV show, Haraldur Hardrada and Olaf are rivals, but Snorri’s account in Heimskringla begs to differ. Olaf was 35 and Haraldur Hardrada just 15-years old during the climactic battle, thus deemed too young to fight, even if he tied a sword to his wrist. Nevertheless, he did go into battle beside his brother. 

And Olaf needed all the help he could get. He managed to raised troops in Sweden, but on his way across the mountains to Norway he insist on their conversion to Christianity. The Swedes proclaimed themselves willing to fight for Olaf but were sent home after declining to convert. As such, Olaf and what remained of his men — a ragtag force of Norwegians, Finns, Swedes and even some from distant Rus — were heavily outnumbered by the time they came face-to-face with the enemy at Stiklestad.  

            The odds were against them from the start and Olaf ended up getting stabbed several times, most fatefully with a spear to his tremendous gut. However, since he was killed in the name of Christ, Olaf the Fat posthumously became known as Saint Olaf, the most venerated religious figure among the Nordic nations. 

Meanwhile, little half-brother Haraldur Hardrada was badly wounded and dragged away by his men, according to some sources. By his own account, he slipped away ungraciously. A Scandinavia dominated by Canute the Great was no longer a safe place for Haraldur to be, so he did what his kinsmen, including Olaf, had always done in times of distress and headed east. Past Sweden and Finland and on the distant shores of the Baltic was the vast realm of the Rus, a kingdom supposedly founded by Vikings 200 years prior. While becoming ever more Slavicized, contact with Scandinavia was still strong and the rulers could speak Norse. The Rus realm was the precursor to both modern day Ukraine and Russia and centred on Kænugarður, which is present day Kyiv, the capital of Ukraine. 

            Known in the Sagas as Garðaríki or the Realm of Cities due to its vast size and wealth, Rus was going through something of a Golden Age at the time of Haraldur Hardrada’s arrival. Its king is known in Kyivan sources as Jaroslav the Wise, but in the Icelandic Sagas he is labelled Jaroslav the Lame, probably due to an old arrow wound that impacted his mobility, if not his nobility. Vikings generally preferred physical characteristics over personality when bestowing nicknames, though this does not pertain to our Haraldur.  

Jaroslav had managed to subdue his siblings and other pretenders to the crown, so he was the sole king by the time Haraldur Hardrada arrived. Peace reigned throughout the land and churches were built — a result of orthodox Christianity having been adopted from the Byzantine Empire by his father Valdemar in 988. Haraldur enters Jaroslav’s service and takes part in putting down rebellions on the periphery in Poland and Estonia. He did well, but not well enough to marry the kings’ daughter Ellisif. She was just 10-years old — though that was probably less of an impediment than Haraldur’s lack of wealth. In order to become the king’s son in law, he first has to acquire riches.  

            Haraldur was still in his teens and the best way for a young man with a sword to get rich quick in the 11th century was to enter the service of the richest man in Christendom. That would be the Byzantine Emperor, who resided in Constantinople with his Varangian Guard of Norse warriors, “Væringi” being Old Norse for “Oath-Taker.” Haraldur headed south and joined the force, and after fighting Arabs in the Middle East and Lombards in Italy in the name of the emperor, he had enough loot and booty to head back to Kyiv. He put in a request to be discharged, but it was refused — the reason for which varies wildly depending on the source. He was either seen as too good of a soldier to be let go, or was secretly loved by the empress Zoe, or even wanted for murder and rape. 

            In any case, Haraldur escaped and made it back to Rus with enough riches to be permitted to marry Ellisif who had come of age. Her sisters would go on to marry the kings of Hungary and France, but Haraldur still did not have a kingdom of his own. Fortuitously, Canute the Great had died by this time and England was being ruled by Saxon king Edward the Confessor, while Denmark and Norway was under the rule of Magnus the Good, son of the now saintly Olaf. 

