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Unread book in perfect condition.

Unread book in perfect condition.

Unread book in perfect condition.

An aura of romance has clung about the Varangians for over six centuries. This book examines how the Norsemen came to be drawn into the Imperial service until the greatest of all the Emperors of the East, Basil II, formed them into the regiment of guards which was to give unique service to the Empire. It surveys the history of the regiment down to the collapse of High Byzantium in 1204 and traces the remnant of the Varangians to the very last day of the Empire in May 1453.

An aura of romance has clung about the Varangians for over six centuries. This book examines how the Norsemen came to be drawn into the Imperial service until the greatest of all the Emperors of the East, Basil II, formed them into the regiment of guards which was to give unique service to the Empire. It surveys the history of the regiment down to the collapse of High Byzantium in 1204 and traces the remnant of the Varangians to the very last day of the Empire in May 1453.

It is Constantinople in 1035, and Thorgils has become a member of the Varangian lifeguard, where he witnesses the glories of the richest city on earth. He embarks on a campaign launched to recover Sicily from the Saracens. After years of traveling, Thorgils retreats to Sweden, but is eventually summoned again to assist in coordinating William the Conqueror’s invasion of England. In September 1066, a Norse fleet of three hundred ships sails towards England and the battle begins. It is a prophetic dream that makes Thorgils warn the troops of the impending disaster at Stamford Bridge, but even he cannot turn aside what fate has decreed—the end of the Viking world.

In a world a few decades from now, Russia has lost its influence and descended into a farcical civil war. With an extreme right-wing cult in power, racial tensions have divided the country into the Varangians - those who consider themselves to be the original Aryan settlers of Russia - and the Khazars, the liberals and Jews driven out of Moscow by recent events. Morale has reached an all-time low as the brutality and pointlessness of the situation is becoming more and more apparent: what is left of the fighting now revolves around capturing and recapturing Degunino, a seemingly magical village with an abundance of pies, vodka and accommodating womenfolk. But there is also a third people - timid, itinerant and on the brink of extinction - who lay claim to Degunino and Russia as their homeland. Against this rich backdrop of events, Living Souls follows the lives of four couples struggling to escape the chaos and stupidity of the war around them: a teenage girl who adopts a homeless man, a poet turned general separated from his lover, a provincial governor in love with one of the natives, and a legendary military commander who is sleeping with the enemy. A wide-ranging work dealing with the ideas of language, power and national identity, Living Souls is a comic and thought-provoking novel with tremendous relevance to the present day.

It is Constantinople in 1035, and Thorgils has become a member of the Varangian lifeguard, where he witnesses the glories of the richest city on earth. He embarks on a campaign launched to recover Sicily from the Saracens. After years of traveling, Thorgils retreats to Sweden, but is eventually summoned again to assist in coordinating William the Conqueror’s invasion of England. In September 1066, a Norse fleet of three hundred ships sails towards England and the battle begins. It is a prophetic dream that makes Thorgils warn the troops of the impending disaster at Stamford Bridge, but even he cannot turn aside what fate has decreed—the end of the Viking world.