An ambitious chief of a tribe in central Europe hires a 3,000-horse squad of Viking mercenaries. He pays them with silver drahm obtained from selling people as slaves to Morocco and Baghdad. The slaves in Morocco revolt and eventually take refuge in the fortress of Qarjat as-Saqaliba.

SYNOPSIS:

The leader wants to be the first king . He sends the captured people by river to the port of Wolin on the Baltic Sea and later to the territories of today's Spain. The women were sent to Baghdad as sex slaves and the men were castrated and sent to Morocco, eventually becoming the bodyguard of Sa'ida II ibn Salih.

After some time, the guards demanded that the ruler formally liberate them from their state of slavery. When he refused, the guards revolted. The emir took up arms in the palace and with great effort drove the guards from the capital. The soldiers and some of the family retreated into the mountains to the fortress of Qarjat as-Saqaliba, where they took an oath that they would not allow themselves to be captured and confirmed it by eating the soil from the cemetery.