Raiding[edit]
Heimskringla states that after leaving Novgorod, Olaf raided settlements and ports with success. In 982 he was caught in a storm and made port in Wendland, where he met Queen Geira, a daughter of King Burizleif. She ruled the part of Wendland in which Olaf had landed, and Olaf and his men were given an offer to stay for the winter. Olaf accepted and after courting the Queen, they were married. Olaf began to reclaim the baronies which while under Geira's rule had refused to pay taxes. After these successful campaigns, he began raiding again both in Skåne and Gotland.
Alliance with Otto II[edit]
Holy Roman Emperor Otto II had assembled a great army of Saxons, Franks, Frisians and Wends to fight against the Norse pagan Danes. Olaf was part of this army as his father-in-law was king of Wendland. Otto's army met the armies of King Harald Bluetooth and Haakon Jarl the ruler of Norway under the Danish king, at Danevirke, a great wall near Schleswig. Otto's army was unable to break the fortification, so he changed tactics and sailed around it, landing in Jutland with a large fleet. Otto won a large battle there, and forced Harald and Haakon with their armies to convert to Christianity. Otto's army then returned to their homelands. Harald would hold on to his new faith, but Haakon continued worshiping the old gods when he got home.
Death of Geira and conversion[edit]
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VIKING KING! OLAV TRYGGVASON
Olaf Tryggvason (960s – 9 September 1000) was King of Norway from 995 to 1000. He was the son of Tryggvi Olafsson, king of Viken (Vingulmark, and Rånrike), and, according to later sagas, the great-grandson of Harald Fairhair, first King of Norway.
Olaf played an important part in the conversion of the Norse to Christianity, often by forcible means.[2][3][4] He is said to have built the first church in Norway (in 995) and to have founded the city of Trondheim (in 997). A statue of Olaf Tryggvason is located in the city's central plaza.
Historical information about Olaf is sparse. He is mentioned in some contemporary English sources,[5]and some skaldic poems. The oldest narrative source mentioning him briefly is Adam of Bremen's Gesta Hammaburgensis ecclesiae pontificum (c. 1070). In the 1190s, two sagas of Olaf Tryggvason were written in Iceland, by Oddr Snorrason and Gunnlaugr Leifsson. Snorri Sturluson gives an extensive account of Olaf in the Heimskringla saga, (c. 1230), using Oddr Snorrason's saga as his main source. The accuracy of these late sources is not taken at face value by modern historians and their validity is a topic of some debate.[6] The following account is mainly based on the late saga sources.
Birth and early life[edit]
There is uncertainty about both the date and the place of Olaf's birth. The earliest Norwegian written source, the late 12th century Historia Norwegiæ, states that Olaf was born in the Orkney Islands after his mother fled there to escape the killers of Olaf's father. Another late 12th-century source, Ágrip af Nóregskonungasögum, says Olaf's mother fled to Orkney with Olaf when he was three years old, for the same reason. All the sagas agree that Olaf eventually ended up in Kievan Rus', at the court of King Valdemar.[7]
The version in Heimskringla is the most elaborate, but also the latest, and introduces elements to the story that are not found in earlier sources. It states that Olaf was born shortly after the murder of his father in 963, while other sources suggest a date between 964 and 969. The later dates cast doubt over Olaf's claim to be of Harald Fairhair's kin, and the legitimacy of his claim to the throne. Snorri Sturluson claims in Olaf Tryggvson's saga that Olaf was born on an islet in Fjærlandsvatnet, where his mother Astrid Eiriksdottir, daughter of Eirik Bjodaskalle, was hiding from her husband's killers, led by Harald Greycloak, the son of Eirik Bloodaxe. Greycloak and his brothers had seized the throne from Haakon the Good. Astrid fled to her father's home in Oppland, then went on to Sweden where she thought she and Olaf would be safe. Harald sent emissaries to the king of Sweden, and asked for permission to take the boy back to Norway, where he would be raised by Greycloak's mother Gunhild. The Swedish king gave them men to help them claim the young boy, but to no avail. After a short scuffle Astrid (with her son) fled again. This time their destination was Gardarike (Kiev), where Astrid's brother Sigurd was in the service of King Valdemar (Vladimir I). Olaf was three years old when they set sail on a merchant ship for Novgorod. The journey was not successful: in the Baltic Sea they were captured by Estonian vikings, and the people aboard were either killed or taken as slaves. Olaf became the possession of a man named Klerkon, together with his foster father Thorolf and his son Thorgils. Klerkon considered Thorolf too old to be useful as a slave and killed him, and then sold the two boys to a man named Klerk for a ram. Olaf was then sold to a man called Reas for a fine cloak.[8] Six years later, Sigurd Eirikson traveled to Estonia to collect taxes for King Valdemar. He saw a boy who did not appear to be a native. He asked the boy about his family, and the boy told him he was Olaf, son of Tryggve Olafson and Astrid Eiriksdattir. Sigurd then went to Reas and bought Olaf and Thorgils out from slavery, and took the boys with him to Novgorod to live under the protection of Valdemar.
Still according to Heimskringla, one day in the Novgorod marketplace Olaf encountered Klerkon, his enslaver and the murderer of his foster father. Olaf killed Klerkon with an axe blow to the head. A mob followed the young boy as he fled to his protector Queen Allogia, with the intent of killing him for his misdeed. Only after Allogia had paid blood money for Olaf did the mob calm down. As Olaf grew older, Vladimir made him chief over his men-at-arms, but after a couple years the king became wary of Olaf and his popularity with his soldiers. Fearing he might be a threat to the safety of his reign, Vladimir stopped treating Olaf as a friend. Olaf decided that it was better for him to seek his fortune elsewhere, and set out for the Baltic.