40 Details About 'Vikings' That The History Channel Doesn’t Want Us To Know

Vikings may not have been strictly historically accurate, but it brought a lot of gory fun to the History Channel. Throughout six seasons fans followed the story of Ragnar Lothbrok and his family, although they had to be careful not to get too attached to any character. The show’s all over now, but new secrets and hilarious cast stories keep coming out! So here are 40 of the best of them.

40. All the tattoos are based in historical reality

Designer Tom McInerney is the man responsible for those awesome Viking tattoos adorning the main cast. Rollo actor Clive Standen told the website Buzzfeed in 2015, “He researches the tattoos from original Scandinavian and Norse artifacts, or actual runic scribe… Some of these things are really complicated to piece out, but they come from real designs.” And they look so cool.

39. Everyone gets a copy of their head

Imagine joining a show and knowing your character could end up dead and headless before too long? That was reality for the cast of Vikings. All the major actors needed a fake head one way or another. Designer Tom McInerney joked to the SBS website in 2017, “We sometimes use 3D prints of the actors’ faces, but if I want to punish someone, I’ll make them sit through the whole plaster cast process, which can be pretty claustrophobic.”

38. Travis Fimmel was once a model

Ragnar actor Travis Fimmel once had a job a long way away from the bloody world of Vikings… he was a male model. And a very successful one to boot. Rumor has it that once a billboard of his beautiful face went up in a busy area of London, distracted-driver car accidents in that area immediately increased.

37. Winnick was the only woman on set for a while

Katheryn Winnick’s character Lagertha represented the warrior women of the Viking era. For a while, she was the only woman on set. The actress told the website Collider in 2013, “I was surrounded by 14 Viking men and I remember thinking, ‘Wow, this sounds and feels familiar.’ I grew up in a martial arts gym surrounded by men and boys, and I pretty much call myself a tomboy.”