A NEW INTRODUCTION TO OLD NORSEPART II: READER

A NEWINTRODUCTION TO
OLD NORSE
PART II

ReadeR
fifth EDITION

edited BY

ANTHONY FAULKES

VIKING SOCIETY FOR NORTHERN RESEARCH
UNIVERSITY COLLEGE LONDON

2011© VIKING SOCIETY FOR NORTHERN RESEARCH
ISBN: 978-0-903521-83-3
First published 2001
Second edition with corrections and additions 2002
Third edition with corrections and additions 2005
Fourth edition with corrections and additions 2007
Reprinted with minor corrections 2008
Fifth edition 2011

Printed by Short Run Press Limited, Exeter

PREFACE
This fifth edition of A New Introduction to Old Norse II: Reader has
the same texts as the fourth edition, but versions of the skaldic verses
in prose word order have been added after the notes to each text that
contains any that are complicated enough to need them. Backgroundnotes to Text I have been contributed by Richard Perkins. Some
additions to the bibliographies and minor corrections have been madeby various contributors.
The texts have been prepared and annotated by the following:
I , XVII and XX: Michael Barnes.
II, XVI and XIX: Anthony Faulkes.
III, VIII, XXI and XXVII: Richard Perkins.
IV, IX, X, XI and XXIV: Rory McTurk.
V, VI, XV and XXVI: Alison Finlay.
VII: Diana Whaley.
XII and XXIII: David Ashurst.
XIII and XXII: Carl Phelpstead.
XIV: Peter Foote.
XVIII: Elizabeth Ashman Rowe.
XXV: John McKinnell.

The introductions are by the same writers, except in the case of Text I,
where the introduction is by Anthony Faulkes, who has also been general
editor of the whole volume, and compiled the main Glossary and Index
in Part III, the fourth edition of which includes supplementary Glossaries
and Indexes to the East Norse texts and the runic inscriptions by
Michael Barnes. The general ‘Introduction to the Study of Old Norse’ isby Alison Finlay, the ‘Note on Normalisation’ is by Anthony Faulkes.
The plan of this volume was that it should include at least one extractfrom works in each of the main genres of Old Norse literature. This
plan has now been fulfilled, and NION now offers an introduction to thewhole range of early Scandinavian writings. Users of this book arereminded that several further complete Old Icelandic texts with glossaries
are available in other Viking Society publications (see p. xxxvi below).
The first part of Text I, the extract from Hrólfs saga, has a comprehensive grammatical commentary. The remainder of the extract is fully
glossed with virtually complete references. It is recommended thatstudents begin with this text to ensure that they understand thegrammatical structure of Old Icelandic before proceeding to others
where the grammatical information in the glossary and notes is muchsparser. The succeeding texts are glossed with progressively fewer

vi

A New Introduction to Old Norse

references, though it is hoped that all words have been explained on
their first occurrence in each extract, so that it will not be necessary
for them to be read in the order in which they are printed. Idioms andconstructions are explained much more fully in the Glossary than isusual in teaching books because experience has shown that it is thesethat cause the greatest difficulty in understanding Old Icelandic texts;
and numerous cross-references are included to help elementary students
identify the entry forms of words that appear in the texts in guises thatare difficult to recognise—another of the persistent problems oflearning this language.

A NOTE ON NORMALISATION
Texts in Old Norse manuscripts use a variety of letter forms andspellings that are very confusing for beginners learning to read in theoriginal language.1 For instance, ‘c’ and ‘k’, ‘i’ and ‘j’, ‘ﬂ’ and ‘›’ areoften used indifferently for the same sounds, and various symbols or
combinations of symbols are used to represent the sounds of ‘o’, ‘ø’ and‘ƒ’ without distinguishing them consistently. Many abbreviations areused. Length of vowels and consonants is indicated in various ways
or not at all. Capital letters, punctuation, word breaks, paragraph breaks
are used according to different conventions from those that are now
current, verse lines and direct speech are arranged differently on thepage from the way that is now usual. Except for some special scholarly
purposes, where diplomatic transcription is felt appropriate, it is now
customary when printing these texts to use a single symbol for eachsound, always to indicate length of vowels by the use of an acuteaccent (except over ‘æ’ and ‘œ’, which are by modern convention
always long), and to use modern conventions for word division,
capitalisation, punctuation, paragraphing and the arrangement of verselines and direct speech. Abbreviations are usually expanded.
There are also variations in the spelling of some words that are due
to differences in the dialect of the author or scribe, and others that
result from changes in pronunciation from the time of the earliest
written texts (twelfth century) to the time of the latest copies of Old
Norse texts (seventeenth century or even later). For instance, thedistinctions between the sounds ‘ƒ’ and ‘ø’, ‘á’ and ‘’ was lost during
the thirteenth century, and these sounds are now represented by ‘ö’and ‘á’ respectively. The distinction betweeen ‘e’ and short ‘æ’ was1

See Stefán Karlsson, The Icelandic Language (2004), section 2.

Introduction to the study of Old Norsevii

lost in Old Icelandic before the time of the earliest manuscripts, but
survives in some texts of Norwegian origin; on the other hand ‘h’before ‘l’ was lost early in Norwegian, but survives still in Icelandic.
Other variations in the spelling of words arise from the developmentof parallel linguistic forms of words as a result of the uneven operationof sound changes, analogy with words of similar structure or withother parts of the same word, or differences in stress in certain
positions. Such are the alternations of nakkvarr/nekkverr/nƒkkurr for
the indefinite pronoun, bar›r/bari›r for the pp. of the verb berja,
ﬂykkir/ﬂikkir/ﬂikir for the 3rd pers. sg. pres. of the verb ﬂykkja.
The variations in the spelling in manuscripts of Old Norse texts are
not random, nor are they idiosyncratic attempts to spell ‘phonetically’.
They are the result of the different training of scribes in scriptoria invarious parts of the Old Norse world at various times. Each scriptorium
had its own method of applying the Latin alphabet to the sounds of
Old Norse, which was usually some variation of the methods used in
Anglo-Saxon scriptoria to apply the Latin alphabet to the sounds of
Old English. There survive almost no authorial manuscripts of works
of Old Icelandic literature, and moreover the copies we have are often
at the end of a chain of copies from the original, that were made by
scribes from various scriptoria. While they would mostly try to replace
the spelling conventions of the exemplar they were copying with thosethey had learned from their own training, they would never be able todo this consistently, so that traces of the conventions of previous
scribes (and of the dialects and periods of those previous scribes)
would remain, resulting in a copy with a mixture of conventions andthus with an appearance of randomness.
In the printing of Old Norse texts in German and Scandinavian
editions, it has been generally customary to keep much closer to themanuscript spellings than in British and American editions, which haveusually used spellings thought to represent the ‘standard’ pronunciation of thirteenth-century Iceland, such as is also used in most of theeditions in Íslenzk fornrit (though in some Icelandic editions intended
for the general Icelandic reader, modern Icelandic spelling is now used),even though in printing Old and Middle English and early Modern
English texts for academic purposes the original spellings havegenerally been retained. Nevertheless, there has been a move towards
keeping closer to the spelling of manuscripts, for instance in Bjarni
Einarsson’s edition of Egils saga (Viking Society for Northern Research2003). In addition, it has been customary for editors to apply different

viii

A New Introduction to Old Norsespelling conventions to any skaldic verses included in prose texts, so
as to reproduce what was supposed to have been the pronunciation at
the time the verses were composed, thought in some cases to havebeen up to three centuries or more earlier. In the verses in Egils saga
2003, however, the same spellings have been used as in rendering theprose, because of the uncertainty about the verses’ date and authorship.
In the texts in this Reader, editors have been given a certain amountof freedom in the spellings they adopt, with the recommendation thatthey keep as close to the spellings of the manuscript they are using as
their base text as possible. The symbols listed in NION I, §§ 2.1.1–2.1.3
have been used, with the addition of ‘∂’ for the short ‘æ’ in the Norwegian
texts where the distinction between ‘e’ and short ‘æ’ is made. Modern
conventions for word division, capitalisation, punctuation, paragraphing
and the arrangement of verse lines and direct speech are used. In thekinds of variant spellings that are due to dialect or difference of date, theeditors have been encouraged to choose the spellings they deem mostappropriate to the supposed date and place of composition, taking into
account the usage of the scribe, but not to treat the skaldic verses differently
from the prose narrative in which they are embedded, even if this interfereswith the normal patterns of vowel assonance (such as characterises bothend rhyme and internal rhyme in Old Norse poetry) and rhythm. It
was recommended that the usage of the scribe of the manuscript should
be followed in the kinds of variant spellings in the third paragraphabove. On the procedures adopted in editing East Norse texts (XX)and runic inscriptions (XVII), see respectively pp. 270 and 221–22.
This policy is intended to help students become accustomed to someof the wide variety of forms (archaic, dialectal, post-classical or
analogical) that appear commonly in editions (and dictionaries andgrammars), and also to ensure that they are aware of the different
spellings that underlie the normalised texts that have traditionally beenused in teaching, and of the variations in the language between AD 900
and 1400 over the wide cultural area inhabited by Vikings in the Middle
Ages. It should also make it easier for them to progress to independent
reading of texts where the language is not fully normalised. All variant
spellings in the texts are included in the Glossary in NION III, withcross-references as necessary.
Emendations to the base texts have been marked by pointed brackets‹ › around letters added to the manuscript readings, square brackets [ ]around letters supplied that are illegible and italics for letters changed(the manuscript readings in the last case are given in footnotes).

Introduction to the study of Old Norseix

CONTENTSABBREVIATIONS ...................................................................................... x
INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY OF OLD NORSE ............................ xi
CHRONOLOGY ................................................................................... xxxix
MAP OF ICELAND .................................................................................. xlii
LIST OF LAWSPEAKERS ...................................................................... xliv
I:HRÓLFS SAGA KRAKA ............................................................... 1
II:
Snorri Sturluson: EDDA ............................................................... 21
III:
Sturla ﬁór›arson: ÍSLENDINGA SAGA ...................................... 29
IV:
KORMAKS SAGA ....................................................................... 41V:
BJARNAR SAGA HÍTDŒLAKAPPA ......................................... 49
VI:
FAGRSKINNA ............................................................................. 61
VII:
Snorri Sturluson: HEIMSKRINGLA ............................................ 85
A: ÓLÁFS SAGA TRYGGVASONAR ............................................... 88
B: HARALDS SAGA SIGUR‹ARSONAR ....................................... 95
C: THE ART AND CRAFT OF THE SKALDIC STANZA .............. 100
VIII: Ari ﬁorgilsson: ÍSLENDINGABÓK ........................................... 105
IX:
ﬁRYMSKVI‹A ........................................................................... 133
X:
V¯LUNDARKVI‹A ................................................................. 147
XI:
ﬁI‹REKS SAGA ........................................................................ 161
XII:
SAGA AF TRISTRAM OK ÍS¯ND ........................................... 169
XIII: MARÍU SAGA ............................................................................ 179
XIV: JÓNS SAGA HELGA ................................................................. 185
XV:LAXDŒLA SAGA ..................................................................... 197
XVI: AU‹UNAR ﬁÁTTR .................................................................... 207
XVII: RUNIC INSCRIPTIONS ............................................................ 217
XVIII: MÖ‹RUVALLABÓK ................................................................ 245
XIX: LANDNÁMABÓK ..................................................................... 261
XX:
EAST NORSE ............................................................................. 267
XXI: EIRÍKS SAGA RAU‹A ............................................................. 287
XXII: ÓLÁFS RÍMA HARALDSSONAR ........................................... 313
XXIII: PHYSIOGNOMY ....................................................................... 329
XXIV: KONUNGS SKUGGSJÁ ............................................................ 339
XXV: HAM‹ISMÁL ............................................................................ 349
XXVI: NJÁLS SAGA ............................................................................. 369
XXVII: GRÁGÁS .................................................................................... 387

ABBREVIATIONS
BS = The Book of the Settlements. Landnámabók, tr. Hermann Pálsson andPaul Edwards (1972).
CCIMA = Corpus Codicum Islandicorum Medii Aevi I–XX (1930–56).
CSI = The Complete Sagas of Icelanders I–V, ed. Vi›ar Hreinsson et al. (1997).
C–V = Richard Cleasby and Gudbrand Vigfusson, An Icelandic–English Dictionary. 2nd ed. by William A. Craigie (1957).
DMA = Dictionary of the Middle Ages, ed. Joseph R. Strayer, 13 vols (1982–89).
EÓS = Einar Ól. Sveinsson, The Age of the Sturlungs: Icelandic Civilizationin the Thirteenth Century, tr. Jóhann S. Hannesson (1953).
Gr = Michael Barnes, A New Introduction to Old Norse. Part I. Grammar(2004).
Hkr = Snorri Sturluson, Heimskringla. History of the Kings of Norway, tr.
Lee M. Hollander (1964 and reprints).
HOIC = Jón Jóhannesson, A History of the Old Icelandic Commonwealth, tr.
Haraldur Bessason (1974).
ÍF = Íslenzk fornrit I– , 1933– .
ION = E. V. Gordon, An Introduction to Old Norse. 2nd ed. by A. R. Taylor(1957).
Laws = Laws of Early Iceland. Grágás I–II, tr. Andrew Dennis, Peter Foote,
Richard Perkins (1980–2000).
LP = Sveinbjörn Egilsson, Lexicon Poeticum, rev. Finnur Jónsson (1931).
MRN = E. O. G. Turville-Petre, Myth and Religion of the North (1964 andreprints).
MS = Phillip Pulsiano (ed.), Medieval Scandinavia: An Encyclopedia (1993).
NION = A New Introduction to Old Norse.
OddrÓT = Saga Óláfs Tryggvasonar af Oddr Snorrason munk, ed. Finnur
Jónsson (1932).
ON = Old Norse.
PE = Edda: die Lieder des Codex Regius nebst verwandten Denkmälern, ed.
Gustav Neckel, 4th ed., rev. Hans Kuhn (1962).
Skj = Den norsk-islandske skjaldedigtning A I–II, B I–II, ed. Finnur Jónsson(1912–15).
SnE, Gylfaginning = Snorri Sturluson, Edda. Prologue and Gylfaginning, ed.
Anthony Faulkes (2005).
SnE, Háttatal = Snorri Sturluson, Edda. Háttatal, ed. Anthony Faulkes (1999).
SnE, Skáldskaparmál = Snorri Sturluson, Edda. Skáldskaparmál, ed. Anthony
Faulkes (1998).
VAch = Peter Foote and David M. Wilson, The Viking Achievement (1970).

INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY OF OLD NORSE
1. Old Norse or Old Icelandic?
The main aim of this Reader, and ultimately of A New Introduction to
Old Norse as a whole, is to introduce students to representative extracts
from works in each of the major genres of literature surviving in Old
Icelandic, along with the necessary apparatus for reading these texts
in their original language. This introduction offers a brief overview
of these genres, together with an account of their context. Somebibliographical references are given at the end of each section, andmore general suggestions for further reading are listed at the end of
this Introduction, but these bibliographies are not exhaustive, and tend
to favour works available in English. More specific introductorymaterial and bibliographical suggestions can be found in the Introduction to each text in the Reader.
The term ‘Old Norse’ has traditionally been used to refer to thelanguage, literature and culture of medieval Scandinavia in the Middle
Ages. Some scholars condemn the term as an appropriation of theculture and heritage of Iceland, and prefer the label ‘Old Icelandic’,since virtually all the surviving literary texts were either written in
Iceland, or are preserved only in Icelandic manuscripts (Jónas
Kristjánsson 1994). But ‘Old Norse’ does capture the fact that thisliterary heritage ultimately represents a culture originating in mainland
Scandinavia, which was taken during the Viking Age (see 2 below)
not only to the Viking colonies, including Iceland, that were established in the Atlantic, but also as far afield as Greenland and North
America. According to accounts in the sagas, the impetus for thesettlement of these colonies came primarily from Norway, thoughattempts have been made to gauge the accuracy of this account by
scientific means, and to argue for a strong Celtic element in the early
Icelandic population. The picture of strong cultural links between
Norway, Iceland and settlements in Orkney, the Hebrides and northern
Britain (including Ireland) has not been seriously challenged. The
language of Norway and its colonies is referred to as West Norse, todistinguish it from East Norse, the language of Sweden and Denmark.
For an account of the term ‘Old Norse’ as it applies to the language,
see Grammar, ‘Introduction’ 1.2.
Apart from the runic inscriptions in Text XVII, the texts includedin this Reader have an Icelandic emphasis, which reflects thexii

A New Introduction to Old Norse

predominance of the Icelanders in recording the history of the
Scandinavian peoples, developing new literary forms, and preserving
texts of many kinds through copying and reworking over many
centuries. But Texts VI, XI and XXIV originated in Norway and aselection of East Norse extracts is included in Text XX.
Even those primarily interested in the material culture — the history
or archaeology — that comes within the sphere of Old Norse willfind themselves extrapolating information from Icelandic texts. The
study of Old Icelandic is also a starting point for runic studies, although
there are virtually no genuinely medieval runic inscriptions in Iceland.
But the medieval culture of Iceland is a rewarding study in itself.
This remote outpost of Norway, first settled in the late ninth century,
was the location for a unique political experiment; until 1262–64,
when it became subject to the Norwegian crown, it remained a society
without a king, ruled by an oligarchy of the most substantial landowners and chieftains. Though an Icelandic historian has recently
described Iceland in this ‘Free State’ or ‘Commonwealth’ period as‘a headless, feuding society’ (Helgi ﬁorláksson in McTurk 2005, 136),
medieval Icelandic writers developed an ideology which represented
it as self-sufficient and, within limits, egalitarian. The early historyof their own society was represented in detail by Icelandic authors,
but the historical account developed largely in the thirteenth century
inevitably casts a mythologising glow over the period of settlement,
and is treated with caution (if not dismissed) by modern historians.
The literature of medieval Iceland is extraordinarily rich and includes
at least two genres unparalleled elsewhere: the Sagas of Icelanders,highly sophisticated prose narratives relating the semi-fictionalised
lives of early farmer heroes; and the highly-wrought skaldic poetryfound in praise poems for Scandinavian and other rulers, usuallycomposed by Icelandic poets, but also in less formal lausavísur(‘occasional verses’) scattered through the Sagas of Icelanders.
Though in Germany and North America Old Norse is usually taught
in departments of Germanic or Scandinavian studies, in Britain it has
traditionally been studied as part of a degree in English. This is ahistorical survival of the development of antiquarian interest in the
Anglo-Saxon past which began in the seventeenth century; scholars
seeking to fill gaps in their knowledge of Anglo-Saxon antiquities
turned to the rich heritage of Norse texts. The Scandinavian and Anglo-

Introduction to the study of Old Norsexiii

Saxon peoples were both offshoots of a common Germanic past: aswell as speaking related languages, they shared a pre-Christian religion.
There is evidence for this shared religion in the account of the Romanhistorian Tacitus, writing at the end of the first century AD, who refers
in his Germania to the cult among the Germanic tribes of the goddess
Nerthus, whose name is etymologically identical with that of the Norse
god Njƒr›r. Yet extended accounts of this pagan religion are foundonly in Norse sources, the Prose Edda of Snorri Sturluson and the
mythological poems of the Poetic Edda; early, sometimes pre-Christianreferences also survive in the diction of skaldic verses which Snorri’s
Edda was written to explicate. Tacitus also refers to the warlike
ideology of these early Germanic warrior peoples, for whom ‘it isinfamy during life, and indelible reproach, to return alive from a battle
in which their prince was slain. To preserve their prince, to defend
him, and to ascribe to his glory all their own valorous deeds, is thesum and most sacred part of their oath.’ This so-called ‘heroic code’of extreme bravery in battle has been seen as informing poems in
English such as Beowulf and The Battle of Maldon, no less than thepoems of Sigur›r and other heroes in the Poetic Edda, and their literary
heirs, the warrior-farmers of the Sagas of Icelanders. And Beowulf
reveals a more tangible link with early Scandinavia, since it tells of thedeeds of legendary heroes of the Danes, Swedes and other early Germanic
peoples, and alludes to legendary history also reworked in Icelandic
sources such as the fourteenth-century Hrólfs saga kraka (see Text I).
Tacitus, Agricola and Germania, tr. H. Mattingly (1973).
R. W. Chambers, Beowulf: An Introduction to the Study of the Poem.

3rd ed. (1963).
Jónas Kristjánsson, ‘Er Egilssaga “Norse”?’, Skáldskaparmál 3 (1994), 216–31.
R. I. Page, Norse Myths (1990, 1994).
G. Turville-Petre, Myth and Religion of the North (1964).
A. Wawn, The Vikings and the Victorians (2000).

2. The Vikings
The period c.750–1050, known as the Viking Age, saw widespread
incursions of Scandinavian peoples, mainly Norwegians and Danes, on
the cultures of Western Europe. English and Frankish sources record theimpact of the wælwulfas ‘slaughter-wolves’, as they are called in the Old
English poem The Battle of Maldon, first as pagan despoilers of thexiv

A New Introduction to Old Norserich resources of the monasteries on the Northumbrian coast, andacross the Channel north of the Seine estuary, in the late eighth century.
They conquered and established colonies in Orkney, Shetland, theHebrides and around the Irish coast in the ninth century, the time alsoof the settlement of the previously uninhabited Atlantic islands, Icelandand the Faroes. The further colonisation of Greenland, and explorationin North America, are recorded in the Icelandic ‘Vinland sagas’ (seeText XXI), though these settlements did not turn out to be permanent.
The battle of Maldon in 991 was probably part of a campaign led by theDanish king Sven Forkbeard (Sveinn tjúguskegg in Icelandic texts), which
culminated in his conquest of the English kingdom in 1013. England
was ruled after him by his son Knut (Canute in English, Knútr in Icelandic
texts); Scandinavian claims to English rule ended, however, with thedefeat of the Norwegian Haraldr har›rá›i at Stamford Bridge in 1066.
While Viking raiders were ravaging in the west, similar activity
was directed at eastern Europe and Russia from what is now Sweden.
These Vikings targeted local resources, largely furs and slaves, which
they obtained by seizure and the exaction of tribute. The term Rus,
probably first used by the Finns of north-western Russia to refer to
Scandinavians operating in their lands, gave what is now Russia its
name. Trading routes were established to the Black Sea and as far
south as Constantinople, where Scandinavians served the Byzantine
Emperor as mercenary warriors in the Varangian guard.
The Anglo-Saxon and Frankish chroniclers who recorded the Viking
raids from the point of view of their victims gave these heathen
plunderers an understandably bad press. A more sympathetic representation had to await the development of written culture in Scandinavia
following the conversion to Christianity c.1000 AD; Icelandic writersof the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, recreating the history of theViking period, cast a contrastingly heroic glow over the activities of
their ancestors. Some testimony contemporaneous to events survives
in the form of skaldic verse, derived from eulogies to warlike leadersof the Viking Age. This must have survived for two centuries or morein oral form before it was embedded in the prose works of later writers.
Sagas based on these verses and reproducing their warlike ideology
record the history of the Norwegian and other Scandinavian kings,
and the writers of Sagas of Icelanders elaborated the deeds of ordinary
Icelandic farmers into Viking heroic epics.

Introduction to the study of Old Norsexv

Further evidence from pre-Christian times survives in the form of
runic inscriptions. The runic alphabet was used in Scandinavia before
the introduction of Latin alphabet. Although inscriptions appear mostoften on memorial stones and are brief and formulaic, they chart the
movements of those commemorated, frequently travellers from
Sweden via the Baltic and Russia to Constantinople. Runic inscriptions
also provide valuable linguistic evidence for the early developmentof the Scandinavian languages (see Text XVII).
The origin of the word Viking (víkingr) is obscure. It may derivefrom the region of Norway around Oslo, known in the Middle Agesas Víkin, or from the substantive vík ‘small bay’, suggesting that
Vikings were prone to lurk in coves or bays, or from Old English wic‘settlement’, particularly used in place-names of ports, associatingthem rather with centres of trade — whether as legitimate traders or
attackers. In The Battle of Maldon, wicingas is used synonymouslywith many terms identifying the Norsemen as aggressors (wælwulfas)
and, especially, seafarers (brimliﬂende, sæmenn). In Old Icelandic
texts the word víkingr appears tainted with the same disapproval, andis usually applied not to heroic figures but to thugs and ‘berserkir’;
but fara í víking (to go on a Viking expedition) was a proper rite ofpassage for the young saga hero.
M. P. Barnes and R. I. Page, The Scandinavian Runic Inscriptions of Britain(2006).
S. Blöndal, The Varangians of Byzantium, tr. B. S. Benedikz (1978).
P. Foote and D. Wilson, The Viking Achievement (1970, repr. 1980).
G. Jones, A History of the Vikings (1984).
G. Jones, The Norse Atlantic Saga (1986).
J. Jesch, Women in the Viking Age (1991).
R. I. Page, Runes (1987).
Peter Sawyer, ed., The Oxford Illustrated History of the Vikings (1997).

3. The Early History of Iceland
The history of Iceland from its first settlement (dated to 870) down to1118 is told in the Íslendingabók of Ari ﬁorgilsson (see Text VIII and
p. 62 below), probably written about 1134. This book, which in thesurviving manuscripts is called Libellus Islandorum — or rather the
first, now lost version from 1122–33 on which it is based, which Ari
refers to as Íslendingabók — is probably the first narrative work to

xvi

A New Introduction to Old Norsebe written in Icelandic, though Ari himself refers to the first recordingof parts of the laws in the eleventh century. Ari uses a system ofchronology that relates events in the history of Iceland to the larger
picture of the Christian history of Europe. He deals with the settlement
and the establishment of the law; the founding of the Alﬂingi, the annual
general assembly held at ﬁingvellir in south-west Iceland each summer
at which legislation was passed and litigation pursued; the divisionof the country into fjór›ungar (‘quarters’ or administrative districts;
see map on pp. xl–xli); the settlement of Greenland; and — as a climax— the conversion to Christianity and the history of the early bishops.
A more detailed account of the settlement of Iceland is given in
Landnámabók (‘The Book of Settlements’), which may originallyhave been compiled as early as 1100 by contemporaries of Ari, who
has been thought to have had a role in the compilation himself (seeText XIX). It records in topographical order the arrival in Iceland ofsome 430 settlers, giving details of their families and descendants.
Surviving versions are from the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries
and later, much expanded with material from Sagas of Icelanders andelsewhere, so that their historicity is hard to assess.
Ari’s account of the conversion to Christianity in about 1000 AD
tells a remarkable story of the adoption of the new religion by aconsensus reached by the ruling oligarchy of large landholders andchieftains. A more detailed account is given in the thirteenth-century
Kristni saga, probably written by Sturla ﬁór›arson. The history of
the Church in the years 1056–1176 is chronicled in another thirteenthcentury work, Hungrvaka (‘Awakener of Hunger’), relating the historyof the first five bishops of Iceland. The Biskupa sögur, more extensive
biographies of the bishops of the eleventh to the fourteenth centuries,
were often written by contemporaries of the bishops themselves orother clerics (see Text XIV).
The laws of the Icelandic commonwealth are preserved in thecomposite collection known as Grágás (‘Grey Goose’), found invarious fragments and copies the earliest of which is from the midtwelfth century (see Text XXVII). It is difficult to assess the relationof the surviving material to the originally oral law, recited annually at
the Alﬂingi by the lawspeaker, part of which, according to Ari, wasfirst committed to writing in 1117–18. With the submission of Iceland
to Norway in 1262–64 Grágás was superseded first by a law codeIntroduction to the study of Old Norse

xvii

called Járnsí›a and then by Jónsbók, of which many fine manuscripts
survive. These codes were drafted in Norway.
The later secular history of Iceland down to the 1260s was told in
Sturlunga saga, actually a compilation of sagas sometimes calledsamtí›arsögur (‘Contemporary Sagas’, or more accurately ‘Sagas of Contemporaries’) (see section 10 below and Text III), since they were written
by contemporaries and sometimes eyewitnesses of the events related.
Íslendingabók. Landnámabók, ed. Jakob Benediktsson, Íslenzk fornrit I (1968).
Biskupa sögur I, ed. Sigurgeir Steingrímsson, Ólafur Halldórsson and P. Foote,Íslenzk fornrit XV (2003) (Includes Kristni saga, Kristni ﬂættir, Jóns sagains helga).
Biskupa sögur II, ed. Ásdís Egilsdóttir, Íslenzk fornrit XVI (2002) (Includes
Hungrvaka, ﬁórláks saga byskups, Páls saga byskups).
Biskupa sögur III, ed. Gu›rún Ása Grímsdóttir, Íslenzk fornrit XVII (1998)(Includes Árna saga biskups, Lárentíus saga biskups).
Sturlunga saga I–II, ed. Jón Jóhannesson, Magnús Finnbogason and Kristján
Eldjárn (1946).
Íslendingabók – Kristni saga. The Book of the Icelanders – The Story of theConversion, tr. S. Grønlie (2007).
The Book of Settlements, tr. Hermann Pálsson and P. Edwards (1972).
Laws of Early Iceland I–II, tr. A. Dennis, P. Foote and R. Perkins (1980–
2000).
Jón Jóhannesson, A History of the Old Icelandic Commonwealth (1974).
Jón Vi›ar Sigur›sson, Chieftains and Power in the Icelandic Commonwealth(1999).
D. Strömbäck, The Conversion of Iceland (1957).
Einar Ól. Sveinsson, The Age of the Sturlungs, Islandica XXXVI (1953).
J. Byock, Viking Age Iceland (2001).
Orri Vésteinsson, The Christianization of Iceland: Priests, Power and Social
Change 1000–1300 (2000).

4. The Language
This Reader offers texts, mostly in excerpts, in the original language
from the full range of Old Icelandic literary genres. Many of the bestknown texts can be read in translation, and references to some available
translations are included at the end of each section of this Introduction
and on pp. xxxvi–xxxviii as well as in the separate introductions toeach extract. But experiencing the texts in their original language
repays the difficulty of learning the language in many ways. This isof course true of literature in any language. In the particular case of

xviiiA New Introduction to Old Norse

Icelandic, the distinctive laconic and often ironical style of the sagas
is often diluted in translation. The highly specialised linguistic requirements of poetry, particularly the highly technical demands of skaldic
poetry, cannot be adequately met in translation; and leaving asideissues of literary style, there are pitfalls in attempting to assess thevalidity of Old Norse texts as historical sources without reference totheir original form and idiom, especially where their import depends
on the intricate interweaving of prose with verse citation.
A basic introduction to the Old Norse language and its relation toModern Icelandic can be found in A New Introduction to Old Norse.
Part 1: Grammar, Chapter 1, and a bibliography of grammatical andlinguistic works on p. 267 of the same book (2nd edition). A supplementary list is included below, concentrating on dictionaries of mostuse to students, and works available in English.
Stefán Karlsson, The Icelandic Language (2004).
J. Fritzner, Ordbog over det gamle norske Sprog I–III (1883–96); IV, Finn
Hødnebø, Rettelser og Tillegg (1972) (Old Norse–Danish/Norwegian).
R. Cleasby and G.Vigfusson, An Icelandic-English Dictionary (1874).
G. T. Zoega, A Concise Dictionary of Old Icelandic (1919).
Ordbog over det norrøne prosasprog/A Dictionary of Old Norse Prose (1:a–bam, 2: ban–da, 3: de–em) (1995–, in progress) (Old Norse–Danishand English).
Sveinbjörn Egilsson, Lexicon Poeticum, rev. Finnur Jónsson (1931) (Old
Norse–Danish; poetic, particularly skaldic, vocabulary).
B. La Farge and J. Tucker, Glossary to the Poetic Edda (1992).

5. Sagas
The word saga is related to the verb segja ‘to say’, meaning to say ortell, and refers in medieval texts to almost any kind of narrative
predominantly in prose (though the term is not used of some books
that we would call chronicles). Icelandic medieval narratives are ofmany different kinds, some of them unique to Icelandic, others
translations or adaptations of other European genres. Their division
into different categories or types of saga is largely the work of modern
scholars, however; though the terms konungasögur (‘Kings’ Sagas’)
and riddarasögur (‘Knights’ Sagas’ or romances) occur occasionallyin medieval contexts, the others are modern inventions.
The development of saga writing has sometimes been represented
as a progression from the early translation of Latin Saints’ Lives intoIntroduction to the study of Old Norsexix

the vernacular, to the full flowering of the Sagas of Icelanders, andthen to a decline into a fashion for more fantastic forms; but this is
misleading. The writing of one kind of saga did not cease with thedevelopment of new types, and some of the translations of ‘fantastic’
European romances are among the earliest sagas to be written. The
reality is that most of these kinds of saga were being written concurrently throughout the medieval period, and cross-fertilised andinfluenced each other.
According to the Preface to Snorri Sturluson’s Saga of St Óláfr,
ﬁat var meirr en tvau hundru› vetra tólfrœ› er Ísland var byggt, á›rmenn tœki hér sƒgur at rita ‘It was more than 240 years after thesettlement of Iceland that people began to write sagas here’ (Heimskringla II, 422). This places the beginning of saga writing at about
1110, which agrees with modern estimates; there is evidence ofvernacular writing in Iceland from the early twelfth century (for an
account of this early period of Icelandic writing, see Turville-Petre
1953). Snorri’s phrase sƒgur at rita highlights the necessary question
whether there was such a thing as a pre-literary, oral saga. It is assumed
that most of the sagas must go back to oral roots, but the question of
the forms that oral narrative might have taken is still much debated(see Clover 1986), and discussions of the sagas as literary types mustbe limited to the written texts we know.
‘Ór Óláfs sƒgu ins helga inni sérstƒku’ in Heimskringla II, ed. Bjarni
A›albjarnarson, Íslenzk fornrit XXVII (1945), pp. 419–51.
C. Clover, ‘The Long Prose Form’, Arkiv för nordisk filologi 101 (1986), 10–39.
P. Foote, ‘Sagnaskemtan: Reykjahólar 1119’, Saga-Book XIV, 226–39 (1953–
56) (repr. in Aurvandilstá (1984), 65–83).
Gísli Sigur›sson, The Medieval Icelandic Saga and Oral Tradition (2004).
G. Turville-Petre, Origins of Icelandic Literature (1953).

6. Sagas of Icelanders
The best-known category of saga is the Íslendingasögur or Sagas of
Icelanders, also known as Family Sagas. These are now taken to be themost distinctive and significant Icelandic saga form, although this was
not always the case; in the nineteenth century, when the sagas wereread more literally as historical sources, the Kings’ Sagas were valued
more highly, at least by readers outside Iceland. There are about 40
Sagas of Icelanders, narrating events that mostly took place or weresaid to have taken place in the period 930–1030, which is therefore

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A New Introduction to Old Norse

often called the ‘Saga Age’. Many begin with preludes reaching backbefore the beginning of the settlement of Iceland in 870. The sagas
range in length from just a few pages to the epic scope of Njáls saga (seeText XXVI), 159 chapters in the standard edition. Some, such as Gísla
saga or Grettis saga, are biographically structured on the life of a single
individual; others, such as Laxdœla saga (see Text XV), deal withseveral generations of the same family or of the inhabitants of a district.
Most of the main characters, and some of the events of the sagas, areclearly historical, though their treatment is fictional. Since the sagas were
written during the thirteenth century about events some three centuries
earlier, they have been compared with historical novels (see Harris1986), but this undervalues their genuinely historical intent to reconstruct
the past in a manner which the author and audience probably thoughtof as likely to be true. From a modern perspective we can see thatthirteenth-century preoccupations, and sometimes reflections ofthirteenth-century events, have been projected onto the sagas’ recreationof the past, and in fact the whole project of the writing of the Sagas of
Icelanders is often interpreted as a reaction to the turbulent politicalsituation in thirteenth-century Iceland, a deliberate idealising of the
distinctively Icelandic Commonwealth period at a time when Iceland
was submitting to the Norwegian throne. It is also significant that theperiod covered by the sagas exactly spans the period of Iceland’s conversion to Christianity in 1000 AD, and a major preoccupation in manysagas is either the event of the conversion itself, or the contrast of theauthor’s attitude to the pagan past with his own Christian world view.
These sagas can be divided into sub-groups on the basis of theirgeographical origin within Iceland; those from the east (such as
Hrafnkels saga) tend to be shorter, those from the north and west,
such as Kormaks saga (see Text IV) and Bjarnar saga Hítdœlakappa(see Text V), more often include skaldic verses, allegedly spoken by
the characters in the sagas themselves. There are also thematicgroupings: the ‘outlaw sagas’ about Grettir, Gísli and Hƒr›r, and thepoets’ sagas, including those believed to be the very earliest Sagas of
Icelanders, dealing with Icelanders who served as skalds at the courtsof Scandinavian rulers. Also included in the Sagas of Icelanders are
the so-called Vinland Sagas, dealing with the settlement of Greenland
and the expeditions made from there to North America; the namederives from Vínland, meaning ‘land of wine’, the name given to one

Introduction to the study of Old Norsexxiof the places visited (see Text XXI). Archaeological investigations inNorth America have confirmed the presence of Viking settlers at
L’Anse aux Meadows in Newfoundland, although the Vinland sagas
include a good deal of fanciful and confused material.
The Sagas of Icelanders are sometimes described as feud sagas.
Some critics have interpreted feud as a fundamental structuring device
in these sagas, others have drawn the conclusion that feud was asmuch a preoccupation in medieval Icelandic society as it was in theliterary world of the sagas.
Íslenzk fornrit II–XIV (1933–91).
Íslendinga sögur, ed. Jón Torfason et al., 2 vols (1985–86) (Version in Modern
Icelandic spelling, also available on CD-rom with searchable concordance(1996)).
The Complete Sagas of Icelanders I–V, tr. Vi›ar Hreinsson et al. (1997);
several of the sagas in this collection are reproduced in The Sagas of
Icelanders, introduction by R. Kellogg (2000).
T. M. Andersson, The Problem of Icelandic Saga Origins: A Historical Survey(1964).
T. M. Andersson and W. I. Miller, ‘Introduction’. In Law and Literature inMedieval Iceland: Ljósvetninga saga and Valla-Ljóts saga (1989).
Einar Ól. Sveinsson, Dating the Icelandic Sagas (1958).
J. Harris, ‘Saga as Historical Novel’. In Structure and Meaning in Old Norse
Literature. New Approaches to Textual Analysis and Literary Criticism. Ed.
John Lindow, Lars Lönnroth and Gerd Wolfgang Weber (1986), 187–219.
K. Liestøl, The Origin of the Icelandic Family Sagas (1930).
W. I. Miller, Bloodtaking and Peacemaking: Feud, Law and Society in Saga
Iceland (1990).
P. M. Sørensen, Saga and Society (1993).
J. Tucker, ed., Sagas of Icelanders. A Book of Essays (1989).
Vésteinn Ólason, Dialogues with the Viking Age: Narration and Representation in the Sagas of the Icelanders (1998).

