From: GEN0036@Husky1.StMarys.Ca (GILBERT RICHARD)
Subject: Icelandic Relgions (was Re: Residence in local branches)
Organization: St. Mary's University, Halifax, N.S., Canada
Date: Tue, 21 Jul 1992 23:13:48 GMT
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Hossein writes:

>Unto the good gentles of the Rialto does Hossein Ali Qomi send greetings and
>prayers for the blessings of Allah.
>
> [ ... Hossein quotes me on early Icelandic settlement ... ]
>
>You are entirely right that the first settlers were fleeing Harald Finehair.
>However, I was not speaking of the first wave of emigration, but of the
>pattern of emigration taken as a whole.  Examination of the limited parish
>records extant in Norway and Sweden suggest that whole families fled to
>avoid penalties for apostacy from Christianity to paganism (frequently in
>the form of notations of parallel ancestoral lines, usually indentifying
>the emigrants as apostates).  Furthermore, the wars to which you allude
>and which accounted for the ensuing waves of emigration were largely over
>royal attempts to impose Christianity and forms of political organization
>which went with it.  The absence of a legal system was extremely attractive
>in light of the Scandanavian legal system being used to persecute apostates.
>The best evidence suggests that, while Iceland was "officially" Christian
>quite early, the actual process of conversion wasn't anything like complete
>until late in the thirteenth century. And there's a lengthy correspondence
>between the church in Iceland and the papacy which strongly supports this
>contention.

Well, in the case of Sweden I would find that highly suspect, as the
references I've read indicate that Sweden didn't convert until the 12th
century, by which point Iceland's laws were rather strict against the old
religions. With Norway and Denmark, I can see it as being possible, as both
of those were converted by the end of the 11th century...

I don't know much about the Kings of Denmark and Sweden in general, but the
first King of Norway to try to convert his subjects was Hakon the Good in
the late 10th century... followed by Olaf Tryggvason, whose military
pressure has been advanced as being possibly one of the causes for the
Lawspeaker's decision to abandon paganism in favour of Christianity.
However, he was *killed* not long after Iceland was converted, and most of
the people he had converted reverted immediately to paganism. It wasn't
until later in the eleventh century that Norway was converted and *stayed*
converted. (Although Olaf did do a lot to help Christianity by building
churches and so on, he didn't really do that much in terms of converting
his subjects...)

The wars I was alluding to were mainly the wars against the Saxons in
England and the Celts in Ireland, neither of which was doing very well
early in the 10th century.

Iceland *had* a legal system. And from the date of the conversion (either
1000 or 999 depending on who you believe), making sacrifices in public was
illegal... along with other pagan practices such as eating horseflesh...

It had a rather sophisticated legal system, actually. A *large* section of
the Saga of the Burning of Njal (Njall? my copy has a number of anglicized
name spellings) is devoted to the suit Kari Solmundarson brings against the
Burners... Simply because a nation has no police force or jail doesn't mean
it doesn't have any law (altho it did had a simple punishment system - you
could be fined, exiled [the 'lesser outlawry'] or outlawed for life)

>My point wasn't that a lot of Norsemen didn't think Harald Finehair was a
>_bitka sonnr_, but that the use of the term "overlord" was duplicitous in
>sense.  In the case of Iceland it was used to mean any oppressive political
>leader.  In the remainder of the original posting to which I was responding
>it was used in its technical, feudal sense.  I was pointing out that
>feudalism didn't exist in Scandanavia at the time, and that the poster's
>argument depended on the duplicity of sense.

Well, yes. I agree with you there... one of the things I *like* about 10th
century Scandinavia is that it's non-feudal... (not being a feudal-type
person)

>I stand by my original assertion.  It is based on the weight of evidence and
>deals with the central tendency of the emigration (like all analyses from
>central tendency it is subject to counterexample, because most distributions
>have outliers -- but if this were pernicious, statistical analysis wouldn't
>be possible).
>
>Best Wishes,
>
>Hossein/Greg

-Brynjolfr Myrkjartanarson, Compaignie Mercurie, Seashire, Ruantallan, East

      The unwise man thinks he will live for ever if he shuns fight, but
      Old age gives him no peace though spears may shun him. - The Havamal

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