How to conquer Greenland ft. Ashley Haden
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Show Notes
Greenland, 986 CE. Erik the Red has just established the first Norse settlement at Brattahlid, and comedian Ashley Haden has been living among the colonists for three months. The problem? A prominent farmer named Thorvald has accused him of stealing two sheep he never touched, and a public assembly called the Thing is happening at dawn. If found guilty, he owes compensation he can't pay, which means outlawry in the middle of a Greenlandic winter.
Ashley's approach to Viking justice: invoke Odin, challenge his accuser to trial by combat, and open with a string of sheep-related insults so offensive that even the Game Master pauses. His knowledge of Norse mythology is suspiciously detailed, his combat instincts are disturbingly practical, and his long-term strategy involves hunting dedications to Freyja, political alliances with Erik the Red, and a patience for revenge that the AI clearly wasn't expecting.
The real Norse settlement of Greenland was a branding exercise. Erik the Red named it "Greenland" to attract settlers to a frozen island where winter darkness lasted twenty hours a day, farming was barely viable, and disputes were settled by public assembly under open sky. Survival required community, reputation, and knowing whose favour to court. Ashley brings all three, plus a moral code that draws the line at torture but not at snare traps.
If you were sent back in time, could you survive and thrive — or would you be burnt at the stake for being a witch? PastMaster is the show that turns history into an interactive adventure game. Each episode, a comedian is dropped into the past with nothing but modern knowledge and terrible ideas. The AI Game Master is strict. The chaos is inevitable. The past will be mastered.
Era: Medieval | 986 CE | Qassiarsuk, Greenland
Featuring: Ashley Haden — comedian (Pegasus New Act of the Year Winner 2016, We Are All C*nts)
EPISODE LINKS
Follow Ashley's adventure on the PastMaster Interactive Map 👉 https://map.pastmasterpod.com
Ashley Haden:
Instagram @ahpoliticalbreakdown
X @ashleyhaden
ashleyhaden.co.uk
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