History Manga / VinlandSaga

** Canute, [[spoiler:once he becomes king]], cleaves very close to Griffith in [[VisionaryVillain character]], [[LongHairedPrettyBoy appearance]], and [[UtopiaJustifiesTheMeans ambition]]. This also makes him a CharClone. [[spoiler:Again, the two end up diverging pretty significantly.]]

* SpellMyNameWithAnS: A historical case with Canute or Knut. Also happens with Sweyn/Sven. But other than that the important names generally have a well-established romanization, surprisingly.

* GenreShift: The series had FamilyUnfriendlyViolence since chapter one to obviously be taken as part of the seinen demographic, oddly enough it started its serialization on ''Weekly Shonen Magazine'' (yeah, right along with a friendly series such as ''Manga/FairyTail''), then it moved to ''Morning Two'' an actual seinen magazine but it wasn't a magazine popular enough to house Vinland Saga's impending success, the series finally found its place in ''Afternoon'' a popular seinen magazine which housed/houses [[Manga/{{Blame}} many]] [[Manga/{{Genshiken}} popular]] [[Manga/AhMyGoddess works]] and coincidentally is also serializing another historical epic, ''Manga/{{Historie}}''
** The post-Prologue arc, which has earned itself the title of "Best Farming Manga" or "Farmland Saga" among fans.
*** The irony is that vinland means farmland so the fan nickname is a proper translation of the manga's title.

* WorldsStrongestMan: Thors, implicitly.
* WorthyOpponent: When 13-year-old Thorfinn is dueling Thorkell, a grown man and longtime Viking, Thorkell is impressed enough with how well the youngster is doing to casually brain one of his followers for laughing at Thorfinn's BadassBoast.

* SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome: One might expect that [[spoiler: a numbers advantage of 3 to 1 would allow Ketil's forces to win the battle, and Ketil even laughs at the King's decision to bring just 100 soldiers to conquer an entire farm. However, as both Thorgill and Snake are aware, a numbers advantage doesn't mean much when your opponents are the most skilled warriors with armor and weapons that far exceed anything Ketil's men possessed. So when the battle actually starts, nearly all of Ketil's forces are slaughtered while King Canute suffers nearly no losses. The only ones on Ketil's side actually able to kill Canute's men are Snake and Thorgill, who were already experienced soldiers who'd been on several battlefields.]]

** Related to the above, the series goes along the theory that the historical Myth/KingArthur was (or was based on) a Romano-British warlord who fought the invading Anglo-Saxons. Disregarding the fact that the very existence of a "real" King Arthur is still hotly debated among historians, this lines up with the earliest depictions of Arthur, and with contemporary or near-contemporary figures whose historical existence is accepted like [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ambrosius_Aurelianus Ambrosius Aurelianus]] who entered early Arthurian legend as Arthur's uncle (and weirdly, one of the prototypes for Merlin). But the historical Arthur in-universe is implied to have been named [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucius_Artorius_Castus Lucius Artorius Castus]] [[spoiler:since Askeladd was named after him]]. Artorius Castus was a verifiably real person, but the theory in particular that he was the "real" King Arthur has been largely rejected since he lived at least three centuries apart from Ambrosius and supposedly Arthur, and he had little in common with Arthur besides somewhat similar names and having been in Britain. Even the time he served in Britain was as an older officer with a desk job (camp prefect) in contrast with Arthur's warrior reputation.

** Related to the above, the series goes along the theory that the historical Myth/KingArthur was the Roman commander [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucius_Artorius_Castus Lucius Artorius Castus]]. Disregarding the fact that the very existence of a "real" King Arthur is still hotly debated among historians, this theory in particular has been largely rejected since the two men lived at least three centuries apart, and had little in common besides somewhat similar names and having fought in Britain.

Taking place in the 11th century, the story chronicles the life of Thorfinn Thorsson, an Icelandic boy who becomes a warrior to avenge his father's death. Dogging at the heels of his father's killer, Askeladd, Thorfinn winds up joining the Viking's band. But this isn’t some tale of deception; Askeladd is aware that Thorfinn wants to kill him, and he [[ManipulativeBastard gleefully manipulates the boy]] into doing his bidding in exchange for a one-on-one duel.

* BadassBookworm: Hild.

* DrunkWithPower: Sveyn Forkbeard gives a long monologue on the nature of power and TheChainsOfCommanding that comes with ruling, treating the crown he wears as a curse that makes the wearer want to get more power. [[spoiler:After becoming king, Canute becomes just as bad as his father.]]

** Episodes 20-24 [[note]] analogous to Volumes 7-8 of the manga [[/note]] make some changes to the timeline designed to streamline and expand on Thorfinn's story. In the manga, [[spoiler: Thorfinn and Askeladd's last duel and Bjorn's death happen ''before'' the main characters go to York, while in the anime these happen ''afterward.'' In turn, this means that said duel happens the day before Askeladd dies. In the anime, Thorfinn, delirious from Askeladd's beating and bitter over his parting words, wanders through the streets of York, gets thrown in jail, is bailed out by Leif, and considers leaving with him, but ultimately decides to go back to Askeladd. This arguably makes the tragedy of what then happens even greater than in the manga, where Thorfinn went back to serving Askeladd after the duel, insolently sat outside King Sweyn's coronation, and leaped into action when he heard the commotion from Askeladd killing Sweyn.]]

*** Einar does more talking about how his home village was burned down by both the English and Danes at different points during the fighting, and instead of first seeing him as a captive on the slave ship, we see his village being attacked by raiders, and both his mother and sister killed before he is carried off.
*** Ketil as a young man lost a woman he loved to a rich and powerful man who named Ebbe who, it's implied, she didn't love. Ketil wanted to fight for her even if it meant provoking conflict with Ebbe, but Sverker convinced him not to do so, fearing what would happen if such a rich and powerful man held a grudge against them. So Ketil reluctantly gave her up... only for a rival of Ebbe's who envied Ebbe's wealth to [[ShootTheShaggyDog kill both Ebbe and his would-be bride at their wedding]]. This likely ties into both Ketil's refusal to let go of Arnheid and reinforced Sverker's fears about how growing too rich [[TallPoppySyndrome breeds resentment and attracts enemies]].
*** Gardar's death takes longer, and we get to see both flashbacks from his time as a slave and his DyingDream where he goes home and is reunited with his son Hjalti before he dies. A detail is also added to when he escaped from slavery; he killed his master, but spared the man's wife and child.

* AgeLift: In the sources we have about the House of Gorm and Knýtlinga, King Canute is the elder son of Sweyn Forkbeard, with Harald as the younger. Makoto switched the ages on purpose to further show Sweyn's disdain for Canute and preference for Harald.

** Askeladd and Bjorn's relationship is similar to ''Golden Age'' Guts and Griffith; one is the cunning leader of a mercenary band, the other is his more brutish but trusted right-hand. Bjorn/Guts admires and desires to be true friends with Askeladd/Griffith, but feels beneath him. [[spoiler: Askeladd and Bjorn's duel mirrors Guts and Griffith's too, with the same snowy hill setting, though the outcomes are very different.]]

* Gorn: This series does NOT hold back in portraying the brutality of the Vikings.

Taking place in the 11th century, the story chronicles the life of Thorfinn Thorsson, an Icelandic boy who becomes a warrior to avenge his father's death. Dogging at the heels of his father's killer, Askeladd, Thorfinn winds up joining the Viking's band. But this isn’t some story of deception; Askeladd is aware that Thorfinn wants to kill him, and he [[ManipulativeBastard gleefully manipulates the boy]] into doing his bidding in exchange for a one-on-one duel.