Viking civilization is a unique phenomenon in history. There were no Europeans before them who would have pushed the boundaries of their world so widely. Their campaigns of conquest, the search for new lands and legendary courage attract our attention after many centuries. John Heywood's book is a fascinating story of the ancient Scandinavians, as well as a story about their mythology, according to which the path of the people of the North began in Asgard at the creation of the world. The author places this civilization in a broad historical context, from its pagan roots to integration into Christian Europe. This approach helps to see that in different countries the Viking Age fell on different periods. It was a special world, born in the first centuries of our era in Western Europe, and finally disappeared only in the 15th century. in Greenland.