Vikings: Valhalla ending explained: here’s what would have happened in season 4, according to history

Set more than 100 years later, Vikings: Valhalla depicts the beginning of the end of the Viking age – a world in which the Norse Gods are falling into obsolescence, replaced by creeping Christian fervour, and Danish settlers are a fact of life in a unified England.

Is Vikings: Valhalla a true story? Broadly yes, though the show has never been afraid to abandon real history in pursuit of a good story. We have to give a special mention here to Danish (and briefly, English) king Sweyn Forkbeard, who we see again this season. In real history, he should have been dead before the series even begins.

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Given this pursuit of story over historical accuracy, season 3 of Vikings: Valhalla leaves a great deal untold.

If you don’t want spoilers for this final season, best not to scroll past this behind-the-scenes photo of Harald in an extremely apocryphal hat. At least he is not embracing the myth that Vikings wore horned helmets.

Vikings: Valhalla ending explained: what happens in the season 3 finale?

The finale of Vikings: Valhalla season 3 sets the stage for the oft-supposed end of the Viking Age: the Norman Conquest of England.

We’ve even met the child versions of Edward the Confessor, Harold Godwinson and William the Conqueror, and given all the knowing winks of who they will become. Yet we don’t quite get there.

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Instead, our heroic trifecta of Leif, Freydís and Harald reunite in Kattegat one last time before stepping into the historical stories we know them best for.

Leif is bound for the ‘Golden Land’ of his dreams, which he would call Vinland and we would call North America; Freydís, one-time ruler of Jomsborg, the semi-legendary stronghold of the Jomsvikings, sails with him.

And Harald, returned from exile in the Byzantine empire as captain of the Varangian Guard, has finally claimed the crown of Norway, adopting the mantle by which we best know him – Harald Hardrada.

The power consolidation in Kattegat stands stark to the power vacuum in England following the death of Cnut, whose hopes to pass power peacefully to his queen, Emma of Normandy, disintegrated immediately after his Viking ship funeral.

Instead Harald Harefoot – Cnut’s second-eldest son by his first queen, Aelfgifu of Northampton – has seized power, though he is one of several sons and disposed claimants circling like vultures.

And it's in this miasma of uncertainty that the series ends.

What would have happened in Vikings: Valhalla season 4? Here’s the missing history

There will be no Vikings: Valhalla season 4, but we can look to the real history to surmise what would have happened next.

The chaos in England created by the death of Cnut continued. Harold Harefoot did rule England after Cnut’s death, from 1035–40, though initially as regent for his brother Harthacnut, who had the stronger claim; it was only in 1037 that Harefoot convinced England’s nobles to proclaim him king in his own right.

There is no evidence that Harold was seduced by Emma of Normandy, as Vikings: Valhalla season 3 implies. Instead, writes archaeologist Cat Jarman for HistoryExtra, “Emma was exiled to Flanders, where she stayed with a distant relative. But her ambitions for herself and her sons remained.”

As the real history would have it, Emma’s ambitions were soon realised: Harefoot’s death in 1040 allowed Harthacnut to embrace his claim, with Emma by his side – though this reign was short-lived too, ending with his early death in 1042.

Harthacnut was followed by his half-brother Edward the Confessor – Emma’s son with her first husband, Aethelred the Unready – who seems to have succeeded in pushing Emma out of political power, and she fades from the historical record at this point.

“One of the first things Edward did on becoming king was to punish his mother,” says historian Tom Licence.

“He confiscated a lot of her assets, and he told her to go and live quietly in a house in Winchester. Whether he did this simply because she was sitting on resources and refusing to release them to him, or because he genuinely felt anger and bitterness at her lack of support from all those years in exile, isn't entirely clear.”

Edward the Confessor marketed himself as a man of peace, but he was responsible for one of the defining conflicts of English history: the Norman conquest. In 1051, he fell out with his father-in-law, Earl Godwin, the most powerful magnate in England. Edward had married Godwin’s daughter Edith in 1045.

“The Godwin plan had assumed that Edith would produce children with Edward and there would be lots of little Godwins running around,” writes historian Marc Morris for HistoryExtra.

But this plan had not come to fruition – leaving open the question of succession.

“Edward's preferred solution in 1051 was to invite William of Normandy to come to England,” says Morris.

