The Wolf Age: The Vikings, the Anglo-Saxons and the Battle for the North Sea Empire

Written by Tore Skeie

Narrated by Michael Page

The first major book on Vikings by a Scandinavian author to be published in English reframes the struggle for a North Sea empire and puts listeners in the mindset of Vikings, providing new insight into their goals, values, and what they chose to live and die for.



The Wolf Age takes listeners on a thrilling journey through the bloody shared history of England and Scandinavia, and on across early medieval Europe, from the wild Norwegian fjords to the wealthy cities of Muslim Andalusia.



Warfare, plotting, backstabbing, and bribery abound as Tore Skeie skillfully weaves sagas and skaldic poetry with breathless dramatization as he entertainingly brings the world of the Vikings and Anglo-Saxons to vivid life.



In the eleventh century, the rulers of the lands surrounding the North Sea are all hungry for power. To get power they need soldiers, to get soldiers they need silver, and to get silver there is no better way than war and plunder.



This vicious cycle draws all the lands of the north into a brutal struggle for supremacy and survival that will shatter kingdoms and forge an empire . . .

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tantor Media, Inc
• Release date: Apr 26, 2022
• ISBN: 9798765016947

Tore Skeie

Tore Skeie is one of Norway's most acclaimed historians, having written several prize-winning and bestselling works of medieval history. Tore is known for his eye for historical and human drama, while his books have been praised both for their thrilling style and the way they challenge traditional nation-oriented historical narratives. The Wolf Age was a bestseller in Norway, won the prestigious Sverre Steen award and is the first of Tore's books to be translated into English.

Reviews for The Wolf Age

[yooperprof · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

"The events described in this book played out in an age when the line between reliable historical information on the one hand, and the myths, legends and narratives of later ages on the other, is often blurred, and sometimes impossible to draw clearly for historians. My aim has been to write a coherent, documentable account based on primary sources and on insight from 150 years of historical, archaeological and philological research, without tiring my readers with long clarifications, discussions and reservations. This is a difficult balance to achieve, SINCE ALL OUR KNOWLEDGE OF THIS DISTANT AGE IS FUNDAMENTALLY UNCERTAIN." [emphasis added]

Personally, I would have liked to have had some of those "long clarifications, discussions and reservations".

There's a lot of fascinating material in this text, and it covers a period that I am tremendously ignorant of. The core of the book is an extended comparison and contrast of two great Viking warrior kings, Cnut of Denmark and St. Olav of Norway. I was interested and intrigued to find out that St. Olav was neither saintly not particularly successful at establishing a last Norwegian "regime" - but he benefitted posthumously from poets, historians, and poet-historians who seem to have whitewashed his reputation for posterity and the Christian churches of Scandinavia.

The printed text does include some sketchy source notes - although it is not really possible to connect the material in the text with the original texts which provide historian Skeie with his material.

The edition I read didn't include an index, which would have been very helpful. I also would have liked a geneological family tree.

[quondame · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

How pre-conquest England was overrun with northmen multiple times before 1066. The violence of contentiously proud men who left large reputations that had less to do with who they actually were than what the writers of history required them to be. Concentrates mostly on the years 990-1030 and the fall of Anglo-Saxon power. Readable and with a good un-obsessive level of detail.