Canute the Great, 995 (circa)-1035, and the Rise of Danish Imperialism during the Viking Age

FACTA DUCIS VIVENT, OPEROSAQUE GLORIA RERUM-OVID, IN LIVIAM, 255. THE HERO'S DEEDS AND HARD-WON FAME SHALL LIVE

Canute and Emma—(The King and Queen are presenting a golden cross to Winchester Abbey, New Minster.) From a miniature reproduced in Liber Vitæ (Birch).

Toward the close of the eighth century, there appeared in the waters of Western Europe the strange dragon fleets of the Northmen, the heathen, or the vikings, as they called themselves, and for more than two hundred years the shores of the West and the Southwest lived in constant dread of pillage and piracy. The viking invasions have always been of interest to the student of the Middle Ages; but only recently have historians begun to fathom the full significance of the movement. The British Isles were pre-eminently the field of viking activities. English historians, however, have usually found nothing in the invasions but two successive waves of destruction. As an eminent writer has tersely stated it,—the Dane contributed nothing to English civilisation, for he had nothing to contribute.
On the other hand, Scandinavian students, who naturally took great pride in the valorous deeds of their ancestors, once viewed the western lands chiefly as a field that offered unusual opportunities for the development of the dormant energies of the Northern race. That Christian civilisation could not fail to react on the heathen mind was clearly seen; but this phase of the problem was not emphasised; the importance of western influences was minimised.
Serious study of the viking age in its broader aspects began about fifty years ago with the researches of Gudbrand Vigfusson, a young Icelandic scholar, much of whose work was carried on in England. Vigfusson's work was parallelled by the far more thorough researches of the eminent Norwegian philologist, Sophus Bugge. These investigators both came to the same general conclusion: that Old Norse culture, especially on the literary side, shows permeating traces of Celtic and Anglo-Saxon elements; that the Eddic literature was not an entirely native product, but was largely built up in the viking colonies in Britain from borrowed materials.