Forgotten Vikings is a chronological overview book of the Viking Age (793-1066 AD) and quite a lot of history on either side of that arbitrary date. Arbitrary? This book aims to explore the phenomenon of “the Vikings” from new angles, familiar to academics but largely entirely unwritten in popular history books; the Viking Age viewed as a much larger time frame from 536 to the mid-1400s. As a result of focusing on lesser-known aspects of the Viking Age, Forgotten Vikings will tap into more obscure regions of the world they visited, more obscure characters, and more obscure elements of their culture, informed by earlier pre-Viking traditions. For instance; the evidence for raiding prior to the 793 AD Lindisfarne attack, or the fact Vikings played such a significant role in Frisia long before they were involved in any other country. The ultimate goal of Forgotten Vikings is to add to the corpus of popular history/overview books of the Viking Age, adding new perspectives and information the average reader will not have read before. Because of these new and lesser-known arguments, Forgotten Vikings’ structure and narrative will be unique amongst other Viking Age chronologies - it will start and end in different years than the average book and will demonstrate an informed academic approach that will hopefully change a lot of readers’ perspectives on the era overall.

Alex Harvey is a postgraduate history student at the University of York with a focus on Scandinavian York. He has written for numerous journals and has presented research for York Archaeological Trust, Lancaster Historical Postgraduate Conference, and Leeds International Medieval Congress.