When the cable channel History decided to branch out into scripted programming, it didn't take any
half measures. The network's first foray, Vikings, is a historic drama on a truly epic scale. Here
are five things you may have missed from the very first episode of Vikings. But be warned, we'll
be talking about the episode's impact on future episodes and seasons. Spoilers for Vikings ahead!
For the most part, Vikings tells its story without breaking out of the narrative mode
to provide lots of rote historical exposition. Instead, viewers have to
look for context clues to place the series' events within the loose historical record.
As the first episode begins, we get a subtitle: Eastern Baltic,
793 A.D. For those of us going in without much knowledge of medieval history, this is
just a helpful way to establish the setting of the show. For those coming into the series with some
knowledge about the history of the actual Vikings, that date has a very specific significance.
The year 793 is considered by most historians to mark the beginning of what we now know as the
Viking Age. To be more specific, historians consider the Norse raid on a monastery on
the island of Lindisfarne, off the coast of Northumberland in the northeast of England,
to mark the beginning of this tumultuous era. We see a dramatized depiction of that famous raid on
the show's second episode after Ragnar goes rogue to build his own seafaring ship and travels west,
despite Earl Haraldson's insistence that they continue to raid the lands to the east.
"I don't care what you believe. You insulted me out there. And not for the first time."
Ragnar's discovery of England and the monastery at Lindisfarne
initiates a century of armed conflict between the
resident Anglo-Saxons and the Scandinavian raiders covetous of their fertile shores.
In some sense, Vikings really does begin at the beginning.
Lagertha is one of the most enduring and fascinating characters on Vikings. The first
time we see her on the show, she's hunting eels with her daughter. During the scene, the camera
pans across the water and follows the head of the spear she's using to kill the creatures.
Like many characters on Vikings, Lagertha is inspired by a possibly real, possibly legendary
woman. In those ancient Sagas that inspired her character, spears are a recurring motif.
In Lagertha's case, her story is told in a 13th-century history of Denmark called
Gesta Danorum, written by the Danish historian Saxo Grammaticus. Grammaticus mostly writes
about her in the context of her husband, Ragnar Lothbrok. He indicates that she was
Ragnar's first wife and that - in order to win Lagertha's love - Ragnar had to
spear a bear to death and strangle a hound that the fierce woman kept to protect her.
"I went to confess my love to her, but I was set upon by a bear
and an enormous hound who guarded her home."
In another charming chapter from her life, Lagertha is said to have killed a separate
powerful husband with a spearhead she had concealed in her clothing.
With him out of the way, Lagertha took on his titles and ruled the land he controlled.
That first image of Lagertha spearing eels is a nice Easter egg for anyone
familiar with the popular symbolism of the shield-maiden's mythology.
Speaking of Ragnar and Lagertha's bear-stabbing, hound-strangling courtship,
Ragnar tells a familiar story to his son, Bjorn, in the first episode.
Bjorn seems mildly amused by the story at the time, but it's possible that it
struck a deeper chord with him later in life when he kills a bear himself.
In the season 4 episode "Mercy," a grown-up Bjorn goes into the wilderness alone to spend
the winter fending for himself in order to prove to Ragnar that he has the strength to be a leader.
While decamped at a remote cabin, Bjorn encounters a ferocious bear that has escaped
an animal trap he set. After tracking it down, he does battle with the animal, emerging victorious,
if a bit slashed up. Bjorn never explicitly ruminates on the symbolism of killing the bear,
but based on the stoic gravity of how the event is portrayed on the show,
it's clear that it has meaning to him beyond the fact that it was a brush with death.
Like his father before him, Bjorn now has a major life event associated with killing a bear.
To tie all that up in an even neater bow,
in many Scandinavian languages "bjørn" is the word for bear.
One of the most complex relationships on Vikings is the one between Ragnar and his brother,
Rollo. We are introduced to Rollo in the first episode, and although he has all the skepticism
of an older brother, he encourages Ragnar's desire to set out on his own to explore the west.
Later on the show, Rollo's betrayal of Ragnar will place the brothers on opposing sides in
a series of armed conflicts. Careful viewers will have seen this twist coming right from the start.
This dynamic is teased toward the end of the first episode. The two budding warlords are discussing
Ragnar's plan to sail west, when Rollo lays out the condition under which he'll join his brother:
"I won't go under your command. I won't go unless we're all equal."
Ragnar gives Rollo assurance that they are, and his statement ends up being fairly accurate.
Unfortunately, the brothers only find true equality as rivals.
Another statement made in the first episode that has the ring of truth comes courtesy of Floki.
Ragnar takes Bjorn to meet the eccentric shipbuilder, who is working on a boat
strong enough to carry Ragnar across the open ocean to the lands he's heard about in the
west. When Floki is introduced to Ragnar's son, he gazes into the young man's face and
tells him he has his father's eyes. Then he adds a less-than-optimistic clarification.
"It means he will be like you,
and therefore he will want to do better than you, and you will hate him for it."
Although Bjorn works with Ragnar and supports his father's endeavors for most of their lives
together, there is a crucial moment wherein he decides to forge his own path. In the fourth
season, Ragnar invites Bjorn and the men who are loyal to him to travel back to England,
the location of many of his most famous conquests. Bjorn declines, choosing instead to sail south to
explore the Mediterranean. This ends up being the last time they see each other. Ragnar goes
back to England, where he's captured and killed by King Aelle. Meanwhile, Bjorn sails to the
Mediterranean and beyond, where he establishes political and trading connections, expanding the
footprint of the Vikings far beyond what Ragnar was able to accomplish in his own lifetime.
Whether or not Ragnar came to hate his son for his ambitions, it's clear that Bjorn did indeed
endeavor to do better than his father. It's just one of the many small ways that the first
episode of Vikings clued viewers into where the show would take its story and characters.
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