How Accurate Is Vikings Season 1?

Ragnar Lothbrok probably never existed. Kattegat was never a real town. Earl Haraldson was invented for the show. And somehow Vikings is still one of the more historically honest shows about the Norse, which is exactly the problem. I go through everything Season 1 gets right, everything it quietly changes, and why all of it pushes in the same direction: getting you to root for men who robbed defenseless monks and sacrificed people at Uppsala. The raid on Lindisfarne, the shield-maidens, the sunstone, the human sacrifice, and the man the whole show is named after, all fact-checked and explained.