In order to gain a crown, Haraldur decided he must show that his half-nephew Magnus was not able to protect his own subjects and was therefore unfit to rule. The best way to do so was to begin killing the subjects himself, which he did in true Viking manner by launching raids up and down the coast. A Magnus the Good was no match for a Haraldur the Ruthless and reluctantly accepted him as co-king in 1046. Both Magnus and Haraldur agreed that whoever lived longer will be sole inheritor of the kingdom. Luck was on Haraldur’s side again, as Magnus died shortly thereafter while on a trip south to discipline his Danish subjects. 

Svein Estridsson — a nephew of Canute the Great — had become king of Denmark and has set his sights on Norway, as well. His determination was met with Haraldur’s own drive to conquer Denmark, and so the two fought for 20 years without either side prevailing. Finally, they called it a draw. By this time, Haraldur was approaching 50 and still king of just one kingdom. His promising start had stalled and a mid-life crisis was perhaps setting in. 

…and all that

Meanwhile, things were coming to a head in merry old England. Edward the Confessor had succeeded the son of Canute the Great but died childless in January of 1066. Harold Godwinson is the son of scheming Godwin, portrayed as such in Vikings: Valhalla. Godwinson is also the brother-in-law of the recently deceased king and claims that Edward promised him the crown before dying. That claim was ratified by the nobility, making Harold Godwinson king of Saxon England. A last-minute deathbed succession might seem convenient for Godwinson, but less so is the fact that William, Duke of Normandy, also proclaims that Edward had promised the same to him. 

Edward the Confessor was son to King Æthelred the Unready, who unwisely ordered the St. Brice’s Day massacre of England’s Norse inhabitants in 1002, and his second wife Emma of Normandy. When Æthelred died in 1014, he was succeeded by Edmund Ironside, his son by first wife Ælgifu. The Vikings, led by Canute the Great, were still out for revenge and though Edmund fought, he  was bested in 1016. The Saxon king submitted to being co-regent with the Viking leader who also married his mother, the widowed Emma. Edmund died soon after, making Canute the Great sole king of England. Other offspring of Æthelred and Ælgifu were executed while Edward, who was son of Æthelred and Emma, by now queen again, was spared and went into exile to his mother’s kinfolk in Normandy. This is where he would spend the next quarter century and where he supposedly promised his crown, should he ever gain it, to William Duke of Normandy, bastard son of Robert I and nephew of Emma. 

            Further adding to the general confusion, Canute the Great had briefly been succeeded by Hardecanute, his son with Emma, who had supposedly promised King of Norway Magnus the Good that he would inherit England if Hardecanute died first. Since Haraldur Hardrada was Magnus’ successor, he felt the claim should go to him. Tostig, younger brother of Harold Godwinson, was also making a play for the throne and egged Haraldur Hardrada on to invade England. They banded together against the elder Godwinson but Haraldur Hardrada was the senior partner, supplying upwards of 300 ships to Tostig’s 12. 

            For the many sides in play, the most pressing question was who would get to England first. As it happened, an act of God would decide. A fierce north wind blew, facilitating Haraldur Hardrada’s ships sailing from Norway to England while confining William’s boats to port. Haraldur Hardrada landed in Cleveland (the English one) in Yorkshire before moving on to burn Scarborough. With some nobles persuaded to join him and others defeated at the battle of Fulford, most of the north, including the important city of York, seemed to be in Harald’s hands. But he would soon get a nasty surprise. 

At the end of the film Braveheart, the English arrive in Scotland expecting to receive tribute from Robert the Bruce and brag about having their behinds kissed by a king. Instead, they are very surprised when the Scots charge them instead. While this in no way represents the actual Battle of Bannockburn in 1314, something very similar did  happen at Stamford Bridge in 1066. Thinking the English were about to offer their surrender, Haraldur Hardrada set off to meet them with only a few men, lightly armed and armoured due to the sweltering late-September heat, no probably only perceived as such by Scandinavians. Meanwhile, the main force stayed by the shore guarding the ships. 