7. Kings’ Sagas
The sagas known as konungasögur or Kings’ Sagas are mainly
historical biographies of the kings of Norway, though other Scandinavian
states are represented too: Kn‡tlinga saga concerns the kings ofDenmark, and Orkneyinga saga the rulers of Orkney, technically notkings but jarls. According to a chronological model the Kings’ Sagas
would have to precede the Sagas of Icelanders, since their roots lie inearlier historical works, some in Latin, some in the vernacular, written

xxii

A New Introduction to Old Norsein both Norway and Iceland in the twelfth century. The Íslendingabók
of Ari ﬁorgilsson (see Text VIII), from about 1130, is an example ofthis early historiography, and of course the surviving version concentrates on the history of Iceland; but Ari’s preface tells us of an earlier
version, now lost, that included konunga ævi (‘lives of kings’). It is
not clear what form these took or how detailed they were. For further
details of early historiography, see the Introduction to Text VI below(pp. 62–64, and bibliography p. 66). The Kings’ Sagas also have rootsin hagiography (the lives of saints or heilagra manna sögur), since
they draw on early lives of the two missionary kings of Norway, Óláfr
Tryggvason, credited with the conversion of the Nordic countries, andhis successor Óláfr Haraldsson inn helgi (‘the Saint’).
The fact that Icelanders were involved in historical writing fromthe start, in Norway as well as in Iceland, either as authors or as
authoritative sources, must be linked with the fact that Icelanders had
a virtual monopoly of the profession of court poet to Scandinavian
rulers, composing the complex dróttkvætt (‘court metre’) or skaldic
verse (see 12 below) that was used as an essential oral source by thewriters of Kings’ Sagas. It is said in the Prologue to Snorri Sturluson’s
Heimskringla that this poetry is the most reliable kind of historicalsource since the complexity of the metre renders it less prone to corruption
and change than oral report not in verse would be. The stylistic
technique developed in the Kings’ Sagas, where a verse is cited as
authority for what has been said in a prose passage, undoubtedly
influenced the practice of citing verse in the Sagas of Icelanders too,
where it is used to promote a realistic impression even in cases where
it is not difficult to see that the verse cited has no historical authenticity.
The most distinguished example of the Kings' Saga genre is Snorri
Sturluson’s Heimskringla (see Text VII), a collection of sixteen sagasof kings of Norway from its legendary origins to the late twelfth
century, structured as a triptych of which the central and longest third
is the biography of King Óláfr the Saint. Snorri probably wrote thecollection in the 1220s or 1230s; he had already written the saga ofKing Óláfr as a free-standing work before incorporating it in thecollection. Snorri drew on earlier, shorter works covering all or someof the same historical span, such as Morkinskinna and Fagrskinna(see Text VI), but these are continuous narratives rather than being
divided into biographies of individual kings. The writing of Kings'

Introduction to the study of Old Norse

xxiii

Sagas after Snorri became a process of expansion, using his work as
a basis but interpolating material of different kinds; ironically enough,a late compilation such as the fourteenth-century Flateyjarbók reinstates some of the more fantastic hagiographical or legendary
material that Snorri had pruned from his sources. Another kind of
elaboration found in both Morkinskinna and Flateyjarbók is theinclusion of ﬂættir (the singular form is ﬂáttr), often thought of as
comparable to the modern short story but characterised by their context
within the texture of the Kings' Sagas; they typically relate an
encounter between the king in question and a visitor to his court,
usually an Icelander, and help to reveal the king’s character in a
fictional, and often humorous mode (see Au›unar ﬂáttr, Text XVI).
The assembling of the Kings’ Sagas into these larger wholes tends
to mask their diversity; in Heimskringla the mythological andlegendary Ynglinga saga, drawing on poetic and oral sources to relate
the descent of the early kings of Sweden and Norway from the pagan
gods, contrasts both with the hagiographical Saga of St Óláfr andwith sagas giving near-eyewitness accounts of events of the late twelfth
century. Hákonar saga Hákonarsonar, indeed, written by Sturlaﬁór›arson, chronicles the life of the king who oversaw the submissionof Iceland to Norway, and can be read alongside Sturlunga saga as asource for the thirteenth-century history of Iceland.
Flateyjarbók, ed. Gu›brandur Vigfússon and C. R. Unger, 3 vols (1860–68).
Heimskringla I–III, ed. Bjarni A›albjarnarson, Íslenzk fornrit XXVI–XXVIII(1941–51).
Hákonar saga Hákonarsonar, ed. G. Vigfusson, tr. G. Dasent, Icelandic Sagas
II and IV, Rolls series (1887–94).
Kn‡tlinga saga, in Danakonunga sögur, ed. Bjarni Gu›nason, Íslenzk fornrit
XXXV (1982).
Orkneyinga saga, ed. Finnbogi Gu›mundsson, Íslenzk fornrit XXXIV (1965).
Stories from the Sagas of the Kings, ed. A. Faulkes (1980).
Two Icelandic Stories, ed. A Faulkes (1967, repr. 1978).
Heimskringla, tr. L. M. Hollander (1964).
S. Bagge, Society and Politics in Snorri Sturluson’s Heimskringla (1991).
J. Harris, ‘Theme and Genre in some Íslendinga ﬂættir’, Scandinavian Studies
48, 1–28 (1976).
J. Knirk, Oratory in the Kings’ Sagas (1981).
E. A. Rowe, The Development of Flateyjarbók (2004).
D. Whaley, Heimskringla, An Introduction (1991).

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8. Legendary sagas (fornaldarsögur)The category of fornaldarsögur (‘sagas of the ancient time’), known
as Legendary or Mythical–Heroic Sagas, is more miscellaneous, encompassing about thirty texts many of which are based in the remote
Germanic past and include many fantastic episodes and themes. The
increasing popularity of these sagas in the fourteenth and fifteenth
centuries, and the fact that the Sagas of Icelanders believed to becomparatively late (such as Grettis saga) show a taste for this kind of
material, has led the fornaldarsögur to be dismissed as a late andeven decadent form, the suggestion being that at a time of cultural
decline the Icelanders sought refuge in an escapist view of the golden
age of the heroic past. More recently an opposing interpretation has
been that the increased taste, from the late thirteenth century onwards,
for more fictional forms, including a readiness to engage with foreignmodels, represents a new literary self-confidence in Iceland. As far
as chronology is concerned, it is important to bear in mind that what
may have been the earliest example of this genre, Skjƒldunga saga, ahistory of the earliest Danish kings which is now mostly lost, waswritten probably near the end of the twelfth century, before any of theSagas of Icelanders were written. The legendary Ynglinga saga would
also come into this category if it were not subsumed into Snorri’s
historical scheme. So sagas of this kind were being produced throughout the period of composition of the Sagas of Icelanders.
Some fornaldarsögur are prose retellings of known heroic poems;Vƒlsunga saga, for instance, is a rather flat paraphrase of the legendary
poems of the Poetic Edda, with the story of the dragon-slaying Sigur›r
at its centre. Another group closer to folktale in its origins is sometimes
called ‘Adventure Tales’ and includes themes such as the quest,
sometimes but not always for a wife and kingdom. The way in which
the fornaldarsögur put their diverse sources to use as entertainment
can be illustrated by the story of Bƒ›varr Bjarki in Hrólfs saga kraka(see Text I), which tells the essentially heroic story of a hero who rids
the hall of the Danish King Hrólfr (the Hroﬂulf of Beowulf) of amarauding beast. A similar story is told in Beowulf in epic mode, but
gets a burlesque treatment in the Icelandic saga.
Fornaldar sögur Nor›urlanda I–IV, ed. Gu›ni Jónsson (1950).
Hervarar saga ok Hei›reks, ed. C. Tolkien and G. Turville-Petre (1956).
Saga Hei›reks konungs ins vitra ( = Hervarar saga), ed. and tr. C. Tolkien (1960).

Introduction to the study of Old Norsexxv

The Saga of the Volsungs, ed. and tr. R. G. Finch (1965).
Icelandic Histories and Romances, tr. R. O’Connor (2002).
The Saga of King Hrolf Kraki, tr. J. Byock (1998).
Seven Viking Romances, tr. Hermann Pálsson and P. Edwards (1985).
Ármann Jakobsson et al., eds, Fornaldarsagornas struktur och ideologi(2003) (includes several articles in English).
C. Clover, ‘Maiden-Warriors and Other Sons’, Journal of English andGermanic Philology 85, 35–49 (1986).
Torfi Tulinius, The Matter of the North. The Rise of Literary Fiction in
Thirteenth-Century Iceland (2002).

9. Heilagra manna sögur
Other saga genres are more closely related to their European counterparts. The genre of heilagra manna sögur (‘sagas of holy people’,Saints’ Lives) has the distinction of being the first kind of saga to be
written in Iceland. The practice of writing was introduced to Icelandby the Church, as elsewhere in Europe, and the first documents written
in the vernacular language were, not surprisingly, translations offoreign religious texts, such as Saints’ Lives, for the instruction oflay people. One of the earliest surviving is Matheus saga, one of the
postola sögur (Sagas of Apostles), which must date from earlier than
1150; at the other extreme Thómas saga erkibyskups, a life of thetwelfth-century English saint Thomas Becket, whose cult wasenormously popular in Iceland, is extant in several versions from thethirteenth century and later. The genre is represented in this Reader
by the account of a miracle from Maríu saga (Text XIII). Although
this group belongs to an international genre, Turville-Petre and othersargue that the realistic mode and use of dialogue of the native Icelandic
genres can be traced back to the style of these early translated texts:
as he says (1953, xx), ‘the learned literature did not teach the Icelanders
what to think or what to say, but it taught them how to say it’.
Clemens saga, ed. and tr. H. Carron (2005).
The Icelandic Legend of Saint Dorothy, ed. K. Wolf (1997).
Heilagra manna sögur, ed. C. R. Unger (1877).
The Old Norse–Icelandic Legend of Saint Barbara, ed. and tr. K. Wolf (2000).
Postola sögur, ed. C. R. Unger (1874).
Matheus saga postula, ed. Ólafur Halldórsson (1994).
Thómas saga erkibyskups, ed. C. R. Unger (1869).
Jónas Kristjánsson, ‘Learned Style or Saga Style?’ In Speculum Norrœnum,ed. U. Dronke et al. (1981), 260–92.

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O. Widding et al., ‘The Lives of the Saints in Old Norse Prose: A Handlist’.
Updated version in M. Cormack, The Saints in Iceland: Their Venerationfrom the Conversion to 1400 (1963).

10. Contemporary Sagas (samtí›arsögur)The genre of Heilagra manna sögur has connections both with thelives of the missionary kings (see above under Kings’ Sagas), andwith the biskupa sögur, lives of the bishops of Iceland from theeleventh to the fourteenth centuries. Of these, the lives of the two
bishops who achieved sanctity, ﬁorlákr and Jón of Hólar (see Text
XIV), though classic hagiographies in their rhetoric and cataloguingof miracles, have features in common with the samtí›arsögur(‘Contemporary Sagas’). These last are mainly collected into a large
compilation called Sturlunga saga (see Text III), and deal with more
recent events in Iceland’s history than the Sagas of Icelanders, inparticular the extensive feuds and factional war leading up to thesubmission of Iceland to Norway in 1262–64. With these sagas wecome closest to the modern conception of history, and they are generally
accepted as historically reliable in a way that the Sagas of Icelanders
are not, but their effect of realism is often created using the samecarefully contrived conventions as those of the more fictional genre.
Hrafns saga Sveinbjarnarsonar, ed. Gu›rún P. Helgadóttir (1987).
Sturlunga saga, ed. Jón Jóhannesson et al., 2 vols (1946).
ﬁorgils saga ok Hafli›a, ed. U. Brown (1952).
Sturlunga saga, tr. J. McGrew and R. G. Thomas (1970–74).
Einar Ól. Sveinsson, The Age of the Sturlungs. Icelandic Civilization in theThirteenth Century, tr. Jóhann S. Hannesson, Islandica XXXVI (1953).
P. Foote, ‘Sturlusaga and its Background’, Saga-Book 13, 207–37 (1950–51).
G. Nordal, ‘Sturlunga saga and the Context of Saga-Writing’, in Introductory
Essays on Egils saga and Njáls saga, ed. J. Hines and D. Slay (1992), 1–14.
G. Nordal, Ethics and Action in Thirteenth-Century Iceland (1998).
S. Tranter, Sturlunga saga: The Role of the Creative Compiler (1987).

11. Riddarasögur
The riddarasögur (‘Sagas of Knights’) or chivalric sagas can bedivided into translations of romances popular in Europe and England,
and indigenous Icelandic romances making use of the same courtly
milieu and themes. As with the fornaldarsögur, the writing of
riddarasögur is sometimes seen as a late development, but we know

Introduction to the study of Old Norsexxvii

from a preface attached to the earliest surviving one, Tristrams sagaok Ísƒndar (see Text XII), that it was composed in 1226 at the courtof King Hákon of Norway, which makes it squarely contemporaneouswith the writing of the earliest Sagas of Icelanders. Although a newflorid style was developed for the writing of riddarasögur, these earlytranslations at least are strikingly similar to the Sagas of Icelanders intheir use of an apparently impersonal narrative perspective, and while
tending to stick closely to the events recorded in their originals, strip
out most of the elements of description and refined analysis of emotion
characteristic of their French originals.
Riddarasögur, ed. Bjarni Vilhjálmsson, 6 vols (1949–54).
Norse Romance I–III, ed. M. Kalinke (1999).
G. Barnes, ‘The Riddarasögur: A Medieval Exercise in Translation’, SagaBook 19 (1977), 403–41.
G. Barnes, ‘Arthurian Chivalry in Old Norse’, in Arthurian Literature VII(1987), 50–102.
M. Kalinke, King Arthur North by Northwest. The matière de Bretagne in
Old Norse–Icelandic Romances (1981).
M. Kalinke, ‘Scribes, Editors, and the riddarasögur’, Arkiv för nordisk filologi
97 (1982), 36–51.
H. G. Leach, Angevin Britain and Scandinavia (1921, repr. 1975).
P. M. Mitchell, ‘Scandinavian Literature’, in Arthurian Literature in the
Middle Ages, ed. R. S. Loomis (1959), 462–71.
M. Schlauch, Romance in Iceland (1934, repr. 1973).
G. W. Weber, ‘The Decadence of Feudal Myth: Towards a Theory of
Riddarasaga’, in Structure and Meaning in Old Norse Literature. New
Approaches to Textual Analysis and Literary Criticism, ed. John Lindow,
Lars Lönnroth and Gerd Wolfgang Weber (1986), 415–54.

12. Eddic poetry
Eddic poetry is so named after the collection of 29 poems called the
Poetic Edda, preserved in a manuscript from c.1270 known as the
Codex Regius, and dating from the ninth to the twelfth centuries. The
origin of the term edda is uncertain. It was used of the Codex Regiuscollection by its seventeenth-century owner, Bishop Brynjólfur
Sveinsson, who called it ‘Sæmundar Edda’ (mistakenly believing it
to be written by the early Icelandic historian, Sæmundr Sigfússon) to
distinguish it from Snorra Edda, the prose work by Snorri Sturluson.
This suggests that in the seventeenth century the term was taken to
imply a collection of mythological material, though it is clear that inxxviii

A New Introduction to Old Norsethe Middle Ages, as for Snorri Sturluson, it meant ‘Art of Poetry’.
The poems of the Codex Regius are arranged thematically, ten dealing
with mythological material, nineteen with heroes of the legendary
Germanic past. A section of perhaps eight leaves, now missing fromthe manuscript, would have included further heroic poems. Six mythological poems (or parts of them), one of which is not in the Codex
Regius, are preserved in the fragmentary manuscript AM 748 I a 4to,from about 1300, which may have been another, similar poetical compilation, and a few others in manuscripts of Snorra Edda and elsewhere.
The metres of eddic poetry derive from the Germanic alliterative
pattern essential also to Old English, Old Saxon and some Old HighGerman verse. While the structural unit in these languages is the longline made up of two linked half-lines, eddic verse breaks up into
stanzas of variable length, but most usually of eight lines (equivalent
to four Old English long lines, the lines linked in pairs by alliteration).
The prevailing metre, fornyr›islag ‘old story (or ‘talk’) metre’,normally includes two stressed syllables and a varying number of
unstressed syllables in each line, and either one or two stressedsyllables in the first half-line alliterate with the first stressed syllableof the second half-line. Variant metres are málaháttr ‘speeches metre’,in which each line is heavier, and made up of no fewer than fivesyllables, and ljó›aháttr ‘songs-form’, in which two lines offornyr›islag are followed by a third, so called full line, which
alliterates within itself. A basic account of eddic metres is found in
Turville-Petre 1976, xiii–xvi.
The first four poems of the Edda focus on the god Ó›inn, and —through his perpetual quest for wisdom — on mythological andgnomic lore. All are cast in direct speech. Vƒluspá, made up of Ó›inn’s
dialogue with a sybil from the giant world, relates the events — past,present and future — in the history of the gods, ending in their downfall
at ragnarƒk (‘the doom of the gods’) and the regeneration of the world
and a new generation of gods. Vafﬂrú›nismál and Grímnismál areboth catalogue poems set in narrative frameworks; Hávamál ‘thespeeches of the high one’ is itself a compilation of several separate
poems, incorporating catalogues of gnomic wisdom as well as eventsfrom the god’s own history. Skírnismál narrates the winning by the
god Freyr of the giant-bride Ger›r. The remaining mythological poems
are concerned with ﬁórr, including the humorous Hárbar›sljó›, inIntroduction to the study of Old Norse

xxix

which ﬁórr is outwitted by the cunning of Ó›inn, and ﬁrymskvi›a,the burlesque account of ﬁórr’s journey to Jƒtunheimr to retrieve hisstolen hammer (see Text IX). Lokasenna is a satirical poem in which
the gods are comprehensively attacked by the ambiguous god-giant
Loki, who accuses each of them in turn of immorality; it ends withﬁórr’s forcible silencing of Loki.
Vƒlundarkvi›a (see Text X), which tells of the supernatural smithVƒlundr (‘Weland’ in Old English, later Wayland) and his revenge
against the tyrant Ní›u›r, may be seen as a bridge between the mythological poems proper, and those dealing with the world of men (though
it is followed by the mythological Alvíssmál, another catalogue set in
the narrative frame of a wisdom contest, about ﬁórr’s encounter witha dwarf).
The heroic poems of the Edda deal with legendary figures — thetwo Helgis, Sigur›r, Gunnarr and Ham›ir (see Text XXV) whosestories must originally have been distinct, but who, even before thecompilation of the Codex Regius, were beginning to be linked into acycle. This process culminated in the fourteenth-century Vƒlsungasaga, a prose retelling that completes the fusion of these legends intoa single family saga and attempts to smooth out the elements ofcontradiction and overlap introduced by the juxtaposition of originallyseparate poems from a variety of styles and periods. At the centre is
the hero Sigur›r, slayer of the dragon Fáfnir (Siegfried in German
versions of the story), who is betrothed to the valkyrie Brynhildr but
marries Gu›rún Gjúkadóttir, and suffers vengeance at the hand ofGu›rún’s brother Gunnarr, who is married to Brynhildr.
Some figures in the eddic poems, such as the Atli of Atlakvi›a (Attila
the Hun) and his enemy Gunnarr, king of the Burgundians, have an
identifiable historical background and elements of their stories can befound in early histories such as that of the sixth-century Jordanes (seeDronke 1969, 29–38 and 192–96). The story of Sigur›r is told withconsiderable differences in the Middle High German Nibelungenlied.
Die Lieder des Codex Regius nebst verwandten Denkmälern, ed. G. Neckel,
rev. H. Kuhn (1962).
Hávamál, ed. D. Evans, with Glossary and Index by A. Faulkes (1986–87).
Vƒluspá, ed. S. Nordal, tr. B. Benedikz and J. McKinnell (1978).
The Poetic Edda I: Heroic Poems, ed. and tr. U. Dronke (1969).
The Poetic Edda II: Mythological Poems, ed. and tr. U. Dronke (1997).

xxx

A New Introduction to Old Norse

The Poetic Edda, tr. C. Larrington (1996).
P. Acker and C. Larrington, eds, The Poetic Edda: Essays on Old Norse
Mythology (2002).
B. Fidjestøl, The Dating of Eddic Poetry: A Historical Survey and Methodological Investigation (1999).
R. J. Glendinning and Haraldur Bessason, eds, Edda. A Collection of Essays(1983).
T. Gunnell, The Origins of Drama in Scandinavia (1995).
P. Hallberg, Old Icelandic Poetry (1975).
J. McKinnell, Both One and Many. Essays on Change and Variety in Late
Norse Heathenism (1994).
K. von See et al., Kommentar zu den Liedern der Edda I–V (1993–2006).

13. Skaldic poetry
This term derives from the Old Norse word skáld ‘poet’, appropriately
in that, while eddic poetry is anonymous, most skaldic poetry is
attributed to a named poet. The Icelandic term for the metre mostcommon in skaldic poetry is dróttkvætt, an adjective derived fromdróttkvæ›r ‘poetry in court metre’, referring to the aristocratic milieu
of this poetic style. The earliest surviving skaldic poetry dates fromthe ninth century, but poems in skaldic metres, usually on religious
subjects, continued to be composed throughout the fourteenth century.
Skaldic poetry is famous for its convoluted syntax, elaborate diction
and taxing alliterative, rhyming and syllable-counting requirements(for an exposition of these, see VII C below).
The Kings’ Sagas include accounts of skalds appearing at courts,
in Norway and elsewhere, to offer poems in praise of rulers, and it
seems there was a premium set on length and elaborate construction(there are stories of skalds who get into trouble by offering a mere
flokkr or sequence of verses in place of a drápa, a formal poem of atleast twenty stanzas, including at least one refrain); but most surviving
poems are experienced in more fragmentary form, in quotations in
Kings’ Sagas, often of no more than a single stanza, in the context ofthe event they refer to. Their reconstitution into long poems, few ofwhich can be considered complete, and where the order of the stanzas
is often in doubt, is the work of modern editors. On the other hand,the authors of the histories who cite these verses as corroboration for
their historical narrative, and for whom they must often have been
the only source, usually identify the poet by name and often give aIntroduction to the study of Old Norsexxxi

name to the poem to which the verse belongs as well (see Texts VI
and VII for the citing of verses as historical evidence). Most early
court poets were Norwegian, but from c.1000 most skalds seem tohave come from Iceland.
In the Sagas of Icelanders the citing of verse is superficially similarin that an episode may be supported by the citation of a single verse, but
the verse is more often woven into the fabric of the narrative as dialogue,or the comment of an individual on the events of the saga. These
verses are usually lausavísur or free-standing verses, specific to theoccasion they refer to, though attempts have been made to reconstruct
longer poems from some. Like the verses in the Kings’ Sagas, someof these verses must have survived in oral form from the time of theircomposition (which may often have been later than the events or
claimed events to which they are tied in the sagas), and have been thesources for the thirteenth-century prose narratives in which they areincorporated. But their historical authenticity is harder to establish
than that of the Kings’ Sagas verses, and some are taken to be ‘forgeries’,
or in less emotive terms, embellishments composed by the saga authors
themselves to enhance the apparent historicity of their narratives.
A sub-group among the Sagas of Icelanders is the so-called poets’sagas, written mostly early in the thirteenth century, which seem toindicate an interest in the biographies of Icelandic poets. But although
they quote a good deal of occasional verse attributed to the poet, they
seem almost to avoid the public or historical role of the court poet(see Text IV, which features love verse by the poet Kormakr, andeven a stanza he shares with his beloved, Steinger›r; and Text V, inwhich the rival poets Bjƒrn Hítdœlakappi and ﬁór›r Kolbeinsson reciteverses). The saga which investigates most closely the temperamentand sensibility of the poet is Egils saga Skallagrímssonar, often
supposed to be the work of Snorri Sturluson.
Another repository of skaldic poetry dismembered into single
stanzas, and an invaluable source of information about it, is the Prose
Edda of Snorri Sturluson (also known as Snorra Edda). In this treatise
Snorri set out, according to his own account, to instruct young poetsin the mysteries of skaldic verse at a time when its conventions may
have become less popular and memories of the pagan religion that
underpinned it were beginning to fade. The work consists of fourparts: a Prologue; Gylfaginning, an outline of the pre-Christian NorsexxxiiA New Introduction to Old Norse

religion supported by quotations from eddic mythological poems;
Skáldskaparmál (‘the language of poetry’) giving an account of thekennings (poetic periphrases) and heiti (poetic synonyms) used by
the skalds, and liberally exemplified by quotations; and Háttatal(‘catalogue of verse-forms’), which takes the form of a poem, composedby Snorri himself, in 102 stanzas, each exemplifying a variant skaldic
verse-form. His Edda is thus a vital source of information on both
mythology and the skaldic craft. Although it is primarily a learned
work, the stories in Gylfaginning and Skáldskaparmál are told withverve and humour (see Text II below). Háttatal was most probably
composed after Snorri’s first visit to Norway in 1218–20, and the restof his Edda may well have been written later.
While the art of skaldic poetry had acknowledged roots in the pagan
religion, its conventions were adapted after the Conversion to Christianthemes. Poets of the Conversion period straddle the two religions:Hallfre›r vandræ›askáld, for instance, composed for both the pagan
Jarl Hákon and, later, Hákon’s proselytising Christian successor, Óláfr
Tryggvason, and the poet’s saga dramatises the story of his own conversion (in which he demands, and gets, the king’s agreement to act as
his godfather) and its implications for his poetic craft. By the twelfth
century Church patronage was encouraging the development of a genreof religious drápur, adapting the conventions of dróttkvætt within a literatemonastic culture, in contrast to the oral context of their predecessors.
Where earlier encomiastic poems survive fragmentarily as scatteredreferences within the Kings’ Sagas, twelfth-century drápur such as
Geisli, composed by the Icelander Einarr Skúlason for recitation at
the shrine of St Óláfr in Ni›aróss (Trondheim), probably in 1153, arethe earliest to survive complete. Poets continued to compose extended
poems in dróttkvætt into the fourteenth century, fusing traditionalskaldic elements with themes derived from continental material.
A development from skaldic poetry, probably originating early inthe fourteenth century and remaining popular well into the nineteenth,
was the distinctively Icelandic genre of rímur. These long narrative
poems, sometimes interspersed with lyrical passages called mansöngvar(‘love poems’), often reworked the narrative material of sagas, usually
fornaldarsögur and riddarasögur. They made use of skaldic diction
but with rhythms closer to those of ballads. Óláfs ríma Haraldssonar(Text XXII) is the earliest surviving example.

Introduction to the study of Old Norse

xxxiiiDen norsk-islandske skjaldedigtning, A I–II: Tekst efter håndskrifterne, B I–II:
Rettet tekst, ed. Finnur Jónsson (1912–15).
Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages: A New Edition. II
Poetry from the Kings’ Sagas 2, ed. Kari Ellen Gade (2009); VII Poetry
on Christian Subjects, ed. Margaret Clunies Ross (2007). (Website:www.skaldic.arts.usyd.edu.au)
Einarr Skúlason’s Geisli, A Critical Edition, ed. M. Chase (2005).
Fourteenth-Century Icelandic Verse on the Virgin Mary, ed. K. Wrightson (2001).
Snorri Sturluson, Edda: Prologue and Gylfaginning, ed. A. Faulkes (2ndedn 2005).
Snorri Sturluson, Edda: Skáldskaparmál, ed. A. Faulkes, 2 vols (1998).
Snorri Sturluson, Háttatal, ed. A. Faulkes (1991).
Snorri Sturluson, Edda, tr. A. Faulkes (1987).
K. Attwood, ‘Intertextual Aspects of the Twelfth-Century Christian drápur’.
Saga-Book 24, 221–39.
A. Faulkes, What was Viking Poetry For? Inaugural Lecture, University ofBirmingham (1993).
B. Fidjestøl, Det norrøne fyrstediktet (1982).
B. Fidjestøl, Selected Papers (1997).
R. Frank, Old Norse Court Poetry, Islandica XLII (1978).
K. E. Gade, The Structure of Old Norse Dróttkvætt Poetry, Islandica XLII (1994).
E. A. Kock, Notationes Norrœnæ (1923–41).
R. Meissner, Die Kenningar der Skalden (1921, repr. 1984).
G. Nordal, Tools of Literacy. The Role of Skaldic Verse in Icelandic Textual
Culture of the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries (2001).
R. Perkins, ‘Rowing Chants and the Origins of dróttkvæ›r háttr’. Saga-Book
21 (1984–85), 155–221.
R. Poole, Viking Poems on War and Peace: A Study in Skaldic Narrative (1991).
G. Turville-Petre, Scaldic Poetry (1969).

14. Modern Icelandic
Icelandic is a conservative language and has changed less since theMiddle Ages than the other Scandinavian languages, so that medieval
texts are still comparatively accessible to the modern Icelandic reader.
Many editions of medieval texts, including most of those in this Reader,are printed in a normalised spelling that aims to represent the languageof the thirteenth century; though this differs somewhat from modern
Icelandic spelling, it is much closer to modern spelling than is that of
the original manuscripts (see pp. vi–viii above and Stefán Karlsson, The
Icelandic Language (2004), section 2). Although pronunciation haschanged considerably, this is masked by the fact that many teachersxxxivA New Introduction to Old Norseof Old Norse adopt modern pronunciation. For an account ofdifferences between Old and Modern Icelandic pronunciation, see
NION I, pp. 14–21.
Ásgeir Blöndal Magnússon, Íslensk or›sifjabók (1989) [etymological dictionary].
Ásta Svavarsdóttir and Margrét Jónsdóttir, Íslenska fyrir útlendinga. Kennslubók í málfræ›i (1998).
D. Neijmann, Colloquial Icelandic. The Complete Course for Beginners (2001).
Sverrir Hólmarson et al., Concise Icelandic–English Dictionary (1989).

15. Manuscripts
Attitudes to medieval literature in post-medieval Iceland were also
conservative. As in other European countries, antiquarian interest in
the medieval past began to develop in the Renaissance, but this went
alongside an unbroken tradition of the copying of medieval texts.
This continued long after the introduction of printing, with handwritten
and printed texts existing side by side. Several thirteenth-century sagas
are now preserved only in manuscripts from the seventeenth century
and later. The spelling of texts reproduced in this Reader has beennormalised, with conventional abbreviations expanded editorially; as
an introduction to reading texts as they appear in early manuscripts,
an extract from the fourteenth-century Mö›ruvallabók (Text IV) has
been reproduced in facsimile as Text XVIII.
With the revival of antiquarian interest in the Nordic medieval past,and the consciousness of its preservation largely in Icelandic manuscripts, scholars in Scandinavia made collections of Icelandic manuscripts.
The largest of these was built up over a lifetime by the Icelandic
scholar Árni Magnússon, who was employed as assistant to the Danish
Royal Antiquarian, Thomas Bartholin, and later as Professor of History
at the University of Copenhagen. During a ten-year stint (1702–12)
on a royal commission making a census of all the farms in Iceland hescoured the country for manuscripts and documents of all kinds; after
his return to Denmark in 1713 he continued to obtain manuscripts in
Norway and Denmark, as well as those he was given or sold byconnections in Iceland. Many that he was unable to buy he copied, orcommissioned others to copy; he also painstakingly researched theprovenance of manuscripts. Despite a fire in Copenhagen in 1728
that destroyed a few dozen of Árni’s manuscripts (together with all
his printed books and some of his notes), Árni did more than anyone

Introduction to the study of Old Norse

xxxv

else to preserve Iceland’s medieval literary heritage. His collection
was bequeathed to the University of Copenhagen when he died in
1730, and was the basis for the manuscript institute there that still
carries his name. As a result of negotiations in the mid-twentiethcentury, a large proportion of this collection (mainly manuscripts
whose subject matter related specifically to Iceland) has now beenreturned to Iceland, where it is housed in an institute that also bears
Árni’s name, The Árni Magnússon Institute for Icelandic Studies. The
first manuscripts to be returned were the Codex Regius of the Poetic
Edda and the great Kings’ Saga compilation Flateyjarbók.
Many Icelandic manuscripts have been printed in facsimile editions. Somecan also be viewed on the internet at:
http://am.hi.is/WebView/
http://arnamagnaeansk.ku.dk/haandskriftssamlingen/eks/
Hreinn Benediktsson, Early Icelandic Script (1965).
Corpus Codicum Islandicorum Medii Aevi I–XX (1930–56).
Early Icelandic Manuscripts in Facsimile I–XX (1958–93).
Íslenzk handrit. Icelandic Manuscripts I– (1956–).
Gísli Sigur›sson and Vésteinn Ólason (eds), The Manuscripts of Iceland (2004).
Jónas Kristjánsson, Icelandic Illuminated Manuscripts (1993).
O. Bandle et al., The Nordic Languages. An International Handbook of theHistory of the North Germanic Languages I (2002).

General reference and further reading
C. Clover and J. Lindow, eds, Old Norse–Icelandic Literature. A Critical
Guide. Islandica XLV (1985).
M. Clunies Ross, ed., Old Icelandic Literature and Society (2000).
P. Foote, Aurvandilstá: Norse Studies (1984).
E. V. Gordon, ed., An Introduction to Old Norse, 2nd ed. rev. A. R. Taylor (1957).
J. Jesch, Ships and Men in the Late Viking Age: the Vocabulary of Runic
Inscriptions and Skaldic Verse (2001).
J. Jochens, Old Norse Images of Women (1996).
Jónas Kristjánsson, Eddas and Sagas (1988).
Kulturhistorisk leksikon for nordisk middelalder I–XXII (1956–78).
R. McTurk, ed., A Companion to Old Norse-Icelandic Literature and Culture(2005).
Sigur›ur Nordal, Icelandic Culture, tr. Vilhjálmur T. Bjarnar (1990).
P. Pulsiano, ed., Medieval Scandinavia: An Encyclopedia (1993).
Stefán Einarsson, A History of Icelandic Literature (1957).

xxxviA New Introduction to Old Norse

Icelandic texts in English editions
Texts with notes and glossary:
Bandamanna saga, ed. H. Magerøy (1981).
Egils saga, ed. Bjarni Einarsson (2003).
Einar Skúlason’s Geisli, A Critical Edition, ed. M. Chase (2005).
Gunnlaugs saga, ed. P. Foote and R. Quirk (1953).
Hávamál, ed. D. Evans, with Glossary and Index by A. Faulkes (1986–87).
Hervarar saga, ed. C. Tolkien and G. Turville-Petre (1956).
Hrafns saga Sveinbjarnarsonar, ed. Gu›rún P. Helgadóttir (1987).
Snorri Sturluson, Edda: Prologue and Gylfaginning, ed. A. Faulkes (2ndedn 2005).
Snorri Sturluson, Edda: Skáldskaparmál, ed. A. Faulkes, 2 vols (1998).
Snorri Sturluson, Háttatal, ed. A. Faulkes (1991, repr. 1999).
Stories from the Sagas of the Kings, ed. A. Faulkes (1980).
Two Icelandic Stories, ed. A. Faulkes (1978).
Two Tales of Icelanders: Ögmundar ﬂáttr dytts og Gunnara Helmings.
¯lkofra ﬂáttr, ed. I. Wyatt and J. Cook (1993).
Vafﬂrú›nismál, ed. T. W. Machan (1989).
Víga-Glúms saga, ed. G. Turville-Petre (1960).
Vƒluspá, ed. S. Nordal, tr. B. Benedikz and J. McKinnell (1978).
ﬁorgils saga ok Hafli›a, ed. U. Brown (1952).
Texts with parallel translation:Ágrip af Nóregskonungasƒgum, ed. M. J. Driscoll (1995).
The Book of the Icelanders, ed. Halldór Hermannsson, Islandica XX (1930).
Clemens saga, ed. H. Carron (2005).
The First Grammatical Treatise, ed. Einar Haugen (1972), ed. Hreinn
Benediktsson (1972).
Fourteenth-Century Icelandic Verse on the Virgin Mary (2001), ed. K.
Wrightson (2001).
R. Frank, Old Norse Court Poetry, Islandica XLII (1978).
Grottasƒngr, ed. C. Tolley (2008).
Gunnlaugs saga, ed. P. Foote, tr. R. Quirk (1957).
Guta saga, ed. C. Peel (1999).
Hákonar saga Hákonarsonar, ed. G. Vigfusson, tr. G. Dasent, Icelandic Sagas
II and IV, Rolls series (1887–94).
Hávamál, ed. D. E. M. Clarke (1923).
Historia Norwegie, ed. I. Ekrem and L. B. Mortensen, tr. P. Fisher (2003).
Jómsvíkinga saga, ed. N. Blake (1962).
Norse Romance I–III, ed. M. Kalinke (1999).
The Old Norse–Icelandic Legend of Saint Barbara, ed. and tr. K. Wolf (2000).
The Poetic Edda I: Heroic Poems, ed. and tr. U. Dronke (1969).

Introduction to the study of Old Norse

xxxvii

The Poetic Edda II: Mythological Poems, ed. and tr. U. Dronke (1997).
The Poetry of Arnórr jarlaskáld, ed. and tr. D. Whaley (1998).
Saga Hei›reks konungs ins vitra ( = Hervarar saga), ed. and tr. C. Tolkien (1960).
The Saga of the Volsungs, ed. and tr. R. G. Finch (1965).
Translations of the Sagas of Icelanders:
The Complete Sagas of Icelanders I–V, ed. and tr. Vi›ar Hreinsson et al. (1997).
Many of these translations are reproduced by Penguin under the heading‘World of the Sagas’, as follows:
The Sagas of Icelanders, introduction by R. Kellogg (2000) [Egils saga,
Vatnsdœla saga, Laxdœla saga, Hrafnkels saga Freysgo›a, Bandamannasaga, Gísla saga, Gunnlaugs saga, Refs saga, Grœnlendinga saga, Eiríks
saga rau›a, ﬂættir]
Egil’s Saga, tr. B. Scudder, introduction by Svanhildur Óskarsdóttir (2004).
Gisli Sursson’s Saga and the Saga of the People of Eyri, tr. Vésteinn Ólason,
J. Quinn and M. Regal (2003).
Njál’s saga, tr. R. Cook (2002).
Sagas of Warrior Poets, ed. D. Whaley (2002) [Kormaks saga, Bjarnar sagaHítdœlakappa, Hallfre›ar saga, Gunnlaugs saga, Víglundar saga].
The Saga of Grettir the Strong, tr. Bernard Scudder (2005).
Other translations:
Arrow-Odd: a medieval novel, tr. Hermann Pálsson and P. Edwards (1970).
The Book of Settlements, tr. Hermann Pálsson and P. Edwards (1972).
T. M. Andersson and W. I. Miller, Law and Literature in Medieval Iceland:
Ljósvetninga saga and Valla-Ljóts saga (1989).
Bar›ar saga, tr. Jón Skaptason and P. Pulsiano (1984).
The Confederates and Hen-Thorir, tr. Hermann Pálsson (1975).
Erik the Red and other Icelandic sagas, tr. G. Jones (1961).
Eyrbyggja saga, tr. P. Schach and L. M. Hollander (1959).
Fagrskinna, tr. A. Finlay (2004).
Fljotsdale saga and the Droplaugarsons, tr. E. Howarth and J. Young (1990).
Gautrek’s Saga, tr. D. Fox and Hermann Pálsson (1974).
Gongu-Hrolfs saga, tr. Hermann Pálsson and P. Edwards (1981)
Guta lag, tr. C. Peel (2009).
Heimskringla, tr. L. M. Hollander (1964).
A History of Norway and the Passion and Miracles of the Blessed Óláfr, tr.
D. Kunin, ed. C. Phelpstead (2001).
Hrafnkel’s Saga and Other Icelandic Stories, tr. Hermann Pálsson (1971).
Hrolf Gautreksson, tr. Hermann Pálsson and P. Edwards (1972).
Icelandic Histories and Romances, tr. R. O’Connor (2002).
King Haralds Saga by Snorri Sturluson, tr. Magnus Magnusson and Hermann
Pálsson (1976).

xxxviii

A New Introduction to Old NorseÍslendingabók – Kristni saga. The Book of the Icelanders – The Story of theConversion. tr. S. Grønlie (2007).
Karlamagnús saga: the saga of Charlemagne and his heroes, tr. C. B. Hieatt(1975).
Knytlinga saga: History of the Kings of Denmark, tr. Hermann Pálsson and
P. Edwards (1986).
Laws of Early Iceland I–II, tr. A. Dennis, P. Foote and R. Perkins (1980–2000).
Laxdaela Saga, tr. Magnus Magnusson and Hermann Pálsson (1975).
The Life of Gudmund the Good, Bishop of Hólar, tr. G. Turville-Petre and
E. S. Olszewska (1942).
Morkinskinna, tr. T. M. Andersson and K. E. Gade, Islandica LI (2000).
Oddr Snorrason, The Saga of Olaf Tryggvason, tr. T. M. Andersson, Islandica
LII (2003).
Orkneyinga Saga: The History of the Earls of Orkney, tr. Hermann Pálsson (1981).
The Poetic Edda, tr. C. Larrington (1996).
The Saga of Bjorn, Champion of the Men of Hitardale, tr. A. Finlay (2000).
The Saga of the Jomsvikings, tr. L. M. Hollander (1988).
The Saga of King Hrolf Kraki, tr. J. Byock (1998).
The Saga of King Sverri of Norway, tr. J. Sephton (1899, reissued 1994).
The Saga of Tristram and Isond, tr. P. Schach (1973).
The Saga of the Volsungs: The Norse Epic of Sigurd the Dragon Slayer, tr. J.
Byock (1999).
The Sagas of Kormak and the Sworn Brothers, tr. L. M. Hollander (1949).
Saxo Grammaticus, History of the Danes, tr. P. Fisher, ed. H. E. Davidson(1979–80).
The Schemers and Víga-Glúm: Bandamanna saga and Víga Glúms saga, tr.
G. Johnston (1999).
Seven Viking Romances, tr. Hermann Pálsson and P. Edwards (1985).
J. Simpson, The Northmen Talk (1965).
J. Simpson, Icelandic Folktales and Legends, 2nd ed. (2004).
The Skalds, A Selection of their Poems, tr. L. M. Hollander (1968).
Snorri Sturluson, Edda, tr. A. Faulkes (1987).
Sturlunga saga, tr. J. McGrew and R. G. Thomas (1970–74).
Sven Aggesen, Works, tr. E. Christiansen.
Theodoricus Monachus, Historia de Antiquitate Regum Norwagiensium. An
Account of the Ancient History of the Norwegian Kings, tr. D. and I.
McDougall (1998).
Three Icelandic Outlaw Sagas. The Saga of Gisli, the Saga of Grettir, theSaga of Hord, tr. A. Faulkes and G. Johnston (2004).
Viga-Glums saga, tr. J. McKinnell (1987).
Vikings in Russia: Yngvars saga and Eymund’s saga, tr. Hermann Pálsson
and P. Edwards (1989).
The Vinland sagas: Grænlendinga saga and Eirik’s saga, tr. Magnus
Magnusson and Hermann Pálsson (1973).