The visit was recorded in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. What they discussed wasn’t written down, but it is supposed that Edward promised William the throne. By the end of his reign, Edward may have preferred his great nephew Edgar Aetheling to succeed him – but nothing came of this claim.

By 1052, the Godwins are back in favour – with a vengeance. “They reduced Edward to a rubber stamp at that point,” says Morris. “For the last 14 years of his reign, he was little more than a cypher for the Godwins.

This was perhaps the reason that, following Edward’s death in January 1066, the witan ratified the claim of Harold Godwinson, Earl Godwin’s son and successor to the earldom of Wessex. He became Harold II.

This is where Harald Hardrada re-entered the story.

What happens to Harald Hardrada after Vikings: Valhalla?

When Harald Hardrada returned from exile in Byzantium, he found that Magnus (known to history as Magnus the Good, a far cry from his portrayal in Vikings: Valhalla) has been king of Norway for 10 years.

It was Magnus’s choice to make his long-lost uncle his co-ruler, rather than a decision forced on his by the jarls, as the show depicts. Yet, this was no happy family reunion: they kept separate courts and avoided each other as much as was possible. And while the real Harald didn’t overthrow his nephew as in Vikings: Valhalla, it’s unlikely he shed a tear when Magnus died unexpectedly in 1047.

After becoming sole king of Norway, Harald had a long way to go before his eventual death at the battle of Stamford Bridge in 1066 – though he spent much of those near 20 years in a futile attempt to conquer Denmark.

Did Harald have a dream to reunite the North Sea Empire of Cnut the Great? History doesn’t tell us, but nonetheless with Denmark resolutely unconquered, in 1066 Harald turned his attention to England at the behest of Harold Godwinson’s brother, Tostig.

Tostig, turfed out of his earldom in Northumbria, had turned against his brother, so reminded the glory-hungry Harald that the Norwegian also had a claim on the English throne via Harthacnut and Magnus.

Harald, for his part, needed little cajoling. Having amassed 300 Viking longships, some 12,000–18,000 warriors descended on the North of England, brushing aside the English at their first clash at Gate Fulford on 20 September 1066.

The triumph would be short lived: hearing of the Viking invasion, Harold Godwinson raced north to meet them. The Harald vs Harold clash at Stamford Bridge just five days later left was a crushing defeat for the Vikings, leaving Tostig and Hardrada dead on the field.

“The tale of that invasion – from the surrender of York to the surprise English counterattack at Stamford Bridge, which resulted in Harald’s very Viking death in battle – is better known than most of his life, and all this barely tells his whole story,” writes historian Don Hollway for HistoryExtra. “From stripling prince to the court of Byzantium and the throne of Norway, Harald personified the high point of the Viking Age. In many ways, he really was the last Viking.”

That legacy was cemented by what happened three days later: William the Conqueror invaded from Normandy to press his claim, forcing Harold to rush south to meet him.

Events culminated on 14 October 1066 with the battle of Hastings, which brought to an end the Anglo-Saxon rule of England and ushered in the Norman conquest.

Do Leif and Freydís reach the 'golden land'?

What then of Leif and Freydís? Leif did sail west around AD 1000 – so a full 35 years earlier than Vikings: Valhalla ends – and discovered the land of his dreams, which he named Vinland after discovering an abundance of grapes. He made no contact with the natives, and after overwintering in what we now call North America, he returned home.

Freydís also reached Vinland – but not with Leif. According to the sagas, she was part of the first attempt to settle in Vinland, and then led the second attempt herself.

Quite how we should view Freydís depends on which saga we read, says historian Jóhanna Katrín Friðriksdóttir.

“In one, she is heavily pregnant and scares off a group of attackers by waving a sword at them. In the other, she is manipulative and ruthless, murdering a group of defenceless women in cold blood,” she writes.

“Freydís behaves in astonishing ways in both stories, but whether presented in a positive or negative light, her steely nature is common to both narratives.”

Will there be a Vikings Valhalla season 4?

Season 3 of Vikings: Valhalla was the final season, but all of this missing history leaves the door open for a potential finale movie in the form of The Last Kingdom swansong Seven Kings Must Die – though there have been no news to that effect. In lieu of that, here are the best historical dramas to stream right now, and our picks of the new history TV and radio released in the UK this week.

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Vikings: Valhalla is streaming on Netflix now