Meeting Vikings in English Churches

Interesting online lecture from the Churches Conservation Trust looking at how we can see the presence of Vikings though looking at English churches.

I had assumed the talk would be looking at possible Viking carving and architectural details but the speaker, Eleanor Parker, looked more at how the dedications of churches showed the Viking presence.

She took us through the legends of various saints who the Viking’s favoured including St Edmund, the King of East Anglia. She talked about how, bizarrely they often championed English saints whose deaths they may have been involved in. Was this a political move? King Cnut did a similar thing with St Olaf who he had defeated in battle.

She also looked at saints and traditional for which there is no basis in fact but looking at how the stories may have come about eg St Ragnar whose ‘body’ was conveniently found when rebuilding a church although it is likely his legend was a confusion of the life of Ragnar Lothbrok.

She used good illustrations throughout from manuscripts, wall paints and even more modern stained glass windows.