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CHRONOLOGY
Poets fl.
Beowulf written
First viking raid on Northumbria
Beginning of viking settlement in England[Bragi the Old
Beginning of viking settlement in Iceland
Alfred the Great becomes king of England
Haraldr finehair becomes king of all[ﬁjó›ólfr of Hvinir
Norway[ﬁorbjƒrn hornklofi
930 Foundation of Alﬂingi
c.965 Division of Iceland into quarters[Eyvindr skáldaspillir
c.985 Beginning of settlement of Greenland[Egill, Kormakr
995 Óláfr Tryggvason becomes king of Norway[Einarr skálaglamm
999/1000 Christianity accepted in Iceland[Hallfre›rc.1000 Discovery of America by vikingsc.1005 Fifth court established1010 Burning of Njáll
1014 Battle of Clontarf[Sighvatr
1030 Fall of St Óláfr at Stikla(r)sta›ir[Arnórr jarlaskáld
1056 First bishop at Skálaholt. Sæmundr the Wise born[ﬁjó›ólfr Arnórsson
1066 Fall of Haraldr har›rá›i in England. Battle of Hastings
1067/8 Ari the Wise born
1096 Tithe laws introduced
1106 First bishop at Hólar
1117–18 Laws first written downc.1125 Íslendingabók compiled
1133 First monastery established (at ﬁingeyrar)c.1150 Earliest Icelandic manuscript fragments
1153 Archbishopric established at Ni›aróss[Einarr Skúlasonc.1170 First Grammatical Treatise. Hryggjarstykki
1179 Snorri Sturluson bornc.1190–1210 Sverris saga
1197 Jón Loptsson dies
1199 Bishop ﬁorlákr of Skálaholt declared saint1200 Bishop Jón of Hólar declared saint1214 Sturla ﬁór›arson born
1215–18 Snorri lawspeaker
1217 Hákon Hákonarson becomes king of Norway
1218–20 Snorri’s first visit to Norwayc.1220 The Prose Edda
1222–31 Snorri lawspeaker again
1226 Tristrams saga
AD

c.725
793
c.850
c.870
871
c.885

xl

A New Introduction to Old Norse

1237–9 Snorri’s second visit to Norway
1240 Duke Skúli killed
1241 Snorri Sturluson killed 23rd September
c.1250 Oldest surviving manuscript fragment of a saga of Icelanders(Egils saga)
1261 Magnús Hákonarson crowned king in Norway
1262–4 Icelanders acknowledge the king of Norway as their sovereign
1263 King Hákon diesc.1275 Codex Regius of eddic poems. Morkinskinna
c.1280 Njáls saga. Hrafnkels saga. King Magnús Hákonarson dies
1284 Sturla ﬁór›arson diesc.1320 Grettis sagac.1340 Chaucer bornc.1350 Mö›ruvallabók written[Eysteinn Ásgrímsson
1382 Flateyjarbók begun
1397 Norway and Iceland come under Danish rule1550 Reformation in Iceland
1944 Iceland regains complete independence

AD

900

Settlement

1000‘Saga Age’

1100
‘Age of Peace’

1200
1400
1500

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Dansar≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈○

Christian poetry≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈

1300○

Skaldic poetry⇐≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈

Sturlung Age○

Eddic poetry⇐≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈

800

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Learned prose≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈

Rímur≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈⇒

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Bishops’ Sagas≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈

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Heroic Sagas≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈○

Sagas of Icelanders≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈○

Sagas of Contemporaries≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈○Saints’ lives≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈○

Kings’ Sagas≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈

1600

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Romances
Lygisƒgur
≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈≈⇒

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The diagram shows the approximate periods during which the various medieval Icelandic literary genres were cultivated. The dottedlines mark the time of the conversion to Christianity (1000), the end of the Commonwealth (1262) and the Reformation (1550).

Introduction to the study of Old Norse
xli

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LAWSPEAKERS OF THE MEDIEVAL ICELANDIC COMMONWEALTH
1. Úlfljótr (cf. Text VIII, note 19; Laws I 1–2)
2. Hrafn Hœngsson .................................................................... c.930–949
3. ﬁórarinn Ragabró›ir Óláfsson ............................................... c.950–969
4. ﬁorkell máni ﬁorsteinsson ........................................................ 970–984
5. ﬁorgeirr Ljósvetningago›i ﬁorkelsson ................................... 985–1001
6. Grímr Svertingsson ............................................................... 1002–1003
7. Skapti ﬁóroddsson ................................................................ 1004–1030
8. Steinn ﬁorgestsson ................................................................ 1031–1033
9. ﬁorkell Tjƒrvason .................................................................. 1034–1053
10. Gellir Bƒlverksson ................................................................ 1054–1062
11. Gunnarr inn spaki ﬁorgrímsson ............................................ 1063–1065
12. Kolbeinn Flosason ................................................................ 1066–1071
13. Gellir Bƒlverksson (second time) ........................................ 1072–1074
14. Gunnarr inn spaki ﬁorgrímsson (second time) .............................. 1075
15. Sighvatr Surtsson .................................................................. 1076–1083
16. Markús Skeggjason .............................................................. 1084–1107
17. Úlfhe›inn Gunnarsson .......................................................... 1108–1116
18. Bergﬂórr Hrafnsson .............................................................. 1117–1122
19. Gu›mundr ﬁorgeirsson ......................................................... 1123–1134
20. Hrafn Úlfhe›insson .............................................................. 1135–1138
21. Finnr Hallsson ...................................................................... 1139–1145
22. Gunnarr Úlfhe›insson .......................................................... 1146–1155
23. Snorri Húnbogason ............................................................... 1156–1170
24. Styrkárr Oddason .................................................................. 1171–1180
25. Gizurr Hallsson ..................................................................... 1181–1202
26. Hallr Gizurarson ................................................................... 1203–1209
27. Styrmir inn fró›i Kárason .................................................... 1210–1214
28. Snorri Sturluson .................................................................... 1215–1218
29. Teitr ﬁorvaldsson .................................................................. 1219–1221
30. Snorri Sturluson (second time) ............................................ 1222–1231
31. Styrmir inn fró›i Kárason (second time) ............................. 1232–1235
32. Teitr ﬁorvaldsson (second time) ........................................... 1236–1247
33. Óláfr hvítaskáld ﬁór›arson ................................................... 1248–1250
34. Sturla ﬁór›arson ............................................................................. 1251
35. Óláfr hvítaskáld ﬁór›arson (second time) ..................................... 1252
36. Teitr Einarsson ...................................................................... 1253–1258
37. Ketill ﬁorláksson .................................................................. 1259–1262
38. ﬁorleifr hreimr Ketilsson ...................................................... 1263–1265
39. Sigur›r ﬁorvaldsson ....................................................................... 1266
40. Jón Einarsson .................................................................................. 1267
41. ﬁorleifr hreimr Ketilsson (second time) ........................................ 1268
42. Jón Einarsson (second time) ................................................ 1269–1270
43. ﬁorleifr hreimr Ketilsson (third time) ............................................ 1271

I: HRÓLFS SAGA KRAKA
Hrólfs saga is one of the sagas known as heroic, mythical, or ‘of ancienttime’ (Modern Icelandic fornaldarsögur). Their main distinguishingfeature is that they take place before the settlement of Iceland, chiefly
in northern Europe (whereas most of the ‘Romance Sagas’ take placein southern Europe). They are often based on poems like the heroiclays of the Poetic Edda. Hrólfs saga contains stories associated with
the Danish Skjƒldung dynasty (also celebrated in the earlier but now
mostly lost Skjƒldunga saga), which seem to underlie some parts of
the Anglo-Saxon poem Beowulf too. Hrólfr kraki corresponds to
Hro›ulf, nephew of King Hro›gar, and the historical background of
the legends about these kings was Scandinavia in the fifth and sixth
centuries of our era. In Hrólfs saga, however, the story has come under
the influence of later genres, and Hrólfr and his kappar (‘champions’)
are to a certain extent based on Charlemagne and his peers; the kastali(‘castle’) mentioned in the present extract, which appears to be separate
from the traditional hƒll (‘hall’), also belongs to a later period. The
double fight against the monster has certain similarities to Beowulf’sfights against Grendel and Grendel’s mother, and Bƒ›varr bjarki
inherits some of Beowulf’s characteristics from his own bear-like father.
The story as it is told here, however, lacks the high seriousness of
Beowulf and the Chansons de Geste, and contains some of the comedy
and irony which feature in other medieval Icelandic tales.
All the surviving manuscripts of Hrólfs saga were written in theseventeenth century or later, and although the original saga is believed
to have been compiled in the fourteenth, none of the manuscripts seems
to preserve the original text unchanged, and their language is more
like Modern than Old Icelandic. Many late forms and spellings are
retained here. They are explained in the grammatical notes. The present
text is based on the manuscript AM 285 4to. Where this manuscript is
incoherent it is emended from AM 9 fol.
The passage begins mid-way through chapter 23 with Bƒ›varr bjarki
arriving at King Hrólfr’s court where he has come to seek service withthe king (in the first part of the chapter Bƒ›varr has been visiting his
two brothers, cf. line 149). On his way there through rain and mud hehad lodged with a poor peasant and his wife who told him that theirson Hƒttr was at the court and being badly treated by the courtiers;
they asked Bƒ›varr to be kind to him.

2

I: Hrólfs saga kraka

King Hrólfr’s courtiers had been throwing bones into the corner
where Hƒttr was cowering. There is a historical example of viking
bone-throwing in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle under the year 1012 (themartyrdom of Archbishop Alphege or Ælfheah) and a mythical one in
Snorri Sturluson’s Edda, Gylfaginning ch. 44; and one might also
compare the Odyssey XX 287–319 and XXII 284–91; Judges 15: 15.
The abbreviations used in the grammatical notes are explained at
the beginning of the Glossary in Part III; the figures in brackets referto sections of the Grammar in Part I. Unlike the Grammar and Glossary,
the grammatical notes here distinguish strong masculine nouns (sm.)
from weak masculine (wm.), strong feminine nouns (sf.) from weakfeminine (wf.), and strong neuter nouns (sn.) from weak neuter (wn.);
see 3.1.4 and 3.1.8 in the Grammar.

Bibliography
The standard edition is Hrólfs saga kraka, ed. D. Slay (1960). There is a text
with normalised spelling in Fornaldarsögur Nor›urlanda I–IV, ed. Gu›ni
Jónsson (1950), I 1–105.
The saga appears in English in Eirik the Red and other Icelandic Sagas, tr.
G. Jones (1961); and in The Saga of King Hrolf Kraki, tr. Jesse L. Byock,Penguin Books (1998).
On the connection with Beowulf see Beowulf and the Fight at Finnsburg,ed. F. Klaeber (1950), xviii–xx; R. W. Chambers, Beowulf: An Introduction(1959). On the genre, see P. Hallberg, ‘Some Aspects of the Fornaldarsögur asa Corpus’, Arkiv för nordisk filologi 97 (1982), 1–35.
For the story of Bƒ›varr bjarki (under the name Biarco) as told by Saxo
Grammaticus in his Latin Gesta Danorum, recourse may be had to thefollowing English translations of that work: The First Nine Books of theDanish History of Saxo Grammaticus, tr. Oliver Elton (1894), 68–80; Saxo
Grammaticus, The History of the Danes I, English text, tr. Peter Fisher, ed. Hilda
Ellis Davidson (1979), 54–64.

I: Hrólfs saga kraka

3

I: HRÓLFS SAGA KRAKA
Chapter 23. . . Sí›an ferr Bƒ›varr lei› sína til Hlei›argar›s.1 Hann kemr til konungs
atsetu. Bƒ›varr lei›ir ﬂegar hest sinn á stall hjá konungs hestum hinum
beztu ok spyrr øngvan at; gekk sí›an inn í hƒll ok var ﬂar fátt manna.
sí›an adv. ‘then’. ferr sv. ‘goes’: 3rd sg. pres. indic. of fara (3.6.10). Bƒ›varr sm.
(personal name): nom., the subject of the sentence; the adv. sí›an occupies the first
position in the sentence, so Bƒ›varr is in third position since the finite verb must be in
first or second place (3.9.1). lei› sf. ‘way’ ‘journey’ ‘path’: acc., the direct object of
the sentence; fara does not normally take an object, but may be construed with socalled ‘locative objects’ (ones that indicate where something took place, cf. Eng. hejumped the ditch) — here we might translate ‘on his way’. sína REFL. POSS. (referring
back to the subject; 3.2.1) ‘his’: acc. f. sg., agreeing with lei›. til prep. ‘to’.
Hlei›argar›s sm. (place-name): gen., the case always triggered by the prep. til; on thequestion of case, gender and number in compound nouns, see the analysis of mannshƒnd
in line 6. hann pron. ‘he’: nom., the subject. kemr sv. ‘comes’: 3rd sg. pres. indic. ofkoma—kom—kómu—komit. til prep. ‘to’. konungs sm. ‘king’s’: gen., indicating
possession or association, cf. the corresponding -’s in English. atsetu wf. ‘residence’:gen., the case always triggered by the prep. til. Bƒ›varr sm. (personal name): nom.,the subject. lei›ir wv. ‘leads’: 3rd sg. pres. indic. of lei›a. ﬂegar adv. ‘at once’‘immediately’. hest sm. ‘horse’: acc., the direct object. sinn REFL. POSS. (referring
back to the subject) ‘his’: acc. m. sg., agreeing with hest. á prep. ‘into’. stall sm.
‘stable’: acc., the case triggered by the prep. á when motion is denoted. hjá prep.
‘alongside’ ‘next to’. konungs sm. ‘king’s’: gen., indicating possession, cf. the corresponding -’s in English. hestum sm. ‘horses’: dat., the case always triggered by the
prep. hjá. hinum art. ‘the’: dat. pl., agreeing with hestum. beztu adj. ‘best’: weak dat.
pl. sup. — weak because the noun phrase is definite (‘the best horses’; 3.3.2), dat. pl.
agreeing with hestum (note that in classical ON the weak dat. pl. of adjectives ends in-um (3.3.4), but that in later texts this is increasingly replaced by -u by analogy with allother weak pl. adj. endings); on the word-order see 3.3.5, 3.9.2. ok conj. ‘and’. spyrr
wv. ‘asks’: 3rd sg. pres. indic. of spyrja; the subject, Bƒ›varr or hann, is understood.
øngvan pron. ‘no one’: acc. m. sg., the direct object; masculine is used since a humanbeing is denoted and feminine gender has not been specified, masculine being the default gender (cf. fáir line 23). at prep. ‘about’: the prep. is here used absolutely, i.e.
without a following noun or noun phrase, ‘it’ — Bƒ›varr’s action — being understood(3.7.7); such usage is often classed as adverbial rather than prepositional. gekk sv.
‘walked’ ‘went’: 3rd sg. past indic. of ganga—gekk—gengu—gengit; the subject, Bƒ›varr
or hann, is understood. sí›an adv. ‘then’. inn adv. ‘in’. í prep. ‘to’: the combinationof adv. inn and prep. í corresponds to the English prep. ‘into’. hƒll sf. ‘hall’: acc., thecase triggered by í when motion is denoted. ok conj. ‘and’. var sv. ‘was’: 3rd sg. past
indic. of vera (3.6.10); in this sentence the finite verb (var) occupies first position, as iscommon in ON narrative style. ﬂar adv. ‘there’. fátt adj. ‘few’: strong nom. n. sg., thesubject; n. sg. is used because the adj. does not modify a noun with a particular number
or gender; in the absence of such a noun, the adj. takes over the function of head of thenoun phrase (3.3; 3.3.6 (19–21)) and is modified by manna. manna sm. ‘of men’:gen., indicating type, i.e. menn are the type or class of which few were present.

3
1

2

3

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6
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I: Hrólfs saga kraka

Hann sezk útarliga,2 ok sem hann hefr setit ﬂar nƒkkra hrí›, heyrirhann ﬂrausk nƒkkut útar í hornit í einhverjum sta›. Bƒ›varr lítr ﬂangat
ok sér at mannshƒnd kemr upp ór mikilli beinahrúgu, er ﬂar lá; hƒndin
var svƒrt mjƒk. Bƒ›varr gengr ﬂangat ok spyrr hverr ﬂar væri í beinahann pron. ‘he’: nom., the subject. sezk wv. ‘sits down’: 3rd sg. pres. indic., -sk form
(3.6.5.3), of setja; the sense is reflexive, the literal meaning being ‘sets/places himself’.
útarliga adv. ‘far out [i.e. near the door]’. ok conj. ‘and’; this conj. connects theimmediately preceding independent sentence with the one beginning heyrir hann ﬂrausknƒkkut at the end of line 4. sem conj. ‘when’ (3.8.2.1, end). hann pron. ‘he’: nom.,the subject. hefr wv. ‘has’: 3rd sg. pres. indic. of hafa (3.6.7). setit sv. ‘sat’: supine (=pp. nom./acc. n. sg.) of sitja—sat—sátu—setit; hefr + setit forms a so-called perfect
construction, the equivalent of Eng. has sat (3.6.2). ﬂar adv. ‘there’. nƒkkra pron.
‘some’ ‘a little’: acc. f. sg.; here used adjectivally, nƒkkra (an abbreviated form ofnƒkkura) agrees with hrí›. hrí› sf. ‘while’: acc., since the phrase nƒkkra hrí› functions here as time adverbial (3.1.2, 3.1.5 (10)). heyrir wv. ‘hears’: 3rd sg. pres. indic.
of heyra; the finite verb is in first position because the independent sentence in which it
occurs is immediately preceded by a dependent sentence (3.9.1). hann pron. ‘he’: nom.,the subject. ﬂrausk sn. ‘rummaging’: acc., the direct object. nƒkkut pron. ‘some’ ‘a’:acc. n. sg.; here used adjectivally, nƒkkut agrees with ﬂrausk. útar adv. ‘farther out’:
comp., consisting of út + comp. suffix -ar. í prep. ‘in’. hornit sn. + art. (horn-it) ‘thecorner’: acc., the case triggered by í when motion is denoted; the English speaker may
not conceive of hearing something somewhere as involving motion, but the clue isprovided by the motion adv. útar — the hearing of hann, the subject, is directed farther
out into the corner. í prep. ‘in’. einhverjum pron. ‘some’: dat. m. sg.; here usedadjectivally, einhverjum agrees with sta›. sta› sm. ‘place’: dat., the case triggered byí when location is denoted; note that sta› is one of those masculine nouns that has no
ending in the dat. sg. (3.1.4, 3.1.8, paradigm 2). Bƒ›varr sm. (personal name): nom.,the subject. lítr sv. ‘looks’: 3rd sg. pres. indic. of líta—leit—litu—litit. ﬂangat adv.
‘thither’ ‘there’. ok conj. ‘and’. sér sv. ‘sees’: 3rd sg. pres. indic. of sjá (3.6.10). at conj.
‘that’. mannshƒnd sf. ‘man’s hand’: nom., the subject; note that although manns, gen.
sg. of ma›r, is sm., the gender of the compound is determined by the second element,
hƒnd; note further that the nom. case and sg. number of the compound is expressed byhƒnd alone. kemr sv. ‘comes’: 3rd sg. pres. indic. of koma—kom—kómu—komit. upp
adv. ‘up’. ór prep. ‘out of’. mikilli adj. ‘big’: strong dat. f. sg., agreeing with beinahrúgu.
beinahrúgu wf. ‘bone-pile’ ‘pile of bones’: dat., the case always triggered by ór; likemannshƒnd above, beinahrúgu is a compound, whose gender is determined and caseand number expressed by the second element, hrúgu; in the following the structure ofcompounds will receive no further analysis. er conj. ‘which’. ﬂar adv. ‘there’. lá sv.
‘lay’: 3rd sg. past indic. of liggja—lá—lágu—legit: the finite verb does not often immediately follow a subordinating conjunction, and here ﬂar intervenes (3.9.1). hƒndin sf.
+ art. (hƒnd-in) ‘the hand’: nom., the subject. var sv. ‘was’: 3rd sg. past indic. of vera
(3.6.10). svƒrt adj. ‘black’: strong nom. f. sg. (3.3.2), agreeing with hƒndin. mjƒk adv.
‘very’ (3.9.2). Bƒ›varr sm. (personal name): nom., the subject. gengr sv. ‘goes’: 3rd
sg. pres. indic. of ganga—gekk—gengu—gengit. ﬂangat adv. ‘thither’ ‘there’. ok conj.
‘and’. spyrr wv. ‘asks’: 3rd sg. pres. indic. of spyrja. hverr pron. (interrog.) ‘who’:nom. m. sg.; hverr fulfils a double function here, (1) as a conjunction introducing thesentence, (2) as the subject (3.8.2.3); since a human being is denoted, masculine, thedefault gender, is used (see øngvan, line 3). ﬂar adv. ‘there’. væri sv. ‘was’: 3rd sg. pastsubj. of vera (3.6.10); the subj. is normally used in dependent interrogative sentenceswhere the main verb of the independent sentences of which they are the object is one of‘asking’; on the word-order hverr ﬂar væri, see the analysis of lá in line 6. í prep. ‘in’.

I: Hrólfs saga kraka
hrúgunni. ﬁá var honum svarat ok heldr óframliga:‘Hƒttr heiti ek, bokki sæll.’3‘ﬁví ertu hér,’ spyrr Bƒ›varr, ‘e›a hvat gørir ﬂú?’Hƒttr svarar, ‘Ek gøri mér skjaldborg,4 bokki sæll.’Bƒ›varr segir, ‘Vesall ertu ﬂinnar skjaldborgar!’

5

9

12
beinahrúgunni wf. + art. (beinahrúgu-nni) ‘the bone-pile’ ‘the pile of bones’: dat., the 8case triggered by í when location is denoted. ﬂá adv. ‘then’. var sv. ‘was’: 3rd sg. past
indic. of vera (3.6.10). honum pron. ‘to him’: dat., the indirect object; note that in theabsence of a nominative subject, honum is the first (and only) noun phrase in the sentence (for an alternative analysis of the syntactic role of honum here, see 3.9.3); on theword-order ﬂá var honum, see the analysis of Bƒ›varr in line 1. svarat wv. ‘answered’: pp. nom. n. sg. of svara; in the absence of a subject with a particular genderand number with which svarat could agree, n. sg. is used; nom. case is assumed sincewere there a subject, e.g. ﬂat, it would be in the nom.; var svarat, the equivalent of Eng.
was answered, forms the passive counterpart to active NN svara›i ‘NN answered’ (3.6.4).
ok conj. ‘and’. heldr adv. ‘rather’. óframliga adv. ‘timidly’. Hƒttr sm. (personal 9name): nom., the subject complement — here in first position because it is emphasised(3.9.1). heiti sv. ‘am called’: 1st sg. pres. indic. of heita—hét—hétu—heitit. ek pron.
‘I’: nom., the subject. bokki wm. ‘buck’ ‘fellow’: nom., the case used when someone
is being addressed. sæll adj. ‘happy’ ‘fortunate’: strong nom. m. sg., agreeing withbokki; the phrase bokki sæll may be translated ‘good fellow’ ‘good friend’ ‘kind sir’ or
the like — it is a slightly formal term of endearment. ﬂví adv. (interrog.) ‘why’ (the 10
more common word for ‘why’ is hví ). ertu = ert ﬂú. ert sv. ‘are’: 2nd sg. pres. indic.
of vera (3.6.10). ﬂú pron. ‘you’: nom., the subject. hér adv. ‘here’. spyrr wv. ‘asks’:3rd sg. pres. indic. of spyrja. Bƒ›varr sm. (personal name): nom., the subject. e›aconj. ‘or’: when introducing a question e›a is often closer in meaning to English and or
but — here the former. hvat pron. (interrog.) ‘what’: acc. n. sg., the direct object;neuter is used because the pron. denotes a state or action — what Hƒttr is doing — andneuter is the gender for inanimate or abstract reference. gørir wv. ‘are . . . doing’: 2nd
sg. pres. indic. of gøra (3.6.7); note that ON does not distinguish between simple (e.g.
do) and continuous constructions (e.g. are doing), but expresses both meanings by thesame form. ﬂú pron. ‘you’: nom., the subject. Hƒttr sm. (personal name): nom., the 11
subject. svarar wv. ‘answers’: 3rd sg. pres. indic. of svara. ek pron. ‘I’: nom., thesubject. gøri wv. ‘am making’: 1st sg. pres. indic. of gøra (3.6.7); on the English
translation of the present tense, see gørir in line 10. mér pron. ‘myself’ ‘for myself’:
dat., the indirect object; note that there is no separate reflexive form of the 1st or 2nd
person pronouns, and that mér can thus mean both ‘me’ and ‘myself’ (3.2.1). skjaldborg
sf. ‘shield fortification’ ‘shield wall’: acc., the direct object; skjaldborg — a term denoting a battle formation in which men confront the enemy with an impenetrable wallof shields — is used here metaphorically to denote the protective construction Hƒttr isbuilding out of the pile of bones. bokki wm. ‘buck’ ‘fellow’ (see line 9). sæll adj.
‘happy’ ‘fortunate’ (see line 9). Bƒ›varr sm. (personal name): nom., the subject. 12
segir wv. ‘says’: 3rd sg. pres. indic. of segja. vesall adj. ‘wretched’: strong nom. m.
sg., agreeing with ﬂú (ertu = ert ﬂú, cf. line 10), which has masculine reference; vesall
is moved into first position in the sentence to give it emphasis, and since the verb, theert of ertu, must be in either first or second position in an independent sentence, itcomes next, pushing the subject, the ﬂú of ertu, into third place (3.9.1). ertu (see line
10 and the analysis of vesall immediately above). ﬂinnar poss. adj. ‘in respect of
your’: gen. f. sg., agreeing with skjaldborgar. skjaldborgar sf. ‘shield fortification’‘shield wall’ (see line 11): gen., dependent on the adj. vesall and imparting the sense ‘inrespect of’ ‘with regard to’.

6

I: Hrólfs saga kraka

Bƒ›varr ﬂrífr til hans ok hnykkir honum upp ór beinahrúgunni. Hƒttr
kva› ﬂá hátt vi› ok mælti:15‘Nú viltu bana mér! Gør eigi ﬂetta, svá sem ek hefi nú vel um búizk,en ﬂú hefr nú rofit í sundr skjaldborg mína, ok haf›a ek nú gƒrt hana
15 Gør eigi ﬂetta] at ﬂú gørir ﬂetta 285.

13 Bƒ›varr sm. (personal name): nom., the subject. ﬂrífr sv. ‘grabs’: 3rd sg. pres. indic.
of ﬂrífa—ﬂreif—ﬂrifu—ﬂrifit. til prep. ‘at’: the sense indicated is of movement towards Hƒttr — verb + prep. might be translated ‘grabs hold of’ or simply ‘grasps’.
hans pron. ‘him’: gen., the case always triggered by til. ok conj. ‘and’. hnykkir wv.
‘pulls’: 3rd sg. pres. indic. of hnykkja. honum pron. ‘him’: dat., the direct object (3.1.5(16) and (18)). upp adv. ‘up’. ór prep. ‘out of’. beinahrúgunni wf. + art. (beinahrúgunni) ‘the bone-pile’ ‘the pile of bones’: dat., the case always triggered by ór. Hƒttr sm.
14 (personal name): nom., the subject. kva› sv. ‘cried out’: 3rd sg. past indic. of kve›a—kva›—kvá›u—kve›it. ﬂá adv. ‘then’. hátt adv. ‘loudly’ (3.5.1). vi› prep. ‘at’: theprep. is used here absolutely, ‘this’ or ‘this treatment’ being understood as followingvi› (3.7.7; see also at in line 3). ok conj. ‘and’. mælti wv. ‘said’: 3rd sg. past indic. of
15 mæla. nú adv. ‘now’. viltu = vilt ﬂú. vilt wv. ‘want’: 2nd sg. pres. indic. of vilja(3.6.7). ﬂú pron. ‘you’: nom., the subject; nú occupies the first position in the sentence, so ﬂú is in third position since the finite verb must be in first or second place(3.9.1). bana wv. ‘kill’: inf. mér pron. ‘me’: dat., the direct object (3.1.5 (16) and(18)). gør wv. ‘do’: imp. (2nd sg. pres.) of gøra (3.6.7); the subject of the imperative,
ﬂú, is omitted here as in English. eigi adv. ‘not’: since in English negative verb phrases
are constructed with auxiliary do (e.g. I do not drink rather than *I drink not), we must
translate ‘do not do!’. ﬂetta pron. ‘this’: acc. n. sg.; neuter is used because the pronounrefers to an action — the destruction of the pile of bones — and neuter is the gender for
inanimate or abstract reference. svá adv. ‘so’: the construction here is discontinuous— svá, which has its natural place before the sem that introduces the dependent sentence (3.8.2.4), modifies the adv. vel, which would normally immediately follow, but
vel itself modifies the verb phrase um búizk, and has been attracted to the position
preceding it inside the dependent sentence. sem conj. ‘as’ (3.8.2.4). ek pron. ‘I’:
nom., the subject. hefi wv. ‘have’: 1st sg. pres. indic. of hafa (3.6.7). nú adv. ‘now’.
vel adv. ‘well’ (see the analysis of svá in this line). um prep. ‘around’: the prep. is usedhere absolutely since the noun phrase it governs is expressed by the -sk inflexion of
búizk (3.9.8.3). búizk sv. ‘protected myself’ ‘made myself secure’: supine (= pp. nom./acc. n. sg.), -sk form (3.6.5.3), of búa—bjó—bjoggu—búit: as is clear from the translation, the -sk suffix here imparts a reflexive sense to the verb; hefi + búizk forms a so16 called perfect construction, the equivalent of Eng. have protected (myself )(3.6.2). en
conj. ‘but’. ﬂú pron. ‘you’: nom., the subject. hefr wv. ‘have’: 2nd sg. pres. indic. of
hafa (3.6.7). nú adv. ‘now’. rofit sv. ‘broken’: supine (= pp. nom./acc. n. sg.) of
rjúfa—rauf—rufu—rofit; hefr + rofit forms a so-called perfect construction, the equivalent of Eng. have broken (3.6.2). í sundr adv. ‘asunder’ ‘to pieces’: although formallythis phrase consists of prep. + adv., it functions as an adverb just like English asunder— historically prep. + adj.; often sundr is used on its own with the same meaning as ísundr. skjaldborg sf. ‘shield fortification’ ‘shield wall’: acc., the direct object of rofit.
mína poss. adj. ‘my’: acc. f. sg., agreeing with skjaldborg; note that the possessive
follows the noun it modifies, the usual word-order in ON (3.9.2). ok conj. ‘and’.
haf›a wv. ‘had’: 1st sg. past indic. of hafa (3.6.7). ek pron. ‘I’: nom., the subject. nú
adv. ‘now’. gƒrt wv. ‘made’: supine (= pp. nom./acc. n. sg.) of gøra (3.6.7); haf›a +gƒrt forms a so-called pluperfect or past perfect construction, the equivalent of Eng.
had made (3.6.2). hana pron. ‘her’: acc., the direct object of gƒrt: note that the femi-I: Hrólfs saga kraka

7

svá háva útan at mér, at hon hefr hlíft mér vi› ƒllum hƒggum ykkar,
svá ekkert hƒgg hefr komit á mik lengi, en ekki var hon ﬂó enn svá 18
búin sem ek ætla›a hon skyldi vera.’Bƒ›varr mælti: ‘Ekki muntu nú fá skjaldborgina gƒr›a lengr.’
nine 3rd person pron. is used because the reference is to the feminine noun borg. svá
adv. ‘so’. háva adj. ‘high’: acc. f. sg., agreeing with hana; the nom. m. sg. form of thisadj. is hár (3.3.8.5, point (5)). útan adv. ‘from without’ ‘externally’ (3.5.1). at prep.
‘towards’ ‘up to’: together útan at might be translated ‘around’ — the wall extending
towards Hƒttr affords him protection from the outside world. mér pron. ‘me’: dat., thecase always triggered by at. at conj. ‘that’. hon pron. ‘she’: nom., the subject; on thefeminine gender, see hana in line 16. hefr wv. ‘has’: 3rd sg. pres. indic. of hafa. hlíft
wv. ‘protected’: supine of hlífa. mér pron. ‘me’: dat., the direct object (3.1.5 (16) and(18)). vi› prep. ‘against’. ƒllum adj. ‘all’: dat. pl., agreeing with hƒggum. hƒggum
sn. ‘blows’: dat., the case triggered by vi› in the sense ‘against’ (3.7.4). ykkar poss.
adj. ‘your [dual]’: originally the 2nd dual poss. adj. was inflected for case, gender andnumber (3.3.9), but in later ON the invariable form ykkar (formally gen. of the pronoun(ﬂ)it; 3.2.1) came to be the norm; the use of the dual here is unexpected since thereference is to a large number of people, as the text goes on to make clear — possiblyHƒttr is categorising Bƒ›varr as one entity and the courtiers as another, but more likely
this is a modern Icelandic usage, where the originally dual 1st and 2nd person forms areused to denote all numbers higher than one; note that the possessive follows the noun it
modifies, the usual word-order in ON. svá conj. ‘so’: svá is normally an adverb, but it
regularly combines with a following at to form a two-word conjunction introducing
sentences of result or purpose (‘so that’; 3.8.2.2); occasionally the at is omitted, as here,
and svá then adopts the role of conjunction. ekkert pron. ‘no’: nom. n. sg.; here usedadjectivally, ekkert (a later form of ekki) agrees with hƒgg. hƒgg sn. ‘blow’: nom., thesubject. hefr wv. ‘have’: 3rd sg. pres. indic. of hafa. komit sv. ‘come’ ‘landed’:supine of koma—kom—kómu—komit. á prep. ‘on’. mik pron. ‘me’: acc., the casetriggered by á when motion is denoted. lengi adv. ‘for a long time’. en conj. ‘but’.
ekki adv. ‘not’: although formally the nom./acc. n. sg. form of the pron. engi ‘no one’‘none’, ekki is often used synonymously with the adv. eigi ‘not’. var sv. ‘was’: 3rd sg.
past indic. of vera (3.6.10). hon pron. ‘she’: nom., the subject: ekki occupies first
position in the sentence (for reasons of emphasis), so the subject comes in 3rd placesince only one element may precede the finite verb (3.9.1); on the use of the feminine
gender, see line 16: hana. ﬂó adv. ‘all the same’ ‘nevertheless’. enn adv. ‘yet’. svá
adv. ‘so’. búin sv. ‘prepared’ ‘constructed’: pp. nom. f. sg., agreeing with hon, ofbúa—bjó—bjoggu—búit. sem conj. ‘as’. ek pron. ‘I’: nom., the subject. ætla›a wv.
‘intended’: 1st sg. past indic. of ætla. hon pron. ‘she’: nom., the subject. skyldi pret.pres. vb. ‘should’: 3rd sg. past; formally skyldi may be either indic. or subj. (3.6.7), but
in a dependent sentence describing a hypothetical situation, i.e. what was intended, it islikely to be subj. vera sv. ‘be’: inf. (3.6.10). Bƒ›varr sm. (personal name): nom., thesubject. mælti wv. ‘said’: 3rd. sg. past indic. of mæla. ekki adv. ‘not’ (see the analysis
of ekki in line 18). muntu = munt ﬂú. munt pret.-pres. vb. ‘will’: 2nd sg. pres. indic.
of munu (3.6.7). ﬂú pron. ‘you’: nom., the subject; on the word-order adv. + finite verb
+ subject, see the analysis of hon in line 18. nú adv. ‘now’. fá sv. ‘get’: inf. of fá—fekk—fengu—fengit. skjaldborgina sf. + art. (skjaldborg-ina) ‘the shield fortification’‘the shield wall’: acc., the direct object. gƒr›a wv. ‘made’ ‘constructed’: pp. acc. f. sg.
(a later form of gƒrva), agreeing with skjaldborgina, of gøra; fá + gƒr›a forms a periphrastic construction, the equivalent of Eng. get made (3.9.7.1). lengr adv. ‘any longer’:
comp.

17

18

19

20

8

I: Hrólfs saga krakaHƒttr mælti, ‘Skaltu nú bana mér, bokki sæll?’Bƒ›varr ba› hann ekki hafa hátt, tók hann upp sí›an ok bar hann útór hƒllinni ok til vatns nƒkkurs sem ﬂar var í nánd, ok gáfu fáir at
24 ﬂessu gaum. Hann ﬂvá›i hann upp allan.5
Sí›an gekk Bƒ›varr til ﬂess rúms sem hann haf›i á›r tekit, ok leiddi
21

21 Hƒttr sm. (personal name): nom., the subject. mælti wv. ‘said’: 3rd sg. past indic. ofmæla. skaltu = skalt ﬂú. skalt pret.-pres. vb. ‘shall’: 2nd sg. pres. indic. of skulu(3.6.7); the usual implication of skulu is intention, so that although ‘shall’ is the English
cognate of skalt, an idiomatic English translation would be ‘do [you] intend to’ ‘are[you] going to’. ﬂú pron. ‘you’: nom., the subject. nú adv. ‘now’. bana wv. ‘kill’: inf.
mér pron. ‘me’: dat., the direct object (3.1.5 (16) and (18)). bokki wm. ‘buck’ ‘fellow’
22 (see line 9). sæll adj. ‘happy’ ‘fortunate’ (see line 9). Bƒ›varr sm. (personal name):nom., the subject. ba› sv. ‘bade’ ‘told’: 3rd sg. past indic. of bi›ja—ba›—bá›u—be›it.
hann pron. ‘him’: acc., the direct object of ba› (but see the analysis of hafa in this line).
ekki adv. ‘not’ (see line 18). hafa wv. ‘behave’ ‘act’: inf. (3.6.7); the basic meaning of
hafa is ‘have’, but when construed with an adv. and nothing further it takes on the senseof behaving in the manner denoted by the adv; ba› hann ekki hafa is an acc + inf.
construction, in which acc. hann can be analysed both as the direct object of ba› andthe subject of hafa (3.9.4). hátt adv. ‘loudly’, ‘noisily’ (3.5.1). tók sv. ‘took’ ‘lifted’:3rd sg. past indic. of taka—tók—tóku—tekit. hann pron. ‘him’: acc., the direct object.
upp adv. ‘up’. sí›an adv. ‘then’. ok conj. ‘and’. bar sv. ‘carried’: 3rd sg. past indic.
of bera—bar—báru—borit. hann pron. ‘him’: acc., the direct object. út adv. ‘out’.
23 ór prep. ‘from’. hƒllinni sf. + art. (hƒll-inni) ‘the hall’: dat., the case always triggeredby ór. ok conj. ‘and’. til prep. ‘to’. vatns sn. ‘lake’: gen., the case always triggeredby til. nƒkkurs pron. ‘some’ ‘a certain’: gen. n. sg.; here used adjectivally, nƒkkurs
agrees with vatns and follows it. sem conj. ‘which’. ﬂar adv. ‘there’. var sv. ‘was’:
3rd sg. past indic. of vera (3.6.10); on the word-order sem ﬂar var, see the analysis of lá
in line 6. í prep. ‘in’. nánd sf. ‘proximity’: dat., the case triggered by í when location
is denoted; idiomatic English for í nánd would be ‘near by’. ok conj. ‘and’. gáfu sv.
‘gave’ ‘paid’: 3rd pl. past indic. of gefa—gaf—gáfu—gefit. fáir adj. ‘few’: strong nom.
m. pl., the subject; although fáir is the sole element in the noun phrase and thus has nonoun to agree with, it takes nom. m. pl. form because the referent is plural and probably
exclusively male, and masculine is in any case the default gender where people in gen24 eral are denoted (3.3; 3.3.6 (19–21)). at prep. ‘to’. ﬂessu pron. ‘this’: dat. n. sg. — dat.
case is automatic after at; on the neuter gender, see ﬂetta in line 15. gaum sm. ‘heed’,‘attention’: acc., the direct object. hann pron. ‘he’: nom., the subject. ﬂvá›i wv.
‘washed’: 3rd sg. past indic. of ﬂvá; more commonly this verb is strong (3.6.9.3). hannpron. ‘him’: acc., the direct object. upp adv. ‘up’ ‘thoroughly’. allan adj. ‘all’: acc. m.
sg., agreeing with hann; more idiomatic English for allan would be the adverbial phrase
25 ‘all over’. sí›an adv. ‘then’. gekk sv. ‘went’: 3rd sg. past indic. of ganga—gekk—
gengu—gengit. Bƒ›varr sm. (personal name): nom., the subject. til prep. ‘to’. ﬂess
pron. ‘that’: gen. n. sg.; here used adjectivally, ﬂess agrees with rúms. rúms sn. ‘seat’‘place’: gen., the case always triggered by til. sem conj. ‘which’. hann pron. ‘he’:nom., the subject. haf›i wv. ‘had’: 3rd sg. past indic. of hafa. á›r adv. ‘previously’‘before’. tekit sv. ‘taken’: supine of taka—tók—tóku—tekit. ok conj. ‘and’. leiddi
26 wv. ‘led’: 3rd sg. past indic. of lei›a. eptir prep. ‘after’. sér refl. pron. (referring backto the understood subject, Bƒ›varr; 3.2.1; 3.2.6 (6) and (10)) ‘him’: dat., the case triggered by eptir in the sense ‘after [motion]’ ‘following’. Hƒtt sm. (personal name): acc.,
the direct object. ok conj. ‘and’. setr wv. ‘places’: 3rd sg. pres. indic. of setja (3.6.9.3).

