The Viking Naval Battle of Hafrsfjord 872 AD
Map 2.5. The Battle of Nisa, 1062.
(a) Phase I: From his 70-oar drekkar, King Harald III Hardrada leads a 300-ship Norwegian fleet to an appointed location to battle King Sveinn Estridson’s Danish fleet.
(b) Phase II: The Danes fail to arrive at the rendezvous at the appointed time, leading Hardrada to believe they have refused the challenge. He orders half of his fleet, containing his militia troops, to return home (1). The Norwegian fleet, reduced in number but crewed by Hardrada’s finest warriors, continues on (2).
(c) Phase III: As half of Hardrada’s fleet sails out of sight, the Danes suddenly appear, 300 strong (1). Hardrada prepares to fight, ordering most of his remaining longships to be lashed together side by side (2). Two groups of vessels remain untethered to protect the Norwegians’ flanks (3).
(d) Phase IV: Estridson follows the Norwegian lead and orders the Danish fleet to close up and rope together (1). The Danish king seizes the initiative and orders his fleet to row towards the enemy (2). Hardrada orders his force to follow suit (3), and the two sides slowly close with each other as daylight begins to fade.
(e) Phase V: The opposing lines clash, and the air is filled with arrows as Danish and Norwegian archers ply their deadly trade. The fight continues through the night, and neither side is able to gain a decisive advantage.
(f) Phase VI: The deadlock is broken when one of the Norwegian flank elements under the command of Earl Hakon Ivarsson sails around the main battle and drives off the smaller Danish vessels (1). Several hours later, Hakon reinforces a failing flank (2) and drives back the Danes. The Norwegians offer no quarter and begin to clear the Danish vessels (3), boarding Sveinn Estridson’s flagship last (4). By dawn, seventy of the tethered Danish longships are cleared of opponents and the Norwegians are victorious, though Sveinn Estridson is able to escape.
The primary instrument of Scandinavian overseas aggression
was the longship. Long, narrow-keeled and flat-bottomed vessels with
beautifully carved arched prows, the first longships carried around thirty-five
warriors. They were made of oak using clinker construction (overlapping planks
held together with clinch bolts) with a mast amidships and one bank of oars on
each side. Controlled with two steering oars, these vessels had shallow
draughts making it possible for them to navigate up rivers and along
coastlines, giving the Vikings unprecedented strategic mobility. The Gokstad
ship, built in the second half of the ninth century, was over 76 feet long and
12 feet wide, and drew less than 34 inches of water, giving it the ability to
sail up rivers and estuaries into shallow waters only 3 feet deep. Longships
were also easy to beach and portage over short distances using rollers and
manpower.
After 1000, the Scandinavians built larger warships, known
as drekkars or ‘dragon ships’, capable of carrying perhaps as many as eighty
warriors on raiding expeditions, invasions and, curiously, large naval
engagements against rival Viking fleets. These larger, taller vessels were
particularly suited for the last purpose because, unlike longships, drekkars
had high, planked decks fore and aft, from which arrows and spears could be
rained down on their opponents’ decks. Apparently difficult to manoeuvre in
battle, these medieval dreadnoughts were sometimes lashed together ‘stem to
stem and stern to stern’ to create large, floating battlefields of oak, canvas
and rope. Often dozens of Viking ships were tied together, with the larger
drekkars placed in the middle of the line as a command post for kings and
commanders, while unfettered longships protected the flanks of the tethered
vessels. A contemporary historian, Saxo Grammaticus, explains the benefits of
lashing ships together for combat:
Having ordered the
ships in a line, they joined them together with grapples, so that being bound
together the fleet might easily ride down any enemy in its path. And when they
were brought together for this purpose, they were joined together solidly, for
flight or victory, as it would not be possible for anyone to break free from
his colleagues. Thus they planned to make their weakness strong by this tactic.
