Cnut conquers Norway

1028

Sailing north with fifty ships laden with English silver, the Danish-English king exploited Norwegian discontent with Olaf Haraldsson. The exile of St. Olaf gave Cnut a North Sea empire stretching from Dublin to the Gulf of Finland. It was an empire no later Scandinavian king would ever match, a maritime dominion held together by silver, intimidation, and the personal magnetism of a single ruler.