The Frankish World and the Vikings
Publisher
:
Albin Michel
Parution date
:
2009
EAN
:
9782226187154
Number of pages
:
455
Description
This is a splendidly produced book that is a credit to its publisher.
—Institute of Historical Research on La première Normandie,
The stereotypic view of the Vikings’ invasion is of a unified Europe struggling against wild and barbaric attackers. The Frankish World and the Vikings challenges that view, offering an in-depth examination of the eighth through the tenth centuries on the frontiers of Western Europe. Through careful combing of archival and published sources, Pierre Bauduin provides a well-documented investigation of the culture of Christianization that began with the Carolingian dynasty and describes a gradual and surprisingly natural assimilation of the Vikings into the dominant society.
Under Charlemagne, the Franks’ kingdom expanded into the Roman Empire and imposed a culture of Christianity onto peripheral populations through persecution and mediation. The power of the Carolingian empire was, at that time, unrivaled, and its growth was unchallenged—until the Vikings invaded. Coming south from Scandinavia, the Vikings—known as the Knights of the Apocalypse—attacked the Frankish world, and their paganism and violence disrupted the process of Europe’s integration. But as Bauduin shows, there were more political and cultural affinities between the Franks and their Danish and Norwegian invaders than generally understood. Despite the unprecedented bloodshed, integration took place, with the Duchy of Normandy as the most successful example of the Vikings’ strategy of colonization.
In this original and groundbreaking work, Bauduin scrutinizes the annals of history to identify how the Vikings’ extraordinary integration took place.
Author
Pierre Bauduin : Pierre Bauduin is a professor and specialist in the history of the Middle Ages with a focus on the Anglo-Norman world. Regarded as an authority on Viking history, he teaches at the University of Caen in France. He also established Tabularia, a review that traces written sources from the Middle Ages in Normandy, as well as project SCRIPTA, an online research database for ancient texts available to academics. His publications include La première Normandie, Xe–XIe siècles (Presses Universitaires de Caen, 2004) and Les Vikings (Presses Universitaires de France, 2004
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