Ragnar Lodbrok

According to tales, Ragnar Lodbrok was a Danish and Swedish king as well as a legendary Viking hero. He is well-known thanks to Viking Age Old Norse poetry, Icelandic sagas, and almost contemporaneous chronicles. The traditional literature claims that Ragnar distinguished himself by leading numerous attacks during the ninth century against the British Isles and the Holy Roman Empire. Additionally, he is mentioned in Norse mythology. In Tale of Ragnar's Sons and a Saga of Certain Ancient Kings, Ragnar Lodbrok's father is identified as Sigurd Ring, a mythical Swede king.

Ragnar was the son of the Swedish king Sigurd Ring, according to the Tale of Ragnar Lodbrok, Tale of Ragnar's Sons, Heimskringla, Hervarar saga of Heireks, Sögubrot af nokkrum fornkonungum, and numerous other Icelandic sources. Almost all of the sagas concur that Sigurd's father was the Danish king Randver, and the Hervarar saga names his spouse as sa, a Norwegian royal descendant named King Harald with the Red Moustache. According to several tales, Randver was a descendant of famous Scandinavian king Ivar Vidfamne through his daughter Aud (whom the Hervarar saga calls Alfhild). Following the death of king Ivar Vidfamne, Aud's eldest child with Danish king Hroerekr Ringslinger, Harald, anointed himself Harald Wartooth and seized control of the entire realm.

The brutal Norse King Ywar and his brothers, Inguar (a doppelganger of Ywar), Ubbi, Byorn, and Ulf, who dominate the northern peoples, are mentioned as being the children of Lodbrok (Lothpardus) in the Chronicon Roskildense (about 1138) as their father. The Viking invasion of the West Frankish realm culminated in the Siege of Paris and the Sack of Paris in 845. "Reginherus," also known as Ragnar, was the Norse chieftain who commanded the Viking army. This Ragnar has sometimes been tentatively linked to the legendary saga character Ragnar Lodbrok, however scholars question the veracity of this claim.