THE VIKING SAINT: Olaf II of Norway

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Norway's King Olaf II Haraldsson (c. 995-1030) started out with traditional Viking toughness on raids, but eventually changed his overriding mission to Christianize Norway and extirpate heathenism. He took the Norwegian throne in 1015, when he had barely reached his twenties. For the next 15 years he labored against immense odds to subdue the rebellious heathen nobles of Norway while fending off Swedish hostility. Both finally combined against Olaf in 1030, when he fell in battle not far from Trondheim, still only in his mid-thirties. After his body was believed to possess healing powers, and reports of them spread from Scandinavia to Spain and Byzantium, Olaf II was canonized a saint 134 years later. He remains Norway's patron saint as well as a legendary warrior.