Valhalla’s historical accuracy isn’t nearly as important as its fun.
Vikings: Walhallawhich hit Netflix’s Top 10 this week, is the sequel to the History Channel show vikings, which followed Ragnar Lothbrok (Travis Fimmel) and his descendants through the peak years of Viking raiding and expansion. the original vikings was surprisingly fun to watch, for a channel show primarily dedicated to ancient aliens and Nazis. Valhalla is set in the 11th century, over a hundred years after the end of the original series, with characters who speak of Ragnar Lothbrok as a legendary figure from the past. The Viking people, having pushed beyond Scandinavia, now absorb the cultures they encounter and are changed by them. As vikings, Valhalla has been filmed in Ireland, and as vikings, Valhalla is full of dirty, gorgeous people wearing leather armor and hacking each other with swords and axes.
Medievalist David Perry has a good overview in Smithsonian places where Valhalla aligns with and deviates from real history. Leif Eriksson (played by the almost too pretty Sam Corlett) was the famous Greenland explorer who, according to the Vinland Sagas, visited North America long before Christopher Columbus. Freydís Eiríksdóttir (Frida Gustavsson), in these same sagas, went with her brother Leif to North America and was, apparently, a fierce fighter who may or may not have shouted a lot. Harald Sigurdsson (Leo Suter) is based on a real Norwegian king and world traveler, Harald Hardrada, who visited Constantinople, Sicily, Bulgaria, and more – although he wouldn’t have known Eriksson, since, d ‘According to the evidence we have, he was about five years old when Eriksson died. Since Harald, Leif, and Freydis did not meet, to our knowledge much of the show’s plot is entirely made up: Harald never fell in love with Freydis; never before did Leif accompany a Viking force into battle for London, forging a battle-tested bond with Harald.
The Vikings of Valhalla have a very particular look: scummy, as befits people who sail across the ocean in an open boat for weeks without stopping – but also, somehow, healthy, stunning and vital, with hair shiny and strong teeth. We don’t know if the Vikings partially shaved their heads, like Ragnar Lothbrok did in the last series; we don’t know if the men had long hair, or styled it in braids or buns, as Leif Eriksson does on this show. As historian Andrew E. Larsen details in a extensive blog post on the physical culture of the original vikings, the armor in these shows is totally fake: historical Vikings would have worn loose clothing, not those tight-fitting leather outfits that make young actors look so good. But it’s also a show where the actor who plays Leif Eriksson is wearing leather armor made of cactus, because he’s vegan and didn’t like being covered in cowhide. It’s not your mother’s viking show, and it’s not your back-back-back-back-back-back-back-back-back-back-back-back-back-back-back-back-back-back-back-back-back-back-back-back-back-back-back-back-back-back-back-back rear-rear-rear-rear rear-rear-rear-rear-rear-rear-rear-rear-rear-rear-rear-rear-rear-rear-rear-rear-rear-rear-rear-rear-large -mother Vikings.
In place, Valhalla definitely takes place in a universe where game of thrones exist. Local kings and nobles fought among themselves for power in historic England, Norway and Denmark, so we have the excuse for writers to work in a group of thrones-ish court plot. A king has married two queens, who then plot to get out of each other! An advisor fakes the accidental death of a king, to push court policy in his direction! etc This adviser, Godwin (played by David Oakes), is like Petyr Baelish, aka Littlefinger; the Boy King, Edmund (played by Louis Davison) is (as a fan noted) a doppelganger of the boring and super-evil Prince Joffrey.
Viking scholars, writes Perry, may particularly like Valhalla, despite its tenuous relationship to the historical truths of the time, as it shows how diverse and interconnected the Viking world became during this time. In the series, Jarl Estrid Haakon, the ruler of the fictional town of Kattegat, is played by black Swedish actress Caroline Henderson. (Yes, the usual types of people who get mad at the presence of non-white actors in historical fiction are Jarl Haakon mad – maybe even crazier than usual, because their dear Vikings are particularly precious to them.) This city is a hub of commerce, a cosmopolitan place, where the ruler made a point of keeping things relatively free and open. Not so free and open that slave traders don’t enter the market—Vikings practiced slavery as a matter of course– but at the very least, there is freedom to worship either pagan Norse gods or Christian gods.
I would have thought that people angry at Jarl Haakon would be more angry at another major plot driver. This show features (in my opinion) at least three Christian fanatics who kill, rape and plunder in the name of pagan “cleaners” of England and Scandinavia, as well as many of their Christian followers who see no problem with these raids. While pagans can also get violent (there are several scenes of human sacrifice, which the Vikings may or may not have practiced), it’s the Christians who are the bad guys here. It is interesting to see, in a Netflix top 10 show, a Christian named Jarl Kare (played by Asbjörn Krogh Nissen), with an aggressive wedge beard and wild eyes, murders several villages of women and children in order to achieve what he believes is his destiny. Perry points out that the large-scale religious wars occurring in Valhalla were not common in Scandinavia: “Most of the time, beliefs overlapped in a more or less easy coexistence, Christianization.” But easy coexistence and progressive moves don’t put you in the Netflix Top 10.