            No one was expecting a quick reaction from London to have made it north. However, the roads the Romans built almost a millennium earlier were still in working order and Harold Godwinson managed to force-march his troops up from the south in little time. The Vikings were understrength and underequipped, but it was still a close-run thing. A single axe-wielding berserker managed to keep the Saxons at bay on the titular bridge while the unarmoured Vikings formed a shield wall. That would have been an opportune time for Haraldur Hardrada to retreat in good order towards the rest of his army, but he does not. The Last Viking would not be known as a coward. 

            A sneaky Saxon skulked under the bridge and stabbed the berserker from below and history as we know it began to take shape. Godwinson’s army crossed over and the battle commenced. Haraldur Hardrada was shot in the throat with an arrow and died. Tostig took over and the rest of the Viking troops arrived from the shore, fully armoured but exhausted from the running. Tostig also died and the battle turned into a rout, with the Vikings eventually legging it back to their ships, many drowning trying to cross a river in full battle-gear. 

            The remaining Norse were allowed to go home in exchange for a promise never to return. The promise is kept, if only for practical reasons. Out of 300 crews, just 20 returned to Norway. Among them is Haraldur Hardrada’s 16-year-old son Olaf, who will reign under the un-Vikinglike moniker Ólafur Kyrri, which translates to Olaf the Still or Olaf the Peaceful. Norway had lost a generation and there would not be more large-scale Viking invasions any time soon. Or ever, in fact. A generation later, much had changed in England and neither the Norwegians nor anyone else has succeeded in invading it since. 

            Harold Godwinson would not savour his epoch-ending victory over the Vikings for long, though. By now the tides have turned and the Normans have landed in the south. Saxon King Harold Godwinson raced with his army south again along the Roman roads and offered battle at Hastings, close to where the Normans had disembarked. This time the parties were evenly matched, with the Normans better armoured but the Saxons holding the high ground up on a hill. 

And for a while it seems that Harold Godwinson would be Obi-Wan to Williams’ Anakin. The Bastard fell off his horse and was presumed dead. The Norman ranks were about to break and the Saxons very likely would have won that day if they had charged. But Harold Godwinson’s brothers commanding the flanks had both been killed and there was no one to lead the attack. The Battle of Hastings was fought at a time when armies were led personally by kings and dukes, individual actions could determine the outcome and the fate of a nation could be decided in an afternoon. As was here to prove the case.  

            It would turn out that William the Bastard was not dead. He climbed back up on his mount and removed his helmet so that all might see he was still among the living. His men take heart and the battle continues as the day progresses, without either side claiming victory. That is, until Harold Godwinson gets shot through the eye with an arrow. Or perhaps he was killed in another manner, the Bayeux Tapestry is rather unclear to this point. In any case, the king of the Saxons died on the field and his men began to break and flee. The day — and the country — would belong to the Normans.  

A Viking World? 

Everything hinged on that fateful autumn day in 1066 and could easily have gone the other way. William could have died when he fell of his horse and the Norman army broken ranks with predictable results. Or one or both of Godwinson’s brothers could have lived longer and counterattacked when the enemy was in disarray. The arrow might even have passed by with a simple tilt of Godwinson’s head and the Saxons triumphed after all.

            The Saxons could have won at Hastings with a bit of luck, but with a different strategy the odds would have been more thoroughly in their favour. The noblemen of Northumbria were gathering their armies in aid of Godwinson and his forces would have been overwhelming had he waited instead of rushing to meet the Normans. Had he waited longer still and allowed William’s troops to tire themselves out on the long march inland, his victory would have been all but assured. 

