Little is known about him except for stray references in various Frankish annals and The Life of Ansgar by Rimbert. Judging from the Frankish sources, the power center of the dynasty lay in extreme southern Denmark, including Hedeby, and Horik II emerged as the strongest of the claimants although young. Moreover, there still relatives of the former king Harald Klak alive. Kings were literally shouted into office at the assemblies (Danish: landsting) by the chiefs and peasants who supported him. The problem with the story is that at the time there was no hereditary kingship. In later historiography he is hence known as Erik the Child. The Frankish Fulda Annals and the Vita Ansgari make clear that only a single royal child was left alive, also called Horik (Old Norse, Hárikr). In the brief civil war that followed, the branches of the royal family were nearly wiped out. One of them, Guttorm, attacked Horik in 854. By the mid 9th century he was old by the standards of the time, and younger relatives began to create trouble. His predecessor Horik I had a long reign of more than 40 years.
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