THE ARMY

ÍMAR — THE KING BEHIND IVAR THE BONELESS Who was Ivar the Boneless? The familiar story gives us an answer. A son of Ragnar Loðbrók. A brilliant Viking commander. One of the leaders of the Great Army that entered England in 865. A man driven, according to later tradition, by the death of his father. But when we began looking for that man in the earliest sources, something unexpected happened. The further back we went, the less certain the story became. And another man appeared. His name was Ímar. Ímar is not a shadow from a saga. He appears in the Irish annals of the ninth century, fighting beside Amlaíb, sharing power among the Norse in Ireland, taking part in the siege of Dumbarton and returning to Dublin with a great fleet, captives and wealth. When he died in 873, the annals remembered him with an extraordinary title: King of the Norsemen of all Ireland and Britain. His name did not disappear with him. Sons and descendants followed, and the dynasty now known as Uí Ímair would become one of the great Norse dynasties of the Irish Sea world, with connections stretching between Dublin, York, Scotland and beyond. And this is where the mystery begins. Many historians have identified this Ímar with the Ivar/Inwar associated with the Great Army in England. The chronology can fit. The geography can fit. Even the disappearance of Ímar from the Irish record during crucial years can fit. But there is something we could not find: the line that proves they were the same man. No contemporary source says: Ímar of Ireland was Ivar of England. So this album does not pretend that one exists. Instead, these 15 tracks follow the evidence as far as it will take us. Along the way we meet Amlaíb, Óisle, the mysterious King of Laithlind, Tomrair, Máel Sechnaill, Halfdan and the rulers caught inside the rapidly changing world of the mid-ninth century. We follow wars between Irish kings and Norse leaders — but also alliances between them. We find Scandinavian factions fighting other Scandinavian factions. We find kings without names. Brothers without a clearly recorded father. Great fleets sent to demand obedience. Political alliances changing from one year to the next. And eventually, in 865, a Great Army appears in England. Later tradition would give that army a simple and powerful story: Ragnar died. His sons came for revenge. The contemporary sources are far less certain. They show armies, kings, brothers, treaties, tribute, shifting alliances and competing centres of power — but they do not explain the Great Army as the revenge of Ragnar's sons. Perhaps the army was not created by one death. Perhaps it was the result of twenty years of war, wealth, migration, political upheaval and increasingly powerful military networks stretching across northern and western Europe. And perhaps not everyone who became part of that army even came from the same direction. That question remains open too. The same is true of Ragnar Loðbrók. This album does not claim that Ragnar never existed. A historical Reginherus appears in the Frankish world in 845, while later traditions gradually connect Loðbrók and Ragnar with some of the great Viking leaders of the ninth century. But those connections become much clearer long after the men themselves were dead. So rather than forcing the pieces together, we leave the gaps visible. Because sometimes the missing pieces are part of the history. This album began as an attempt to find Ivar the Boneless. Instead, we found a much larger world behind him. Laithlind. Dublin. Ireland. Britain. The Great Army. Kings and warlords whose relationships are still debated more than a thousand years later. And at the centre of it all stands one man we know was there. Ímar. Was Ímar Ivar the Boneless? Maybe. There are good reasons to think so. But after following the sources as far as we can, there are still not two lines beneath the answer. So the final track ends where the evidence leaves us: We went looking for Ivar. We found Ímar. And perhaps one day, another forgotten line in another source will bring the two names together. Until then, the question remains open.