Character · Vinland Saga
Prince Canute
The prince the Vikings capture is so quiet and so beautiful that the crew keeps mistaking him for a woman.
In Otakana the clue reads: Danish prince taken hostage on campaign
- Type
- Character
- Series
- Vinland Saga
- Letters
- 6 · Normal
Canute is the younger son of King Sweyn, sent on the English campaign because leaving him at home would look like favouritism, and hidden behind a cloak because he cannot stand to be looked at. He prays constantly, defers to his priest, and appears to have no capacity for command at all. Askeladd takes him hostage and the entire war reorganises itself around the fact.
What happens to him is the closest thing Vinland Saga has to a conversion, and it runs the wrong way. Grief and a hard argument about the nature of love turn the timid boy into something colder and far more capable, and the change is fast enough that people who knew him do not recognise the man giving orders a few episodes later.
The historical Canute became Cnut the Great, king of England from 1016 and later of Denmark and Norway. Makoto Yukimura keeps the outline of that career and fills in a personality for it, which is the method the whole series uses: real names and real dates, with the interior life invented.
Spelling CANUTE
CANUTE is the English form of the Old Norse Knut, six letters ending in a silent-ish E. The Japanese is クヌート, Kunuuto, so hearing the show gives you no help with the Roman spelling at all. Do not try KNUT or CNUT, both of which are historically defensible and both of which are wrong on the tiles. One C, one N, and the U sits in the middle.