“This was some guy,” Costas murmured. “And you say he was from Norway originally?”
Maria waved the book she had taken from Jeremy. “This is our main source, King Harald’s Saga, written by the Icelandic poet Snorri Sturluson in the early thirteenth century. It’s part of the Heimskringla, a history of the kings of Norway. It gives us our only description of what Harald looked like: immensely tall, fair-haired, with a fair beard and long moustaches, a classic Viking. It shows that he was born Harald Sigurdsson in the year 1015. Later he acquired the name Hardrada, literally ‘Hard Ruler,’ Harald the Ruthless. His indoctrination into the ways of war came early, at the age of fifteen, when he fought alongside his half-brother, King Olaf the Saint, at the Battle of Stiklestad against a rival Norwegian army. Olaf was killed and Harald fled east into exile, first to Sweden and then to Novgorod and Kiev to serve as a mercenary of King Yaroslav of Rus.”
“How did he get to Constantinople, then?” Costas asked, looking at a map.
“Well, the pickings were richer there. At the age of eighteen, Harald arrived in Constantinople to join the Varangian Guard. He quickly rose to be atrologus, chief of the Guard, and for nine years plundered his way across the Mediterranean in the name of the Byzantine emperor. In 1042 he fled Constantinople, laden with booty, and reclaimed the throne of Norway. Twenty-four years later, years in which he ravaged Denmark and ruled Norway with an iron fist, his ambition drove him to the fateful encounter with King Harold of England at the Battle of Stamford Bridge. It was a career drenched in blood from beginning to end, but along the way Harald secured his birthright and became one of the wealthiest and most feared rulers in the medieval world.”
“It’s plausible that he should have visited Vinland,” Jack murmured. “Iceland and Greenland were predominantly Norse settlements, discovered by Norwegian Vikings, and a king like Harald Hardrada would have wanted to exert his influence. Also there’s the kudos factor. A voyage to Vinland would have been a daring feat, further shoring up his reputation as a fearless warrior and adventurer.”
“He wouldn’t have been the only man to try,” Maria said. “The Icelandic annals mention a bishop of Greenland who set off for Vinland. He vanished forever, disappeared from history.”
“It doesn’t add up.” Jack sounded troubled. “If Harald made the voyage to Vinland then he did survive, returning to Norway in time for 1066. He would have had everything to gain from proclaiming his success, asserting his claim over the western Viking settlements and extolling his courage. It’s the stuff of sagas, yet I’m assuming there’s nothing about it in the Heimskringla, is there? All we’ve got is a secret reference on a map in Hereford Cathedral. It doesn’t make sense.”
“His treasure, the stuff he looted with the Varangians,” Costas said. “What do we know about that?”
“It’s a fantastic story.” Maria flicked through the book to find a page and then held it open. “Listen to this:
“His hoard of wealth was so immense that no one in northern Europe had ever seen the like of it in one man’s possession before. During his stay in Constantinople, Harald had three times taken part in a palace-plunder: it is the custom there that every time an emperor dies, the Varangians are allowed palace-plunder-they are entitled to ransack all the palaces where the emperor’s treasures are kept and to take freely whatever each can lay his hands on.”
“I guess that’s the price you pay to keep the loyalty of mercenaries,” Costas said.
“It means the Varangians not only had as much as they could carry from the palaces each time an emperor died, but also must have known the locations of treasures that remained out of bounds. After all, their main job in Constantinople was to guard the Imperial Treasury. But Snorri’s account of palace-plunder is undoubtedly exaggerated, something that would appeal to his Viking audience. The greatest treasures must of course have remained under lock and key.”
“You’re talking about the menorah,” Costas said.
Maria nodded. “But wait for the rest of the story. It gets even better. By 1042, after more than a decade in the service of the emperor, Harald had had enough of campaigning. He’d got all the fame and plunder he wanted and was now bent on reclaiming Norway. So on his final return to Constantinople from the wars, he resigned from the Varangian Guard. The emperor, Michael Calaphates, was a weak man who seems to have been okay with this, but the empress Zoe was furious. She already had a grudge against Harald. Apparently he’d asked for her beautiful niece Maria’s hand in marriage, but Zoe had refused. The story later put about by the Varangians was that Zoe herself wanted Harald, and this was the real reason she was so upset about his departure from Constantinople.”
“A love triangle,” Costas chuckled. “The Thunderbolt of the North had finally met his match.”
“Harald was thrown in prison but was released by a mysterious lady, maybe another lover. The story goes that Harald summoned his Varangians and they exacted terrible revenge on the emperor, blinding him in his bed. That same night Harald broke into Maria’s apartment and kidnapped her. This is what Snorri says happened next:
“They went down to the Varangian galleys and took two of them. They rowed to the Bosporus, where they came to the iron chains stretched across the Sound. Harald told some of the oarsmen to pull as hard as they could, while those who were not rowing were to run to the stern of the galleys laden with all their gear. With that, the galleys ran up on to the chains. As soon as their momentum was spent and they stuck on top of the chains, Harald told all the men to run forward to the bows. Harald’s own galley tilted forward under the impact and slid down off the chains; but the other ship stuck fast on the chains and broke its back. Many of her crew were lost, but some were rescued from the sea.”
“That’s it,” Jeremy said excitedly. “What I was saying yesterday. The timbers you found in the chain in the Golden Horn were from Harald’s second ship. Snorri doesn’t say it actually sank, which explains why you only found the wood broken off in the chain. The skull with the helmet must be one of the drowned Varangians.”
“What happened to your namesake?” Jack asked Maria.
“According to Snorri, Maria was released unharmed when they reached the Black Sea and even given an escort back to Constantinople. Maybe her kidnapping was Harald’s way of cocking a snook at Zoe, but he’d already moved on and was planning to marry King Yaroslav’s daughter Elizabeth, probably a girlfriend of his in Kiev before he joined the Varangians.” Maria smiled at Jack. “But others think Maria remained with him and was his mistress and true love to the end.”
“So you think the menorah was stolen on the same night?” Costas persisted.
“Yes. If the Varangians had time to kidnap Maria, they also had time to snatch the greatest treasure they knew of in Constantinople.”
“That maybe explains the menorah symbol on the Hereford map.” Costas stared into the middle distance for a moment, lost in thought. “If the Vikings were only interested in the treasure as gold bullion, then it seems odd that the shape of the menorah should still have meaning years later when Richard of Holdingham wrote down that runic inscription. Maybe the fact that it was forbidden treasure, not palace-plunder, gave the menorah added significance. It could have become a symbol of Harald’s prowess, his manliness, a spoil of victory like in Roman days, to be endlessly trumpeted by the Vikings in sagas and feasts. When they got back home the story of that final night in Constantinople must have kept the Varangians in free drinks for the rest of their lives.”