Description

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The Vikings famously took no prisoners, relished cruel retribution, and prided themselves on their bloodthirsty skills as warriors. But their prowess in battle is only a small part of their story, which stretches from their Scandinavian origins to America in the West and as far as Baghdad in the East. As the Vikings did not write their own history, we have to discover it for ourselves; and that discovery, as Neil Oliver reveals, tells an extraordinary story of a people who, from the brink of destruction, reached a quarter of the way around the globe and built an empire that lasted nearly two hundred years.

Drawing on the latest discoveries that have only recently come to light, Scottish archaeologist Neil Oliver goes on the trail of the real Vikings. Where did they emerge from? How did they really live? And just what drove them to embark on such extraordinary voyages of discovery over 1,000 years ago? The Vikings: A New History explores many of those questions for the first time in an epic story of one of the world's great empires of conquest.

About the Author

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Neil Oliver is a Scottish archaeologist, historian, broadcaster, and writer. He is perhaps best known as the charismatic presenter of the award-winning documentary series Coast, as well as his two critically acclaimed landmark BBC history series, A History of Scotland and A History of Ancient Britain. He lives in Scotland.

Praise For…

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“Looks beyond the clichéd impressions of hairy raiders to exhaustively explore their less well-documented maritime innovations.”
— —Lonely Planet Traveler

"Scottish archaeologist and historian Oliver takes clues from their contemporaries, burial remnants, and other cultural activities to tell their story. Anyone interested in finding out more about these real-life raiders will enjoy everything Oliver reveals."
— —Publishers Weekly

"The author has studied his sources in depth and provides a great chronicle of these nation-shapers who stretched the limits of the known world."
— —Kirkus Reviews