Of course, the Normans could always have tried again had they lost. But after the Bastard’s disaster, it is unlikely other Norman nobles would have been eager to follow in his footsteps. In fact, they were just getting a foothold in southern Italy at that same time. Had all their energies been directed there instead, the history of southern Europe might have changed radically. Perhaps power and wealth would have been concentrated in the south rather than the north, even preventing the Renaissance from taking place with vast consequences for all?   

            Going back one more week, what if Haraldur Hardrada had been more cautious and assembled all his troops at Stamford Bridge? With his full force he would have been likely to win. Two scenarios come to mind in the event of a Norwegian victory. The invading army of William the Bastard was already on its way and would have landed in the south anyway. In this case, they would have been met with Norwegian Vikings, flush after their victory in the north and probably supported by many of the English nobles seeing them as the lesser of two evils. In that case, either William would have won and history would revert to a familiar course or Haraldur Hardrada would have won, thereby becoming king of both Norway and England. Perhaps this could have created a North Sea Empire that would have made the Vikings a power factor in Europe for centuries to come?  

            Perhaps — but 1066 is a bit too late for all that. The Vikings never came as close to conquering England as they did two centuries earlier, when the Great Viking Army was assembled in 865 and led, according to legend, by the sons of Ragnar Loðbrók. England was divided into four major kingdoms at the time: Northumberland, Mercia, East Anglia and Wessex. The Vikings swiftly conquered the first three and even King Alfred of Wessex was so hard-pressed that he had to hide in the marshes before he could reconstitute an army which then managed to beat the Vikings at Eddington. Wessex survived and became the precursor to todays‘ England. Had Alfred, later deemed “the Great,” been killed or captured here, England as we know it might never have come into being.              

            However, it is unlikely that a Viking England would have taken its place at this point. The Norsemen still consisted of different war-bands that would join up to attack a common enemy but would then break apart and just as happily fight each other. In fact, the Great Viking Army partially disbanded after conquering Northumbria and East Anglia, with some settling down to become farmers and others moving on to invade Wessex. The goal was to acquire land and riches, not to form large kingdoms. The Vikings’ core countries of Norway, Denmark and Sweden were still similarly divided. 

            The closest we come to a formal Viking Empire is in the early 11th Century, when Canute the Great ruled over England, Denmark and Norway and held sway over much of Sweden too. Canute was astute enough to see that the future of his empire lay in England, where he took up residence. A generation earlier, the kingdom of Denmark had a population of half a million, which at this time included southern Norway and south Sweden, while another 80.000 lived along the Norwegian coastline. England had a population of roughly a million, but it was positioned for growth. 

Unlike what had taken place 200 years prior, there was no great influx of people from Scandinavia during or after the invasion. Canute’s men were mostly professional soldiers who were paid off and returned home after conquering the country. Some were granted titles, but the occupying power mainly consisted of 40 boatloads of huscarls amounting to a royal bodyguard but hardly enough to pacify the whole county. 

            For unlike the Normans later, this was hardly an occupation at all. Canute ruled with the consent of most of the local nobility. Many felt his reign to be a relief after the constant fighting that had come before. There was little in the way of Viking raids as most of the Vikings worked for Canute, English laws were kept in place and, unlike previous Viking invaders, he was a Christian and therefore more palatable than the heathen hordes of the 9th century. Canute even sent English missionaries from Canterbury to educate the nominally Christian Danes and made contact with the mainland, personally going to Rome to be present at the coronation of Conrad as German Emperor and make sure his traders had access to that vast market. Economically, England was joined to Europe here with Brexit still a long way off. 

            The Viking Superpower lasted just 19 years, from 1016 to 1035. Authority lay with the person of the king and did not always survive him. When Canute died, his son by his first wife, Harold Harefoot, took over England while Hardecanute, Canute’s son by Emma of Normandy, got Denmark. Hardecanute was preparing to invade England when Harold Harefoot suddenly died. Even so, Hardecanute had him exhumed, beheaded and thrown into a marsh to make clear his claim on the throne.  

