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VIK: This is Lindisfarne. It's an island off the north-east coast of England. We Vikings came here in the 8th century.

It was one of the first pieces of English land that we arrived at when we came from Scandinavia.

It's right on the edge of Britain. The Christian monastery here was famous and we Vikings knew that it was full of beautiful things, maybe even treasure.

Well, you can't blame us for wanting to take home a few… souvenirs. I mean after all, we had travelled a long way.

SID: Souvenirs? You make the monastery sound like a gift shop.

VIK: Well, I suppose it was a bit like that for us Vikings. Oh come on, we were pagans. We didn't understand Christianity then. The monasteries weren't so important from our point of view.

SID: That's still no excuse for killing a load of monks. There's no doubt about it, you Vikings were a load of bullies. You were very destructive and you did a lot of damage, especially around here.

VIK: By the hammer of Thor, I'll make you hold your tongue. By the sword of Odin, I'll…

SID: What you doing? Stop mucking about.

VIK: Well, as you think us Vikings are nothing more than bullies and fighters, I thought I'd live up to my reputation.

SID: Well, I didn't mean that you were like that, I was only joking.

VIK: Ha! So was I. But you shouldn't have said all those nasty things about us Vikings. We weren't all the same, you know.

There were good Vikings and bad Vikings, just like there were good and bad Saxons.

Anyway… What was so important about the monastery?

SID: I don't know. Press buttons on your gadget thing and find out.

VIK: That's exactly what I was just about to do.

NARRATOR: 'Monasteries were places where monks lived and worshipped.'

'They spent their days praying, working and helping people who lived nearby.'

'They were also able to read and write at a time when hardly anybody else could.'

'People respected them and gave them money and gifts for their monasteries, which is why they were special buildings.'

'The first monastery at Lindisfarne was started by a monk called Aidan, in 635 AD.'

'He built it for Oswald, the Saxon king of Northumbria, who had become a Christian.'

'Early monasteries weren't made of stone, they were wooden.'

'So it was easy for the Vikings to burn them down.'

'But the island continued to be important to Christians and they returned to build this stone monastery 400 years later.'

'To this day, Lindisfarne is known as Holy Island.'

'The Vikings had visited Britain before they attacked Lindisfarne, but this rage shocked people.'

'They started to believe that Vikings were pirates and fierce warriors and they were afraid of them.'

SID: Why were you Vikings so violent?

VIK: We weren't. Well, okay, we were when we came to Lindisfarne. But you can't believe everything that's been written about us,you know.

Look, I'll admit, there are reports in the Anglo-Saxon chronicles about what we did at Lindisfarne.

It says here that the terrified people of Northumbria saw omens like whirlwinds and lightning and dragons in the sky and a storm breaking out, just as us Vikings arrived.'

The other written report about Lindisfarne was in a letter that Bishop Alcuin sent to the king of Northumberland.

The bishop saw the destruction at Lindisfarne as a message from God because there were still too many pagans living in England.

His letter was more like an advert for the Christian church than a true report of what actually went on here in 793 AD.

Vikings came from Scandinavian countries, like Norway, Sweden, and Denmark.

Now, these countries had very harsh weather, especially during the winter, and people found it difficult to find or grow food.

You had to be tough to live in a country like Norway, tough enough, in fact, to sail to a new country and find a new home.

We Vikings were very hardy and strong people, eh, and we were skilful sailors, too. Brave enough to sail the cruellest seas.

Hey… maybe people wrote nasty things about us because they were 'jealous' of our amazing courage and skill.

SID: Not to mention your modesty.

VIK: Aye, that too. Come on.