I: Hrólfs saga kraka

9eptir sér Hƒtt ok setr hann ﬂar hjá sér. En hann er svá hræddr at skelfrá honum leggr ok li›r, en ﬂó ﬂykisk hann skilja at ﬂessi ma›r vill 27
hjálpa sér. Eptir ﬂat kveldar ok drífa menn at hƒllunni ok sjá Hrólfs
kappar at Hƒttr var settr í bekk upp ok ﬂykir ﬂeim sá ma›r hafa gƒrthann pron. ‘him’: acc., the direct object. ﬂar adv. ‘there’. hjá prep. ‘next to’. sér refl.
pron. ‘him’: dat., the case always triggered by hjá; on the use of the refl. pron., see theprevious sér in this line. en conj. ‘but’. hann pron. ‘he’: nom., the subject. er sv. ‘is’:
3rd sg. pres. indic. of vera. svá adv. ‘so’. hræddr adj. ‘frightened’: strong nom. m.
sg., agreeing with hann. at conj. ‘that’. skelfr sv. ‘trembles’: 3rd. sg. pres. indic. ofskjálfa—skalf—skulfu—skolfit. á prep. ‘on’. honum pron. ‘him’: dat., the case trig- 27
gered by á when location is denoted; body-part possession is often indicated in ON by
á + dat., corresponding to a possessive adj. in English — thus á honum here should be
rendered ‘his’. leggr sm. ‘hollow bone [of arm or leg]’: nom., the subject. ok conj.
‘and’. li›r sm. ‘joint’: nom., the subject; the conjoined nouns leggr ok li›r are usedhere by synecdoche for the whole body, the sense being that Hƒttr trembled all over —that may be in part why the verb skelfr is sg., even though together leggr ok li›r make apl. subject, but another possible reason is that skelfr precedes the subject, and that thewriter was not clear in his mind at that point what form the subject was going to take(3.9.8.2). en conj. ‘but’. ﬂó adv. ‘nevertheless’. ﬂykisk wv. ‘thinks’: 3rd. sg. pres.
indic., -sk form (3.6.5.3), of ﬂykja (3.6.9.3); the sense is reflexive, the literal meaning
being ‘thinks himself’ — the -sk takes the place of the direct (reflexive) object in an
acc. + inf. construction ‘thinks himself to . . . [i.e. thinks that he . . .]’ (3.9.4). skilja wv.
‘understand’: inf. at conj. ‘that’. ﬂessi pron. ‘this’: nom. m. sg.; here used adjectivally, ﬂessi agrees with ma›r. ma›r sm. ‘man’: nom., the subject. vill wv. ‘wants’:3rd sg. pres. indic. of vilja (3.6.7); indic., rather than subj., is used because the dependent sentence describes not a hypothetical situation, but what Hƒttr understands to be afact. hjálpa sv. ‘[to] help’: inf. of hjálpa—h(j)alp—hulpu—hólpit. sér refl. pron. 28(referring back to Hƒttr, the subject of the higher sentence, rather than ﬂessi ma›r ;3.2.1) ‘him’: dat., the direct object (3.1.5 (16) and (18)). eptir prep. ‘after’. ﬂat pron.
‘that’: acc., the case triggered by eptir in the sense ‘after [time]’; on the neuter gender,
see ﬂetta in line 15. kveldar wv. ‘evening draws on’: 3rd sg. pres. indic. of kvelda; theconstruction is impersonal in the sense that no subject is conceived or expressed (3.9.3).
ok conj. ‘and’. drífa sv. ‘drift’: 3rd. pl. pres. indic. of drífa—dreif—drifu—drifit. mennsm. ‘men’: nom., the subject. at prep. ‘to’ ‘towards’. hƒllunni sf. + art. (hƒllu-nni;
3.1.7.4 (3)) ‘the hall’: dat., the case always triggered by at. ok conj. ‘and’. sjá sv.
‘see’: 3rd pl. pres. indic. of sjá (3.6.10). Hrólfs sm. (personal name): gen., indicating
possession or association. kappar wm. ‘champions’ ‘warriors’: nom., the subject. at conj. 29‘that’. Hƒttr sm. (personal name): nom., the subject. var sv. ‘was’: 3rd. sg. past indic.
of vera. settr wv. ‘placed’ ‘put’: pp. nom. m. sg. of setja, agreeing with Hƒttr. í prep.
‘in(to)’ ‘on’. bekk sm. ‘bench’: acc., the case triggered by í when motion is denoted.
upp adv. ‘up’. ok conj. ‘and’. ﬂykir wv. ‘seems’: 3rd sg. pres. indic. of ﬂykja (3.6.9.3).
ﬂeim pron. ‘to them’: dat., representing the experiencer, i.e. the person experiencing
the process denoted by the verb (3.9.4); the construction ﬂykir ﬂeim is impersonal in thesense that there is no nominative subject (3.9.3) — though see ma›r in this line. sápron. ‘that’: nom. m. sg.; here used adjectivally, sá agrees with ma›r. ma›r sm. ‘man’:nom., the subject: we have here a hybrid construction, nom. + inf., where sá ma›r istaken as the subject of the immediately following inf. clause rather than as the object of
ﬂykir (3.9.4); on a more abstract level the whole of the inf. clause sá ma›r hafa gƒrt sikœrit djarfan can be analysed as the subject of ﬂykir in that this is what ‘seems’ to‘them’. hafa wv. ‘have’: inf. gƒrt wv. ‘made’: supine of gøra.

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33

I: Hrólfs saga krakasik œrit djarfan, er ﬂetta hefr til tekit. Illt tillit hefr Hƒttr, ﬂá hann sér
kunningja sína, ﬂví hann hefr illt eitt af ﬂeim reynt; hann vill lifa gjarnan
ok fara aptr í beinahrúgu sína, en Bƒ›varr heldr honum, svá at hannnáir ekki í burt at fara, ﬂví hann ﬂóttisk ekki jafnberr fyrir hƒggum

30 sik refl. pron. (referring back to the subject, sá ma›r; 3.2.1; 3.2.6 (6) and (10)) ‘himself’: acc., the direct object. œrit adv. ‘enough’, ‘sufficiently’. djarfan adj. ‘bold’‘arrogant’: strong acc. m. sg., the object complement agreeing with sik, which has masculine singular reference; an idiomatic translation of ﬂykir ﬂeim sá ma›r hafa gƒrt sikœrit djarfan would be ‘it seems to them the man has shown considerable arrogance’.
er conj. ‘who’. ﬂetta pron. ‘this’: acc. n. sg., the direct object; on the neuter gender, seeﬂetta in line 15. hefr wv. ‘has’: 3rd sg. pres. indic. of hafa. til prep.: the prep. is usedhere absolutely, i.e. without a following noun or noun phrase (3.7.7), its function being
to modify the sense of the verb. tekit sv. ‘taken’ ‘undertaken’ ‘done’: supine of taka—
tók—tóku—tekit; it is the prep. til, used in close collocation with taka ‘take’, that gives
the sense ‘undertaken’ ‘done’. illt adj. ‘bad’ ‘expressing dislike’: strong acc. n. sg.,
agreeing with tillit. tillit sn. ‘look’ ‘glance’: acc., the direct object. hefr wv. ‘has’:
3rd. sg. pres. indic. of hafa. Hƒttr sm. (personal name): nom., the subject. ﬂá conj.
‘when’: ﬂá is normally an adverb meaning ‘then’, but it regularly combines with afollowing er to form a two-word conjunction with the meaning ‘when’; sometimes theer is omitted, as here, and ﬂá then adopts the role of conjunction (3.8.2.1). hann pron.
31 ‘he’: nom., the subject. sér sv. ‘sees’: 3rd sg. pres. indic. of sjá (3.6.10). kunningja
wm. ‘acquaintances’: acc., the direct object. sína REFL. POSS. (referring back to thesubject; 3.2.1) ‘his’: acc. m. pl., agreeing with kunningja. ﬂví conj. ‘because’: ﬂví isnormally an adverb meaning ‘therefore’, but it regularly combines with a following at
to form a two-word conjunction introducing sentences of reason or cause (3.8.2.2);
sometimes the at is omitted, as here, and ﬂví then adopts the role of conjunction. hannpron. ‘he’: nom., the subject. hefr wv. ‘has’: 3rd sg. pres. indic. of hafa. illt adj. ‘bad’‘evil’: strong acc. n. sg., the direct object; on the absence of a noun with which illt canagree and the use of the n. sg., see fátt in line 3. eitt adj. ‘alone’: strong acc. n. sg.,
agreeing with illt; this is the same word as the numeral ‘one’, and although used here
adjectivally, it corresponds most naturally to the Eng. adverbs ‘only’, ‘just’. af prep.
‘of’ ‘from’. ﬂeim pron. ‘them’: dat., the case always triggered by af. reynt wv.
‘experienced’: supine of reyna. hann pron. ‘he’: nom., the subject. vill wv. ‘wants’:3rd sg. pres. indic. of vilja (3.6.7). lifa wv. ‘[to] live’: inf. gjarnan adv.: the functionof gjarnan here is to emphasise vill — we might translate the sentence ‘he wants very
32 much to live’. ok conj. ‘and’. fara sv. ‘go’: inf. of fara (3.6.10). aptr adv. ‘back’. í
prep. ‘in(to)’. beinahrúgu wf. ‘bone-pile’ ‘pile of bones’: acc., the case triggered by í
when motion is denoted. sína REFL. POSS. (referring back to the subject, hann) ‘his’:acc. f. sg., agreeing with beinahrúgu. en conj. ‘but’. Bƒ›varr sm. (personal name):nom., the subject. heldr sv. ‘holds’: 3rd sg. pres. indic. of halda—helt—heldu—haldit.
honum pron. ‘him’: dat., the direct object. svá adv. ‘so’. at conj. ‘that’: see svá (1) in
33 line 18. hann pron. ‘he’: nom., the subject. náir wv. ‘gets’ ‘manages’ ‘is able’: 3rd
sg. pres. indic. of ná. ekki adv. ‘not’: see ekki in line 18. í burt adv. ‘away’. at inf.
marker ‘to’. fara sv. ‘go’: inf. of fara. ﬂví conj. ‘because’: see ﬂví in line 31. hannpron. ‘he’: nom., the subject. ﬂóttisk wv. ‘thought’ ‘felt’: 3rd sg. past indic., -sk form
(3.6.5.3) of ﬂykja (3.6.9.3); the -sk suffix here corresponds to a dative experiencer (as inhonum ﬂótti ‘to him seemed’), while hann, the subject of the infinitive clause (withomitted infinitive; 3.9.5.2) hann ekki [vera] jafnberr ‘he not [to be] equally exposed[i.e. he would not be equally exposed]’ is moved into the higher sentence and becomes
the subject of ﬂóttisk (3.9.4). ekki adv. ‘not’. jafnberr adj. ‘equally exposed’: strong

I: Hrólfs saga kraka

11

ﬂeira, ef hann næ›i ﬂangat at komask. Hir›menn hafa nú sama van›a,ok kasta fyrst smám beinum um ﬂvert gólfit til Bƒ›vars ok Hattar.6
Bƒ›varr lætr sem hann sjái eigi ﬂetta. Hƒttr er svá hræddr at hann tekr 36
eigi á mat né drykk, ok ﬂykir honum ﬂá ok ﬂá sem hann muni vera
lostinn. Ok nú mælir Hƒttr til Bƒ›vars:
34 sama van›a] samt van›a sinn 285.

nom. m. sg., agreeing with hann (see the analysis of ﬂóttisk in this line). fyrir prep.
‘before’ ‘to’. hƒggum sn. ‘blows’: dat., the case triggered by fyrir when location in
front of is denoted. ﬂeira poss. adj. ‘their’: the gen. of the 3rd pl. personal pronoun
used with adjectival function (3.3.8.5 (6)). ef conj. ‘if’. hann pron. ‘he’: nom., thesubject. næ›i wv. ‘managed’ ‘were able’: 3rd sg. past subj. of ná; the subjunctive isnormally used in sentences introduced by ef where the verb is in the past tense. ﬂangat
adv. ‘thither’ ‘there’. at inf. marker ‘to’. komask sv. ‘come’ ‘get’: inf., -sk form, ofkoma—kom—kómu—komit; the -sk suffix imparts a reflexive sense to the verb, theliteral meaning being ‘move oneself’. hir›menn sm. ‘courtiers’: nom., the subject.
hafa wv. ‘have’ ‘maintain’: 3rd pl. pres. indic. of hafa. nú adv. ‘now’. sama adj. ‘thesame’: weak acc. m. sg., agreeing with van›a; the weak form of this adjective suffices
to express definite sense, though it is often found in conjunction with the def. art. van›awm. ‘custom’ ‘practice’: acc., the direct object. ok conj. ‘and’. kasta wv. ‘throw’: 3rd
pl. pres. indic. of kasta. fyrst adv. ‘at first’. smám adj. ‘small’: dat. pl., agreeing withbeinum. beinum sn. ‘bones’: dat., with instrumental sense (3.1.5 (20)). um prep.
‘over’. ﬂvert adj. ‘transverse’: strong acc. n. sg., agreeing with gólfit; the sense ofﬂvert is adverbial (‘over the floor crossways’) and strong forms of this adj. are normallyused whether the noun phrase in which it occurs is definite or indefinite. gólfit sn. +art. (gólf-it) ‘the floor’: acc., the case always triggered by um. til prep. ‘to’. Bƒ›vars
sm. (personal name): gen., the case always triggered by til. ok conj. ‘and’. Hattar sm.
(personal name): gen., the case always triggered by til. Bƒ›varr sm. (personal name):nom., the subject. lætr sv. ‘acts’: 3rd sg. pres. indic. of láta—lét—létu—látit. sem
conj. ‘as though’. hann pron. ‘he’: nom., the subject. sjái sv. ‘sees’: 3rd sg. pres. subj.
of sjá (3.6.10; sjái is a later variant of sé); the subjunctive is used in sentences introduced by sem with the meaning ‘as though’, because what is expressed is unreal —Bƒ›varr does see what is happening, but he pretends not to. eigi adv. ‘not’. ﬂetta
pron. ‘this’: acc. n. sg., the direct object; on the neuter gender, see ﬂetta in line 15.
Hƒttr sm. (personal name): nom., the subject. er sv. ‘is’: 3rd sg. pres. indic. of vera.
svá adv. ‘so’. hræddr adj. ‘afraid’: strong nom. m. sg., agreeing with Hƒttr. at conj.
‘that’. hann pron. ‘he’: nom., the subject. tekr sv. ‘takes’: 3rd sg. pres. indic. oftaka—tók—tóku—tekit. eigi adv. ‘not’. á prep. ‘on(to)’: tekr á, literally ‘takes on(to)’,means ‘touches’. mat sm. ‘food’: acc., the case triggered by á when motion is denoted.
né conj. ‘nor’ (3.8.1). drykk sm. ‘drink’: acc., the case triggered by á when motion isdenoted (eigi á mat né [á] drykk). ok conj. ‘and’. ﬂykir wv. ‘seems’: 3rd sg. pres.
indic. of ﬂykja (3.6.9.3). honum pron. ‘to him’: dat., the case marking the experiencerof the ‘seeming’. ﬂá adv. ‘then’. ok conj. ‘and’. ﬂá adv. ‘then’: ﬂá ok ﬂá means ‘atevery moment’. sem conj. ‘as though’. hann pron. ‘he’: nom., the subject. muni
pret.-pres. vb. ‘will’ ‘must’: 3rd sg. pres. subj. of munu (3.6.7); on the use of the subjunctive, see sjái in line 36. vera sv. ‘be’: inf. lostinn sv. ‘hit’: pp. nom. m. sg.,
agreeing with hann, of ljósta—laust—lustu—lostit; vera + lostinn form a passive construction, the equivalent of Eng. be hit (3.6.4). ok conj. ‘and’. nú adv. ‘now’. mælir
wv. ‘speaks’ ‘says’: 3rd. sg. pres. indic. of mæla. Hƒttr sm. (personal name): nom., thesubject. til prep. ‘to’. Bƒ›vars sm. (personal name): gen., the case always triggeredby til; on the word-order of nú mælir Hƒttr, see Bƒ›varr in line 1.

34

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36

37

38

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39

I: Hrólfs saga kraka‘Bokki sæll, nú ferr at okkr stór knúta, ok mun ﬂetta ætlat okkr til
nau›a.’ 7

39 bokki wm. ‘buck’ ‘fellow’ (see line 9). sæll adj. ‘happy’ ‘fortunate’ (see line 9). nú
adv. ‘now’. ferr sv. ‘travels’ ‘comes’: 3rd sg. pres. indic. of fara (3.6.10). at prep.
‘towards’. okkr pron. ‘us [dual]’: dat., the case always triggered by at. stór adj. ‘big’:
strong nom. f. sg., agreeing with knúta. knúta wf. ‘knuckle-bone’: nom., the subject;when the subject comes after the verb, as here (see Bƒ›varr in line 1), it is common for
it to be postponed, allowing phrases dependent on the verb, like at okkr, to follow it
immediately. ok conj. ‘and’. mun pret.-pres. vb. ‘will’: 3rd sg. pres. indic. of munu
(3.6.7). ﬂetta pron. ‘this’: nom. n. sg., the subject: on the neuter gender, see ﬂetta inline 15. ætlat wv. ‘intended’: pp. nom. n. sg., agreeing with ﬂetta, of ætla; mun . . .
ætlat is a contracted form of mun . . . vera ætlat (3.9.5.2), a passive construction, theequivalent of Eng. will be intended (3.6.4). okkr pron. ‘for us [dual]’: dat., the case of
40 the intended beneficiary (a type of indirect object). til prep. ‘for’ ‘as’. nau›a sf.
‘difficulties’ ‘harm’: gen., the case always triggered by til; pl. nau›ir commonly corresponds to an Eng. sg.; a more idiomatic translation of mun ﬂetta ætlat okkr til nau›a is‘this will be intended to harm us’.

Bƒ›varr ba› hann ﬂegja. Hann setr vi› holan lófann ok tekr svá vi›
42 knútunni ok fylgir ﬂar leggrinn me›. Bƒ›varr sendir aptr knútuna oksetr á ﬂann sem kasta›i, ok rétt framan í hann me› svá har›ri svipan athann fekk bana. Slær ﬂá myklum ótta yfir hir›mennina.
45
Kemr nú ﬂessi fregn fyrir Hrólf konung 8 ok kappa hans upp íkastalann, at ma›r mikilú›ligr sé kominn til hallarinnar ok hafi drepit
einn hir›mann hans, ok vildu ﬂeir láta drepa manninn. Konungr spyrr,
48 hvárt hir›ma›rinn hef›i verit saklauss drepinn.
‘ﬁví var næsta,’ sƒg›u ﬂeir.
Komsk ﬂá fyrir Hrólf konung ƒll sannindi hér um. Hrólfr konungr
51 sag›i ﬂat skyldi fjarri, at drepa skyldi manninn.
‘Hafi ﬂit hér illan van›a upp tekit, at berja saklausa menn beinum;
er mér í ﬂví óvir›ing, en y›r stór skƒmm, at gøra slíkt. Hefi ek jafnan
54 rœtt um ﬂetta á›r, ok hafi ﬂit hér at øngvan gaum gefit, ok hygg ek at
ﬂessi ma›r muni ekki alllítill fyrir sér, er ﬂér hafi› nú á leitat; ok kalli›hann til mín, svá ek viti hverr hann er.’57
Bƒ›varr gengr fyrir konung ok kvaddi hann lystiliga. Konungr spyrr
hann at nafni.
‘Hattargri›a kalla mik hir›menn y›ar, en Bƒ›varr heiti ek.’
60
Konungr mælir, ‘Hverjar bœtr viltu bjó›a mér fyrir hir›mann minn?’Bƒ›varr svarar, ‘Til ﬂess gør›i hann, sem hann fekk.’
Konungr mælir, ‘Viltu vera minn ma›r ok skipa rúm hans?’63Bƒ›varr svarar, ‘Ekki neita ek at vera y›ar ma›r, ok munu vit ekkiskiljask svá buit, vit Hƒttr, ok dveljask nær ﬂér bá›ir, heldr en ﬂessi
hefr setit; elligar vit fƒrum burt bá›ir.’
66
Konungr segir, ‘Eigi sé ek at honum sœm›, en ekki spara ek mat vi›
hann.’

I: Hrólfs saga kraka

13Bƒ›varr gengr nú til ﬂess rúms sem honum líka›i, en ekki vildi hannﬂat skipa sem hinn haf›i á›r. Hann kippti upp í einhverjum sta› ﬂremr 69
mƒnnum, ok sí›an settusk ﬂeir Hƒttr ﬂar ni›r ok innar í hƒllinni en
ﬂeim var skipat. Heldr ﬂótti mƒnnum ódælt vi› Bƒ›var, ok var ﬂeim
72
inn mesti íhugi á honum.
Ok sem lei› at jólum, gør›usk menn ﬂar ókátir. Bƒ›varr spur›i Hƒtthverju ﬂat sætti; hann sag›i honum at d‡r eitt hafi komit ﬂar tvá vetr í75samt, mikit ok ógurligt.
‘Ok hefr vængi á bakinu ok fl‡gr jafnan. Tvau haust hefr ﬂat nú hingat
vitjat ok gƒrt mikinn ska›a. Á ﬂat bíta ekki vápn,9 en kappar konungs
78
koma ekki heim, ﬂeir sem eru einna mestir.’Bƒ›varr mælti, ‘Ekki er hƒllin svá vel skipu› sem ek ætla›a, at eittd‡r skal hér ey›a ríki ok fé konungsins.’
81Hƒttr sag›i, ‘ﬁat er ekki d‡r, heldr er ﬂat it mesta trƒll.’Nú kemr jólaaptann. ﬁá mælir konungr:‘Nú vil ek at allir menn séu kyrrir ok hljó›ir í nótt, ok banna ekƒllum mínum mƒnnum at ganga í nƒkkurn háska vi› d‡rit, en fé ferr 84
eptir ﬂví sem au›nar, ﬂví ek vil eigi missa menn mína.’10
Allir heita hér gó›u um, at gøra eptir ﬂví sem konungr bau›.
Bƒ›varr leynisk í burt um nóttina; hann lætr Hƒtt fara me› sér, ok 87
gør›i hann ﬂat nau›ugr ok kallar sér st‡rt til bana. Bƒ›varr segir betr
muni til takask. ﬁeir ganga í burt frá hƒllinni, ok ver›r Bƒ›varr at beraHƒtt, svá er hann hræddr. Nú sjá ﬂeir d‡rit, ok ﬂví næst œpir Hƒttr 90
slíkt sem hann má ok kva› d‡rit mundi gleypa hann. Bƒ›varr ba›
bikkju ﬂá ﬂegja ok kastar honum ni›r í mosann, ok ﬂar liggr hann okeigi me› ƒllu óhræddr, ok eigi ﬂorir hann heldr heim at fara. Nú gengr 93
Bƒ›varr í móti d‡rinu; ﬂat hœfir honum, at sver›it er fast í umgjƒr›inni,
er hann vildi breg›a ﬂví. Bƒ›varr eggjar nú fast sver›it ok ﬂá brag›arí umgjƒr›inni,11 ok nú fær hann brug›it umgjƒr›inni svá sver›it gengr 96
ór slí›runum, ok leggr ﬂegar undir bœgi d‡rsins ok svá fast at ﬂegar
stó› í hjartanu, ok datt ﬂá d‡rit til jar›ar dautt ni›r. Eptir ﬂat ferr hannﬂangat sem Hƒttr liggr. Bƒ›varr tekr hann upp ok berr hann ﬂangat 99
sem d‡rit liggr dautt. Hƒttr skelfr ákaft. Bƒ›varr mælir:‘Nú skaltu drekka bló› d‡rsins.’
Hann er lengi tregr, en ﬂó ﬂorir hann víst eigi annat. Bƒ›varr lætr 102
hann drekka tvá sopa stóra; hann lét hann ok eta nƒkkut af d‡rshjartanu.12
Eptir ﬂetta tók Bƒ›varr til hans ok áttusk ﬂeir vi› lengi. Bƒ›varr mælti:‘Helzt ertu nú sterkr or›inn, ok ekki vænti ek ﬂú hræ›isk nú hir›menn 105
Hrólfs konungs.’
Hƒttr svarar, ‘Eigi mun ek ﬂá hræ›ask upp frá ﬂessu ok ekki ﬂik.’‘Vel er ﬂá or›it, Hƒttr félagi,’ segir Bƒ›varr. ‘Fƒrum nú til ok reisum 108
upp d‡rit ok búum svá um at menn hyggi kvikt muni vera.’

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I: Hrólfs saga kraka

ﬁeir gøra nu svá. Eptir ﬂat fara ﬂeir heim ok hafa kyrrt um sik, okveit enginn ma›r hvat ﬂeir hafa i›jat.
Konungr spyrr um morguninn hvat ﬂeir viti til d‡rsins, hvárt ﬂat
hafi nƒkkut ﬂangat vitjat um nóttina. Honum var sagt at fé allt væriheilt í grindum ok ósakat. Konungr ba› menn forvitnask hvárt enginsæi líkindi til at ﬂat hef›i heim komit. Var›menn gør›u svá ok kómu
skjótt aptr ok sƒg›u konungi at d‡rit fœri ﬂar ok heldr geyst at borginni.
Konungr ba› hir›menn vera nú hrausta ok duga nú hvern eptir ﬂví
sem hann hef›i hug til, ok rá›a af óvætt ﬂennan; ok svá var gƒrt, sem
konungr bau›, at ﬂeir bjuggu sik til ﬂess. Konungr horf›i á d‡rit okmælti sí›an:‘Øngva sé ek fƒr á d‡rinu, en hverr vill nú taka kaup til ok ganga ímóti ﬂví?’Bƒ›varr mælti, ‘ﬁat væri næsta hrausts manns forvitnisbót. Hƒttr
félagi, rektu af ﬂér illmæli ﬂat at menn láta, sem enginn krellr e›r dugrmuni í ﬂér vera. Farﬂú nú ok dreptu d‡rit. Máttu sjá at enginn er allfúss
til annarra.’‘Já,’ svara›i Hƒttr, ‘ek mun til ﬂessa rá›ask.’
Konungr mælti, ‘Ekki veit ek hva›an ﬂessi hreysti er at ﬂér komin,Hƒttr, ok mikit hefr um ﬂik skipazk á skammri stundu.’Hƒttr mælti, ‘Gef mér til sver›it Gullinhjalta,13 er ﬂú heldr á, ok skal
ek ﬂá fella d‡rit e›a fá bana.’
Hrólfr konungr mælti, ‘ﬁetta sver› er ekki beranda nema ﬂeim manni
sem bæ›i er gó›r drengr ok hraustr.’Hƒttr sag›i, ‘Ætla svá til, konungr, at mér muni svá háttat.’
Konungr mælti, ‘Hvat má vita, nema fleira hafi skipzk um hagi ﬂínaen sjá ﬂykir? ﬁví fæstir menn ﬂykjask ﬂik kenna, at ﬂú sért hinn samima›r. Nú tak vi› sver›inu ok njót manna bezt, ef ﬂetta er til unnit.’
Sí›an gengr Hƒttr at d‡rinu alldjarfliga ok høggr til ﬂess, ﬂá hannkemr í hƒggfœri. D‡rit fellr ni›r dautt. Bƒ›varr mælir:‘Sjái› nú, herra, hvat hann hefr til unnit.’
Konungr segir, ‘Víst hefr hann mikit skipazk, en ekki hefr Hƒttr
einn d‡rit drepit; heldr hefr ﬂú ﬂat gƒrt.’Bƒ›varr segir, ‘Vera má at svá sé.’Konungr mælir, ‘Vissa ek, ﬂá ﬂú komst hér, at fáir mundi ﬂínir
jafningjar vera, en ﬂó ﬂyki mér ﬂat ﬂitt verk frægiligast, at ﬂú hefr gert
hér annan kappa ﬂar er Hƒttr er, ok óvænligr ﬂótti til mikillar gæfu.
Nú vil ek hann heiti eigi Hƒttr lengr ok skal hann heita Hjalti upp frá
ﬂessu; skaltu nú heita eptir sver›inu Gullinhjalta.’
Ok endar hér ﬂennan ﬂátt frá Bƒ›vari ok brœ›rum hans.

I: Hrólfs saga kraka

15

Notes
1
As its name suggests, Hrólfs saga kraka has the story of the Skjƒldung
king Hrólfr kraki (cf. note 8 below) as its main theme and ends withthe king’s defeat and death in a great battle fought against his halfsister Skuld and her husband Hjƒrvar›r. But as implied by the text
itself, the saga consists of different episodes (ﬂættir; sg. ﬂáttr), atleast the fourth of which (chs 17–23) is substantially digressive incontent from the rest of the saga. This fourth part tells the story of Bƒ›varr
and his brothers and how Bƒ›varr becomes King Hrólfr’s trusted
retainer (cf. line 149). Bƒ›varr’s father is Bjƒrn (‘Bear’), the son of aking in northern Norway, his mother is Bera (‘She-bear’). Bjƒrn’s
stepmother, Hvít, lays a curse on him so that by day he is transformed
into a bear. In this embodiment he is killed and the pregnant Bera isforced to eat a small portion of the bear meat. She subsequently gives
birth to three sons, Elgfró›i, who is an elk from the navel downwards,ﬁórir who has dog’s paws instead of feet and Bƒ›varr who appears
normal but later displays bear-like qualities. When they reach adulthood, Elgfró›i adopts the life of a brigand and ﬁórir becomes king of
Gautland, while Bƒ›varr sets out to join the court of King Hrólfr at
Hlei›argar›r. Close to the king’s residence he lodges with a poor farmerand his wife who tell him how their son Hƒttr is at Hrólfr’s court andhow the king’s courtiers pelt him with bones; they beg Bƒ›varr tothrow only small bones at their son. The hero then continues on his way.
Bƒ›varr corresponds to the Bodvarus of the lost Skjƒldunga saga
and the Biarco of Saxo Grammaticus’s Gesta Danorum. He is scarcely
to be regarded as a historical figure. In the final chapters of Hrólfs
saga, Bƒ›varr is accorded the nickname bjarki and this may havebeen a more original name for the hero. The name Bƒ›varr probably
arose as a prefix to Bjarki’s name, a genitive singular of bƒ›, ‘battle’;bƒ›var-Bjarki would mean ‘battle-Bjarki’. The figure of Bƒ›varr also
corresponds in many ways to that of the eponymous hero of the Old
English poem Beowulf.
Bƒ›varr’s bear-like qualities manifest themselves for example in
the names of his mother and father, his (nick)name bjarki which means‘little bear’ and the fact that he fights part of the final battle against
Skuld and Hjƒrvar›r in the form of a bear. In this respect he also
shares similarities with Beowulf, whose name (‘bee-wolf’) is probably
a noa-expression for a bear.

16

I: Hrólfs saga kraka

Hlei›argar›r is the Lethra of Saxo Grammaticus’s Gesta Danorum
and the modern Danish (Gammel) Lejre. The present-day village ison the Danish island of Zealand (Sjælland) some 40 km. west of
Copenhagen and a short distance inland from the city cathedral town
and port of Roskilde. The area is replete with visible evidence ofhabitation stretching back to the Stone Age (including grave-mounds
and ship-settings). Excavations at Lejre in the 1980s revealed theremains of two large halls, the one built partially on top of the other.
The later of these, measuring some 48 × 11 metres, is probably to bedated to the mid-ninth century and is one of the largest Viking-Age
halls hitherto discovered in Scandinavia. The earlier hall, of similarsize, has been dated to around AD 660 — later, that is, than the lifetime of the historical Hrólfr (see note 8 below). While the associationof Lejre with the Skjƒldung dynasty is not perhaps to be regarded asa certainty, it was one made already in the late medieval period by
Danish and Icelandic chroniclers and historians. And in the twentiethcentury R. W. Chambers could write in his Beowulf: An Introduction(p. 19): ‘We may be fairly sure that the spot where Hrothgar built his“Hart-Hall” and where Hrothulf [i.e. the Norse Hrólfr] held that court
to which the North ever after looked for its pattern of chivalry was
Leire, where the grave mounds rise out of the waving cornfields.’2

It appears that the author of the saga conceives the entrance to thehall as being in one of its shorter ends. The king’s seat (hásæti) would
have been halfway along on the right hand side (cf. the ‘Plan of a
Norse hall’ in ION 229). Other seats would have been assigned
according to status. Thus those nearer the door would have been more
lowly than others and when Bƒ›varr chooses such a place (i.e. sezkútarliga) he would modestly (and perhaps circumspectly) have beenplacing himself amongst those of lower rank. But having become oneof the king’s men, he selects for himself and Hƒttr places (and three
men’s places instead of two) further away from the door than those
allocated to them (lines 70–71: innar í hƒllinni en ﬂeim var skipat)
and than the one occupied by the man Bƒ›varr has killed. And
generally places closer to the king’s would have been of higher status
than others. Thus in lines 63–65, Bƒ›varr makes it a condition of his
becoming Hrólfr’s courtier that he and Hƒttr are allocated places closer(nær) to the king than that occupied by the man he has killed. Later inthe saga (ch. 24) and recognized as Hrólfr’s most esteemed champion,I: Hrólfs saga kraka

17Bƒ›varr is honoured with a place at the king’s immediate right hand,with Hƒttr (now called Hjalti) to his immediate right.
3

In addressing Bƒ›varr with the words bokki sæll (also in lines 11,
21, 39), Hƒttr is being very deferential: bokki has the sense of ‘important person’ or ‘man of stature’, and the adjective sæll is best translated
idiomatically by some such phrase as ‘by your leave’ (cf. ch. 75 of
Grettis saga (ÍF VII, 239–40) where a serving-woman uses it inaddressing her mistress who has just scolded her). After his transformation into a new, confident person later in the passage, Hƒttr’s
tone changes and in his first words to King Hrólfr he uses the familiar
second person singular imperative (line 130; cf. note 7 below).
4

skjaldborg: we hear of ‘shield-walls’ not only in Norse but also inmedieval English and German sources (Old English scildburh; OldHigh German sciltburg) and they were a feature of battles and sieges.
The word might refer either to a defensive line or enclosure of overlapping shields or to a movable screen intended to protect warriors
from attack from above (for example, in sieges). In some cases theskjaldborg may have resembled the Roman testudo, with warriors
holding shields above their heads. In the final chapter of the saga (ch.
34) King Hrólfr appears to fight his final battle initially from within ashield-wall. Hƒttr’s structure of bones is, of course, a travesty of thereal thing.

5

The present extract from Hrólfs saga kraka, which tells how Hƒttr istransformed from a frightened wretch into a formidable warrior has
been analysed by Jens Peter Schjødt (Initiation Between Two Worlds.
Structure and Symbolism in Pre-Christian Scandinavian Religion (2008),
312–26; cf. also 238 and 290 note 31). Schjødt finds in it reminiscencesof pre-Christian initiation rites for warriors (as described, for instance,by Tacitus in his account of the Germanic tribe the Chatti in ch. 31 of
his Germania). Thus when at Bƒ›varr’s bidding Hƒttr drinks two gulpsof the beast’s blood and eats a morsel of its heart (lines 102–03), it islargely that which changes him into a new person. And when here inline 24 Bƒ›varr gives Hƒttr a thorough cleansing in a lake, Schjødt
suggests that we have a vestige of a purification rite which might beseen as a stage in Hƒttr’s separation from his former way of life.
Schjødt also sees Hƒttr’s ‘killing’ of the already dead beast (lines
138–39), in reality already dispatched by Bƒ›varr, as part of the18

I: Hrólfs saga kraka

initation process. And the process might be thought of as being sealedby the change of Hƒttr’s name to Hjalti (lines 147–48).
6
On bone-throwing, see, in addition to the introduction, Ian McDougall,‘Serious entertainments: an examination of a peculiar type of Viking
atrocity’, in Anglo-Saxon England 22 (1993), 201–25. McDougall
draws attention to a number of references to bone-throwing inmedieval sources, including the sagas and the provincial laws of
mainland Scandinavia. Perhaps the most pertinent of these is a passage
in Sven Aggesen’s Lex castrensis (written c.1182; cf. MS 2–3), which
purports to represent the rules of Canute the Great’s bodyguard andstates how any member judged to have transgressed the rules of thecompany was to be seated apart from the others (cf. line 5: útar í
hornit) so that they could pelt him with bones. (McDougall’s translation: ‘Further, if obstinate arrogance should, through three offences,mark anyone off as incapable of being corrected, and should he refuse
to repent, they have decreed that he should be seated as far as possible
away from everyone else, to be pelted with bones as anyone pleases.’)
While the historical reliability of this information offered by Sven is
not unimpeachable, neither is it without interest in the present context.
Cf. also The works of Sven Aggesen, tr. Eric Christiansen (1992), 35.
7

The use of the first and second person personal pronouns in this extract
deserves special comment. In the earliest Icelandic the functions of thesecond person nominative forms were singular for ﬂú, dual (two andtwo only) for (ﬂ)it, and plural (more than two) for (ﬂ)ér, with corresponding functions for the oblique cases (acc., gen. and dat.). For first
person personal pronouns, the functions were singular for ek, dual for
vit, plural for vér, again with corresponding functions in the obliquecases. Cf. Gr 3.2.1. As the language developed over the centuries, however,the dual sense gradually disappeared and the old dual forms ((ﬂ)it, vit(and their oblique forms) came to have plural sense. At the same time,quite possibly under the influence of German usage, the old pluralforms (vér, (ﬂ)ér, and their oblique forms) came to be used in honorificsenses. The result was that ek and ﬂú (with their oblique forms) retained
their singular sense, the older dual forms ((ﬂ)it, vit and their obliqueforms) assumed plural sense, while the older plural forms (vér, (ﬂ)ér,and their oblique forms) were used in honorific contexts. In the present
text, representing a saga probably written in the fourteenth or perhaps
first half of the fifteenth century but preserved in a manuscript of theI: Hrólfs saga kraka

19

mid-seventeenth century, there is a mixture, indeed something of a
confusion, of the two systems. Bƒ›varr (lines 63, 64, 65: vit) andHƒttr (line 39: okkr (twice)) are probably each using the old dual inreferring collectively to their two selves. On the other hand, in line
17, Hƒttr appears to use the old dual ykkar with plural sense (cf.
grammatical note to that line). And when the king scolds his courtiersin lines 52–56, he uses not only the old dual form ﬂit on the one handbut also the old plural forms ﬂér and y›r on the other, all with plural(but not honorific) sense. In addressing King Hrólfr in lines 59 and63, Bƒ›varr uses the honorific y›ar, although in line 64 he switches
to a more familiar singular ﬂér (dat.). And the plural imperative (sjái›)with which Bƒ›varr addresses the king in line 140 also presupposes
an honorific sense. By contrast, when Hƒttr asks the king to give him
the sword Gullinhjalti in line 130, it is with the more familiar singularimperative (gef) (cf. also the singular imperative ætla in line 134); cf.
note 3 above. See further the introduction to Text XXIV (pp. 340–
41); Helgi Gu›mundsson, The Pronominal Dual in Icelandic (1972);
Stefán Karlsson, The Icelandic Language, tr. Rory McTurk (2004), 28.
8

Hrólfr konungr: this is the king after whom the saga is named andits main character. Hrólfr appears in a number of medieval sources,
particularly Icelandic and Danish ones (e.g. as Rolvo in Saxo’s Gesta
Danorum), but also in the Old English poems Widsiﬂ (as Hroﬂwulf)
and Beowulf (as Hroﬂulf). (In Beowulf it is, however, Hroﬂulf’s uncle
Hroﬂgar (Hróarr in the Norse sources) who plays a central role in thefirst part of the poem and who receives Beowulf’s visit.) Traditions
about Hrólfr must go back to a historical king of the Skjƒldung dynasty
whose reign probably fell in the first half of the sixth century.
Otherwise little is known about the figure. There are hints in the Old
English sources that at some stage Hroﬂulf usurped the dynasty’s
throne. And it is not impossible that some of the events recounted in
the final chapters of Hrólfs saga (e.g. Hjƒrvar›r’s attack on Hrólfr in
chs 31–34) have a basis in reality.

