Armed Bands on Both Sides of the Channel: Can We Track Individual Viking Gangs?

International audienceIn the last third of the ninth century, a number of large viking armies were active on both sides of the English Channel, either in Northern Frankia or in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms. As opposed to previous viking gangs who had been raiding the coasts of Gaul and the British Isles over the previous century, these vikings threatened the very existence of established powers and conquered vast areas both in the Isles and on the Continent: in Frisia, in East Anglia, in Mercia, in Northumbria, and finally in Normandy in the early tenth century, newcomers were able to establish important and often lasting power bases. Since the early twentieth century at least, there has been a consensus in historiography that these "new" vikings were broadly the "same" people, who operated on either side of the Channel, depending on the circumstances. This paper tries to introduce nuances into this general view