            Hardecanute was the last Danish king of England and reigned from 1040 to 1042. His moniker, Hard-Canute, came from his taxation policies and few mourned him when he died at a wedding feast while making a toast to the bride, probably from drink induced heart-attack. With him, Viking rule over England ended. Perhaps something similar would have been the fate of the second North Sea Empire had it come into being in 1066. It might not have outlived its founder for long. 

            And yet. Haraldur Hardrada was 50 when he died at Stamford Bridge. Had he become king of England, his son Olaf Kyrre, born in 1050, would have succeeded him a decade or two later. Olaf was to become a peaceful ruler and a state builder in Norway. Perhaps it was the traumatic experience of seeing his father and countrymen slaughtered at Stamford Bridge that made him conflict averse and a victory that day may have seen him become a chip off the old block. But if we assume he retained the characteristics he is known for, he would have been exactly what our North Sea Empire would have needed to prosper. The the riches of England coupled with Norse maritime know-how and under a wise ruler could have brought a powerful kingdom into being. 

            But Olaf the Peaceful would have his work cut out for him. Norse monarchs had problems turning English taxes into boats. Canute the Great maintained a 16-ship navy — not much compared to Viking fleets that sometimes numbered in the hundreds. Hardecanute expanded that to 62 ships, but the resultant taxes made him so unpopular that the English chose a Saxon king over another Dane after he drank himself to death. It is therefore unlikely that a Norse-English fleet would have ruled the waves as the British Empire was to do centuries later. In addition, the coming “Little Ice Age” would make conditions worse for sailing in northern waters, as Icelanders would find out when they became increasingly isolated. 

            Everyone was beginning to turn southwards. The Danes would be moving their centre of gravity from Jutland to Copenhagen, from the Atlantic to the Baltic. Danish and Swedish expansion would next be eastwards, to present day Finland and the Baltic States, now in the guise of Crusades rather than Viking raids. The Norwegians continued to look westwards for a while but had to contend with smaller quarry such as Greenland and Iceland, in 1261 and 1262 respectively. But even they could not resist the lure of the mainland. Southwards-facing Oslo was founded in 1048 and the capital moved there from Trondheim in around 1300.  

Even the languages started drifting apart. During the Viking Age, the Norse tongue could be spoken by traders as well as chieftains and their courts all the way from Greenland to Garðaríki. But by around 1300, Danish, Norwegian and Swedish became more and more influenced by mainland languages, particularly German. The three Scandinavian tongues remain more or less mutually intelligible (even allowing for the Danish accent), but largely isolated Iceland has retained something resembling the original Norse tongue to this day, which has become largely incomprehensible to the others. Had a Viking Empire survived, perhaps it would have retained its original language and something very similar to Icelandic would have been spoken around the North Atlantic? 

England After a Viking Victory

As it was, the outcome of 1066 would have profound changes on England itself. William the Bastard, henceforth to be known as William the Conqueror, brought with him new modes of governing. Royal authority would now reach everywhere rather than each district having its own laws, as had previously been the case. There would be fewer individual liberties and many Saxon noblemen were murdered or driven into exile, some in fact winding up in Constantinople with the Varangian Guard, which at that time started to acquire an Anglo-Saxon character rather than a Norse one. Some would even wind up fighting the Normans again in Italy and the Balkans on behalf of the Byzantine Emperor, which they did with particular relish even though tending to lose.  

Norman lords would take the place of Saxon ones. So thoroughly did they appropriate England’s wealth that even today those bearing French-Norman surnames are roughly 20 percent richer than the average Briton. William strengthened royal power to the extent that England has been a unified kingdom ever since, but the authority of the king was not to last. In 1215 King John was made to sign the Magna Carta, granting increased rights to the nobility and giving him the nickname “Landless.” as he was no longer sole ruler of the land. Perhaps this was a belated reaction to overbearing Norman rule after Hastings. 