9

Immunity from weapons was thought to be enjoyed by all sorts ofbeings (e.g. monsters, wizards and witches) in Norse legend and folklore,
not least in the sagas. In Beowulf Grendel cannot be killed by the sword.

10

The pagan Yule-tide was a dangerous time when hauntings traditionally took place; see Schjødt, Initiation between two worlds.

20

I: Hrólfs saga kraka

Structure and symbolism in pre-Christian Scandinavian religion (2008),
322, footnote 58.
11

At the beginning of ch. 23 of Hrólfs saga we are told how Bƒ›varr
acquires his sword in a cave on the direction of his mother and how
he makes a scabbard for it out of birch. The sword has special qualities:
it could only be urged (eggjat) to action on a limited number ofoccasions and when drawn would always be the death of a man. We
hear of it elsewhere in Norse tradition too. It was called Laufi and
Saxo describes it as being unusually sharp and long. Various sources
tell how in later times a certain Mi›fjar›ar-Skeggi broke into the gravemound of King Hrólfr where Bƒ›varr was also buried and tried
unsuccessfully to remove Laufi, though he did come away with
Hrólfr’s sword Skƒfnungr (see e.g. ÍF I, 212, 213, BS 81; cf. note 13
below). Other swords in Norse legend have temperaments of theirown and show a reluctance to be drawn.

12

It was a widespread belief that by drinking a creature’s blood oreating part of its body one acquired the characteristics of that creature,for example, strength, courage, wisdom. Earlier in ch. 23, Bƒ›varr’s
brother Elgfró›i lets blood from his own leg and after Bƒ›varr has
drunk it, he immediately becomes considerably stronger. And theanimal-like features of Bera’s three sons (ch. 20; see note 1 above)
are the result of her eating, while pregnant, a morsel of the meat of
the bear into which Bjƒrn has been transformed.
13

The name of this sword has been compared with the Old English words
gylden hilt (or proper noun Gyldenhilt) used in line 1677 of Beowulf
of the sword that Beowulf finds in the lair of Grendel’s mother, withwhich he kills her and cuts off Grendel’s head and which eventually
passes into the hands of the Danish king Hroﬂgar (cf. note 8 above).
This is one of the interesting (if enigmatic) correspondences between
the accounts of Bƒ›varr and Beowulf. Cf. R. W. Chambers, Beowulf:
An Introduction (pp. 54–61, 473, 475). Rather than referring to thehilt of a sword, the word hjalt in Old Norse was used either of theguard (the part between the blade and the hilt) or the pommel (i.e. theknob or boss at the end of the hilt). The personal name Hjalti is indeed
probably derived from the word hjalt in this sense (cf. lines 147–48).
The sword normally worn by Hrólfr, called Skƒfnungr, was describedin ch. 30 of the saga as ‘the best sword ever carried in Scandinavia’.

II: Snorri Sturluson, EDDA: SKÁLDSKAPARMÁL
Skáldskaparmál is the second part of the Prose Edda, written by
Snorri Sturluson in Iceland, probably after his first visit to Norway in 1218–20, and he may have been intermittently engaged on
the work until his death in 1241. It is a treatise on poetry, claiming to be addressed to young poets; Skáldskaparmál (‘the languageof poetry’) is mainly about poetic diction, and Háttatal (‘enumerationof verse-forms’), the third part, is about metre and formal devices
such as alliteration and rhyme. Gylfaginning, the first part, andthe first section of Skáldskaparmál, given here, contain a seriesof mythological narratives that give the background to many of thekennings (periphrastic expressions, often metaphorical, for various
concepts which sometimes require knowledge of the mythologyof heathen Scandinavia for their understanding). A purportedly
historical introduction to the mythology is provided in a Prologue
to Gylfaginning, and in this first section of Skáldskaparmál the
mythological narratives told to explain various kennings lead up
to a story about the origin of the mead of poetry.
Like most of the rest of the Prose Edda, the first section of
Skáldskaparmál is in dialogue form, the questions being asked byÆgir, a personification of the sea, and the stories being told by
the god Bragi, according to Snorri a god of poetry. The setting isa feast, as in the eddic poem Lokasenna, and the dialogue, between
one of the gods and a visitor to their hall, is reminiscent of bothGylfaginning and Vafﬂrú›nismál, another of the eddic poems.
The first story has a close parallel in the skaldic poem Haustlƒng
by ﬁjó›ólfr of Hvinir, a Norwegian poet of the ninth century, whichis quoted by Snorri in other parts of his Edda, and the story of theorigin of the mead of poetry is paralleled in Hávamál verses 104–10.
There are allusions to all the stories told in this selection in skaldic
kennings, but even though there are analogues for some of themfrom mythologies outside the Norse area, it is uncertain how ancientthey are.
The text here is based on the Codex Regius (GkS 2367 4to;= R). Emendations are from Codex Wormianus (AM 242 fol.) or
Codex Trajectinus (MS No. 1374, University Library, Utrecht).

22

II: Skáldskaparmál
Bibliography

Editions: Snorri Sturluson: Edda. Prologue and Gylfaginning. Ed. A. Faulkes.
Clarendon Press (1982), repr. Viking Society for Northern Research(1988, 2000).
Snorri Sturluson: Edda. Skáldskaparmál. Ed. A. Faulkes. 2 vols. Viking
Society for Northern Research (1998).
Snorri Sturluson: Edda. Háttatal. Ed. A. Faulkes. Clarendon Press (1991),
repr. Viking Society for Northern Research (1999).
Translation: Snorri Sturluson. Edda. Tr. A. Faulkes. Everyman (1987).

II: Skáldskaparmál

23

II: Snorri Sturluson: EDDA
Skáldskaparmál
E[inn ma]›r er nefndr Ægir e›a Hlér. Hann bjó í ey ﬂeiri er nú
er kƒllu› [Hlé]sey. Hann var mjƒk fjƒlkunnigr. Hann ger›i fer›sína til Ásgar›s, en er Æsir vissu fer› hans var honum fagnat vel 3
ok ﬂó margir hlutir me› sjónhverfingum. Ok um kveldit er drekka
skyldi, ﬂá lét Ó›inn bera inn í hƒllina sver›, ok váru svá bjƒrt at
ﬂar af l‡sti, ok var ekki haft ljós annat me›an vi› drykkju var 6
setit. ﬁá gengu Æsir at gildi sínu ok settusk í hásæti tólf Æsir, ﬂeir
er dómendr skyldu vera ok svá váru nefndir: ﬁórr, Njƒr›r, Freyr,T‡r, Heimdallr, Bragi, Vi›arr, Váli, Ullr, Hœnir, Forseti, Loki; 9slíkt sama Ásynjur: Frigg, Freyja, Gefjun, I›unn, Ger›r, Sigyn,
Fulla, Nanna. Ægi ﬂótti gƒfugligt ﬂar um at sjásk. Veggﬂili ƒll
váru ﬂar tjƒldu› me› fƒgrum skjƒldum. ﬁar var ok áfenginn mjƒ›r 12
ok mjƒk drukkit. Næsti ma›r Ægi sat Bragi, ok áttusk ﬂeir vi›
drykkju ok or›askipti. Sag›i Bragi Ægi frá mƒrgum tí›indum ﬂeim
15
er Æsir hƒf›u átt.
Hann hóf ﬂar frásƒgn at ‘ﬂrír Æsir fóru heiman, Ó›inn ok Lokiok Hœnir, ok fóru um fjƒll ok ey›imerkr ok var illt til matar. En
er ﬂeir koma ofan í dal nakkvarn, sjá ﬂeir øxna flokk ok taka einn 18
uxann ok snúa til sey›is. En er ﬂeir hyggja at so›it mun vera, raufa
ﬂeir sey›inn ok var ekki so›it. Ok í annat sinn er ﬂeir raufa sey›inn,ﬂá er stund var li›in, ok var ekki so›it. Mæla ﬂeir ﬂá sín á milli 21
hverju ﬂetta mun gegna. ﬁá heyra ﬂeir mál í eikina upp yfir sik at
sá er ﬂar sat kvazk rá›a ﬂví er eigi so›na›i á sey›inum. ﬁeir litu
24
til ok sat ﬂar ƒrn ok eigi lítill. ﬁá mælti ƒrninn:‘ “Vili› ﬂér gefa mér fylli mína af oxanum, ﬂá mun so›na á
sey›inum.”‘ﬁeir játa ﬂví. ﬁá lætr hann sígask ór trénu ok sezk á sey›inn ok 27
leggr upp ﬂegar it fyrsta lær oxans tvau ok bá›a bógana. ﬁá var›
Loki rei›r ok greip upp mikla stƒng ok rei›ir af ƒllu afli ok rekr
á kroppinn erninum. ¯rninn bregzk vi› hƒggit ok fl‡gr upp. ﬁá 30
var fƒst stƒngin vi› kropp arnarins ok hendr Loka vi› annan enda.
¯rninn fl‡gr hátt svá at fœtr taka ni›r grjótit ok ur›ir ok vi›u,[en] hendr hans hyggr hann at slitna munu ór ƒxlum. Hann kallar 33
ok bi›r allﬂarfliga ƒrninn fri›ar, en hann segir at Loki skal aldri

24

II: Skáldskaparmállauss ver›a nema hann veiti honum svardaga at koma I›unni út of36 Ásgar› me› epli sín,1 en Loki vil ﬂat. Ver›r hann ﬂá lauss ok ferr

til lagsmanna sinna ok er eigi at sinni sƒg› fleiri tí›indi um ﬂeira
fer› á›r ﬂeir koma heim. En at ákve›inni stundu teygir Loki I›unni
39 út um Ásgar› í skóg nokkvorn ok segir at hann hefir fundit epli
ﬂau er henni munu gripir í ﬂykkja, ok ba› at hon skal hafa me›sér sín epli ok bera saman ok hin. ﬁá kemr ﬂar ﬁjazi jƒtunn í arnarham
42 ok tekr I›unni ok fl‡gr braut me› ok í ﬁrymheim til bús síns.
‘En Æsir ur›u illa vi› hvarf I›unnar ok ger›usk ﬂeir brátt hárir
ok gamlir. ﬁá áttu ﬂeir Æsir ﬂing ok [spyrr hverr annan] hvat sí›arst
45 vissi til I›unnar, en ﬂat var sét sí›arst at hon gekk ór Ásgar›i me›
Loka. ﬁá var Loki tekinn ok fœr›r á ﬂingit ok var honum heitit
bana e›a píslum. En er hann var› hræddr ﬂá kvazk hann mundu
48 sœk‹j›a eptir I›unni í Jƒtunheima ef Freyja vill ljá honum valshams
er hon á. Ok er hann fær valshaminn fl‡gr hann nor›r í Jƒtunheima
ok kemr einn dag til ﬁjaza jƒtuns. Var hann róinn á sæ, en I›unn
51 var ein heima. Brá Loki henni í hnotar líki ok haf›i í klóm sér ok
fl‡gr sem mest. [E]n er ﬁjazi kom heim ok saknar I›unnar, tekrhann arnarhaminn ok fl‡gr eptir Loka ok dró arnsúg í flugnum.
54 En er Æsirnir sá er valrinn flaug me› hnotina ok hvar ƒrninn flaug,ﬂá gengu ﬂeir út undir Ásgar› ok báru ﬂannig byr›ar af lokarspánum,ok ﬂá er valrinn flaug inn of borgina, lét hann fallask ni›r vi›
57 borgarvegginn. ﬁá slógu Æsirnir eldi í lokarspánu en ƒrninn mátti
eigi stƒ›va er hann missti valsins. Laust ﬂá eldinum í fi›ri arnarins
ok tók ﬂá af fluginn. ﬁá váru Æsirnir nær ok drápu ﬁjaza jƒtun
60 fyrir innan Ásgrindr ok er ﬂat víg allfrægt.
‘En Ska›i, dóttir ﬁjaza jƒtuns, tók hjálm ok brynju ok ƒll hervápn
ok ferr til Ásgar›s at hefna fƒ›ur síns. En Æsir bu›u henni sætt63 ok yfirbœtr, ok hit fyrsta at hon skal kjósa sér mann af Ásum ok
kjósa at fótum ok sjá ekki fleira af. ﬁá sá hon eins manns fœtrforkunnar fagra ok mælir:66‘ “ﬁenna k‡s ek, fátt mun ljótt á Baldri.”2‘En ﬂat var Njƒr›r ór Nóatúnum. ﬁat haf›i hon ok í sættargjƒr›sinni at Æsir skyldu ﬂat gera er hon hug›i at ﬂeir skyldu eigi mega,
69 at hlœgja hana. ﬁá ger›i Loki ﬂat at hann batt um skegg geitar
nokkvorrar ok ƒ›rum enda um hre›jar sér ok létu ﬂau ymsi eptir
51 o R.

II: Skáldskaparmál25

ok skrækti hvárttveggja vi› hátt. ﬁá lét Loki fallask í kné Ska›aok ﬂá hló hon. Var ﬂá gjƒr sætt af Ásanna hendi vi› hana.
72‘Svá er sagt at Ó›inn ger›i ﬂat til yfirbóta vi› hana at hann tók
augu ﬁjaza ok kasta›i upp á himin ok ger›i af stjƒrnur tvær.’ﬁá mælir Ægir: ‘Mikill ﬂykki mér ﬁjazi fyrir sér hafa verit, e›a 75
hvers kyns var hann?’
Bragi svarar: ‘¯lvaldi hét fa›ir hans, ok merki munu ﬂér at ﬂykkja
ef ek segi ﬂér frá honum. Hann var mjƒk gullau›igr, en er hann 78
dó ok synir hans skyldu skipta arfi, ﬂá hƒf›u ﬂeir mæling at gullinu
er ﬂeir skiptu at hverr skyldi taka munnfylli sína ok allir jafnmargar.
Einn ﬂeira var ﬁjazi, annarr I›i, ﬂri›i Gangr. En ﬂat hƒfum vér 81
or›tak nú me› oss at kalla gullit munntal ﬂessa jƒtna, en vér felum
í rúnum e›a í skáldskap svá at vér kƒllum ﬂat mál e›a or›ta‹k›,
tal ﬂessa jƒtna.’
84
ﬁá mælir Ægir: ‘ﬁat ﬂykki mér vera vel fólgit í rúnum.’
Ok enn mælir Ægir: ‘Hva›an af hefir hafizk sú íﬂrótt er ﬂér kalli›87
skáldskap?’
Bragi svarar: ‘ﬁat váru upphƒf til ﬂess at gu›in hƒf›u ósætt vi›
ﬂat fólk er Vanir heita, en ﬂeir lƒg›u me› sér fri›stefnu ok settu
gri› á ﬂá lund at ﬂeir gengu hvárirtveggju til eins kers ok sp‡ttu 90
í hráka sínum. En at skilna›i ﬂá tóku go›in ok vildu eigi láta t‡nask
ﬂat gri›amark ok skƒpu›u ﬂar ór mann. Sá heitir Kvasir. Hann er
svá vitr at engi spyrr hann ﬂeira hluta er eigi kann hann órlausn. 93
Hann fór ví›a um heim at kenna mƒnnum frœ›i, ok ﬂá er hannkom at heimbo›i til dverga nokkvorra, Fjalars ok Galars, ﬂá kƒllu›uﬂeir hann me› sér á einmæli ok drápu hann, létu renna bló› hans 96
í tvau ker ok einn ketil, ok heitir sá Ó›reyrir, en kerin heita Són
ok Bo›n. ﬁeir blendu hunangi vi› bló›it ok var› ﬂar af mjƒ›r sá
er hverr er af drekkr ver›r skáld e›a frœ›ama›r. Dvergarnir sƒg›u 99Ásum at Kvasir hef›i kafnat í mannviti fyrir ﬂví at engi var ﬂar
svá fró›r at spyrja kynni hann fró›leiks.
‘ﬁá bu›u ﬂessir dvergar til sín jƒtni ﬂeim er Gillingr heitir ok 102
konu hans. ﬁá bu›u dvergarnir Gillingi at róa á sæ me› sér. En er‹ﬂeir› fóru fyrir land fram, røru dvergarnir á bo›a ok hvelf›i skipinu.
Gillingr var ósyndr ok t‡ndisk hann, en dvergarnir réttu skip sitt 105
ok reru til lands. ﬁeir sƒg›u konu hans ﬂenna atbur›, en hon kunni
91 sína R. 97 heitu R.

II: Skáldskaparmál

26

illa ok grét hátt. ﬁá spur›i Fjalarr hana ef henni mundi hugléttara
ef hon sæi út á sæinn ﬂar er hann haf›i t‡nzk, en hon vildi ﬂat. ﬁámælti hann vi› Galar bró›ur sinn at hann skal fara upp yfir dyrrnar
er hon gengi út ok láta kvernstein falla í hƒfu› henni, ok tal›i sér
111 lei›ask óp hennar, ok svá ger›i hann. ﬁá er ﬂetta spur›i Suttungr
bró›urson Gillings, ferr hann til ok tók dvergana ok flytr á sæ út
ok setr ﬂá í flœ›arsker. ﬁeir bi›ja Suttung sér lífsgri›a ok bjó›a
114 honum til sættar í fƒ›urgjƒld mjƒ›inn d‡ra, ok ﬂat ver›r at sættme› ﬂeim. Flytr Suttungr mjƒ›inn heim ok hir›ir ﬂar sem heita
Hnitbjƒrg, setr ﬂar til gæzlu dóttur sína Gunnlƒ›u. Af ﬂessu kƒllum
117 vér skáldskap Kvasis bló› e›a dverga drekku e›a fylli e›a nakkvars
konar lƒg Ó›reris e›a Bo›nar e›a Sónar e›a farskost dverga, fyrir
ﬂví at sá mjƒ›r f[lut]ti ﬂeim fjƒrlausn ór skerinu, e›a Suttunga
120 mjƒ› e›a Hnitbjarga lƒgr.’ﬁá mælir Ægir: ‘Myrkt ﬂykki mér ﬂat mælt at kalla skáldskapme› ﬂessum heitum, en hvernig kómu ﬂeir Æsir at Suttunga mi›i?’
Bragi svarar: ‘Sjá saga er til ﬂess at Ó›inn fór heiman ok kom
123
ﬂar er ﬂrælar níu slógu hey. Hann spyrr ef ﬂeir vili at hann br‡ni
ljá ﬂeira. ﬁeir játa ﬂví. ﬁá tekr hann hein af belti sér ok br‡ndi, en
126 ﬂeim ﬂótti bíta ljárnir myklu betr ok fƒlu›u heinina. En hann mat
svá at sá er kaupa vildi skyldi gefa vi› hóf, en allir kvá›usk vilja
ok bá›u hann sér selja, en hann kasta›i heininni í lopt upp. En er
129 allir vildu henda ﬂá skiptusk ﬂeir svá vi› at hverr brá ljánum áháls ƒ›rum. Ó›inn sótti til náttsta›ar til jƒtuns ﬂess er Baugi hét,bró›ir Suttungs. Baugi kalla›i illt fjárhald sitt ok sag›i at ﬂrælar
132 hans níu hƒf›u drepizk, en tal›isk eigi vita sér ván verkmanna.
En Ó›inn nefndisk fyrir honum Bƒlverkr. Hann bau› at taka upp
níu manna verk fyrir Bauga, en mælir sér til kaups einn drykk af
135 Suttunga mi›i. Baugi kvazk enskis rá› eiga af mi›inum, sag›i at
Suttungr vildi einn hafa, en fara kvezk hann mundu me› Bƒlverki
ok freista ef ﬂeir fengi mjƒ›inn. Bƒlverkr vann um sumarit níu
138 mannsverk fyrir Bauga, en at vetri beiddisk hann Bauga leigu
sinnar. ﬁá fara ﬂeir bá›ir ‹til Suttungs›. Baugi segir Suttungi bró›ur
sínum kaup ﬂeira Bƒlverks, en Suttungr synjar ﬂverliga hvers dropa
141 af mi›inum. ﬁá mælir Bƒlverkr til Bauga at ﬂeir skyldu freista
véla nokkvorra, ef ﬂeir megi ná mi›inum, en Baugi lætr ﬂat vel

108

135 kva› R.

rá›s R.

II: Skáldskaparmál

27

vera. ﬁá dregr Bƒlverkr fram nafar ﬂann er Rati heitir ok mælir at
Baugi skal bora bjargit ef nafarrinn bítr. Hann gerir svá. ﬁá segir 144
Baugi at gƒgnum er borat bjargit, en Bƒlverkr blæss í nafars raufina
ok hrjóta spænirnir upp í móti honum. ﬁá fann hann at Baugi vildi
svíkja hann, ok ba› bora gƒgnum bjargit. Baugi bora›i enn. En er 147
Bƒlverk‹r› blés annat sinn, ﬂá fuku inn spænirnir. ﬁá brásk Bƒlverkr
í orms líki ok skrei› í nafars raufina, en Baugi stakk eptir honum
nafrinum ok missti hans. Fór Bƒlverkr ﬂar til sem Gunnlƒ› var ok 150
lá hjá henni ﬂrjár nætr, ok ﬂá lofa›i hon honum at drekka af mi›inum
ﬂrjá drykki. Í inum fyrsta drykk drakk hann all‹t› ór Ó›reri, en íƒ›rum ór Bo›n, í inu‹m› ﬂri›ja ór Són, ok haf›i hann ﬂá allan 153
mjƒ›inn. ﬁá brásk hann í arnarham ok flaug sem ákafast. En er
Suttungr sá flug arnarins, tók hann sér arnarham ok flaug eptir
honum. En er Æsir sá hvar Ó›inn flaug ﬂá settu ﬂeir út í gar›inn 156
ker sín, en er Ó›inn kom inn of Ásgar› ﬂá sp‡tti hann upp mi›inumí kerin, en honum var ﬂá svá nær komit at Suttungr mundi ná honumat hann sendi aptr suman mjƒ›inn, ok var ﬂess ekki gætt. Haf›i 159
ﬂat hverr er vildi, ok kƒllum vér ﬂat skáldfífla hlut. En Suttungamjƒ› gaf Ó›inn Ásunum ok ﬂeim mƒnnum er yrkja kunnu. ﬁvíkƒllum v[ér] skáldskapinn feng Ó›ins ok fund ok drykk hans ok 162gjƒf hans ok drykk Ásanna.’Notes
1 According to Gylfaginning ch. 26, Bragi’s wife I›unn had charge ofthe golden apples from which the gods needed to take bites so as toremain eternally young.
2

Baldr is described in Gylfaginning ch. 22 as the most beautiful of thegods and Ska›i naturally hopes that she has chosen him.

151 ljá R. 155 ﬁjazi R. 156 ﬂú R. 160 lit R.

III: Sturla ﬁór›arson: ÍSLENDINGA SAGA
Sturla ﬁór›arson (1214–84) belonged to the great Sturlung family andwas nephew of Snorri Sturluson (d. 1241). His Íslendinga saga is thelongest single saga in the compilation known as Sturlunga saga, which
was probably made about 1300 and covers the history of Iceland from1117 to 1264 with special attention to the thirteenth century. Other
sagas in the collection (and by other authors than Sturla) are, forexample, ﬁorgils saga ok Hafli›a (covering the period 1117–21),
Hrafns saga Sveinbjarnarsonar (about a chieftain and notable physician from the Western Fjords killed in 1213), ﬁór›ar saga kakala (about
Sturla’s cousin, ﬁór›r kakali Sighvatsson, and with a description of afamous sea-battle fought in Húnaflói in 1244) and Svínfellinga saga
(about family feuds in south-eastern Iceland in the years 1248–52).
The sagas of the Sturlunga-compilation (often referred to as ‘Sagas ofContemporaries’) have significant value as contemporary historicalsources for the turbulent period leading up to the country’s submission to Norway in 1262–64. This, perhaps paradoxically, was also atime of intense literary activity during which many of the Sagas of
Icelanders were written.
Sturla’s Íslendinga saga covers the period 1183–1262 and was probably composed towards the end of his life, between 1271 and 1284.
Sturla’s other literary works include Hákonar saga gamla, a biographyof the Norwegian king Hákon Hákonarson (r. 1217–63; written 1264–65);
Magnúss saga lagabœtis, about Hákon’s son Magnús (r. 1263–80),
probably completed shortly after his death; a redaction ofLandnámabók; and perhaps Kristni saga, which describes theconversion of Iceland and the early history of its church. Further, he
may have written a version of Grettis saga. Sturla was also a poet and,for example, composed skaldic poetry in praise of the kings Hákon
Hákonarson and his son Magnús lagabœtir. He probably played a significant part in the compilation of the law-code Járnsí›a which replaced
the laws of the Commonwealth in 1271–73 (but which was itself
replaced in 1281 by another called Jónsbók). Like other members of
the Sturlung family, Sturla was closely involved in the often tumultuous
political events of thirteenth-century Iceland (described not least inÍslendinga saga); but unlike several of them (for example, Snorri
Sturluson), he survived the violence of the age and died of naturalcauses on the day after his seventieth birthday.

30

III: Íslendinga saga

The protagonist of the story told in this extract, Gizurr ﬁorvaldsson(1208–68), played a central part in the history of Iceland in the periodleading up to the end of the Commonwealth. After returning from Norway in 1252, Gizurr established himself at the farm Flugum‡rr (modern Icelandic Flugum‡ri) in Skagafjƒr›r in northern Iceland, in territory which ﬁór›r Sighvatsson kakali had entrusted to Eyjólfr ﬁorsteinsson and Hrani Ko›ránsson. At the same time Gizurr sought to cement
his relationship with Sturla ﬁór›arson by marrying his son Hallr to
Sturla’s daughter Ingibjƒrg. The wedding was celebrated at Flugum‡rr
in October 1253, and it was here, after many of the guests (including
Sturla) had departed, that Eyjólfr and Hrani with a band of followers
made their attack and eventually set fire to the farm. The extract describes the burning and the loss of Gizurr’s wife Gróa and their threesons. Gizurr escaped, however, to take a dreadful revenge, and within
two years many of the attackers of Flugum‡rr, including Eyjólfr andHrani, were dead by the actions of Gizurr and his allies.
Sturla’s account of the burning has been admired for its vivid detailand objective narrative skill. It should be remembered that he had left
the scene of the event only shortly before Eyjólfr’s attack and that his
own thirteen-year-old daughter Ingibjƒrg, the bride, was one of the
major figures in the drama as, fatally, was his newly-acquired son-inlaw, Hallr, son of Gizurr. He was probably, however, writing his account some twenty years after the event. Accounts of the burning at
Flugum‡rr (though not necessarily Sturla ﬁór›arson’s) may well haveinfluenced the story of the burning of Njáll and his sons as told in
chapters 127–130 of Njáls saga.
The context of the episode given here may be summarised as follows. As noted above, ﬁór›r Sighvatsson kakali had put Eyjólfr andHrani Ko›ránsson in control of the territory (in effect the whole ofIceland) which had been assigned to him by King Hákon Hákonarson.
Eyjólfr had control over the westerly part of the area, including
Skagafjƒr›r, and Hrani the easterly part with Eyjafjƒr›r. When Gizurr
arrived back from Norway in 1252, however, the farmers of Skagafjƒr›r
accepted him as their leader and the following year Gizurr drove Eyjólfr
out of Skagafjƒr›r and settled at Flugum‡rr. Eyjólfr moved toMƒ›ruvellir in Hƒrgárdalr. Goaded on by his wife ﬁúrí›r (the daughter of Sighvatr Sighvatsson who had been killed by Gizurr at the Battleof Ørlygssta›ir in 1238), Eyjólfr, together with Hrani Ko›ránsson,

III: Íslendinga saga

31

attacked Gizurr at Flugum‡rr in an episode the latter part of which is
described in this selection. The intention was to kill Gizurr, but as will
be seen, he escaped. After Gizurr went abroad in 1254, hostilities continued between Eyjólfr and Gizurr’s ally, Oddr ﬁórarinsson, and inthese Eyjólfr appears to have had the support of Heinrekr Kársson(bishop of Hólar, 1247–60). Eyjólfr and Hrafn Oddsson, a prominent
chieftain from north-western Iceland, killed Oddr at his home in
Skagafjƒr›r early in 1255. Oddr’s brother ﬁorvar›r allied himself withﬁorgils Bƒ›varsson skar›i, Sturla ﬁór›arson and a third chieftain andattacked and killed Eyjólfr at ﬁveráreyrar on 19th July, 1255.
At the point where the selection begins, Gizurr and his companions
in the farm at Flugum‡rr have put up a stout and lengthy resistance toEyjólfr and his band of assailants before the expedient of fire is resorted
to. Time was not on the side of Eyjólfr and his band, who were in
hostile territory (cf. lines 122–23). Their power base was in Eyjafjƒr›rand eastwards from there, and they had to do something to resolve theimpasse.
Sturlunga saga, and with it Íslendinga saga, is preserved in two
medieval vellums, Króksfjar›arbók (AM 122 a fol.; written c.1350–
70) and Reykjarfjar›arbók (AM 122 b fol.; written c.1375–1400). Bothmanuscripts (particularly the latter) are now defective and, in reconstructing lost parts of their texts, recourse must be had to the many
copies in paper manuscripts (including a good one in the British Library) which were derived from them when they were more complete
than now. The text of the selection here follows Króksfjar›arbók (ff.
101vb28–102vb26) but with certain emendations and additions mostly
based on British Library Add. 11,127.

Bibliography
Facsimile edition: Jakob Benediktsson (ed.), Sturlunga saga: Manuscript no.
122 a fol. in the Arnamagnæan Collection, Early Icelandic manuscripts in
facsimile I (1958). [= Króksfjar›arbók]
Critical edition: Kr. Kålund (ed.), Sturlunga saga, 2 vols. (1906–11).
Popular editions: Jón Jóhannesson, Magnús Finnbogason and Kristján Eldjárn(eds), Sturlunga saga, 2 vols. (1946). Örnólfur Thorsson (ed.), Sturlunga
saga, 3 vols. (1988).

32

III: Íslendinga saga

English translation: Julia McGrew and R. George Thomas (tr.), Sturlunga saga,
2 vols. (1970–74).
Background reading:Gunnar Karlsson, Samband vi› mi›aldir (1992), 164–71.
Jónas Kristjánsson, Eddas and sagas (1988), Index, s.v. Sturla ﬁór›arson.
W. P. Ker, Epic and romance, 2nd ed. (1908), 246–74.
MS, under Hákonar saga gamla Hákonarsonar; Landnámabók; Magnúss sagalagabœtis; Sturla ﬁór›arson; Sturlung Age; Sturlunga saga.
Gu›rún Nordal, ‘Sturlunga saga and the context of saga-writing’, in Introductory essays on Egils saga and Njáls saga, ed. John Hines and DesmondSlay (1992), 1–14.

III: Íslendinga saga

33

III: Sturla ﬁór›arson: ÍSLENDINGA SAGA
Gizurr ﬁorvaldsson’s escape from the burning at Flugum‡rr, 1253
Chapter 172. . . Ok ﬂá er Eyjólfr sá at ﬂeim sóttisk seint, ‹en ugg›i› at hera›smenn
myndi at koma, ﬂá báru ﬂeir eld at. Jón af Bakka haf›i haft tjƒrupinn1me› sér, ok ﬂá tóku ﬂeir gærur af ﬂƒnum ‹er ﬂar váru úti›2 ok báru ﬂar 3
í eld ok tjƒruna. Sumir tóku tƒ›u ok trá›u í gluggana ok lƒg›u ﬂar eld
í, ok var› ﬂá reykr mikill brátt í húsunum ok svælumikit.
Gizurr lag›isk ni›r í skálanum me› setstokkinum ƒ›rum megin ok 6
lag›i nasirnar ok hƒfu›it vi› gólfit3 ok ﬂar Gróa, kona hans, hjá honum.4
ﬁorbjƒrn nef lá ﬂar hjá ﬂeim, ok horf›usk ﬂeir Gizurr at hƒf›unum.5
ﬁorbjƒrn heyr›i at Gizurr ba› fyrir sér á marga vega háleitliga til 9Gu›s, svá at eigi kvazk hann slíkan formála heyrt hafa, en hann ﬂóttisk
eigi sinn munn mega í sundr hefja fyrir reyk. Ok eptir ﬂat stó› Gizurr
upp, ok helt Gróa á honum. Gizurr gekk í anddyrit sy›ra, ok var honum 12
ﬂá erfitt mjƒk, bæ›i af reyk ok hita, ok var ﬂat ﬂá í hug at leita út heldr
en vera lengr inni svældr.
Gizurr gla›i stó› vi› dyrrin ok tala›i vi› Kolbein grƒn ok bau› 15
Kolbeinn honum gri›, ﬂví at ﬂeir hƒf›u fyrr ﬂat vi› mælzk at hvárr
skyldi ƒ›rum gri› gefa, hvárr sem vald hef›i til.6 Gizurr ﬁorvaldsson
stó› at baki nafna sínum me›an ﬂeir tƒlu›u ﬂetta, ok svala›i honum 18
heldr me›an. Gizurr gla›i beiddisk at hann mundi kjósa mann me›
sér til gri›a. Kolbeinn játa›i ﬂví, ﬂegar frá væri Gizurr ok synir hans.
ﬁá kom ﬂar til Gró í anddyrit Ingibjƒrg Sturludóttir ok var í náttserk 21
einum ok berfœtt.7 Hon var ﬂá ﬂrettán vetra gƒmul ok var bæ›i mikil
vexti ok skƒrulig at sjá. Silfrbelti haf›i vafizk um fœtr henni, er hon
komsk ór hvílunni fram; var ﬂar á pungr ok ﬂar í gull hennar mƒrg. 24
Haf›i ‹hon› ﬂat ﬂar me› sér. Gróa var› fegin henni mjƒk ok segir ateitt skyldi yfir ﬂær ganga bá›ar.
Ok er Gizuri haf›i heldr svalat, ﬂá var honum ﬂat í hug at hlaupa 27
eigi út. Hann var í línklæ›um ok í brynju, stálhúfu á hƒf›i, sver›it
Brynjubít í hendi. Gróa var ok í náttserk einum. Gizurr gekk at henni
Gró ok tók fingrgull tvau ór brókabeltispungi sínum ok fekk henni í 30
hƒnd, ﬂví at hann ætla›i henni líf en sér dau›a. Annat fingrgullit haf›iátt Magnús biskup, fƒ›urbró›ir hans, en annat ﬁorvaldr, fa›ir hans.8
Kvazk hann vilja at ﬂeira gripa nyti vinir hans, ef svá fœri sem hann 33

34

36

III: Íslendinga saga

vildi. Gizurr fann ﬂá á Gró at henni fannsk mikit um skilna›inn ﬂeira.
Leita›i Gizurr ﬂá innar eptir húsunum ok me› honum Gu›mundr,frændi hans. Hann vildi aldri vi› hann skilja. ﬁeir kómu at litlustofu
ok ætlu›u ﬂar út at leita. ﬁá heyr›i hann ﬂar mannamál úti ok bƒlvan.
Brott hvarf hann ﬂa›an.
Chapter 173

39

42

45

48

51

54

57

60

63

66

69

Nú ver›r ﬂar frá at hverfa. ﬁær Gróa ok Ingibjƒrg gengu nú út atdurunum. Gróa ba› Ingibjƒrgu útgƒngu. ﬁat heyr›i Kolbeinn grƒn,frændi hennar,9 ok ba› hana út ganga til sín. Hon kvazk eigi ﬂat vilja,
nema hon køri mann me› sér. Kolbeinn kva› eigi ﬂat mundu. Gróaba› hana út ganga, — ‘en ek ver› at leita sveinsins ﬁorláks, systursonarmíns,’ segir hon — ﬁorleifr hreimr var fa›ir hans.10 Sveinninn haf›i úthlaupit á›r, ok logu›u um hann línklæ›in er hann kom ofan á vƒllinn.
Hann var tíu vetra gamall. Komsk hann til kirkju.11
ﬁat er sumra manna sƒgn at ﬁorsteinn genja hryndi Gró inn í eldinn,ok ﬂar fannsk hon í anddyrinu.12
Kolbeinn grƒn hljóp inn í eldinn eptir Ingibjƒrgu ok bar hana út til
kirkju. Tóku ﬂá húsin mjƒk at loga.
Hallr Gizurarson kom litlu sí›ar at ﬂeim inum sy›rum durunum okÁrni beiskr me› honum, fylg›arma›r hans.13 ﬁeir váru bá›ir mjƒkﬂreyttir ok mó›ir af hita. Bor›i var skotit um ﬂverar dyrrnar.14 Hallrhorf›i lítt á ok hljóp ﬂegar út yfir bor›it. Hann haf›i sver› í hendi ok
ekki fleira vápna. Einarr ﬁorgrímsson var nær staddr er Hallr hljóp út,
ok hjó í hƒfu› honum me› sver›i, ok var ﬂat banasár.15 Ok er hannfell, hjó annarr á fótinn hœgra fyrir ne›an kné svá at nær tók af. ﬁórólfr
munkr frá ﬁverá, ƒlger›arma›r, var n‡genginn á›r út ok var ﬂar í
túninu.16 Hann tók gæru, er ﬂar lá, ok skaut undir Hall, ﬂá er ﬂeir
Einarr gengu frá honum. Hann kippti ƒllu saman, Halli ok gærunni, álei› til kirkjunnar, ﬂá er ﬂeir hug›u eigi at. En Hallr var fáklæddr ok
kom kul›i í sár hans. Munkrinn var ok berfœttr, ok kól hann ok. Gat
hann ﬂó komit ﬂeim bá›um í kirkju of sí›ir.17
Árni beiskr hljóp ﬂegar út eptir Halli. Hann drap fótum í bor›it —var ﬂá vi› aldr — ok fell, er hann kom út. ﬁeir spur›u, hverr ﬂar fœrisvá hrapalliga.
‘Árni beiskr er hér,’ segir hann, ‘ok mun ek ekki gri›a bi›ja. Sé ek
ok, at sá liggr hér skammt frá mér er mér líkar eigi illa at ek hafa slíka
fƒr ok hann.’18

III: Íslendinga saga

35

Kolbeinn mælti ﬂá: ‘Man engi nú Snorra Sturluson, ef ﬂú fær gri›.’19
Bá›ir unnu ﬂeir Kolbeinn á honum ok Ari Ingimundarson; ok fleiri
hjoggu ﬂeir hann, ok lét hann ﬂegar líf sitt.
ﬁá fell ofan skálinn, fyrst nor›an af skálanum su›r um loptit
er í var skálanum. ﬁessir menn ur›u ﬂar undir: Ísleifr Gizurarson, Ketilbjƒrn, bró›ir hans, Bjƒrn Óláfsson, Steinn smi›r, Kolbjƒrn, Ásgrímr.
Gu›laugr piltr, Ketill sútari, Kormakr bryti létusk í klefanum. Sokki
Ormsson lézk í litlustofu. Páll hét lausama›r einn er fannsk dau›r
í bor›húsi í stofunni. Snau›ir menn kƒfnu›u níu í gestahúsi ok hétma›r ﬁorfinnr, fa›ir ﬁórólfs tinsmi›s. Hálfr ﬂri›i tugr manna lézk í
brennunni.
Halldórr Gu›mundarson20 gekk út su›rdyrr af búrinu, ok var ﬂar
fyrir Eyjólfr ﬁorsteinsson ok gaf honum gri›. Ok er hann kom mjƒk at
kirkjunni, var ﬂar fyrir sá ma›r er ﬁorkell smi›r hét, er sí›an var veginná Mƒ›ruvƒllum.21 Hann tók til hans ok kva› eigi svá ótt í kirkjuna, en
annarr hjó til hans me› sver›i vi› forkirkjuna ok kom framan á hálsinn
inum hœgra megin, ok hraut bló›it allt á kirkjuna. Var ﬂat mikill áverki.
Komsk hann vi› ﬂat í kirkju.
Nú tóku ƒll húsin at loga, nema eldhús brann eigi ok litlastofa ok
skyrbúr.

