"Take the map and colour with vermilion the provinces, districts and shores which the Northmen visited. The colouring will have to be repeated more than ninety times successively before you arrive at the conclusion of the Carlovingian dynasty. Furthermore, mark by the usual symbol of war, two crossed swords, the localities where battles were fought by or against the pirates: where they were defeated or triumphant, or where they pillaged, burned or destroyed; and the valleys and banks of Elbe, Rhine and Moselle, Scheldt, Meuse, Somme and Seine, Loire, Garonne and Adour, the inland Allier, and all the coasts and coast-lands between estuary and estuary and the countries between the river-streams, will appear bristling as with chevaux-de-frise. The strongly-fenced Roman cities, the venerated Abbeys and their dependent bourgades, often more flourishing and extensive than the ancient seats of government, the opulent seaports and trading towns, were all equally exposed to the Danish attacks, stunned by the Northmen's approach, subjugated by their fury. … They constitute three principal schemes of naval and military operations, respectively governed and guided by the great rivers and the intervening sea-shores. … The first scheme of operations includes the territories between Rhine and Scheldt, and Scheldt and Elbe: the furthest southern point reached by the Northmen in this direction was somewhere between the Rhine and the Neckar. Eastward, the Scandinavians scattered as far as Russia; but we must not follow them there. The second scheme of operations affected the countries between Seine and Loire, and again from the Seine eastward towards the Somme and Oise. These operations were connected with those of the Rhine Northmen. The third scheme of operations was prosecuted in the countries between Loire and Garonne, and Garonne and Adour, frequently flashing towards Spain, and expanding inland as far as the Allier and central France, nay, to the very centre, to Bourges." _Sir F. Palgrave, History of Normandy and England, book 1, chapter 3 (volume 1)._ {2371} ALSO IN: _C. F. Keary, The Vikings in Western Christendom, chapters 9-15._ NORMANS: A. D. 979-1016. The Danish conquest of England. See ENGLAND: A. D. 979-1016. NORMANS: A. D. 986-1011. Supposed voyages to America. See AMERICA: 10-11th CENTURIES. NORMANS: 10-13th Centuries. The breaking up of the Norse island empire.