The British Museum, Viking Hoards, and The Last Kingdom by Bernard Cornwell

Tite: The Last Kingdom

Author: Bernard Cornwell

Genre: Historical Fiction

Publisher: HarperCollins

The Last Kingdom by Bernard Cornwell

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Sometimes real life is the best influencer: it wasn't until after a visit to the British museum—where I saw the Viking hoards and the Saxon helmets and armor—that I finally picked up a Cornwell book.
 
Little in life is more pleasurable than seeing reality reflected in a book.

Here is an author doing research and successfully integrating two pieces of that research into the fabric of the story.
 
Ragnar, leader of the invading Danes, gives Uhtred a mini hammer to wear around his neck, and at first, Uhtred didn't, his allegiance still strongly attached to his Saxon home.
 
“It was a crude iron hammer, a miniature hammer the size of a man’s thumb, …  ‘We’ll make a Dane of you yet,’ he said, plainly pleased. The hammer was the sign of Thor, who was a Danish god almost as important as Odin, as they called Woden.” (p. 39).
 
Cornwell must have seen the same tiny hammer I did. He takes a surviving object and through it reveals the world that the main character, Uhtred, is growing up in: the Saxon lands are besieged by the Danes, and Uhtred must placate the leaders of both groups to survive, eventually wearing the hammer around his neck.

A tiny Thor pendant found in the Viking hoard.

In a later scene, the King of the Saxons, Alfred, gives Uhtred armor. Was this scene inspired by the same chunk of armor at the British Museum, now a rusted, corroded pile of uninspiring junk?
 
“Alfred had summoned a palace slave, who laid a helmet and a mail coat on the grass. … The mail was good, though it had been pierced by a spear or sword where the owner’s heart had been, but it had been expertly repaired by a good smith and with was worth many pieces of silver.” (p. 221).
 
Uhtred recognizes the significance of the gift: armor was, and still is, expensive. He understands these tokens are to buy him off: he's become an important man because he speaks both languages and knows both cultures. Both leaders know they'll be more successful with Uhtred on their side.
 
Whose gift will be the one to win Uhtred over?

Mail-armor in the Saxon Sutton Hoo exhibit in The British Museum.

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