72

75

78

81

84

87

Chapter 174
Nú er at segja frá Gizuri ﬁorvaldssyni at hann kom at skyrbúri, ok 90
hann Gu›mundr, frændi hans, fylg›i honum.22 Gizurr ba› hann fara
frá sér, kva› heldr mega einn fá nokkut undanbrag› ef ﬂess vildi au›na,
ﬂar sem ﬂeir fengu eigi bá›ir. ﬁar kom ﬂá ok Jón prestr Halldórsson,23 93
ok kva› Gizurr ﬂá bá›a skyldu brott fara frá sér at sinni. Gizurr steyptiﬂá af sér brynjunni ok stálhúfunni, en haf›i sver›it í hendi. ﬁeir Jón
prestr leitu›u til su›rdura af búrinu ok fengu bá›ir gri›. Gizurr 96
ﬁorvaldsson gekk í búrit. Hann sá hvar skyrker stó› á stokkum í búrinu.
ﬁar hleypti ‹hann› sver›inu Brynjubít ofan í skyrit svá at ﬂat sƒkk upp
um hjƒltin. Gizurr sá at ﬂar var ker í jƒr›u hjá, lítit, ok var í s‡ra.24 En 99
skyrkerit stó› ﬂar yfir ofan ok hul›i mjƒk s‡rukerit ﬂat er í jƒr›unni
var. ﬁar var rúm ﬂat er ma›r mátti komask í kerit, ok fór Gizurr ﬂar í
kerit ﬂat er ‹í› jƒr›unni var ok settisk ni›r í s‡runa í línklæ›um einum, 102
ok tók honum s‡ran í geirvƒrtur. Kalt var í s‡runni.
Skamma hrí› haf›i hann ﬂar setit á›r hann heyr›i mannamál okheyr›i at um var talat, ef hann fyndisk, at ﬂrír menn váru til ætla›ir til 105

36

III: Íslendinga sagaáverka vi› hann, ok skyldi sitt hƒgg hƒggva hverr ok fara ekki ótt at,
ok vita hvernig hann yr›i vi›. Hrani25 var til ætla›r ok Kolbeinn grƒn108 ok Ari Ingimundarson. Nú kómu ﬂeir í búrit me› ljósi ok leitu›u allt.
ﬁeir kómu at kerinu er Gizurr sat í kerinu,26 ok lƒg›u í kerit ﬂrír mennme› spjótum e›a fjórir. ﬁeir ﬂrættu um: sƒg›u sumir, at fyrir yr›i, en
111 sumir ekki. Gizurr haf›i lófana fyrir kvi›i sér sem hógligast, at ﬂeir
skyldi sem sízt kenna at fyrir yr›i. Hann skeindisk á lófunum ok svá
framan á beinum á skƒfnungunum. Váru ﬂat lítil sár ok mƒrg. Svá
114 hefir Gizurr sagt sjálfr, á›r ﬂeir kœmi í búrit, at hann skalf af kul›a,
svá at svagla›i í kerinu; en er ﬂeir kómu í búrit, ﬂá skalf hann ekki.
Tvisvar leitu›u ﬂeir um búrit, ok fór svá í hvárttveggja sinn. Eptir ‹ﬂat
117 gengu› ﬂeir í brott ok út ok bjoggusk í brott.
Gengu menn ﬂá til gri›a, ﬂeir er lífs váru, Gu›mundr Fálkason, ﬁór›r
djákni, Óláfr er sí›an var kalla›r gestr, ok haf›i Einarr ﬁorgrímsson
120 unnit á honum.27 ﬁá var í dagan. Stigu brennumenn ﬂá á bak ok ri›u út
ór gar›i. Fótar-¯rn28 rei› sí›ast ok segir Eyjólfi at hann sá mann ganga
til kirkju ok var leiddr, ok kvazk hyggja at Gizurr væri; kva› ﬂat eitt
123 rá› at snúa aptr. ﬁeir svƒru›u margir, kvá›u ﬂat ekki vera mega. Var›ok ekki af, at ﬂeir sneri aptr.
Gizurr haf›i ﬂá gengit til kirkju, sem ¯rn ætla›i, ﬂví at svá var honum
126 kalt or›it at hann ﬂol›i eigi lengr ﬂar at vera. Ok er Gizurr kom í
kirkju, váru klæ›i borin at honum, ok verm›i sú kona hann á lærum
sér er Hallfrí›r hét ok var kƒllu› Gar›afylja, er sí›an var heimakona
129 me› Kálfi Brandssyni á Ví›im‡ri.29 Hann var háss or›inn mjƒk af reykok kul›a. Gizurr hresstisk brátt ok bar sik vel ok drengiliga eptir slíka
mannraun ok harma. Hallr, son hans, anda›isk ﬂá er nær var hálfljóst...

III: Íslendinga saga

37

Notes
1 Jón and his son, Ljótr (‘Ugly’) were probably the last to join Eyjólfr’s

party. His farm lay in Øxnadalr, only a little to the east of Øxnadalshei›r, the high ground to be crossed before Skagafjƒr›r, where
Flugum‡rr lay, was reached. It is natural, then, that it was he whoshould provide the tjƒrupinnr, particularly if it were a relatively heavy
object (see below). After the burning, in October 1253, a band of men
under Gizurr ravaged Bakki while Jón was absent. And in late Januaryof the following year, they surprised him while he was sleeping in his
house (rather than in the church there where he had slept since theburning) and killed him. The meaning of the word tjƒrupinnr is uncertain. It may refer to a piece of wood covered in tar which could be
used in starting a fire. But it more probably refers to a small barrel (orother vessel) containing tar (cf. older English pin, ‘small cask, keg’).
2 There would have been sheepskins stretched out to dry outside thefarm at Flugum‡rr.
3 Gizurr did this to be able to breathe the fresher air near the floor.
4 Gróa Álfsdóttir was Gizurr’s second wife, whom he had only mar-ried in 1252. She was certainly mother of Hallr (line 51) and Ísleifr(line 74), and possibly also of Ketilbjƒrn (line 74).
5 ﬁorbjƒrn nef was son of ﬁór›r Narfason, brother of Helga, mother ofthe bride, Ingibjƒrg Sturludóttir.
6 On gri›, cf. Laws, I 183–84, 210, 260. Gizurr gla›i appears to havebeen a close companion and supporter of Gizurr ﬁorvaldsson for atleast a quarter of a century. He survived the burning at Flugum‡rr,
quite possibly by accepting Kolbeinn’s offer mentioned here. His home
was at Lang(a)holt in Flói in southern Iceland. His by-name gla›i means‘the Cheerful’. Kolbeinn Dufgusson grƒn was one of the incendiaries.
He was subsequently apprehended and killed at Espihóll in Eyjafjƒr›rin January, 1254, by one of a band of men under Gizurr ﬁorvaldsson.
Gizurr composed a skaldic verse commemorating the killing. Cf. lines
40–41 and note 9.
7 Ingibjƒrg Sturludóttir was the daughter of Sturla ﬁór›arson, the authorof Íslendinga saga, by Helga ﬁór›ardóttir. She was newly wed to Hallr
Gizurarson.

38

III: Íslendinga saga

8 ﬁorvaldr Gizurarson (d. 1235), Gizurr’s father, is known for, among

other things, his foundation (1226) of the Augustinian monastery on
the island of Vi›ey (off modern Reykjavík), of which he was firstprior. See HOIC, 197–98 and Index.
9 Kolbeinn’s father Dufgus was a nephew of ﬁór›r Sturluson, fatherof Sturla ﬁór›arson, father of Ingibjƒrg. Cf. line 15 and note 6.
10 ﬁorleifr Ketilsson hreimr (died 1289; married to Gróa’s sister) had

left the wedding-feast the day before the night of the burning (i.e. on
Tuesday, 21st October, 1253), apparently leaving his son at Flugum‡rr.
He also joined Gizurr in the revenge for the burning. ﬁorleifr later
distinguished himself by being elected lawspeaker (lƒgsƒguma›r) on
three occasions (1263–1265, 1268, 1271) and was the last person to
hold the position.
11 Most of the churches of thirteenth-century Iceland were attached tofarms and privately owned. It is natural that there should have been
one at an important farm like Flugum‡rr. In situations like the one
described here, churches would have been regarded as places of sanctuary.
12 This refers to the gruesome scene where Gizurr returns to the farmsoon after the burning and finds the remains of his wife and his son,Ísleifr. ﬁorsteinn genja may well be identical with ﬁorsteinn Gu›mundarson, who after the event praised the stout resistance presented
by the defenders at Flugum‡rr.
13 Árni beiskr was the man who dealt Snorri Sturluson his death-blow

at Reykholt on 23rd September, 1241. He was killed by Kolbeinn grƒnDufgusson and Ari Ingimundarson at Flugum‡rr.
14 A board had been put across the doorway by the attackers to prevent

escape from the burning building.
15 Einarr ﬁorgímsson was from Øxnahóll in Øxnadalr (cf. note 1). He

was killed there in January, 1254, by Óláfr gestr in Gizurr’s revenge
for the burning (cf. lines 119–20).
16 ﬁórólfr munkr frá ﬁverá was presumably from ﬁverá, often called

Munka-ﬁverá, in Eyjafjƒr›r. A Benedictine monastery was establishedthere in 1155 (cf. HOIC, 194). Ale was specially brewed for greatIII: Íslendinga saga

39

feasts such as this one at Flugum‡rr and ﬁórólfr had presumably played
at least some part in this.
17 ﬂeim bá›um must refer to Hallr and ﬁórólfr himself.
18 Árni’s reference to Hallr here presupposes a situation prior to theevents described in lines 58–63; in other words, the narrative is here
going back in time. Sturla recognised the difficulties of telling of anumber of more or less simultaneous events. Earlier in the descriptionof the events at Flugum‡rr, he explicitly writes: ‘Now a number ofthings happened simultaneously, but one can only tell about one thing
at a time’ (Nú ur›u margir atbur›ir senn, ok má ﬂó frá einum sennsegja).
19 It is appropriate that Kolbeinn should draw attention to Snorri
Sturluson’s killing. His father was Snorri’s nephew as well as ﬁór›r
Sturluson’s. Cf. lines 15–16, 40 and notes 6 and 9.
20 Gu›mundarson: so Króksfjar›arbók; but some manuscripts have¯gmundarson here, and earlier in Íslendinga saga (ch. 172), a Halldórr¯gmundarson is mentioned amongst the defenders of Flugum‡rr‘er sí›an var kalla›r hálshƒgg’ (who afterwards was known as ‘neckchop’); cf. lines 85–86.
21 Mƒ›ruvellir was a farm in Hƒrgárdalr (not to be confused withMƒ›ruvellir in Eyjafjƒr›r, about 33 km. further south) some 50 km.
north-eastwards from Flugum‡rr. In late January, 1254, three of the
incendiaries were seized at Mƒ›ruvellir and killed. One of the three isnamed ﬁorgils Sveinsson, and it is quite possible that ‘ﬁorkell’ here isan error for ‘ﬁorgils’.
22 Excavations of the eleventh-century farmhouse at Stöng in southern

Iceland have revealed the remains of a skyrbúr and evidence of large
vats, some half-buried in the earthen floor, and similar remains havealso been found at the Augustinian monastery on the island of Vi›ey
off modern Reykjavík (cf. note 8 above). Skyr was a common dish in
Scandinavia of the Middle Ages and is still widely consumed in presentday Iceland (often eaten with sugar and milk or cream); it consists ofmilk, soured and thickened, and is sometimes likened to yoghurt.

40

III: Íslendinga saga

Although modern skyr has something of the consistency of creamcheese, medieval sources refer to it being drunk.
23 Probably not the same as Prest-Jóan, who was involved in the kill-ing of Kolbeinn grƒn (cf. note 6 above).
24 S‡ra was sour whey; this was a common drink in medieval Iceland

and would have been stored in large quantities on farms. It was often
mixed with water to make a drink called blanda.
25 Hrani Ko›ránsson, of Grund in Eyjafjƒr›r, one of the incendiaries,
was subsequently killed in revenge (May, 1254) on the island of
Grímsey by a band of men under the leadership of Oddr ﬁórarinsson,
an ally of Gizurr ﬁorvaldsson.
26 The repetition of the antecedent kerinu is perhaps for emphasis,though er Gizurr sat í may mean ‘while Gizurr was sitting in [it]’rather than ‘which Gizurr was sitting in’.
27 Óláfr gestr survived the burning at Flugum‡rr; cf. note 15 above.
28 We learned earlier that Fótar-¯rn acted as look-out for Eyjólfr’sband. We are also told that during the attack he spent most of his timeon his horse. The latter circumstance might be consistent with the suggestion that he may have been called Fótar-¯rn because he had something wrong with his leg or foot.
29 Kálfr Brandsson had himself been at the wedding-feast but had pre-sumably left before the attack by Eyjólfr. He later married Gu›n‡,another daughter of Sturla ﬁór›arson. In 1259 he also allied himself
with Gizurr ﬁorvaldsson against his enemy, ﬁór›r Andrésson. Like
his father and grandfather before him, he lived at Ví›im‡rr, a major
farm in Skagafjƒr›r.

IV: Kormaks saga

41

IV: KORMAKS SAGAThe other Family Sagas with which Kormaks saga has most in common are Hallfre›ar saga, Bjarnar saga Hítdœlakappa, Gunnlaugs saga
ormstungu and Laxdœla saga. In all of these apart from Laxdœla saga
the hero, as in Kormaks saga, is a poet; and in all five sagas the hero
seems to hesitate between, on the one hand, the idea of committing
himself in marriage to a woman with whom he is intimately involvedin Iceland and, on the other, the lure of the útanfer› (‘journey abroad’),the need (as the hero sees it) to travel abroad to win fame and fortune.
Kormaks saga is exceptional among these sagas in that its hero’s hesitation is attributed to supernatural causes, as this extract shows; and in
the fact that the hero, Kormakr, does not travel abroad until relatively
late in the history of his relations with Steinger›r, the woman withwhom he is involved. Kormaks saga also resembles Gunnlaugs saga
but differs from Hallfre›ar saga, Bjarnar saga and Laxdœla saga inthat its hero’s journey abroad does not lead to his marrying another
woman. Kormaks saga nevertheless raises the question of whether thesupernatural explanation of Kormakr’s failure to marry Steinger›r is
to be seen as symbolic of an emotional ambivalence in his character,such as the heroes of the other four sagas all have, in greater or lesser
degree.
Opinions have been divided as to whether these stories with the
motif of the wavering hero owe more to European romances such as
the story of Tristan and Isolde, a prose version of which was made in
Norwegian in the thirteenth century as Tristrams saga ok Ísƒndar, orto Germanic stories such as that of Sigur›r Fáfnisbani (‘the slayer ofFáfnir’), a relatively full version of which is preserved in Vƒlsungasaga, a thirteenth-century Icelandic fornaldarsaga based largely on
the heroic lays of the Poetic Edda. See Bjarni Einarsson, Skáldasögur(‘sagas of poets’, 1961; English summary, pp. 280–99). Kormaks saga
is probably the oldest of the five Family Sagas listed above (see Paul
Bibire’s review of Bjarni Einarsson’s To skjaldesagaer (1976) in SagaBook XX:3 (1980), 238–40, p. 239), and may have influenced theother four. All five are anonymous, but probably written in the west or
north-west of Iceland.
There has also been disagreement about whether or not the versesof Kormaks saga were composed along with the prose by the author of
the saga at the time of its composition, i.e. early in the thirteenth

42

IV: Kormaks saga

century. The claim that the author of the prose also composed the verse
is made in spite of the apparent discrepancy in content between someof the verses and the prose (e.g. in the first verse in the extract here, it
is Kormakr’s shield that the scythe strikes against, rather than a sword
as in the prose). Those who decide that the saga author did not compose the verse then debate whether the verses were made by the persons
to whom they are attributed in the saga or indeed by any other poet orpoets living between the time in which the events of the saga are set(the tenth century) and the author’s time. See, besides the works already cited, Theodore M. Andersson, ‘Skalds and troubadours’, Mediaeval Scandinavia 2 (1969), 7–41; Bjarni Einarsson, ‘The lovesickskald: a reply to Theodore M. Andersson’, Mediaeval Scandinavia 4(1971), 21–41; Einar Ól. Sveinsson, ‘Kormakr the Poet and his Verses’,
Saga-Book XVII:1 (1966), 18–60; Peter Hallberg, Old Icelandic poetry: eddic lay and skaldic verse, tr. Paul Schach and S. Lindgrenson(1975), 141–53.
Kormaks saga is preserved in its entirety in Mö›ruvallabók (AM132 fol.; = M), a mid fourteenth-century collection of Family Sagas. A
small part of the saga (beginning half-way through chapter 3 and ending at a point corresponding to the end of line 56 of this extract) is alsopreserved on one of the three surviving leaves of the late fourteenthcentury manuscript AM 162 F fol. (= 162; the other two leaves preserve parts of Bjarnar saga Hítdœlakappa). The saga has been edited
from these manuscripts by Theodor Möbius (1886) and by Einar Ól.
Sveinsson (ÍF VIII, 1939, 201–302), and it is in the latter edition thatthe full text of the saga is most readily available. The present extract isbased mainly on the text of that edition, though it has been collatedwith that of M as edited in facsimile by Einar Ól. Sveinsson (in CCIMA
V, ff. 121v–122r). The interpretations of the verses reflected in thepresent text differ in several respects from those of Möbius and EinarÓlafur, and indeed from those of Finnur Jónsson in his critical editionof the verses in Skj B I 73–74. The readings from 162 given in the
textual notes are derived from those supplied in the two editions ofKormaks saga just mentioned, as well as from those given by Finnur
Jónsson in his diplomatic edition of the verses in Skj A I 82–83. Readings from 162 are, however, given only in cases where the text of M isin one way or another problematic.

IV: Kormaks saga

43

The spelling of Kormakr’s name with a short a (Kormakr as opposed
to Kormákr), recommended by Einar Ól. Sveinsson in his article of1966 referred to above, in preference to the long á spelling used in his
1939 edition of the saga, has been adopted here.
In this extract, which corresponds to chs 5–6 in ÍF, to a single chapter
in M, Steinger›r’s father ﬁorkell takes steps to end Kormakr’s visits to
his daughter, of which he disapproves. A literal transcription of thetext of M can be found in extract XVIII, and a facsimile of the two
pages of the manuscript at http://vsnrweb-publications.org.uk/NION2-facs.pdf.
Bibliography
Edition: Vatnsdœla saga, ed. Einar Ól. Sveinsson, ÍF VIII, 201–302.
Translations: The Sagas of Kormák and the Sworn Brothers, tr. Lee M. Hollander (1949), 1–72; Kormak’s saga, tr. Rory McTurk, in CSI I, 179–224.
McTurk’s translation has been reprinted in revised form, and with notes, in
Sagas of Warrior-poets: Kormak’s saga, the Saga of Hallfred Troublesomepoet, the Saga of Gunnlaug Serpent-Tongue, the Saga of Bjorn, Championof the Hitardal People, Viglund’s Saga, ed. Diana Whaley (2002), 3–67,
269–74.
Russell Poole, ed., Skaldsagas: Text, Vocation and Desire in the Icelandic
Sagas of Poets (2001).

44

IV: Kormaks saga
IV: KORMAKS SAGA
Chapter 5: Fall ﬁorveigarsona

3

6

9

12

15

18

21

24

ﬁorveig hét kona; hún var mjƒk fjƒlkunnig. Hún bjó á Steinsstƒ›um íMi›fir›i. Hon átti tvá sonu. Hét hinn ellri Oddr en hinn yngri Gu›mundr;ﬂeir váru háva›amenn miklir. Oddr venr kvámur sínar í Tungu til
ﬁorkels ok sitr á tali vi› Steinger›i. ﬁorkell gerir sér dátt vi› ﬂá brœ›rok eggjar ﬂá at sitja fyrir Kormaki. Oddr kva› sér ﬂat ekki ofrefli.
ﬁat var einnhvern dag er Kormakr kom í Tungu; var Steinger›r í
stofu ok sat á palli. ﬁorveigarsynir sátu í stofunni ok váru búnir at
veita Kormaki tilræ›i er hann gengi inn, en ﬁorkell haf›i sett ƒ›rum
megin dyra sver› brug›it, en ƒ›rum megin setti Narfi ljá í langorfi. En
ﬂá er Kormakr kom at skáladyrum, skara›i ofan ljáinn ok mœtti hannsver›inu, ok brotna›i í mikit skar›. ﬁá kom ﬁorkell at ok kva› Kormak
mart illt gera ok var máló›i; sn‡r inn skyndiliga ok kve›r Steinger›i
af stofunni. Ganga ﬂau út um a›rar dyrr, ok l‡kr hann hana í einuútibúri; kva› ﬂau Kormak aldri sjásk skulu. Kormakr gengr inn ok
bar hann skjótara en ﬂá var›i, ok var› ﬂeim bilt.
Kormakr litask um ok sér eigi Steinger›i, en sér ﬂá brœ›r er ﬂeirst‹r›uku vápn sín, sn‡r í brott skyndiliga ok kva› vísu:
Hneit vi› Hrungnis fóta
hallvitj‹ƒ›ndum stalli,
inn var ek Ilmi at finna,
engisax, of genginn;
vita skal hitt, ef hœtir
hand-Vi›ris mér grandi,— ne Yggs fyr li› leggjum —líti‹l›s meira vítis.
Kormakr finnr ‹eigi› Steinger›i, ok kva› vísu:

27

30

Braut hvarf ór sal sæta,sunds erum hugr á Gunni,
hvat merkir nú, herkis,hƒll ﬂverligar alla?
21 engi sár M. fenginn M. 22 hann hættir M.

IV: Kormaks saga

45

Rennda ek allt it innra
Eir ‹h›árgeirs at ﬂeiri,
húns erum Hƒrn at finna,
hús brágeislum, fúsir.

33

Eptir ﬂat gekk Kormakr at húsi‹nu› er Steinger›r var í ok braut upp
36
húsit ok tala›i vi› Steinger›i.
Hon mælti, ‘ﬁú breytir óvarliga, sœkir til tals vi› mik, ﬂví atﬁorveigarsynir eru ætla›ir til hƒfu›s ﬂér.’ ﬁá kva› Kormakr:
Sitja sver› ok hvetja
sín andskotar mínir,eins karls synir, inni;
erut ﬂeir banar mínir.
En á ví›um velli
vega tveir at mér einum;ﬂá er sem ær at úlfiórœknum fjƒr sœki.

39

42

45

ﬁar sat Kormakr um daginn.
Nú sér ﬁorkell at ﬂetta rá› er farit er hann haf›i stofnat. Nú bi›r hann 48
ﬁorveigarsonu at sitja fyrir Kormaki í dal einum fyrir útan gar› sinn.
ﬁá mælti ﬁorkell: ‘Narfi skal fara me› ykkr, en ek mun vera heima
51
ok veita y›r li›, ef ﬂér ﬂurfu›.’
Um kveldit ferr Kormakr í brott, ok ﬂegar er hann kemr at dalnum,
sá hann menn ﬂrjá ok kva› vísu:
Sitja menn ok meina
mér eina Gná steina;
ﬂeir hafa víl at vinna
er mér var›a Gná bor›a;
ﬂví meira skal ek ﬂeiri
er ﬂeir ala meiraƒfund um órar gƒngur
unna sƒlva Gunni.
ﬁá hljópu ﬁorveigarsynir upp ok sóttu at Kormaki lengi. Narfi skrjá›i
33 hlíns erumk M. 42 erat M.

54

57

60

46
63

66

69

72

75

IV: Kormaks saga

um it ‡tra. ﬁorkell sér heiman at ﬂeim sœkisk seint, ok tekr vápn sín. Í
ﬂví bili kom Steinger›r út ok sér ætlan fƒ›ur síns; tekr hon hannhƒndum, ok kemsk hann ekki til li›s me› ﬂeim brœ›rum. Lauk svá
ﬂví máli at Oddr fell, en Gu›mundr var› óvígr ok dó ﬂó sí›an. Eptir
ﬂetta fór Kormakr heim, en ﬁorkell sér fyrir ﬂeim brœ›rum.
Litlu sí›ar ferr Kormakr at finna ﬁorveigu ok kvezk ekki vilja bygg›
hennar ﬂar í fir›inum.
‘Skaltu flytja ﬂik í brott at ákve›inni stundu, en ek vil allra bóta
varna um sonu ﬂína.’ﬁorveig mælti, ‘ﬁat er líkast at ﬂví komir ﬂú á lei› at ek ver›ahera›flótta, en synir mínir óbœttir, en ﬂví skal ek ﬂér launa at ﬂú skalt
Steinger›ar aldri njóta.’Kormakr segir, ‘ﬁví mantu ekki rá›a, in vánda kerling.’‹Chapter 6›
Sí›an ferr Kormakr at finna Steinger›i jafnt sem á›r; ok eitt sinn, er
ﬂau tala um ﬂessa atbur›i, lætr hon ekki illa yfir. Kormakr kve›r vísu:
Sitja menn ok meina
mér ásjánu ﬂína;
ﬂeir hafa lƒg›is Loddu
linna fœtr at vinna;
ﬂví at upp skulu allar,ƒlstafns, á›r ek ﬂér hafna,l‡sigrund, í landi,linns, ﬂjó›ár rinna.

78

81

84

87

‘Mæl ﬂú eigi svá mikit um,’ segir Steinger›r. ‘Mart má ﬂví breg›a.’ﬁá kva› Kormakr vísu:
Hvern myndir ﬂú, Hrundar,
Hlín, skapfrƒmu›, línu,— líkns‡nir mér lúka
ljós — ﬂér at ver kjósa?

90

Steinger›r segir:
88 Grundar M.

IV: Kormaks sagaBrœ›r mynda ek blindum,
bauglestir, mik festa;yr›i go›, sem ger›isk,gó› mér ok skƒp, Fró›a.

47
93

96

Kormakr segir, ‘Nú kaustu sem vera ætti; opt hefi ek higat mínar
kvámur lag›ar.’
Nú bi›r Steinger›r Kormak stunda til fƒ›ur hennar ok fá hennar, ok 99
fyrir sakir Steinger›ar gaf Kormakr ﬁorkatli gjafar. Eptir ﬂetta eigu
margir menn hlut í, ok ﬂar kom um sí›ir at Kormakr ba› Steinger›ar,
ok var hon honum fƒstnu› ok ákve›in brullaupsstefna, ok stendr nú 102
kyrrt um hrí›. Nú fara or› á milli ﬂeirra, ok ver›a í nokkurar greinirum fjárfar, ok svá veik vi› breytiliga, at sí›an ﬂessum rá›um var rá›it,fannsk Kormaki fátt um, en ﬂat var fyrir ﬂá sƒk at ﬁorveig seiddi til at 105
ﬂau skyldi eigi njótask mega.
ﬁorkell í Tungu átti son roskinn er ﬁorkell hét ok var kalla›r tanngnjóstr; hann haf›i verit útan um stund. ﬁetta sumar kom hann út ok 108
var me› fƒ›ur sínum.
Kormakr sœkir ekki brullaupit eptir ﬂví sem ákve›it var, ok lei›fram stundin. ﬁetta ﬂykkir frændum Steinger›ar óvir›ing er hann breg›r 111
ﬂessum rá›ahag, ok leita sér rá›s.

93 Brá›r M. 100 gjƒfum M.

48

IV: Kormaks saga
Verses in prose word orderLines 18–25: Engisax hneit vi› stalli fóta Hrungnis hallvitj‹ƒ›ndum; ek varof genginn inn at finna Ilmi; hitt skal vita líti‹l›s meira vítis, ef hœtir mér
grandi hand-Vi›ris; ne leggjum Yggs fyr li›.
Lines 27–34: Sæta hvarf braut ór sal; erum hugr á Gunni herkis sunds; hvat
merkir nú ﬂverligar alla hƒll? Ek rennda brágeislum allt it innra hús at ﬂeiri
Eir ‹h›árgeirs; erum fúsir at finna Hƒrn húns.
Lines 39–46: Andskotar mínir, synir eins karls, sitja inni ok hvetja sver› sín;ﬂeir erut banar mínir. En tveir vega at mér einum á ví›um velli; ﬂá er sem ærsœki fjƒr at órœknum úlfi.
Lines 54–61: Menn sitja ok meina mér eina Gná steina; ﬂeir er var›a mér
Gná bor›a hafa víl at vinna; ﬂví meira skal ek unna ﬂeiri Gunni sƒlva er ﬂeir
ala meira ƒfund um gƒngur órar.
Lines 78–85: Menn sitja ok meina mér ásjánu ﬂína; ﬂeir hafa fœtr linna Loddu
lƒg›is at vinna; ﬂví at allar ﬂjó›ár í landi skulu rinna upp á›r ek hafna ﬂér,l‡sigrund linns ƒlstafns.
Lines 88–91: Hvern skapfrƒmu› Hrundar myndir ﬂú kjósa ﬂér at ver, Hlín
línu? Líkns‡nir lúka mér ljós.
Lines 93–96: Ek mynda festa mik brœ›r Fró›a blindum, bauglestir; yr›i go›ok skƒp gó› mér, sem ger›isk.

V: Bjarnar saga Hítdœlakappa

49

V: BJARNAR SAGA HÍTDŒLAKAPPA
Bjarnar saga Hítdœlakappa, like Kormaks saga, belongs to the groupof poets’ sagas which tell of the rivalry between men for a woman’s
love. In the case of Bjarnar saga, the hero’s rival, ﬁór›r Kolbeinsson,
is a historically-attested court poet, whose eulogistic verses arepreserved in texts of the Kings’ Sagas; the more fictitious poetic
reputation of the hero Bjƒrn Arngeirsson depends entirely on thefrequently scurrilous verses preserved in his saga. The feud arises fromcompetition for the love of Oddn‡ ﬁorkelsdóttir, originally betrothedto Bjƒrn but married instead to ﬁór›r, who treacherously spreads afalse report of the hero’s death during his youthful adventures in Russia
and England. On Bjƒrn’s return to Iceland his justifiable antagonism
to ﬁór›r inaugurates a lifelong hostility, involving an adulterous
relationship with Oddn‡ and a series of slanderous exchanges between
the two poets, reflecting the details of life in a farming community in
Borgarfjƒr›r in the west of Iceland. Slander, especially in verse, was
an offence heavily punished by law in Iceland, a law also breached byBjƒrn’s erection of ní› — a carved representation of ﬁór›r involved ina homosexual encounter. The sexual connotations of the insult
correspond metaphorically to Bjƒrn’s sexual appropriation of ﬁór›r’s
wife, as does the saga’s unusually negative representation of ﬁór›r as
a paradoxical blend of coward and aggressor. The feud finally modulates into the physical violence conventionally found in the Sagas of
Icelanders, culminating in the scene reproduced below, in which ﬁór›r,
assisted by a host of minor characters who have been drawn into thefeud — including ﬁór›r’s nominal son Kolli, who learns only in thecourse of battle that Bjƒrn is his real father — finally gets the better ofthe hero.
The saga is poorly preserved, mainly in the seventeenth-century paper
manuscript AM 551 D a 4to (= 551). The first five chapters are missing,although a summary text survives in an expanded version of Snorri
Sturluson’s separate Saga of St Óláfr. Two leaves survive of themedieval manuscript (AM 162 F fol., = 162; late fourteenth century)
from which the seventeenth-century copy was made; the first part of
the text below (to line 45) is found on the second of these leaves. The
saga’s relatively unsophisticated structure and absence of overt
influence from other sagas suggest an early date of composition, around1220, although an attempt has recently been made to establish it as a

50

V: Bjarnar saga Hítdœlakappalate and derivative work (Bjarni Gu›nason 1994). The text refers toearlier traditions which served as its sources, and to the twelfth-century
cleric Runólfr Dálksson, who may have written a short biography ofBjƒrn. Most of the verses cited must also be older than the prose.
The full text of the saga can be found in ÍF III. The following extract
is based on that edition, with some modifications from the edition ofJohn LeC. Simon (1966).
Bibliography
Bjarnar saga Hítdœlakappa. In Borgfir›inga sƒgur, ed. Sigur›ur Nordal andGu›ni Jónsson (1938; reprinted with supplement 1951). ÍF III.
John LeC. Simon, ed., A Critical Edition of Bjarnar saga hítdælakappa. Unpublished Ph.D thesis, University of London (1966).
Bjarnar saga Hítdœlakappa, ed. R. C. Boer (1893).
The Saga of Bjorn, Champion of the Hitardal People, tr. Alison Finlay. In CSI
I, 255–304.
The Saga of Bjorn, Champion of the Men of Hitardale, tr. Alison Finlay (1999).
Bo Almqvist, ‘The death forebodings of Saint Óláfr, King of Norway, andRögnvaldr Brúsason, Earl of Orkney. A folkloristic and philological study’.
In Viking Ale: Studies on folklore contacts between the Northern and Western worlds, ed. Éilís Ní Dhuibhne-Almqvist and Séamas Ó Cathaín (1991),
30–64, and notes 243–55. Reprinted from Béaloideas 42–44 (1974–76),
1–40.
Theodore M. Andersson, The Icelandic Family Saga: An Analytic Reading(1967). Harvard Studies in Comparative Literature 28.
Theodore M. Andersson and William Ian Miller, Law and Literature in Medieval Iceland: Ljósvetninga saga and Valla-Ljóts saga (1989).
Bjarni Gu›nason, ‘Aldur og einkenni Bjarnarsögu Hítdælakappa’. In Sagnaﬂing
helga› Jónasi Kristjánssyni sjötugum 10. apríl 1994, ed. Gísli Sigur›sson,
Gu›rún Kvaran and Sigurgeir Steingrímsson (1994), 69–86.
Ursula Dronke, ‘Sem jarlar for›um. The influence of Rígsﬂula on two saga
episodes’. In Speculum Norrœnum: Norse Studies in Memory of Gabriel
Turville-Petre, ed. Ursula Dronke, Gu›rún P. Helgadóttir, Gerd Wolfgang
Weber and Hans Bekker-Nielsen (1981), 56–72.
Preben Meulengracht Sørensen, The Unmanly Man: Concepts of Sexual Defamation in Early Northern Society (1983). The Viking Collection 1.
W. H. Vogt, ‘Die Bjarnar saga hítdœlakappa. Lausavísur, frásagnir, saga’. Arkiv
för nordisk filologi, 27 (1921), 27–79.
Russell Poole, ed., Skaldsagas: Text, Vocation and Desire in the Icelandic
Sagas of Poets (2001).
Alison Finlay, ‘Interpretation or Over-Interpretation? The dating of twoÍslendingasƒgur’, Gripla XIV (2004), 61–91.

V: Bjarnar saga Hítdœlakappa

51

V: BJARNAR SAGA HÍTDŒLAKAPPA
Chapter 32
ﬁat er sagt í ƒ›ru lagi frá Birni, at hann var snimma á fótum ﬂann
morgin ok mata›isk, en Sigmundr, húskarl hans, var farinn upp í dal.
Birni ﬂótti illar húsgƒngur, er hann átti sƒkótt, ok ﬂótti aldri ørvænt á 3
hverri stundu hann ﬂurfti manna vi›, ok var hann nokkut brúnvƒlr oksag›i ﬁórdísi, konu sinni, at hann myndi fara á Hvítingshjalla ok skeramƒn á hrossum ﬁorsteins, á›r hann sendi ﬂau vestr;1 ok ﬂó kva› hann 6heldr hafa harkat um draumana um nóttina ok kvazk ﬂó ógƒrla vita
fyrir hverju ﬂat mun vera. Hann kvazk mjƒk opt á ﬂá lei› dreyma sem
9
nú ok kva› ﬂó nú mest um vera.
Hon mælti, ‘ﬁat vilda ek at ﬂú fœrir hvergi frá húsi í dag, ok ertuóvarr um ﬂik, ﬂar er fjándmenn ﬂínir sitja umhverfum ﬂik; e›a hvat
12
dreym›i ﬂik?’‘Ekki læt ek drauma rá›a fƒrum mínum,’ segir hann.
‘Eigi vilda ek at ﬂú fœrir frá húsi, ok værir sem varastr um ﬂik okhefir ﬂat fyrir engum spillt; en mér vir›isk sem raunillar hafi verit 15
svefnfararnar í nótt, ok seg mér hvat fyrir bar.’ En Bjƒrn kva› vísu:2
Undr er, ef ekki bendir,
opt vakir drengr at lengrum,ógn hef ek fyr›a fregna,
framvísar mér dísir,ﬂví at armleggjar orma
Ilmr dagleygjar hilmis
heim ór hverjum draumi
hjalmfaldin b‡›r skaldi.

18

21

24

‘ﬁetta hefir mik opt dreymt,’ sag›i hann, ‘ok nú me› mestu móti í nótt.’Hon latti hann frá húsi at fara, en hann lét ekki letjask. Húskarlar,
ﬂeir sem heima váru, fóru í skóg at hƒggva vi›, ok var Bjƒrn einn 27
roskinna manna. Nú b‡r hann til hrossanna ok hefir manskæri mikil álinda ok hƒtt á hƒf›i ok skjƒld á hli›; sver› haf›i hann í hendi, er
ﬁorfinnr ﬁvarason átti.3 Bjƒrn var mikill ma›r vexti ok vænn ok 30
freknóttr, rau›skeggja›r, skrofhárr ok dapreyg›r ok manna bezt vígr.4
22 dagleggjar 162.

52

V: Bjarnar saga Hítdœlakappa

Sveinn fimmtán vetra gamall fór me› honum. Ok er ﬂeir gengu ór
33 túni, kva› Bjƒrn vísu:

Út geng ek me› li› lítit,lítt sé ek hers vi› víti;sver› fylgir menmyr›i5
mítt ok skjƒldr enn hvíti;
en fyrir einum runniægis d‡rs of M‡rar,vƒndr skal hjalts ór hendi
hrøkkva, fyrr en ek støkkva.

36

39

42 ﬁeir fóru ﬂá gƒtu er liggr til Hvítingshjalla; en ﬂeir eigu at fara yfir

Hítará, skammt frá ﬂví er hon fellr ór vatninu. Ok er ﬂeir hafa farit um
hrí›, ﬂá sér sveinninn sex menn fara í móti ﬂeim frá stakkgar›i af
45 Hvítingshjalla. Bjƒrn spyrr sveininn ef hann sæi hrossin6 á hjƒllunum,kva› au›sæ vera munu fyrir litar sakir. Hann kvazk sjá hrossin ok svá
sex menn fara í mót ﬂeim. Bjƒrn kva› ﬂá enn vísu:
Tveir eru‹m›, vƒr›r,7 en várum,vápn-Eirar, vel fleiri;
opt ‹v›ar ‹s›kald und skildi
skól‹kinn›i‹s› at jólum;enn hraustge›i á hausti,
hoddlestis, kom vestan,sveit vara seggja lítil
snarfengs, me› li› drengja.

48

51

54

Bjƒrn haf›i kyrtil gó›an ok var í hosum ok vafit silkiræmu um fót sér,
57 ﬂeiri er hann haf›i skipt um vi› inn helga Óláf konung.8 Hann brá

sver›inu er ﬁorfinnr ﬁvarason átti, ok mælti:‘Illt sver› á hér gó›r drengr,’ segir hann.
Kálfr sér ﬂá brátt, ﬂar sem hann var kominn, ok heldr eptir ﬂeim ok60mælti:‘Eigi er minni ván,’ segir hann, ‘at skipti me› oss gæfunni; ﬂeir
63 ﬂóttusk mik hafa í hættu settan,9 en ek hygg at ek vei›a nú ﬂann bjƒrn,er vér vildum allir vei›a.’
48 Tvær 551.

52 hraustgo›i 551.

54 leggja 551.