Not built for ramming, Viking ships could not duplicate the
tactics of the ancient triremes, and so medieval sea battles usually consisted
of closing on an opposing vessel, grappling the two ships together and then
fighting in close quarters until one side was defeated, the enemy ship captured
or, if damaged, scuttled. In the case of large engagements, one side chose to
take the defensive by lashing their ships together, while the attacking navy
either moved in on the tethered flotilla as individual ships, grappling,
clearing and cutting away ships one by one, or attacked as a tethered armada
itself. In these ship-to-ship battles, the Vikings attempted to match larger
ships to smaller and favoured missile fire from bows and spears over
hand-to-hand shock combat. Because of the nature of this attrition warfare,
Viking sea battles tended to drag on far longer than engagements fought on
land, often taking hours to conclude.
One such long sea battle took place at Nisa on 9 August 1062
between the fleets of King Harald III Hardrada of Norway and King Sveinn
Estridson of Denmark. This was the second battle between the two rival monarchs
and seems to have been joined by mutual consent. Hardrada, unhappy about being
unable to conquer Denmark despite successful annual raids, hoped for a large
decisive victory over Estridson. Having raised a large army from the whole of
Norway, Hardrada placed the men on 300 ships, leading the armada from his own
seventy-oar drekkar (Map 2.5(a)). He sailed to the appointed spot at the
prearranged time and waited for his Danish foe to arrive, but Estridson’s fleet
was not there. Believing the Danes had refused battle, Hardrada dismissed the
half of his ships containing the militia to return to their farms and prepared
for another year of raiding (Map 2.5(b)). Those warriors who remained were the
veterans of numerous raids, and some may have fought at Hardrada’s side during
his days in Russia and Byzantium. One of the Varangian Guard’s more
distinguished soldiers, Hardrada spent most of his twenties in the Byzantine
emperor’s employment, rising to become the ‘leader of all of the Varangians’
and then returning to Norway to become king in 1047.
But as half of the Norwegian navy sailed out of sight, the
Danish fleet appeared, 300 ships strong (Map 2.5(c)). Refusing to flee from his
numerically superior enemy, Hardrada ordered his remaining ships lashed
together, placing his own ‘dragon ship’ in the centre of the line. Unfettered
longships protected the flanks, including the warships of Earl Hakon Ivarsson.
Mirroring the Norwegians, Estridson ordered his warships roped together in a line,
his own ship in the centre, and seizing the initiative, rowed against the enemy
(Map 2.5(d)). As the tethered Danish line slowly rowed forward, Hardrada
ordered his own Norwegian fleet to meet the advancing Danes. The two bound
Viking armadas clashed as the sun began to set.
According to both Danish and Norwegian sources, the battle
lasted into and throughout the night, with both sides evenly matched (Map
2.5(e)). The prominent role of missile warfare in ship-to-ship combat is
evident from a poem written about Hardrada’s prowess as an archer:
Norway’s king was
bending
His bow throughout
that night,
Raining a shower of
arrows
On the white shields
of Denmark,
Bloody spear-points
opened
Holes in iron armour;
Shields were pierced
by arrows
From Harald’s deadly
dragon.
Hardrada’s prowess with a bow was not unusual, and Viking
sources tell us that numerous Viking heroes died by missile fire, including
Harold Bluetooth, King Hakon and, ironically, perhaps Harald Hardrada himself.
The turning point came hours into the battle when Earl Hakon
Ivarsson ordered his warships from their flanking position to sail around the
main battle group and prey on smaller and weaker Danish vessels (2.5(f)). Hours
later, Hakon’s warships buttressed a failing flank, forcing the Danes back.
Sveinn Estridson’s warship was the last boarded. No quarter was given and those
Danes not killed jumped overboard. By dawn Estridson’s fleet was defeated and
no fewer than seventy of the Danish king’s tethered ships had been cleared.
Estridson escaped the slaughter by jumping into the water
and swimming for Hakon Ivarsson’s ship. Donning a disguise, the Danish king was
brought on board and inexplicably led to shore on Hakon’s order, eventually
escaping back to Denmark. Though initially recognized as the hero of the
battle, the earl was quickly condemned by the Norwegian king and exiled.
Ultimately, the battle of Nisa proved indecisive. Two years later, in 1064, the
two kings signed a peace treaty ending years of Norwegian raiding, and King
Harald Hardrada looked to the west for new lands to conquer. In 1066 a massive
Norwegian fleet set sail for England in the last great invasion of the Viking
age.
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