Harald Hardrada — The Last Viking

The last real Viking. Exiled at fifteen, he fought his way across the known world — Kievan Rus, the Byzantine court, the sands of North Africa — commanding the Emperor's elite guard before returning north to seize the Norwegian crown. He spent two decades trying to conquer Denmark, failed, and then rolled the dice on England instead. He died at Stamford Bridge in 1066, three weeks before Hastings. The arrow that killed him also closed the Viking age.