caption father death_date death_place predecessor successor title birth_date spouse image article_title name reign
nineteenth-century and back of one of haraldr 's now non-existent seals representation . of a seventeenth-century illustration of the front Óláfr guðrøðarson 1248 sumburgh roost Óláfr guðrøðarson rögnvaldr Óláfsson king of mann and the isles 1222 or 1223 cecilía hákonardóttir harald -lrb- seal 01 -rrb- . jpg olafsson , king of mann and the isles harald olafsson
 haraldr Óláfsson 1237 & ndash ; 1248
harald olafsson

haraldr Óláfsson -lrb- died 1248 -rrb- , also known as harald olafsson , and arailt mac amhlaíbh , was a thirteenth-century king of mann and the isles , and a member of the crovan dynasty .
he was one of several sons of Óláfr guðrøðarson , king of the isles , although the identity of his mother is uncertain .
when his father died in 1237 , haraldr succeeded to the kingship as a fourteen-year-old , and held the kingship for about a decade afterwards .
early in his reign , haraldr was forced to contend with an apparent coup perpetrated by a kinsman and perhaps an otherwise unknown younger brother .
following this , haraldr was then ejected from mann by envoys of his father 's overlord , hákon hákonarson , king of norway , who probably took action against haraldr because the former had refused to render him homage .
unable to overcome hákon 's supporters in the isles , haraldr eventually submitted to hákon in norway , and remained there for about two or three years before being restored in the isles .
unlike his immediate royal predecessors , who appear to have favoured the title `` rex insularum '' , haraldr appears to have preferred `` rex mannie et insularum '' .
three charters from haraldr 's reign are known , two of which are recorded to have borne a waxen seal , depicting a galley on one side and a lion on the other .
haraldr reigned during a period of competing claims to overlordship of the isles by the english , norwegian , and scottish crowns .
like his father before him , and a younger brother after him , haraldr was knighted by henry iii , king of england .
the act itself brought haraldr closer within the orbit of the english crown .
late in 1247 , however , haraldr returned to norway and married hákon 's daughter , cecilía , and thereby bound himself closer to the norwegian crown .
whilst attempting to return to the isles in the autumn of 1248 , the newly-wed 's ship was lost at sea south of shetland in a tidal race known as sumburgh roost .
news of haraldr 's demise appears to have reached mann by the spring of 1249 , whereupon his younger brother , rögnvaldr , succeeded to the kingship .
haraldr was evidently a popular and capable king who appears to have garnered much of his support from the hebridean portion of his realm .
his untimely death , however , led to the continuation of the vicious kin-strife which had wracked the crovan dynasty during his father 's `` floruit '' .
the chaos brought about by haraldr 's demise appears to have contributed to the invasion of argyll , and near conquest of the hebrides , by alexander ii , king of scotland .