V: Bjarnar saga Hítdœlakappa

53‘Skammt eigu ﬂeir nú hingat, Bjƒrn,’ segir sveinninn, ‘ﬂví at ﬂeir
66
fara hart.’Bjƒrn svarar, ‘ﬁví au›veldara mun okkr at taka hrossin sem fleiri
beina at.’
Sveinninn mælti, ‘Ekki munu ﬂetta fri›armenn vera; ﬂeir eru allir 69
me› vápnum. Ok enn sé ek fleiri menn, ﬂví at sumir fara eptir okkr ok
enn vápna›ir.’‘Eigi skyldir ﬂú of mikit um gera,’ segir Bjƒrn; ‘kann vera, at ﬂat sé 72
réttamenn.’10
Sveinninn mælti, ‘Ek sé enn fleiri menn, ok fara frá Hólmi; ok er
okkr ﬂat eitt rá› at snúa til Hellisdals, ok fƒrum sí›an Klifsdal ok 75
for›um okkr.’11
Bjƒrn mælti, ‘Ekki hefi ek enn eltr verit hér til, ok svá mun enn, ok
mun ek eigi aptr hverfa; fƒrum eptir Klifsandi til Klifsjƒrva, ok gjarnan 78
vilda ek fara til Grásteins ins mikla, ef vit mættim ﬂangat komask.’‘Eigi má ek ﬂat vita,’ segir sveinninn, ‘hvé okkr má ﬂat endask, ﬂví
at menn sœkja at okkr ƒllum megin, ok sé ek ﬂat gƒrla, at sex eru hvar 81
saman, ﬂótt sumir eigi lengra til okkar en sumir; ok sé ek nú alls eigifæri menn en fjóra ok tuttugu.’Bjƒrn spyrr, ‘Hvern veg er ﬂeim mƒnnum varit, er okkr eru næstir?’ 84
Sveinninn segir, ok ﬂóttisk Bjƒrn kenna Kálf at frásƒgn hans.12 Kálfr
var ma›r mikill ok svartr, ok átti skammt til ﬂeira á bak ﬂeim, er Kolli
ok synir Ei›s kómu fyrir ﬂá. Dálkr ferr at frá Hólmi ok er s‡nu first 87
ﬂeim ok ﬂeir er honum fylgja. Bjƒrn mælti vi› sveininn:‘Far ﬂú nú upp í hjallann eptir hrossunum, en ek mun hér bí›a; ekki90
mun sto›a at fara lengra.’Nú settisk Bjƒrn ni›r, en sveinninn ferr at taka hrossin ok vildi víkja
ok mátti eigi, ﬂví at ﬂá haf›i tekizk fundr ﬂeira.
ﬁeir koma fyrst at Birni, Kálfr vi› sétta mann, Kolli ok synir Ei›s 93
me› honum vi› sex menn. ﬁorvaldr Ei›sson sk‡tr spjóti at Birni ﬂegar
er hann náir til hans. Bjƒrn tók spjótit á lopti ok sendi aptr til eiganda.
ﬁat kom á ﬁorvald mi›jan, ok fell hann dau›r til jar›ar. ﬁeir hƒf›u 96
komizk á milli hans ok Grásteins, svá at Bjƒrn komsk eigi ﬂangat.
ﬁór›r vildi hefna bró›ur síns ok hjó til Bjarnar mikit hƒgg; en Bjƒrn
helt á skildinum svá at handleggr hans var í mundri›anum, ok kom 99hƒggit á skjƒldinn ok var› svá mikit, at handleggr Bjarnar gekk í sundr,ok fell skjƒldrinn ni›r. ﬁá ﬂreif Bjƒrn spor› skjaldarins hinni hendinni
69 fyrirmenn 551.

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V: Bjarnar saga Hítdœlakappa

ok rak í hƒfu› ﬁór›i, svá at hann fekk ﬂegar bana; en sumir mennsegja at hann leg›i hann me› sƒxunum til bana.13 Kolli sótti Bjƒrn
fast, nær í mesta lagi einna manna í sífellu, ﬂótt vér kunnim eigi at
105 greina hvert sárafar hann veitti honum. Kálfr mælti, kva› honum núfyrir allt eitt koma, ﬂótt hann felldi nokkura menn, ok kva› hann skyldu
nú eigi undan ganga.
108‘Er oss nú eigi mannfátt,’ segir hann.
Sumir mæltu at slá skyldi hring um Bjƒrn ok var›veita hann, at
hann komisk hvergi í brott, ok bí›a ﬁór›ar Kolbeinssonar at vega at
111 honum til lyk›a. Ok me›an ﬂeir rœddusk ﬂetta vi›, ﬂá leysti Bjƒrn
manskæri af linda sér, ok váru ﬂau n‡hvƒtt er hann fór heiman, bæ›imikil ok bitrlig. Nú kom Dálkr til me› sex menn ok vill ﬂegar sœkja at
114 Birni, ﬂví at hann var hraustr karlma›r, ok ﬂóttisk hann varla á‹n›hólmsƒk vi› Bjƒrn, er hann átti sonar síns at hefna. En Bjƒrn breg›r
sver›inu ﬁorfinns, er hann haf›i heiman haft, ok høggr á fót Dálki svá
117 hart at fótrinn brotna›i, en eigi beit, ok var› Dálkr óvígr ok fluttr ábrott ﬂangat sem honum var óhætt.
Ok ﬂví næst kom ﬁór›r Kolbeinsson; ok er Bjƒrn sá hann, ﬂá mælti
120 hann:‘Seinn til slíks móts, lítill sveinn.’14‘Sá skal ﬂér ﬂó nú nær standa í dag,’ segir ﬁór›r, ‘ok hƒggva ﬂik
123 klækishƒgg.’‘ﬁau ein muntu hƒggva,’ segir Bjƒrn, ‘me›an ﬂú lifir.’ﬁór›i var› mismælt, ok vildi hann sagt hafa at sá skyldi hann hƒggva
126 klámhƒggvi ﬂann dag.15 Bjƒrn grípr nú skærin, ﬂví at hann veit atsver›it dugir ekki, ok hleypr at ﬁór›i ok ætlar at reka á honum skærin.
ﬁór›r veiksk undan, en fyrir var› húskarl ﬁór›ar er Grímr hét, ok
129 fekk ﬂegar bana. Ok í ﬂví bili hjó Kálfr til Bjarnar ok veitti honum
mikit sár, ok fell Bjƒrn nú, svá at hann stó› á knjám ok var›isk me›skærunum af mikilli hugpr‡›i, ﬂví at hann var inn mesti fullhugi, sem
132 opt hƒf›u raunir á or›it, ok veitti ﬂeim mƒrg sár er hann sóttu. ﬁeir
sóttu hann nú svá fast, ok engi meir en Kolli.
Bjƒrn mælti, ‘Fast sœkir ﬂú mik í dag, Kolli,’ segir Bjƒrn.
135‘Eigi veit ek hverjum í er at ﬂyrma,’ segir hann.
‘Svá er ok,’ segir Bjƒrn, ‘mó›ir ﬂín mun ﬂetta fyrir ﬂik hafa lagt at
ﬂú skyldir mér har›asta atgƒngu veita; en sjá ﬂykkjumk ek at annat
138 mun ﬂér betr gefit en ættvísin.’16
Kolli segir, ‘Eigi ﬂykkir mér ﬂú ﬂat snimma sagt hafa, ef mér er
nokkurr vandi á vi› ﬂik.’
102

V: Bjarnar saga Hítdœlakappa

55

141
Ok ﬂegar gengr Kolli brott ok hættir atsókninni.
Bjƒrn var›isk mjƒk lengi me› skærunum, svá at hann stó› á knjám,
ok allir undru›usk ﬂeir hví hann mátti slíka vƒrn veita, næsta vápnlaussma›r, svá margir sem ﬂeir sóttu hann, ok ﬂóttusk ﬂó allir hafa fullleiksa, 144
er honum ur›u næstir. Nú er ﬂat sagt at ﬁór›r hjó til Bjarnar, ok beit afhonum ﬂjóhnappana, ok fellr Bjƒrn ﬂá. ﬁór›r vill ﬂá eigi láta hƒggva ámilli ok høggr af Birni hƒfu› í ƒ›ru hƒggvi ok gengr á milli bols ok 147
hƒfu›s,17 ok ﬂá kva› ﬁór›r vísu:

Láskat, snarr at snerru,(segg ﬂann bitu eggjar,
hinn er fyrir hei›i sunnan
hugpr‡›i mér fr‡›i)
at, mor›vandar, myndak,mei›s hlutum rán af bei›i(bitu ﬂann fyrir sƒk sannasver›) hans bani ver›a.

150

153

156

ﬁór›r tók hƒfu› Bjarnar ok batt vi› álar sér; lét ﬂar hanga vi› sƒ›ulsinn.18 Kálfr kvazk vilja at ﬂeir kœmi í Hólm ok l‡sti ﬂar víginu, ok
lézk vilja fœra ﬂeim men, er Bjƒrn haf›i haft á sér. Dálkr svarar ok 159
kva› ﬂat óskylt vera ok kappsamligt, kva› ﬂat betr sóma at s‡na sik í
yfirbótum vi› frændr Bjarnar eptir ﬂetta verk heldr en auka vansem›vi› ﬂá. ﬁór›r lag›i ﬂar hvártki til. Kálfr rei› ﬂegar af vetfangi. Ok er 162
ﬂeir ri›u í brott ok váru komnir ofan yfir Klifsand, ﬂá flugu móti ﬂeim
hrafnar nokkurir, ok ﬂá orti ﬁór›r vísu ﬂessa:
Hvert stefni ﬂér, hrafnar,
hart me› flokk enn svarta?
Fari› ljóst matar leita
landnor›r frá Klifsandi.
ﬁar liggr Bjƒrn, en Birni
bló›gƒgl of skƒr stó›u;
ﬂollr hné hjalms á hjalla
Hvítings ofar lítlu.

152 kvi›a 551.

153 ek mor›vandan 551.

165

168

171

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V: Bjarnar saga Hítdœlakappa
Notes

1 The trimming of horses’ manes has aristocratic and heroic resonances.

ﬁrymr, lord of the giants, is said to trim his horses’ manes and twist
golden collars for his dogs as he sits on his ancestors’ burial mound(ﬁrymskvi›a 6); it is also named as one of the activities (along withmaking shafts for their spears and driving horses) which the murdered young sons of the great king Atli have not lived to perform(Atlakvi›a 37). The horses are a gift from Bjƒrn to the influential
chieftain, ﬁorsteinn Kuggason, who had attempted to bring about asettlement between Bjƒrn and ﬁór›r.
2 The verse includes a strange blend of pagan and Christian symbolism.

The helmeted woman who invites the poet home — that is, to his
death — suggests the valkyrie, one of the supernatural ‘shield-maidens’
whose function was to help Ó›inn in his task of choosing warriors
doomed to die. The chosen heroes would join the god in Valhƒll andengage in perpetual warfare in preparation for the final battle against
the predestined enemies of gods and men. But this apparition is
explicitly associated with the ‘ruler of day’s fire’, clearly a kenningfor the Christian God, though it has been argued that the kenning may
refer to Ó›inn, or to a deity blending pagan and Christian conceptions.
There is a parallel in a number of verses in Gísla saga in which thepoet describes two women, one benign and one hostile, who appear tohim in dreams; in one of these the expression bjó›a heim ‘invite home’is used, as in Bjƒrn’s verse. It has been argued that the ‘good’ dreamwoman is the poet’s fylgja or protective spirit.
3 ﬁorfinnr ﬁvarason, Bjƒrn’s cousin, is said earlier in the saga to haveborrowed Bjƒrn’s famous sword, though no reason is given. ﬁorfinnr
has little role in the saga other than to account for the hero’s
weaponless state.
4 It is not uncommon for sagas to include a description of the heroshortly before his death, a passage described by Theodore M. Andersson
as a ‘necrology’ (1967, 60–62), and generally used to present him in apositive light. It has been suggested that skalds were stereotypicallyportrayed as dark and ugly; Bjƒrn does not conform to this type, but

V: Bjarnar saga Hítdœlakappa

57

shares his red hair and freckled colouring with another hero withpoetic leanings, Grettir. There are some indications that red hair orbeard was associated with shrewdness and wit; Snorri go›i in Eyrbyggja
saga is also red-bearded, and Rau›grani ‘Red-beard’ was one ofÓ›inn’s names. The purpose of the reference to Bjƒrn’s poor sightmust be to motivate the dialogue between him and the boy who
describes the approaching attackers (lines 44–85).
5 The man-kenning menmyr›ir must refer to Bjƒrn himself, although

it seems inappropriate that the verse stresses his ownership of the sword
and shield he is carrying (Bjƒrn’s own weapons have, according to theprose narrative, been borrowed by his father, and he is carrying theinadequate sword of his cousin ﬁorfinnr ﬁvarason). This has been cited
as one instance of the disparity between verse and prose in this part ofthe saga (Vogt 1921, 54, 65); it would be more accurate, in fact, torefer it to the multiplicity of traditions, in both verse and prose, aboutBjƒrn’s last battle and the weapons he carried to it (Finlay 2004).
6 At this point the text preserved in the second of the two surviving

medieval manuscript fragments breaks off; the remaining text comesfrom the seventeenth-century paper copy of this manuscript which is
the major source for the saga.
7 Again it is inappropriate, though not unprecedented, for Bjƒrn toaddress the boy accompanying him with a full-blown warrior kenning(vƒr›r vápn-Eirar). The author seems determined to push the idea ofan unequal encounter to its extremity. Bjƒrn is attacked by no fewer
than twenty-four, and while the saga’s presumed source, the verse,
emphasizes the vulnerability of the warrior stripped of all but one ofhis supporters, the prose pares this down to the point where Bjƒrn’s
companion, though adequate as an audience for his last verse, isnegligible as a combatant, and in fact leaves the scene before the fight
begins. The ‘bold man’ who ‘brought a band from the west in autumn’
may be Bjƒrn’s powerful ally ﬁorsteinn Kuggason.
8 Chapter 9 of the saga relates how Bjƒrn accidentally exchanges garters

with King (later Saint) Óláfr of Norway as they dress after a communal

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V: Bjarnar saga Hítdœlakappa

bath; Bjƒrn continues to wear the garter all his life and is buried with
it after his death. When his bones are later disinterred the garter is founduncorrupted — a testimony to the king’s sanctity — and is claimed to
be still in existence at the time of the saga’s writing, used as a belt on
a set of mass vestments. Another version of this story exists in somemanuscripts of Snorri’s Saga of St Óláfr.
9 í hættu: ‘in danger [of missing him]’. This must be the sense of Kálfr’s

remark. It is improbable that he should be the first attacker to catch up
with Bjƒrn in view of the detailed account of ﬁór›r’s disposition offorces, which places Kálfr not on the way to Hvítingshjalli, but in the
opposite direction, towards Vellir. The subsequent narrative, however,makes it clear that Kálfr is overtaking Bjƒrn from behind; the six men
the boy sees in front of them must be the sons of Ei›r, Kolli and theircompanions. Kálfr’s pun on the meaning of the name Bjƒrn, ‘bear’, istaken up later as the attackers encircle their disarmed opponent (line 109).
10 Bjƒrn’s insistence that the attackers are men of peace is clearly aheroic pretence, since he has already drawn his sword.
11 The names appear in this order in the manuscripts, but haveapparently been mistakenly reversed, as the route to Hellisdalr lies
through Klifsdalr.
12 For the literary convention of characters identified from a distanceby their clothing, see Laxdœla saga ch. 63; Andersson and Miller(1989), 141 n. 38, 172 n. 90. See note 4 above.
13 This reference to two conflicting versions of the narrative is thestrongest indication of the existence of differing traditions, presumably
oral, about Bjƒrn’s life before the writing of the saga. In his examinationof the relationship between verse and prose in the saga, Vogt (1921)
suggests that the author was attempting to reconcile the testimony ofthe verse Út geng ek me› li› lítit, lines 34–41, which says that Bjƒrn iscarrying a sword and shield, with that of a narrative in which he isunarmed except for the mane-shears (his weapons having beenborrowed by his father).

V: Bjarnar saga Hítdœlakappa

59

14 Bjƒrn’s slighting epithet lítill sveinn is also used of ﬁór›r in verses

earlier in the saga.
15 Bo Almqvist, analysing this and other slips of the tongue in saga

literature, argues that in folk-belief a slip of the tongue was a portentof death, and speculates that ‘it is not impossible that the folk tradition
upon which the saga was based ascribed the slip of the tongue to Björn’(1991, 248 note 30). But Almqvist also acknowledges that in literary
manifestations of the theme, the person whose tongue slips is frequently
made to reveal an accidental truth, in this case the cowardly strain inﬁór›r’s own character. ﬁór›r intends to threaten Bjƒrn with a klámhƒgg,a blow struck from behind on the thighs or buttocks, shaming bothbecause it implies that the victim was turning to flee, and also, as
Meulengracht Sørensen argues, as ‘a symbolic action with a sexualcomponent, corresponding to that of ní›; the mutilated man was
deprived of his manhood’ (1983, 68). The law-code Grágás includes
klámhƒgg among injuries categorised as in meiri sár, ‘major wounds’.
By involuntarily substituting the word klækishƒgg, ‘coward’s blow’,similar in sound and structure but opposite in meaning, ﬁór›r turns
the shame upon himself.
16 This dramatic revelation to Kolli of his relationship with Bjƒrn

concludes the ‘paternity theme’ (Dronke 1981) running through thesaga. Once again traditional heroic motifs are called upon; in the Old
High German Hildebrandslied, father and son fight to the death.
17 This phrase might conceivably have something to do with the an-

cient ritual of passing between a severed head and trunk in order toprevent the dead person from returning.
18 The cutting off of an enemy’s head as a trophy is frequently men-tioned in the sagas. Orkneyinga saga tells of Jarl Sigur›r of Orkney
tying the head of his defeated enemy, Melbrikta ‘Tooth’, to his saddle‘for his own glory’, but wounding his leg on Melbrikta’s protruding
tooth and eventually dying of the wound. The custom is thought to beof Irish origin.

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V: Bjarnar saga Hítdœlakappa
Verses in prose word orderLines 17–24: Undr er, ef framvísar dísir bendir mér ekki—drengr vakir opt at
lengrum, hef ek fregna ógn fyr›a — ﬂví at hjalmfaldin armleggjar orma Ilmr
dagleygjar hilmis b‡›r skaldi heim ór hverjum draumi.
Lines 34–41: Ek geng út me› lítit li›; ek sé lítt vi› víti hers; sver› mítt ok enn
hvíti skjƒldr fylgir menmyr›i; en fyrr en ek støkkva of M‡rar fyrir einum
runni ægis d‡rs, skal vƒndr hjalts hrøkkva ór hendi.
Lines 48–55: Eru‹m› tveir, vƒr›r vápn-Eirar, en várum vel fleiri; ‹s›kald ‹v›ar
opt und skildi at skól‹kinn›i‹s› jólum; enn hraustge›i kom vestan á hausti me›li› drengja; seggja sveit snarfengs hoddlestis vara lítil.
Lines 149–56: Láskat, snarr at snerru (eggjar bitu ﬂann segg, hinn er fr‡›i mér
hugpr‡›i fyrir sunnan hei›i) at myndak ver›a bani hans; hlutum rán af bei›imei›s mor›vandar; sver› bitu ﬂann fyrir sanna sƒk.
Lines 165–172: Hrafnar, hvert stefni ﬂér hart me› enn svarta flokk? Fari›ljóst leita matar landnor›r frá Klifsandi. ﬁar liggr Bjƒrn, en bló›gƒgl stó›u ofskƒr Birni; hjalms ﬂollr hné lítlu ofar á Hvítingshjalla.

VI: Fagrskinna

61

VI: FAGRSKINNA
Fagrskinna is a history of Norway written in the early thirteenth century
in Norway, possibly by an Icelander. It covers in a more compressed
form the same time-span as Snorri Sturluson’s Heimskringla, excluding
the legendary Ynglinga saga: the period from the reign of the ninthcentury Hálfdan svarti to 1177. Whether Snorri knew Fagrskinna is
uncertain, but Fagrskinna and Heimskringla certainly share many
features and at times the wording is identical, though the author of
Fagrskinna falls short of Snorri’s sophistication and skill. The author’s
taste for set-piece battles is well illustrated in the extract reproduced
here; he gives full value to the account of this climactic scene foundin his source, but dispenses with its hagiographic dwelling on the
missionary efforts of Óláfr Tryggvason and does not aspire to thepsychological and political depth of Snorri’s account of the manœuvrings preceding the battle.
The name Fagrskinna, ‘beautiful parchment’, was applied in theseventeenth century to a now lost manuscript of the work, which wasapparently known in medieval times as Nóregs konunga tal, ‘Catalogueof the kings of Norway’. Compared with the earlier prose Latin andvernacular histories which were its sources, the work is a wellconstructed and serious attempt at historical objectivity, avoiding
excesses of piety and fantastic elements, as witness the measured
treatment in this extract of the legend of Óláfr Tryggvason’s survivalof the Battle of Svƒl›r. The high proportion of verses, many of them
unknown elsewhere, which are interwoven with the prose text anddrawn on for authenticating detail, shows this author as a pioneer ofthe historiographical techniques perfected by Snorri.
The text survives in two versions, both now existing only in seventeenthcentury and later copies of two medieval manuscripts. The older version(B, c.1250) is the basis of the text edited in Bjarni Einarsson’s editionin ÍF XXIX and is that followed in this extract. This version, however,has numerous gaps which are filled by reference to the later version(A, c.1300); the latter third of the extract below follows the A version
because of a lacuna in B. Although the surviving copies are Icelandic,
the survival of many Norwegian word-forms reflects the origin of thetext in Norway (see below).

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VI: Fagrskinna
The place of Fagrskinna in early Norse historiography

Histories of Norway and other Scandinavian topics were among thefirst texts to be written in Iceland, and provide important evidence ofthe transition from Latin to vernacular composition and of the shiftingof the literary focus from continental Scandinavia to Iceland. Theinterrelationship of the various texts is difficult to disentangle, sincesome are completely lost, and others are now found only in later copies
and reworkings that have often incorporated material from supposedly
later works. The following is a summary account of historians andtexts relevant to Fagrskinna:
Adam of Bremen, Gesta Hammaburgensis ecclesiae pontificum. The author
was an eleventh-century canon who wrote (c.1073), in Latin, on matters ofconcern to the Archbishop of Bremen. Book 4 includes material, valuable
because of its early date but sometimes of dubious accuracy, about the preChristian practices of the Scandinavian peoples.
Sæmundr Sigfússon ‘inn fró›i’ (the Wise), an Icelandic scholar (d. 1133), isreferred to as an authority in many historical texts. His lost work probably
took the form of a chronological summary of the lives of the Norwegian kings.
It is presumed to have been in Latin, since Ari, whose work was composed
later, is referred to by Snorri Sturluson as the first writer of history in thevernacular.
Ari ﬁorgilsson is best known for his surviving short vernacular history of
Iceland, now known as Íslendingabók; but the manuscript gives the surviving
book a Latin title, Libellus Islendorum, and refers to an earlier, now lost, version
as Íslendingabók, which it seems to say included lives of kings and genealogies.
Whether these were in Latin or the vernacular, and whether they were morethan brief regnal lists, is not known. The first version was written between 1122
and 1133 (see the introduction to VIII below).
Theodoricus monachus, Historia de Antiquitate Regum Norwagiensium ‘The
Ancient History of the Norwegian Kings’. This is an account in Latin, brief
but with many digressions, of the Norwegian kings from Haraldr hárfagri to
Sigur›r Jórsalafari (d. 1130). Theodoricus (ﬁórir) was probably a Benedictine
monk at Ni›arhólmr in Trondheimsfjord in Norway who wrote the work forpresentation to Archbishop Eysteinn (1161–88) of Ni›aróss (modern Trondheim). Theodoricus claims to be the first to write down the material he records,
naming as sources the memories preserved by Icelanders and in particular
their poems, though he may not have known these directly. He may also have
had access to regnal lists and chronologies such as those attributed to Ari andSæmundr.

VI: Fagrskinna

63

Historia Norwegiae. A Latin text found only in a fragmentary manuscriptfrom 1500 or later, but originally written probably in Norway before 1200.
After a geographical preface, it deals briefly with the history of Norway down
to 1015, and probably concluded with an account of its conversion to Christianity.
Ágrip af Nóregskonunga sƒgum. A short history (ágrip ‘summary’) in Norse,
surviving, though incompletely, in an Icelandic copy (c.1230) of a Norwegianmanuscript. The text was probably written sometime before 1200, and probably
originally covered the reigns from Hálfdan svarti to 1177, though it now breaks
off in the middle of the twelfth century. It is believed that the author made useof Theodoricus and of Historia Norwegiae, but the relative dating of the threetexts is difficult to establish; it also incorporates vernacular poetry.
Oddr Snorrason, Óláfs saga Tryggvasonar. Oddr Snorrason was a monk at
ﬁingeyrar in the north of Iceland who wrote a Latin life of Óláfr Tryggvason
c.1190 (according to some c.1170). It now survives only in three different
redactions (one fragmentary) of an Icelandic translation. Oddr made use of
the early Latin histories as well as oral traditions, including skaldic verse. It isclear that Oddr’s work is the main source for Fagrskinna’s account of Óláfr,
though the relationship is made problematic by the late date of the surviving
translation, some versions of which may in turn have been influenced byFagrskinna itself, as well as other later texts.
Gunnlaugr Leifsson, Óláfs saga Tryggvasonar. Gunnlaugr, also a monk at
ﬁingeyrar, wrote another Latin life of Óláfr Tryggvason which probably usedand expanded Oddr’s version. It is now lost, but some passages survive translated into Icelandic in the form of interpolations in The Greatest saga of Óláfr
Tryggvason (Óláfs saga Tryggvasonar en mesta). This early fourteenth-century
work is based on a version of the saga of Óláfr Tryggvason in Heimskringla,
expanded with material relevant to the king’s life from a variety of texts.
Morkinskinna. In its present state this history, covering approximately the
years 1035–1177, is found in an Icelandic manscript from about 1275, of which
about a third is apparently missing. This version is considered to be a reworking,including interpolations from Ágrip and additional skaldic stanzas, of an older
text written c.1220, which may have lacked the many digressive anecdotes orﬂættir about Icelanders abroad; some argue, however, that these are integral
to the work. The early Morkinskinna was an important source for the latterparts of Fagrskinna and Heimskringla.
Heimskringla. Snorri Sturluson is generally accepted as the author. He is
believed to have written it c.1230, reworking his own earlier Óláfs saga helga
as the centrepiece. It covers the same chronological range as Fagrskinna, withthe addition of the largely legendary Ynglinga saga, but on a more ambitious
scale, with the biographies of individual kings presented as self-contained

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sagas. Snorri made wide use of existing prose sources although they are
rarely overtly acknowledged; his account of the battle of Svƒl›r depends asheavily as Fagrskinna does on Oddr’s Óláfs saga Tryggvasonar, but is more
economically narrated, and more fully supported by Snorri’s account of theevents preceding it.
Snorri famously articulated the importance of skaldic verse as historical source
material and cites it extensively, though there is proportionately more in
Fagrskinna. Scholars disagree as to whether Snorri knew Fagrskinna; it may
not have been known in Iceland before the composition of Heimskringla,
though Snorri could have encountered it during his first visit to Norway. There
are many similarities of structure and wording, but these can often be attributed
to common sources, such as Oddr’s Óláfs saga. It has been suggested that
Snorri came to know Fagrskinna only at a late stage in the composition ofHeimskringla.

The Battle of Svƒl›r
This extract (chapter 24 of the ÍF edition) tells of the defeat and death atSvƒl›r of King Óláfr Tryggvason in 999/1000, at the end of a five-year
reign. He was celebrated as the bringer of Christianity to northernlands, as Fagrskinna relates: ‘He was the first of the kings of Norway
to hold the true faith in God, and from his direction and power all the
kingdom of Norway became Christian, and the Orkneys, Faroes,
Shetland, Iceland and Greenland.’ This is an overstatement, since it
was only the coastal areas of Norway that were touched by Óláfr’s
proselytising; it was left to his more celebrated namesake, King Óláfr
Haraldsson (the Saint) to complete the conversion. Hagiographic
legends concerning both kings began to spring up almost immediately
after their deaths, and there is considerable transference of material
from one body of legend to another: for instance, the famous tale ofthe breaking of Einarr ﬂambarskelfir’s bow at Svƒl›r, found in Heimskringla but not in Fagrskinna, is told of Óláfr Haraldsson at the Battleof Nesjar in the early thirteenth-century Legendary Saga of St Óláfr.
Fagrskinna’s main source for the life of Óláfr was the hagiographic
account by the Icelandic monk Oddr Snorrason, but Fagrskinna
minimises the hagiographic element and heavily compresses thenarration of the king’s life, though the account of the battle, with its
colourful heroic and rhetorical devices, is more expansive. We knowof the events leading up to the battle from a variety of contradictorysources and traditions, most of which the author of Fagrskinna ignores.

VI: Fagrskinna

65

The language of Fagrskinna
Although the text exists in late Icelandic copies, its Norwegian
provenance is clear from the prevalence of Norwegian spellings. These
are found in both versions, though the distribution is somewhat different
in the two. At the time of the settlement of Iceland, the language wasthat taken there by settlers mostly from the western districts of Norway;
by the thirteenth century, significant dialectal divergences can bedetected in manuscripts. The following are the most conspicuous
Norwegian features, and are retained where they occur in the extract
edited here:œy for ey. Where Icelandic ey is produced by i-mutation of au, thecorresponding Norwegian form is œy or øy (lœypizk, Icel. hleypizk; lœyniliga,
Icel. leyniliga).
a for ƒ. The vowel produced by u-mutation of a, rendered in Old Icelandic
by ƒ, often does not occur in Norwegian where the u is, or would normally be,retained; in this text the u is often lost (fa›r, Icel. fƒ›ur; annr, Icel. ƒnnur).
The absence of mutation (i.e. the spelling with a) is more consistent in the B
version (compare frásƒgur, line 320, from A, with fa›r, line 42, and hafu›,
line 76, from B).
l, r, n for hl, hr, hn. The voiceless initial consonant groups hl, hr, hn, werevoiced to l, r, n in Norwegian (ló, Icel. hló; ræddr, Icel. hræddr). In one of theverses attributed to Hallfre›r hnekkir is required for alliteration withhertrygg›ar and hyggja, so the h is added here to the manuscript form nekkir(line 178).
ú for ó. The negative prefix, more commonly ó- in Icelandic, was morecommonly ú- in Norwegian; see here úkristni alongside ókristni.
sunr for son(r). The Icelandic form -son is probably a reduction, because of
its frequent unstressed use in nominal compounds, of the form represented in
Norwegian as sunr.
hánum for honum. The Icelandic form honum derives from mutation of á to
ó under the influence of a nasal consonant and following back vowel; thevowel was then reduced to o because it was frequently unstressed.
me›r and vi›r for me› and vi›. These forms are more prevalent in the A
version (the latter part of this extract).
Other Norwegianisms (frequent occurrence of æ for e, vowel harmony inunaccented syllables, y for i, gh for g) are also found in this text but are notrepresented in this extract.
Where the text is extant in both versions, the earlier (B) version has been
followed, but some emendations have been adopted from the A version without
annotation.

66

VI: Fagrskinna
Bibliography

Fagrskinna: Nóregs kononga tal, ed. Finnur Jónsson (1902–03). Samfund til
Udgivelse af Gammel Nordisk Litteratur 30.
Fagrskinna: Nóregs konunga tal, in Ágrip af Nóregskonunga sƒgum. Fagrskinna — Nóregs konunga tal, ed. Bjarni Einarsson (1985). ÍF XXIX.
Fagrskinna, A Catalogue of the Kings of Norway, tr. Alison Finlay (2004).
Adam of Bremen, Gesta Hammaburgensis ecclesiae pontificum, ed. W.
Trillmich and R. Buchner in Quellen des 9. und 11. Jahrhunderts zur
Geschichte der hamburgischen Kirche und des Reiches (1978), 135–499.
Adam of Bremen, History of the Archbishops of Hamburg-Bremen, tr. Francis
J. Tschan (1959).
Ari ﬁorgilsson, Íslendingabók, in Íslendingabók. Landnámabók, ed. Jakob
Benediktsson (1968). ÍF I.
The Book of the Icelanders (Íslendingabók) by Ari Thorgilsson, ed. and tr.
Halldór Hermannsson (1930). Islandica 20.
Theodoricus monachus, Historia de antiquitate regum Norwagiensium, in
Monumenta Historica Norvegiæ, ed. G. Storm (1880, repr. 1973), 1–68.
Theodoricus monachus, Historia de antiquitate regum Norwagiensium. An
account of the Ancient History of the Norwegian Kings, tr. David and Ian
McDougall (1998).
Historia Norwegiae. In Monumenta Historica Norvegiæ, ed. G. Storm (1880,
repr. 1973), 69–124. Translation in A History of Norway and The Passion
and Miracles of the Blessed Óláfr, tr. Devra Kunin, ed. Carl Phelpstead(2001).
Ágrip af Nóregskonungasƒgum. A Twelfth-Century Synoptic History of theKings of Norway, ed. and tr. M. J. Driscoll (1995).
Saga Óláfs Tryggvasonar af Oddr Snorrason munk, ed. Finnur Jónsson (1932).
Oddr Snorrason, Óláfs saga Tryggvasonar, in Færeyinga saga. Óláfs saga
Odds. Ed. Ólafur Halldórsson (2006). ÍF XXV.
Óláfs saga Tryggvasonar en mesta I–III, ed. Ólafur Halldórsson (1958–2000).
Editiones Arnamagnæanæ.
The Saga of King Olaf Tryggwason who Reigned over Norway A.D. 955 to
A.D. 1000, tr. John Sephton (1895). [The Greatest Saga of Óláfr Tryggvason]
Morkinskinna, ed. Finnur Jónsson (1932). Samfund til Udgivelse af Gammel
Nordisk Litteratur 53.
Morkinskinna: The Earliest Icelandic Chronicle of the Norwegian Kings (1030–
1157), tr. T. M. Andersson and Kari Ellen Gade (2000). Islandica 51.
T. M. Andersson, ‘Kings’ Sagas (Konungasögur)’. In Old Norse-Icelandic
Literature. A Critical Guide, ed. Carol J. Clover and John Lindow (1985).
Islandica 45.
Gustav Indrebø, Fagrskinna (1917). Avhandlinger fra Universitetets historiske
Seminar 4.
Bjarni Einarsson, ‘Fagrskinna’, MS 177.

VI: Fagrskinna

67

VI: FAGRSKINNA
Chapter 24: The Death of Óláfr Tryggvason
Sveinn Danakonungr ﬂóttisk missa mikilla eigna ﬂeira er vera skyldu
í tilgjƒf Gunnhildar konu hans, ﬂví at ﬁyri haf›i eignir ﬂær er Haraldr
konungr, fa›ir hennar, haf›i gefit henni. En Búrizleifr ﬂóttisk ﬂá mjƒk 3
svikinn, ﬂó at hann hef›i tilgjƒf ﬂá er ﬁyri skyldi hafa, ﬂví at konan
kom eigi til hans.1 Af atkalli Gunnhildar ok áeggjun sendi Sveinn
konungr menn eptir ﬁyri ok lét fylgja henni nau›gri á Vin›land til 6
fundar Búrizleifs konungs, ok ger›i hann brullaup til hennar. En hon
vildi eigi eiga hei›inn mann ﬂá heldr en fyrr, ok var hon svá nætr sjaume› konunginum at hon ﬂá at ﬂeim hvárki mat né drykk, ok me› 9
rá›um fóstrfa›r síns gat hon lœypizk á braut á skóg einn ok svá til
ﬂess er hon kom til sjóvar, ok fengu ﬂau ﬂar eitt lítit skip ok fóru til
Danmarkar. En hon ﬂor›i ﬂar eigi at leggja, ﬂví at hon ugg›i at Sveinn 12
konungr, bró›ir hennar, myndi ﬂegar láta fylgja henni til Vin›lands
aptr, ef hann vissi at hon væri ﬂar komin. Hon fór ﬂá lœyniliga til
Nóregs á fund Óláfs konungs ok ba› hann leggja til hjálpræ›i me› 15
sér. Hann tók vi› henni ok ger›i sér at eiginkonu án rá›i Sveins
konungs, bró›ur hennar.
Hon ba› Óláf konung opt at hann skyldi heimta fé hennar at Búrizleifi 18
konungi á Vin›landi, ok kalla›isk hafa lítit af ﬂví er hon átti me› réttu
at hafa. ﬁá ger›i konungr fer› sína ór landi, bau› út li›i miklu ok haf›isex tigu skipa, fór austr til Vin›lands í gegnum Danakonungs ríki fyrir 21útan hans ﬂƒkk ok vilja. Óláfr konungr fær mikit fé, ok allt eigna›iskhann ﬂat er hann vildi, ok olli ﬂví mest li›veizla Ástrí›ar, dóttur
24
Búrizleifs konungs, er átti Sigvaldi jarl at Jómi.
ﬁá er Óláfr konungr fór af Vin›landi, sigldi hann yfir til Danmarkar
lítinn byr ok fagrt ve›r, ok fóru ﬂau skip fyrir er smæri váru, en ﬂau
sí›ar er stœrri váru, fyrir ﬂví at ﬂau ﬂurftu meira ve›rit en ﬂau er smæri 27
váru. Vi› einn hólma fyrir Vin›landi váru saman komnir margir stórirhƒf›ingjar. ﬁessi hólmi heitir Svƒl›r.2 Í ﬂessum flota var Sveinn
Danakonungr, er miklar sakar ﬂóttisk eiga vi› Óláf konung. Sú var ein 30
at Óláfr átti ﬁyri, systur hans, ok fengit hennar at ólœyfi hans. Annrsƒk var at hann sag›i at Óláfr haf›i sezk í skattlƒnd hans, Nóregs ríki,
er Haraldr konungr, fa›ir hans, haf›i lagt undir sik.3 Sigvaldi jarl var 33
ﬂar me› Danakonungi fyrir ﬂá sƒk at hann var Danakonungs jarl.
Í ﬂessum flota var ok mikill hƒf›ingi, Óláfr svænski Svíakonungr, er

68
36

39

42

45

48

hefna ﬂóttisk eiga á Óláfi konungi mikillar svívir›ingar. Hann haf›islitit festarmálum ok lostit me› glófa sínum Sigrí›i, mó›ur Óláfs
konungs, dóttur Skƒglar-Tósta.4 ﬁá samu Sigrí›i átti ﬂá Sveinn
Danakonungr, ok var hon mjƒk f‡sandi at Sveinn Danakonungr ger›iÓláfi konungi mein e›a svívir›ing. Ok í ﬂessu li›i var Eiríkr jarl
Hákonarsunr, er mestar sakar ﬂóttisk eiga vi› Óláf konung ok hansmenn, er verit haf›u nær drápi fa›r hans, Hákonar, ok flæmt ór landi
alla sunu hans ok sezk í ríkit eptir.
Ástrí›r haf›i fengit Óláfi konungi ellifu skip, ok skyldi ﬂetta li›
fylgja konunginum til ﬂess er hann kœmi um Danmƒrk. En ﬂat var
mest til at ﬂau Búrizleifr ok Ástrí›r tóku svá vel vi› Óláfi konungi, atGeila haf›i verit dóttir Búrizleifs konungs ok systir Ástrí›ar, er Óláfr
konungr haf›i átta ﬂá er hann var á Vin›landi.5 Óláfr Tryggvasunr
haf›i alls eitt skip ok sjau tigu skipa, sem segir Halldórr ókristni:6Œyna fór ok einu,
unnviggs, konungr sunnan,sver› rau› mætr at mor›imei›r, sjau tigum skei›a,ﬂá er húnlagar hreina
haf›i jarl7 um kraf›a,sætt gekk seggja áttar
sundr, Skánunga fundar.

51

54

57

60

63

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VI: Fagrskinna

ﬁessir hƒf›ingjar haf›u úvígjan her ok lágu í hƒfn einni innan at
hólmanum, en skip Óláfs konungs sigldu hit ‡tra fyrir, ﬂá er hƒf›ingjarnir váru uppi á hólmanum ok sá til er flotinn sigldi austan.
ﬁeir sá at smá skip sigldu fyrir. Nú sjá ﬂeir eitt mikit skip ok mjƒkglæsiligt.
ﬁá mælti Sveinn konungr, ‘Farum til skipa sem tí›ast, ﬂar siglir nú
Ormr enn langi austan.’8ﬁá svara›i Eiríkr jarl, ‘Bí›um enn, fleiri hafa ﬂeir stór skip en Orm
enn langa.’
Ok svá var. ﬁetta skip átti Styrkárr af Gimsum. ﬁá sá ﬂeir enn annat
skip mikit ok vel búit, hƒf›askip.
ﬁá mælti Sveinn konungr, ‘Nú man hér fara Ormr enn langi, okver›um eigi of seinir í móti ﬂeim.’
54 hanum MS.

55 skræf›an, kraf›an MSS. 56 ættar MS.

