Kings on the Move: The case of the Viking Great Army

Between AD 865 and 879, the viking great army campaigned extensively across England, eventually conquering three of the four Anglo-Saxon kingdoms. As different members of the army permanently settled these kingdoms, their leaders became their kings. Yet before this, the leaders of the army were sometimes named as kings in the written sources, suggesting that the great army was recognised by its adversaries as a mobile kingdom led by one or more kings. This paper explores the validity of this notion through an examination of the written sources, the use of client kings, the evidence for the non-combative aspects of the army’s activities, and the monumental burial at Repton