Unraveling the Legends: How Accurate Is 'Vikings: Valhalla'? Discover the True Stories Behind Netflix's Epic Saga!

According to SAEDNEWS, Vikings: Valhalla Season 3 is now available to stream on Netflix. Creator Jeb Stuart never hid away from the fact that, though this show requires a huge amount of research (with the help of Vikings history specialists working on the show), it was also his job, as a storyteller, to fill in the gaps, to mix up the dates and the characters' relationships to deliver an understandable and entertaining story to the audience.

Now that we can learn what happens to Freydís Eiríksdóttir (Frida Gustavsson), Leif Erikson (Sam Corlett), and Harald Sigurdsson (Leo Suter) after the terrible battle of Kattegat at the end of Season 1, we thought we would take a moment to find out if the London Bridge collapsed as shown in the first season, or if Leif and Harald's brotherhood was as strong in real life, or yet, was King Edmund as arrogant and inexperienced as portrayed in Vikings: Valhalla? How accurate was the portrayal of the well-known Viking explorer Erik the Red (Goran Visnjic) introduced in Season 3? What were the Vangarians at the beginning of the show, and lastly, did Harald really become the King of Norway, succeeding the fallen King Canute (Bradley Freegard)? Most of the information in this article can be found in the Viking sagas (which means ”a thing that is said” in Old Norse), written by Icelanders during the 13th century, or in the research of archeologists and historians.

As far as the Vikings: Valhalla cast goes, many of the actors involved in the series carried out extensive research into both the true-life characters they are playing and also this period of the Viking age in general. Some of the stars, such as Swedish pair Frida Gustavsson and Caroline Henderson (who play Freydís Eiríksdóttir and Jarl Haakon respectively), had a headstart in that regard.

"Vikings are very steeped into our DNA," Gustavsson explained to RadioTimes.com. "When you're in school, you learn about it, and I feel like as a Swedish or Scandinavian person, you're quite proud of the legacy of the Vikings.

"I did need a little bit of brushing up, " she added. "Because I realised that what I remembered was all these men, the only thing that you really learn in school about the Vikings were all these men – so I started reading the Poetic Edda, all the Sagas, the Greenlanders Saga, the Njáls Saga.

"And slowly popping up like mushrooms in the ground are these incredibly strong women who have incredible stories to tell. And I also discovered a wonderful book by an Icelandic scholar called Women of the Viking Age. She paints a picture of, from the cradle to the grave, how life can look like with the everyday kind of routines, and it's all based off archaeology and literature. So that was a gateway for me to really deepen my knowledge of the Viking world."

Meanwhile, although Henderson's character is fictional, she still found research extremely helpful in terms of understanding the character.

"It's an amazing part to play because of course she's inspired by all these male and female Viking people that we know existed through DNA, through research, through Sagas," she said. "And for me, my mother was very into the whole Viking history – she used to read stuff for us, for me and my little brother, so its been part of me all my life.

"And I think from as a little girl, I was so inspired by the stories that she told me of Viking women, that this is part of your DNA, as well, part of your legacy. And, you know, 1000 years ago, for me as a Scandinavian woman, it's quite relatable, actually – because back 1000 years ago, you could actually marry, you could divorce, you could own land, you could travel, you could raid, you could do all this stuff. You could be a shieldmaiden. We know that now for a fact. So for me to be able to play something like this was very fulfilling, and very, very exciting."

The True Story Behind Canute, Emma of Normandy and Edmund Ironside

As we established before, Canute was a great warrior. However, he didn’t fight alongside Harald when the retaliations to St. Brice’s Day Massacre were decided (we'll get back to this event later in the article). As said in the show, Canute wasn’t the first Viking King of England, but his father, Sweyn Forkbeard, was (during one winter). When the latter died, Canute fought against England, and in particular against Prince Edmund, who then became king after the death of his father, Æthelred II. So far, the series has kept this storyline. However, Edmund wasn’t a ”boy king,” as Canute calls him in Vikings: Valhalla. The two men were actually the same age when they fought (roughly 26 years old). Edmund was a skilled warrior, but his efforts remained in vain during the battle of Assandun in 1016. Indeed, just like in the show, Eadric Sterna, who was supposed to come and fight with Edmund, abandoned the conflict, which allowed Canute and his men to break through English defenses and win the fight. Edmund later died under mysterious circumstances. Some say he was poisoned, and others claim that an arrow pierced his lungs while he was in the privy. Canute then married Queen Emma of Normandy, the widow of Æthelred II. She was a great strategist and politician, and she married King Canute, who succeeded in ruling over a North Sea Empire, as he always wanted to.