Just thought I'd start with a gratutious slam on Vikings... <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />
http://www.doyle.com.au/battleclontarf.htm Unlike the Vikings, who felt that any form of deceit, subterfuge or underhandedness simply proved the wisdom of a leader, the Irish disdained the use of stealth and guile, though ambushes were considered a normal form of warfare. The Irish often extended courtesies to their enemies, a practice that perplexed the Vikings. In the year 1002, for instance, Brian Boru marched to Tara (the Irish capital) to demand that the High King Malachi either submit or do battle. Malachi asked for a month�s delay - time to muster his army, and Brian upholding the Irish tradition of honourable fairness in war, granted his request. The Irish sense of honour brought the grantor of such graces even greater glory in the end - provided that he was the victor!
There seems to be a pretty good consensus as to the numbers and dispostiion of the forces on the Viking/Dublin/Leinster alliance that day. This Dublin side was lined up facing generally west, backs to the sea. Some distance off the Dublin right wing lay a patch of woodland along a minor river called the Tolka, the Dublin left was anchored on the Liffey, the city of Dublin itself lying on the far shore of that river.
Some accounts have it that the collective Viking force had feigned a withdrawal the evening before and returned before dawn to land on the beach, perhaps intending to flank the Irish left. Possible I guess, but such would imply close cooperation between Earl Sigurd of Orkney and Brodir of Man. In any event, if that manouver happened, it seems to have had little effect on the disposition of the forces at the start of battle. As it turns out the repositioning of the ships may have been merely to support the disposition of the line of battle.
Brodir, the long-haired, heavily armored sorcerer-pirate, led the Dublin right wing with his force of 1,000 Vikings. To his own right was the wooded area along the Tolka, to his rear the shore and the ships.
Next in line, under an infamous black raven banner, was Sigurd, Earl of Orkney with another 1,000 Vikings "....1,000 well-armoured, axe-wielding veterans of many wars...."
http://www.eiretek.org/chapters/books/General/clontarf.htmAlong with the great Orkney Earl came a great gathering of his chiefs and followers, called to the war from every island on the Scottish main from Uist to Arran, beaten blades who had followed the descendant of Thorfinn the skull-splitter in many a roving cruise - half heathen, half Christian men, who trusted perhaps to the sign of the cross on land, and to Thor's holy hammer on shipboard. . . . Along with their island levies came many Icelanders of the best blood in the land. Flosi would have gone himself, but the Earl would have none of his company, as he had his pilgrimage to Rome to fulfil, but 15 of the Burners went to the fray, and Thornstein, Hall of the Side's son, and Halldor, son of Gudmund the powerful, and many other northern champions of lesser note."
To Sigurd's left were massed the Leinster clansmen under Mael Morda, 3,000 strong and, as convention has it, collectively less well armed and armored than their Viking allies.
The Dublin left wing, closest to the bridge across the Liffey from the city, consisted of 1,000 Dublin Vikings under Sytric's own son (who's name is remarkably elusive in the record).
An additional 1,000 Dublin men were held in reserve behind the city walls, Sytric himself observing the battle from that refuge.
Closest to Dublin and to the river on the Irish right were a force of 1,000 Vikings and assorted professional warriors allied to Brian, well armed and armored and, as some accounts have it, superior to the Dublin force facing them. Ospak of Man and his force numbered among this contingent.
The Irish center was composed of clansmen, Rutherford (presumably reflecting the most recent scholarship) says of the Irish "....They had drawn up for battle in three great lines. In the centre, the from line was made up of men from Brian's own tribe [Dal Cas], led by one of his grandsons; behind them came the Munster host, with the Connaught men in the third line."
The composition of the Irish left facing Brodir's force appears to be an open question. Rutherford has them as another Viking/mercenary force, older sources say they were primarily Irish clansmen. The question is significant, because events on this end of the battle lines would affect the eventual outcome.
Particularly, there was on the Irish left wing that day a renowned warrior with the remarkably evocative name of Wolf the Quarrelsome. The Icelandic saga has it that Wolf was Brian Boru's brother, which is possible even though Brian was 74 at the time and Wolf still in his prime. Other sources state that Wolf was a renouned Irish warrior without mentioning kinship.
Rutherford identifies Wolf as Norse, and certainly the name has a Viking ring to it. Equally likely he was of mixed parentage, as many of the Dublin Vikings on the other side certainly must have been.
Regardless, Brian brought to the field a combined force of 7,000 men that day, predominantly clansmen but probably including well more than 1,000 assorted Vikings and foreign mercenaries. Opposing him on the field were a force of 3,000 Leinster Irish and 3,000 Vikings.
Keeping his forces close while observing the outcome of events was the previous Irish High King, nominally allied and subservient to Brian but previously deposed by him, and with little reason to risk his own neck on Brian's behalf. As it turns out the late entry into the battle of these further 1,500 fresh Northern Irish clansmen would turn the eventual Viking/Dublin defeat into a slaughter.
The battle would be decided by brute combat between lines of massed men on foot, no mention of archers or cavalry. A sort of tactic which would seem to have prevailed in the British Isles at least until Hastings in 1066.
One gets the impression that organized Roman Legions could have cleaned up against ALL these guys of that era; Irish, Saxon or Viking.
Birdwatcher
