7 Major Characters In The Last Kingdom Who Aren't Even Real

A heartless former shipmaster, Kjartan and his son Sven lived on the land of Earl Ragnar the Fearless and for a while he served faithfully. Then young Sven and his friends decided that they wanted to chase Uhtred's adoptive sister Thyra through the woods and strip her naked. She was only seven or eight years old at the time. The young Uhtred intervenes and drives off Sven, taking her back home.

Enraged, Earl Ragnar descends on the shipmaster's home and demands an explanation. Kjartan thinks that all he needs to is apologise and promise that he has punished his own son, but this is not enough for Ragnar. When Uhtred reminds him that Thyra was made only half-naked, Ragnar takes half of Sven's eyes. He then banishes the two from his lands.

It is many years later when Kjartan and a band of murderers return to Ragnar's lands, to sat his house aflame and murder his family. This is the inciting incident that drives Uhtred out into the world, having sworn vengeance.

We wouldn't see Kjartan or Sven for the rest of the first season, but they would return in the second to serve as vicious antagonists for Uhtred and his brother Ragnar. Now that both are in the north, they have the chance to take their vengeance at Durham. Swords are drawn and blood is spilled there after. Kjartan and his family were made for the story of Uhtred, they did not exist in actual history.