The Vikings had their own form of democracy with their þings or parliaments, but these would later give way to absolute rule by Scandinavian kings in the 17th century. Without the tyranny of the Normans, perhaps parliamentary democracy would never have developed in England? Great Britain would go on to play such a prominent part in shaping the world as we know it — through industrial revolution, global empire and the invention of capitalism — that any change in their course might have led to momentous differences later on. Without it, the United States as we know it would never have come into being, leading to a vastly different present. 

The results of Hastings would also have a more localised effect on English shires. In 1069, the inhabitants of Northern England, many of them descendants of Vikings, revolted against Norman rule. In response, William destroyed the north so thoroughly that up to 75 percent of the inhabitants may have died. This became known as “The Harrying of the North” and was still spoken about when I was a schoolboy in Yorkshire roughly 900 years later.  

Had the Vikings won, the various parts of England would have kept their local laws and characteristics, not least in the north. Perhaps there would be a movement towards independence in present-day Northumbria as there is in modern Scotland. They would no doubt look to their cousins in Scandinavia and perhaps a similar language would still be spoken by many. Even in our timeline, people in the Shetlands could still speak Norn, derived from old Norse, until the 18th century. And without the Normans, the English language itself would have been more influenced by its Germanic sister languages in Scandinavia and Germany rather than the French of the Normans, which could have had political implications later on, not least in the 20th century. 

Even a Saxon victory might have led to greater integration with the north. Saxon England belonged to the economic and cultural sphere of the Nordic countries, with much contact and travelling between. Beowulf is an example of Scandi-Saxon cultural product and more might have come into being once written culture got going in Iceland and Norway in the 12th century. Another example of Norse influence is the Saxon adoption of Nordic names for days of the week, which are still retained in the English-speaking world as well as in Scandinavia and Germany. Iceland has lost this tradition, going with a more mundane numbering of the days. Harold Godwinson had a Saxon father and Danish mother and would have been well placed to unite the two peoples who lived in England at the time, much like the mythological Arthur is sometimes said to have unified the Celts and the Romans.

            After their successful invasion of England, the Normans kept their holdings in France and continued adding to them. This eventually led to the Hundred Year‘s War, which actually lasted from 1337 to 1453 when the English were finally driven out. Without William, England would not have become embroiled in the mainland in this manner. If that were the case, not only would William Shakespeare have had to find other subject matter for his history plays, but other more profound changes could have materialised. Both cannons and the fortresses made to withstand them were first used in a widespread manner in this war that seemingly would never end. Some scholars trace the military revolution, which eventually enabled European countries to take over much of the world, to precisely the changes that took place here. Instead of creating a North Sea Empire, it might be that a Saxon or Norse victory in 1066 would have prevented European arms making the advances that they did at the end of the Middle Ages, and therefore prevented European empires from forming in other parts of the world at the dawn of modernity. The results would have been drastically different, and perhaps better.   

Conversely, had England been part of a North Sea Empire instead of the mainland Duchy of Normandy, it might have become a naval power sooner. Already in the 15th century English ships were visiting Iceland so routinely that it became known as “the English Century” in the local historiography. 

Without the Hundred Years War, the English would have been free to concentrate on the high seas. And without the war against the English and the martyrdom of Joan of Arc to unite them, France might have remained divided into smaller kingdoms, much like Germany would be for the next half-millennium. Could a Europe have been permanently divided into tiny fiefdoms rather than a few larger and dominant powers emerging?  

With English-Norse ships sailing back and forth between Norway and England (and on to Iceland and Greenland), they would have come across America sooner or later. This could have led to a colonisation of North America beginning sooner than -or at a similar time- as the Spanish arrival. Perhaps history would have been speeded up, with an English Empire coming into being in the 15th century. Would this then also have collapsed sooner, as the Spanish one did? With decolonisation taking place already here, we might now have been propelled 200 years into the future. But that is assuming history moves in a linear fashion, which would go against the grain of the present book.  

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