1 Penning - Harald Hardråde

Harald Sigurdsson — Harald Hardråde, "Hard Ruler" — seized the Norwegian throne in 1047 after seventeen years of mercenary service, much of it as a Varangian Guard officer in Byzantium. The silver pennings struck under his name represent Norway's earliest indigenous coinage, modeled loosely on contemporary Anglo-Saxon penny types, almost certainly because English moneyers were imported to establish the mint. Harald died at Stamford Bridge in September 1066, three weeks before Hastings — making his coinage output span exactly the nineteen years of his reign, no more.