VI: Fagrskinna

69ﬁá svara›i Eiríkr jarl, ‘Eigi man ﬂetta vera enn Ormr enn langi; fá72
hafa enn farit stór skip ﬂeira, en mƒrg munu til vera.’Svá var ﬂat sem jarlenn sag›i. Nƒkkur skip fóru ﬂá um á›r en skip
sigldi me› stafa›u segli. ﬁat var skei› ok miklu meira en annr skip
ﬂau er siglt haf›u. ﬁá er Sveinn konungr sá at ﬂetta skip haf›i engi 75
hafu›, stó› hann upp, mælti ok ló vi›:‘Ræddr er Óláfr Tryggvasunr nú, eigi ﬂorir hann at sigla me› hƒf›um
78
dreka síns; farum nú ok leggjum at sem har›ast.’ﬁá svara›i Eiríkr jarl, ‘Eigi er ﬂetta, herra, Óláfr konungr. Kenni ek
ﬂetta skip, opt hefi ek ﬂat sét, ﬂat á Erlingr Skjálgssunr,9 ok er betr atvér leggim um skut hánum til ﬂessar orrostu.10 ﬁeir drengir eru ﬂar 81
innan bor›s at vér megum víst vita ef vér hittum Óláf Tryggvasun.
Betra er oss skar› í flota hans en skei› ﬂessi svá búin.’ﬁá mælti Óláfr Svíakonungr, ‘Eigi skyldum vér æ›rask at leggja til 84
bardaga vi› Óláf, ﬂó at hann hafi skip mikit. Er ﬂat skƒmm ok neisa,
ok man ﬂat spyrjask á ƒll lƒnd, ef vér liggjum hér me› óvígjan her, en
87hann siglir ﬂjó›lei› fyrir útan.’ﬁá svara›i Eiríkr jarl, ‘Herra, lát sigla ﬂetta skip; ek man segja ﬂérgó› tí›endi, at eigi man Óláfr Tryggvasunr um oss hafa siglt, ok ﬂenna
dag munum vér kost eiga at berjask vi› hann. Nú eru hér margir 90
hƒf›ingjar ok væntir mek ﬂeirar rí›ar at allir vér skulum hafa œrit atvinna fyrr en vér skiljumsk.’ﬁá mæltu ﬂeir enn, er fram kom eitt mikit skip, ‘ﬁetta man vera 93
Ormr enn langi, ok eigi vill Eiríkr jarl,’ sag›u Danir, ‘berjask ok hefnafa›r síns, ef hann vill eigi nú.’Jarlenn svara›i rei›r mjƒk, ok lét vera eigi minni ván at Danum 96
myndi eigi vera ólei›ari at berjask en hánum e›a hans mannum. ﬁá
var eigi langt at bí›a ﬂess er ﬂrjú skip sigla ok eitt miklu mest, ok haf›i99drekahafu› gyllt.
ﬁá mæltu allir at jarlenn haf›i satt sagt, ‘ok hér ferr nú Ormr enn
langi.’
Eiríkr jarl svara›i, ‘Eigi er ﬂetta Ormr enn langi,’ ok ba› ﬂá ﬂó til 102
leggja ef ﬂeir vildi. ﬁá tók Sigvaldi jarl skei› sína ok reri út til skipanna,
lét skjóta upp skildi hvítum.11 ﬁeir la›a seglum ok bí›a. ﬁetta et miklaskip er Tranan, er st‡r›i ﬁorkell nefja, konungs frændi.12 ﬁeir spyrja 105
Sigvalda hver eru tí›endi.
Hann sag›i ﬂeim ﬂau tí›endi af Sveini Danakonungi, ‘ﬂau er Óláfi
108
Tryggvasyni er skylt at vita, ok ﬂarf hann ﬂess, at hann varisk.’ﬁá létu ﬂeir ﬁorkell fljóta skipen ok bí›a. ﬁví næst sá ﬂeir Sveinn

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114

117

120

123

126

129

132

135

138

141

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VI: Fagrskinna

konungr sigla fjƒgur skip ok eitt miklu mest ok á drekahafu›, ﬂau ergull eitt váru á at sjá. ﬁá mæltu allir senn:‘Fur›u mikit skip er Ormr enn langi. Ekki langskip man jafnfrítt íverƒldu vera, ok mikil rausn er at láta gera slíkan grip.’ﬁá mælti Sveinn Danakonungr, ‘Hátt mun Ormr enn langi bera mik.
Hánum skal ek st‡ra í kveld fyrr en sól setisk,’ ok hét á li› sitt at búask
skyldi.
ﬁá mælti Eiríkr jarl svá at fáir menn hœyr›u, ‘ﬁó at Óláfr Tryggvasunr
hef›i ekki meira skip en ﬂat er nú má sjá, ﬂá man Sveinn konungr vi›
Danaher einn aldrigi ﬂessu skipi st‡ra.’Sigvaldi, er hann sá hvar skipen sigldu, ba› ﬂá ﬁorkel nefju draga
Ormenn undir hólmenn, lét ve›ret ﬂeim betr standa at sigla á hafet ok
at fara landhallt vi› stór skip ok lítinn byr. ﬁeir ger›u svá, heimtu
undir hólmann ﬂessi fjƒgur, fyrir ﬂví at ﬂeir sá sum sín skip undir
hólmann róa, ok gruna›i ﬂá at vera myndi nƒkkur tí›endi, beita á ve›rﬂeim nær hólmanum, ló›u seglum ok taka til ára. ﬁetta et mikla skip
er kallat Ormr enn skammi. ﬁá sá ﬂeir hƒf›ingjarnir hvar sigla ﬂrjú
skip allstór ok et fjór›a sí›ast. ﬁá mælti Eiríkr jarl vi› Svein konungok vi› Óláf Svíakonung:‘Standi› nú upp ok til skipa; nú man ek eigi ﬂræta at Ormr enn langi
siglir, ok ﬂar megu ﬂér nú hitta Óláf Tryggvasun.’13
ﬁá ﬂagna›u ﬂeir allir ok var› at ótti mikill, ok margr ma›r ræddisk
ﬂar vi› sinn bana.
Óláfr Tryggvasunr sá hvar menn hans haf›u lagt undir hólmann, okﬂóttisk vita at ﬂeir myndu hafa spurt nƒkkur tí›endi, vendir ok ﬂessum
skipum inn at hólmanum ok ló›u seglum. Sigvaldi st‡r›i skei› sinni
inn me› hólmanum í móti li›i konunganna, er innan fóru. Fyrir ﬂessa
sƒk kva› Stefnir ﬂetta um Sigvalda:14
Mankat ek nefna— nær man ek stefna:ni›rbjúgt er nef
á ní›ingi —ﬂann er Svein konung
sveik ór landi,en Tryggva sun
á tálar dró.
Sveinn Danakonungr ok Óláfr Svíakonungr ok Eiríkr jarl haf›u gƒrt

VI: Fagrskinna

71

ﬂat rá› á milli sín, ef ﬂeir felldi Óláf Tryggvasun, at sá ﬂeira er ﬂessu 147væri næstr skyldi eignask skip hans ok allt lutskipti ﬂat sem fengisk íorrostu, en veldi Nóregskonungs skyldi hafa at ﬂri›jungi hverr vi›
150
annan.
ﬁá sá Óláfr konungr ok menn hans at ﬂeir váru sviknir, ok at sjór allrvar ﬂak›r í nánd ﬂeim af herskipum, en Óláfr konungr haf›i lítit li›,153
sem segir Hallfrø›r, er li› haf›i siglt í fra hánum:15
ﬁar hygg ek mjƒk til misstu— mƒrg kom drótt á flótta —gram ﬂann er gunni fram›i,
gengis ﬁrœnzkra drengja.
Nœfr vá einn vi› jƒfra
allvaldr tvá snjalla— frægr er til slíks at segjasi›r — ok jarl enn ﬂri›ja.

156

159

ﬁá lag›i í sinn sta› hverr ﬂeira ﬂriggja hƒf›ingja, Sveinn Danakonungr 162
me› sitt li›, Óláfr Svíakonungr me› Svíaher; ﬂri›ja sta› bjó Eiríkr jarlsitt li›.
165
ﬁá mælti vi› Óláf konung einn vitr ma›r, ﬁorkell dyr›ill:‘Hér er ofrefli li›s, herra, vi› at berjask. Dragum upp segl vár oksiglum út á haf eptir li›i váru. Er ﬂat engum manni blœy›i at hann ætli168
hóf fyrir sér.’ﬁá svara›i Óláfr konungr hátt, ‘Leggi saman skipen ok tengi›,
herklæ›isk menn ok breg›i› sver›um. Ekki skulu mínir menn á flótta
171
hyggja.’ﬁetta or› vátta›i Hallfrø›r á ﬂá lund:
Geta skal máls ﬂess, er mælamenn at vápna sennu
dolga fangs vi› drengidá›ƒflgan bƒr kvá›u.
Ba›at hertrygg›ar hyggja‹h›nekkir sína rekka— ﬂess lifa ﬂjó›ar sessa
ﬂróttar or› — á flótta.
160 fræg›, frægt MSS.

161 ﬂí›r, su›r MSS. 176 búr MS.

174

177

180

VI: Fagrskinna

72

183

186

189

192

195

198

201

204

207

210

213

ﬁá spur›i Óláfr Tryggvasunr menn sína, ‘Hverr er hƒf›ingi fyrir ﬂessu
li›i, er hér liggr næst oss?’ﬁeir svara›u, ‘ﬁat hyggjum vér at Sveinn Danakonungr sé.’ﬁá mælti Óláfr konungr, ‘Eigi skulum vér óttask ﬂat li›, ﬂví at aldrigibáru Danir sigr í orrostu, ﬂá er ﬂeir bar›usk á skipum vi› Nor›menn.’
Enn spur›i Óláfr konungr, ‘Hverir liggja ﬂar út í frá ok hafa mƒrg skip?’
Hánum var sagt at ﬂar var Óláfr Svíakonungr. Óláfr konungr segir:‘Ekki ﬂurfum vér at óttask Svía, rossæturnar. ﬁeim man vera blí›ara
at sleikja blótbolla sína en ganga upp á Orm enn langa undir vápn y›r.’16
ﬁá spur›i enn Óláfr Tryggvasunr, ‘Hverir eigu ﬂau skip en stóru, er
ﬂar liggja út í frá flotanum?’
Hánum var sagt at ﬂat var Eiríkr jarl Hákonarsunr me› Járnbar›ann,er allra skipa var mest.17 ﬁá mælti Óláfr konungr:‘Mjƒk hafa ﬂeir tignum mannum í ﬂenna her skipat í móti oss, ok af
ﬂessu li›i er oss ván har›rar orrostu. ﬁeir eru Nor›menn sem vér okhafa opt sét bló›ug sver› ok margt vápnaskipti, ok munu ﬂeir ﬂykkjask
eiga vi› oss skapligan fund, ok svá er.’ﬁessir fjórir hƒf›ingjar, tveir konungar ok tveir jarlar, leggja til
orrostu vi› Óláf Tryggvasun, ok er Sigvalda lítt vi› orrostuna getit.
En ﬂó segir Skúli ﬁorsteinssunr í sínum flokki at Sigvaldi var ﬂar:18
Fygl›a ek Frísa dolgi,19
fekk ungr ﬂar er spjƒr sungu— nú finnr ƒld at eldumk —
aldrbót, ok Sigvalda,
ﬂá er til móts vi› mœtimalmﬂings í dyn hjalma
sunnr fyrir Svƒl›rar mynni20
sárlauk ro›inn bárum.
ﬁessi orrosta var› har›la snƒrp ok mannskœ›. Fellu Danir mest, ﬂví atﬂeir váru næstir Nor›mannum. ﬁeir heldusk eigi vi› ok leggja í frá ór
skotmáli, ok fór ﬂessi herr, sem Óláfr Tryggvasunr sag›i, me›r alls
engan or›stír, en eigi at sí›r21 var hƒr› orrosta ok lƒng; fell af hvárumtveggja mikit li› ok mest af Svíum, ok ﬂar kom at Óláfr svænski sá ﬂatat bezta rá›i fyrir sér ok sínu li›i at vera sem fjarst ok lét síga á hƒmlur
aptr undan, en Eiríkr jarl lá vi›r síbyr›t. Óláfr konungr Tryggvasun
207 munni, my›e MSS.

VI: Fagrskinna73

haf›i lagt Orm enn langa í millum Orms ins skamma ok Trƒnunnar, 216
en hin smæstu skipin ‡zt. En Eiríkr jarl lét frá hƒggva hvert sem ro›itvar, en lag›i at ﬂeim er eptir váru.
Nú er smæri skip Óláfs konungs ru›usk, stukku mennirnir undan 219
ok gengu upp á hin stœrri skipin. Var› í ﬂví mikit mannspjall í hvárntveggja flokkenn. En svá sem li›it fell af skipum Eiríks jarls, ﬂá komannat eigi minna í sta›enn af Svíum ok Danum, en ekki kom í sta›enn 222
ﬂess li›s er fell af Óláfi konungi. Ru›usk ﬂá skip hans ƒll ƒnnr nema
Ormr enn langi eigi, fyrir ﬂví at hann var bor›i hæstr ok bazt skipa›r,
en me›an li›it var til, ﬂá haf›i ﬂangat á gengit, ok haf›i hann haldit 225
sinni fullri skipan at manntali, ﬂó at sumir létisk fyrir hánum. En ﬂá erro›inn var Ormr enn skammi ok Tranan, ﬂá lét Eiríkr ﬂau í frá hƒggva,
en sí›an lag›isk Járnbar›inn síbyr›r vi›r Orm enn langa, sem segir 228
Halldórr úkristni:22Fjƒr› kom heldr í har›a,hnitu rœyr saman drœyra,tungl skrusk ﬂá tingla
tangar, Ormr enn langi,
ﬂá er bor›mikinn Bar›abrynflag‹››s reginn lag›i— jarl vann hjalms und holmi
hrí› — vi› Fáfnis sí›u.23
Ger›isk snarpra sver›a,slitu drengir fri› lengi,
ﬂá er gullin spjƒr gullu,
gangr um Orm enn langa.
Dolgs kvá›u fram fylgja
fráns leggbita hánumsvænska menn at sennu
sunnr ok danska runna.
Hykkat ek væg› at vígi
— vann drótt jƒfur sóttan,fjƒr› kom‹sk› jarl at jƒr›u —ógnhar›an sik spƒr›u,234 bor›mikill MS.

245 í MS.

231

234

237

240

243

246

249

74

252

255

258

261

264

267

270

273

276

279

VI: Fagrskinna
ﬂá er fjar›m‡ils fœr›u›folkhar›r á trƒ› Bar›a— lítt var Sifjar sóti
svangr — vi›r Orm enn langa.

ﬁessi orrosta var svá hƒr›, fyrst af sókn drengiligri ok ﬂó mest af
vƒrnenni, er alla vega lƒg›u skip at Ormenum, en ﬂeir er vƒr›usk
gengu svá í mót at ﬂeir stigu ni›r af bor›unum ok í sjóinn ok sukku
ni›r me› vápnum sínum ok gættu eigi annars en ﬂeir ber›isk á landi
ok vildu æ fram.24 Svá kva› Hallfrø›r:25
Sukku ni›r af Na›ri,
naddfárs í bƒ› sárir,baugs, ger›ut vi› vægjask,verkendr He›ins serkjar.
Vanr man Ormr, ﬂótt Ormi
alld‡rr konungr st‡ri,
ﬂar er hann skrí›r me›r li› l‡›a,lengi slíkra drengja.
ﬁá fellu menninir fyrst um mitt skipit, ﬂar sem bor›en váru lægst, enfram um stafnenn ok aptr í fyrirrúminu heldusk menninir lengst vi›r.
ﬁá er Eiríkr jarl sá at Ormrinn var au›r mi›skipa, ﬂá gekk hann uppme›r fimmtánda mann, ok er ﬂat sá Úlfr enn rau›i ok a›rir stafnbúar,ﬂá gengu ﬂeir ór stafninum framan ok svá hart at ﬂar er jarlenn var atjarlenn var› undan at røkkva ok aptr á skip sitt, ok ﬂá er hann kom áBar›ann, ﬂá eggja›i jarlenn sína menn at sœtti at vel, ok gengu ﬂá upp
í annat sinn me›r miklu li›i. Var ﬂá Úlfr ok allir stafnbúarnir komnir
at lyptingunni, en ro›it var allt skipit fram. Sótti ﬂá li› Eiríks jarls
allumveginn at ﬂeim Óláfi konungi, svá sem Halldórr úkristni segir:26
Hét á heiptar n‡tahugreifr — me› Óleifi
aptr stƒkk ﬂjó› um ﬂoptur —ﬂengill sína drengi,

250 fjar›mykils MS, m‡ils Oddr Snorrason.

VI: Fagrskinna

75

ﬂá er hafvita hƒf›uhallands um gram snjallan— var› um Vin›a myr›ivápnrei› — lokit skei›um.

282

ﬁá sótti Eiríkr jarl aptr at fyrirrúminu me›r sína menn ok var ﬂar hƒr› 285
vi›rtaka. Óláfr konungr haf›i verit ﬂann dag allan í lyptingunni áOrminum. Hann haf›i gylltan skjƒld ok hjálm, ﬂunga ringabrynju ok
svá trausta at ekki festi á henni, ok er ﬂó svá sagt at ekki skorti vápna- 288
bur›enn at lyptingunni, fyrir ﬂví at allir menn kenndu konungenn, af
ﬂví at vápn hans váru au›kennd ok hann stó› hátt í lypting. En í hjá
konungenum stó› Kolbjƒrn stallari me›r ﬂvílíkan vápnabúna› sem 291
konungrenn haf›i. Nú fór ﬂessi orrosta sem líkligt var, ﬂar sem
hvárttveggja hƒf›u raustir á hizk, at ﬂeir létusk ﬂó er fámennari váru,
ok ﬂá er allt var fallit li› Óláfs konungs, ﬂá ljóp hann sjálfr fyrir bor›, 294
ok brá skildinum upp yfir hafu› sér ok svá Kolbjƒrn stallari, en hansskjƒldr var› undir honum á sjónum, ok kom hann sér eigi í kafit, ok
ﬂeir menn er váru á smám skipum tóku hann ok hug›u at konungrinn 297
væri sjálfr. Hann fekk ﬂó gri› af jarlenum. En eptir ﬂat, ﬂá ljópu allir
fyrir bor›, ﬂeir er eptir lif›u ok ﬂó flestir sárir, ok ﬂeir er gri›in fengu
váru af sundi teknir. ﬁat var ﬁorkell nefja, Karlshafu› ok ﬁorsteinn ok 300
Einarr ﬂambarskelfir.27
En eptir ﬂat er orrostunni var lokit, ﬂá eigna›isk Eiríkr jarl Orm enn
langa ok ƒnnr skip Óláfs ok margs manns vápn, ﬂeira er drengiliga 303
haf›u borit til dau›adags. ﬁat hefir Hallfrø›r váttat, at ﬁorkell nefja
fl‡›i svá at ƒll váru skip Óláfs konungs ro›in:28
Ógrœ›ir sá au›a
armgrjóts Tranu fljóta— hann rau› geir at gunni
gla›r — ok bá›a Na›ra,á›r en hjaldrﬂorinn heldi,
hugframr í bƒ› ramri,snotr á snœrivitni
sunds ﬁórketill29 undan.
ﬁessi orrosta hefir frægust verit á Nor›rlandum, af ﬂví at sagt er um
311 æ MS.

306

309

312

VI: Fagrskinna

76

315 vƒrn drengiliga, ﬂar næst af atsókn ok sigrenum, er ﬂat skip var› unnit

á djúpum sæ er engi ma›r ætla›i vápnum sótt ver›a, en ﬂó mest fyrir
sakar ﬂess er ﬂvílíkr hƒf›ingi fell er ﬂá var frægastr á danska tungu.
318 Svá mikit ger›u menn sér um at vingask í allri umrœ›u vi› Óláf konungat mestr lutr manna vildi eigi hœyra at hann myndi fallit hafa, nemalétu at hann var í Vin›landi e›a í Su›rríki, ok eru margar frásƒgur um
321 ﬂat gƒrvar. En hans ástvinir ræddusk at ﬂat myndi logit vera, okl‡sti Hallfrø›r ﬂví vandræ›askáld, sá ma›r er svá mikit haf›i unnt
konungenum at menn segja at eptir fall konungsins fekk hann vanheilsu
324 af harmi, ﬂá er hánum vannsk til dau›adags.30 ﬁetta vitni bar Hallfrø›r:31

327

330

333

336

339

Veit ek eigi hitt, hvár‹t› Heita
hungrdœyfi skal ek lœyfa
dynsæ›inga dau›and‡rbliks e›a ﬂó kvikvan,alls sannliga segja— sárr mun gramr at hváru,hætt er til hans at frétta —hvárttveggja mér seggir.
Samr var árr um ævi
oddflag‹››s hinn er ﬂat sag›i,
at lof›a gramr lif›i,læstyggs burar Tryggva.
Vera kve›r ƒld ór éliÓláf kominn stála;menn geta máli sƒnnu —mjƒk er verr en svá — ferri.
Ok enn kva› hann ﬂetta:

342

345

Mundut ﬂess, er ﬂegnar
ﬂrótthar›an gram sóttu,— fer ek me›r l‡›a lí›ilandher›ar — skƒp ver›a,

325 hætta MS. 344 lifi MS, lí›i Heimskringla.

VI: Fagrskinna
at mundjƒkuls myndi
margd‡rr koma st‡rir— geta ﬂykkjat mér gotnar
glíkli‹g›s — ór her slíkum.

77

348

Ok enn kva› hann:
Enn segir au›ar kenni
austr ór malma gnaustan
seggr frá sárum tyggja
sumr e›a brott of komnum.
Nú er sannfregit sunnan
siklings ór styr miklum,
kann ek eigi margt at manna,mor›, veifanar or›i.

351

Nor›manna hygg ek nenninn— nú er ﬂengill fram genginn,d‡rr hné dróttar stjóri —dróttin und lok sóttan;
grams dau›i brá gœ›i
gó›s úfárar ﬂjó›ar.
Allr glepsk f‹r›i›r af falli
flug‹s›tyggs sunar Tryggva.

360

354

357

Ok enn sag›i hann:32

351 kennir MS.

363

366

78

VI: Fagrskinna
Notes

1 Fagrskinna, ch. 19, outlines the abortive betrothal of ﬁyri, arranged
by Jarl Sigvaldi of Jómsborg as part of a peace settlement between
King Sveinn of Denmark and Búrizleifr, King of the Wends:

Next Sigvaldi sent word to his father-in-law, King Búrizleifr, and said that
King Sveinn had come to Jómsborg, and that he himself was willing toarbitrate between them or else allow King Sveinn to go back to Denmark. In
turn, he persuaded King Sveinn to make peace with King Búrizleifr according
to the settlement that Sigvaldi decided between them. If he was not willingto do that, then he would come into the presence and power of King
Búrizleifr. They came to terms in this way, that each of the kings agreed to
Jarl Sigvaldi’s judgement, and when they had settled this by a binding agreement between them, the jarl pronounced the terms of their settlement,saying first that King Sveinn should marry Gunnhildr, daughter of King
Búrizleifr, and her dowry should be that part of Wendland which the Danes
had conquered in the realm of the king of the Wends. On the other hand,King Búrizleifr was to marry ﬁyri, daughter of King Haraldr and sister ofKing Sveinn. She had previously been married to Styrbjƒrn, son of KingÓláfr of the Swedes; her father, King Haraldr, was still alive then. He had
given her extensive estates on Fyn and south in Falster and Bornholm.
Jarl Sigvaldi made a division in this way: Búrizleifr was to keep that partof Wendland which had previously been apportioned to the estates ofGunnhildr, Búrizleifr’s daughter, whom King Sveinn was to marry, andKing Haraldr’s daughter ﬁyri was now to have that; and Gunnhildr
Búrizleifsdóttir was now to possess all those estates in Denmark whichﬁyri had owned, and receive all her bridal gift in Denmark, and ﬁyri allher bridal gift in Wendland, except that the jarl reserved from the division
Jómsborg and all the districts that he specified. Then King Búrizleifr andJarl Sigvaldi prepared a great feast in Jómsborg, and at that feast the weddingof King Sveinn and the betrothal of King Búrizleifr were celebrated.
After that, King Sveinn went home to his kingdom with his wife Gunnhildr. They later had two sons, the elder called Knútr ríki (the Great), theyounger Haraldr.
When King Sveinn came back from Wendland, he sent word to his
sister ﬁyri, and told her everything he had agreed in Wendland with King
Búrizleifr. ﬁyri was not pleased at this news, for she was Christian, andsaid that she would rather die among Christians than come into the powerof a heathen king and violate her Christianity. She stayed on her estates
and looked after her property for some years after that.
2 The site of the battle is uncertain. Fagrskinna and Heimskringla agree

in locating it by an unidentified island, Svƒl›r, in the southern Baltic,
while Ágrip and Adam of Bremen say that it took place in Øresund,between Sjælland and Skåne.

VI: Fagrskinna

79

3 Sveinn’s father, Haraldr Gormsson, had seized power in Norway inalliance with Jarl Hákon, after the death in battle of King Haraldr
gráfeldr (976). Óláfr Tryggvason established himself as king on thedeath of Jarl Hákon (995).
4 Heimskringla (Óláfs saga Tryggvasonar, ch. 61) relates Óláfr Trygg-

vason’s breach of his betrothal to the pagan Sigrí›r (mother of KingÓláfr of Sweden), on her refusal to accept Christianity, calling her hundhei›in ‘absolutely heathen, ?heathen as a dog’ and slapping her face withhis glove. The words me› glófa sínum occur only in the Aversion of Fagrskinna.
5 Óláfr’s marriage to Geila during his early Viking adventures ismentioned only briefly in Fagrskinna, but Heimskringla, in which
she is called Geira, gives a probably fictitious account of the marriage
and of Geira’s death three years later.
6 This verse is also cited in Heimskringla and Oddr Snorrason’s sagaof Óláfr. Nothing is known of the poet Halldórr ókristni other than theverses cited in the Kings’ Sagas, four of them in Fagrskinna; some or
all of these belong to a poem in honour of Jarl Eiríkr, to which Snorri
refers. This verse supports the timing of the battle during Óláfr’s returnfrom Wendland (sunnan), rather than on his way south as Adam andÁgrip assert, and is the source for the statement in the prose that Óláfr
commanded 71 ships. This is contradicted in other sources; Historia
Norwegiae assigns the 71 ships to Óláfr’s opponents, and according
to Theodoricus, ‘it is said that with only eleven ships he engaged inbattle against seventy’. Fagrskinna is vague about the size of the úvígr
herr opposing Óláfr, although he is still overwhelmed by force of
numbers, presumably because the actual battle involves only the small
number of Óláfr’s ships lured into Sigvaldi’s trap.
7 It is unclear whether this jarl is Eiríkr Hákonarson — referred toelsewhere in Halldórr’s verses, as here, as jarl without further qualification — or the treacherous Sigvaldi. The verse is also cited in
Heimskringla (ÍF XXVI, 352), where Snorri explicitly uses it as a sourcefor his account of Sigvaldi’s apparent support for Óláfr: ‘This verse
says that King Óláfr and Jarl Sigvaldi had 71 ships when they sailed
from the south.’ See note 14 below.
8 Fagrskinna (ch. 23) recounts the building of Ormr inn langi, Óláfr’s

famous ‘Long Serpent’:VI: Fagrskinna

80

King Óláfr had a ship built at Hla›ahamrar. It was much larger and more
splendidly built than other longships. It had thirty-four rowing-benches.
On it were placed dragon-heads decorated with gold, and that ship wascalled Ormr inn langi (the Long Serpent). On this ship there was to be no
man younger than twenty and none older than sixty. Many things wereforbidden to the men who were to be on the Ormr, and none was to be on
it unless he was an impressive man in some way, and many examples
show that on that ship were only heroes, and no cowards or weaklings.
9 Erlingr Skjálgsson was Óláfr Tryggvason’s brother-in-law.
10 leggim um skut hánum til ﬂessar orrostu: go into this battle roundhis stern, that is, after he has sailed on, avoiding a confrontation with him.
11 lét skjóta upp skildi hvítum: showing a white shield was a token ofpeaceful intentions.
12 ﬁorkell nefja was Óláfr Tryggvason’s half-brother, according to

Heimskringla (Óláfs saga Tryggvasonar, ch. 52).
13 The long, tension-building scene in which the leaders wrongly iden-

tify one ship after another as the Long Serpent is an obvious literary
device, and has been traced to the ninth-century De Gestis Karoli Magniby the Monk of St Gall, where it occurs in an account of the approachof Charlemagne’s army against the Langobards. Its treatment inFagrskinna is somewhat confused and repetitive. In the more succinct
version of Heimskringla, there are four rather than six false alarms;
the sightings help to identify two of the leaders serving with the king,as well as his two lesser named ships, the Trana ‘Crane’ and Ormr inn
skammi ‘the Short Serpent’, both of which were introduced earlier in
the narrative of Óláfr’s reign. Fagrskinna mentions both these ships
here for the first time, and is undecided whether ﬁorkell nefja commands the Trana or Ormr inn skammi. According to Heimskringla, Ormr
inn skammi was commanded by ﬁorkell nefja, the Trana by ﬁorkell dyr›ill,
the king’s uncle (mentioned in Fagrskinna simply as ‘a wise man’).
14 This fornyr›islag verse, attributed to the poet Stefnir ﬁorgilsson, isalso found in Oddr Snorrason’s saga, which also quotes a Latin versionof it said to have been composed by Oddr. Heimskringla does not cite
the verse but, like Oddr’s saga, gives a clearer account of Sigvaldi’s
treachery. He is sent by the alliance against Óláfr to lure him from
Wendland, assuring him that there is no army lying in wait for him.
Fagrskinna presents him less ambiguously as a subordinate of King

VI: Fagrskinna

81

Sveinn of Denmark, and Skúli ﬁorsteinsson’s verse (below) associates
him with Eiríkr’s force. The allusion in the verse to Sigvaldi’s tricking
Sveinn into leaving his country is to the story recorded in ch. 19 ofFagrskinna (see note 1 above) of Sigvaldi feigning sickness in orderto capture King Sveinn and carry him off to an enforced settlementwith the Wends.
15 Hallfre›r vandræ›askáld (‘troublesome poet’) was an Icelandic poet

who composed extensively in honour of King Óláfr, and also, paradoxically, for the king’s enemies, the jarls Hákon and Eiríkr. Hallfre›arsaga records his conversion to Christianity by Óláfr, who agreed toact as his godfather, and his probably fictitious love affairs. This andthe subsequent verse are also found in Oddr Snorrason’s saga andHeimskringla, and these and the other verses of Hallfre›r’s in thisextract are believed to belong to the erfidrápa ‘memorial lay’ composed
by Hallfre›r after the king’s death. Hallfre›ar saga relates his
composition of another poem in Óláfr’s honour during his lifetime;nine surviving verses or half-verses about the king’s early viking
adventures, preserved in Fagrskinna and elsewhere, are attributed tothis poem.
16 These are conventional gibes at the stereotypically pagan Swedes.

A verse in Hallfre›ar saga includes a similar taunt (ÍF VIII, 188):
heldr mun hœli-Baldrihrævinns fyr ﬂví minna,vn erumk slíks, at sleikja
sinn blóttrygil innan.
[The boastful Baldr of the carrion-maker (god of the sword = warrior,man) will find it less trouble — so I expect — to lick out the inside of his
sacrifice-bowl (than to fight).]
17 Eiríkr’s ship Járnbar›inn (‘the Iron-Beak’) or Bar›i (as the ship isnamed in Halldórr’s next verse), is mentioned earlier in Fagrskinna,
but without description. The related neuter noun bar› was used of aship’s prow and of the edge of a steep hill.
18 Skúli ﬁorsteinsson was an Icelandic poet, grandson of Egill Skalla-

Grímsson. Egils saga ends with a reference to his presence at Svƒl›r:‘hann var stafnbúi Eiríks jarls á Járnbar›anum, ﬂá er Óláfr konungr
Tryggvason fell’ (ÍF II, 300). Little is known of him in historicalsources, and of his poetry only this verse and a number of half-stanzas

VI: Fagrskinna

82

preserved in Snorra Edda survive, most of them probably belonging
to the flokkr referred to here, about the poet’s deeds.
19 Frísa dolgr ‘enemy of Frisians’ is presumably Eiríkr.
20 Svƒl›rar mynni ‘mouth’ suggests that Svƒl›r may actually havebeen a river; Icelandic authors, presumably unfamiliar with the
topography, seem to have interpreted the references to it in verse sources
as the name of the island referred to in the subsequently cited verse of
Halldórr (line 236).
21 At this point a lacuna begins in the older (B) text. The remainder ofthis extract follows the A version, and some changes in the spelling
conventions are noticeable: vi›r, me›r instead of vi›, me›, and definite
article forms with i rather than e (inn for enn); on the other hand, themutated vowel ƒ before u occurs more frequently.
22 The next three verses are also found in Oddr Snorrason’s saga andthe first two of them also in Heimskringla.
23 Fáfnir, the name of the legendary dragon killed by Sigur›r, refers toOrmr inn langi.
24 The suggestion that the defenders fought so furiously that they

stepped overboard as if they were fighting on land is presumably anover-literal interpretation of Hallfre›r’s following verse, ‘sukku ni›raf Na›ri’.
25 Also in Oddr Snorrason’s saga and in Heimskringla.
26 Also in Oddr Snorrason’s saga and in Heimskringla.
27 MS ﬂambaskelmir, emended in accordance with Heimskringla andother texts. Heimskringla, following Oddr’s saga, includes a colourful
anecdote in which the breaking of Einarr the master-archer’s bow by
an enemy arrow signals Óláfr’s downfall:‘Hvat brast ﬂar svá hátt?’ Einarr svarar, ‘Nóregr ór hendi ﬂér, konungr.’[‘What broke so loudly there?’ Einarr answered, ‘Norway, out of yourhands, King.’]

The story may be inspired by a misinterpretation of the element ﬂƒmb‘belly’, which could also mean ‘bowstring’, in the nickname ﬂambarskelfir (see VII B:2, note 12). As recorded here, Einarr survives thebattle to become a significant figure in the histories of Óláfr Haraldsson

VI: Fagrskinna

83

and his successors (cf. Haralds saga Sigur›arsonar in Heimskringla,
extract VII B below).
28 This verse is also in Heimskringla and Oddr Snorrason’s saga.
29 ﬁórketill is an archaic form of ﬁorkell, its trisyllabic form necessary

to preserve the metre of the verse. The use of such archaic forms tends
to confirm the authentic age of the verse, although they are common
enough to be imitated by later poets.
30 Legends of Óláfr’s survival and possible future return to Norway

are widespread, and sprang up almost immediately after the battle, as
the reference in Hallfre›r’s verse testifies. According to Theodoricus,‘some say that the king then escaped from there in a skiff, and madehis way to foreign parts to seek salvation for his soul.’ Oddr Snorrason’ssaga records a tradition that he ended his life as a monk in Syria or‘Girkland’, i.e. the Byzantine empire. The author of Fagrskinna more
sceptically sees in the rumours evidence for the sense of loss sufferedby the king’s followers.
31 The next four verses are also found in Heimskringla. Only the firsthalf-verse is found in Oddr Snorrason’s saga.
32 This verse is found only in Fagrskinna, except for the last two lines,

which are quoted as the second half of the poem’s stef ‘refrain’ inHallfre›ar saga and Oddr Snorrason’s saga.
Verses in prose word orderLines 50–57: Œyna konungr fór sunnan sjau tigum skei›a ok einu, mætr mei›runnviggs rau› sver› at mor›i ﬂá er jarl haf›i um kraf›a húnlagar hreina
Skánunga fundar; sætt seggja áttar gekk sundr.
Lines 154–61: ﬁar hygg ek gram ﬂann er fram›i gunni misstu mjƒk til gengisﬁrœnzkra drengja; mƒrg drótt kom á flótta. Nœfr allvaldr vá einn vi› tvá snjallajƒfra ok jarl enn ﬂri›ja; frægr si›r er til slíks at segja.
Lines 173–80: Geta skal máls ﬂess, er menn kvá›u dá›ƒflgan bƒr dolga fangsmæla vi› drengi at vápna sennu. Hertrygg›ar ‹h›nekkir ba›at sína rekka hyggja
á flótta; ﬂess sessa ﬂjó›ar ﬂróttar or› lifa.
Lines 201–08: Ek fygl›a Frísa dolgi ok Sigvalda, fekk ungr aldrbót ﬂar erspjƒr sungu — nú finnr ƒld at eldumk — ﬂá er bárum ro›inn sárlauk til mótsvi› mœti malmﬂings í dyn hjalma sunnr fyrir Svƒl›rar mynni.

84

VI: Fagrskinna

Lines 230–37: Fjƒr› kom Ormr enn langi í heldr har›a — rœyr drœyra hnitu
saman — ﬂá tungl tingla tangar skrusk, ﬂá er brynflag‹››s reginn lag›ibor›mikinn Bar›a vi› sí›u Fáfnis; jarl vann hjalms hrí› und holmi.
Lines 138–45: Snarpra sver›a gangr ger›isk um Orm enn langa; drengir slitu
fri› lengi ﬂá er gullin spjƒr gullu. Kvá›u svænska menn ok danska dolgs runna
fylgja hánum fram sunnr at fráns leggbita sennu.
Lines 246–53: Hykkat ek væg› at vígi — drótt vann jƒfur sóttan, jarl kom‹sk›
at fjƒr›jƒr›u — ógnhar›an spƒr›u sik ﬂá er folkhar›r fœr›u› Bar›a á fjar›m‡ils
trƒ› vi›r Orm enn langa — lítt var Sifjar sóti svangr.
Lines 259–66: He›ins baugs serkjar verkendr, sárir í naddfárs bƒ›, sukku ni›raf Na›ri; ger›ut vægjask vi›. Ormr man lengi vanr slíkra drengja ﬂar er hannskrí›r me›r li› l‡›a, ﬂótt alld‡rr konungr st‡ri Ormi.
Lines 277–84: Hugreifr ﬂengill hét á sína heiptar n‡ta drengi — ﬂjó› stƒkkme› Óleifi aptr um ﬂoptur — ﬂá er hƒf›u lokit skei›um hallands hafvita um
snjallan gram; vápnrei› var› um Vin›a myr›i.
Lines 306–13: Ógrœ›ir armgrjóts sá Tranu ok bá›a Na›ra fljóta au›a — gla›r,hann rau› geir at gunni — á›r en hjaldrﬂorinn ﬁórketill, hugframr í ramri bƒ›á snœrivitni, heldi snotr sunds undan.
Lines 325–32: Veit ek eigi hitt, hvár‹t› skal ek lœyfa hungrdœyfi Heita d‡rbliksdynsæ›inga dau›an e›a ﬂó kvikvan, alls seggir segja mér hvárttveggja sannliga;sárr mun gramr at hváru; hætt er at frétta til hans.
Lines 333–40: Var samr árr oddflag‹››s hinn er ﬂat sag›i um ævi læstyggs
burar Tryggva at lof›a gramr lif›i. ¯ld kve›r Óláf vera kominn ór éli stála;menn geta ferri sƒnnu máli; mjƒk er verr en svá.
Lines 342–49: Mundut ver›a skƒp ﬂess, er ﬂegnar sóttu ﬂrótthar›an gram —ek fer me›r lí›i landher›ar l‡›a — at margd‡rr mundjƒkuls st‡rir myndi koma
ór slíkum her; ﬂykkjat mér gotnar geta glíkli‹g›s.
Lines 351–58: Enn segir sumr seggr kenni au›ar frá sárum tyggja e›a brott ofkomnum ór malma gnaustan austr. Nú er mor› siklings sannfregit sunnan ór
miklum styr; kann ek eigi margt at veifanar or›i manna.
Lines 360–67: Ek hygg nenninn dróttin Nor›manna sóttan und lok; nú er
ﬂengill genginn fram; d‡rr dróttar stjóri hné; dau›i gó›s grams brá gœ›i úfárar
ﬂjó›ar. Allr f‹r›i›r glepsk af falli flug‹s›tyggs sunar Tryggva.

VII: Heimskringla

85

VII: Snorri Sturluson: HEIMSKRINGLA
Snorri’s cycle of sixteen sagas about Norwegian kings is often regarded
as supreme among the konungasögur ‘Kings’ Sagas’. Works such as
Morkinskinna, Fagrskinna and sagas of individual kings includingÓláfr Tryggvason and Óláfr Haraldsson have chronological precedence,and they provided Snorri both with material and with literary models(see the list of historiographical antecedents in the introduction to
extract VI above). Nevertheless, Heimskringla is outstanding for its
scope, balance, literary verve, and shrewd penetration of human natureand political motive.
Heimskringla may be seen as a triptych, in which the great saga ofÓláfr Haraldsson (St Óláfr), adapted from Snorri’s earlier separatesaga, is flanked by sagas about his predecessors and successors. ExtractA, from the concluding saga of the first ‘third’ of Heimskringla, shows
something of the variety of the work. The narrative follows theadventures of Óláfr Tryggvason in the British Isles before his coming
to power in Norway c.995, as he engages in routine raiding andacquires, through a mix of supernatural influences and his own practicalflair, a new religion, a distinguished wife and a famous dog. Many ofthe plot motifs have a distinctly folkloristic tinge — test, assumed
identity, prophecy, rivalry in love and a ‘helpful animal’ — and can beparalleled, for instance, in I. Boberg’s Motif-Index of Early Icelandic
Literature (1966). The theme of Icelandic independence under threat— of contemporary interest to Snorri writing probably in the years
around 1230 — is then dramatised in the famous landvættir incident(ch. 33). Extract B, from the racy Haralds saga Sigur›arsonar, is set
in the mid eleventh century. It illustrates on a small scale Snorri’s giftfor constructing powerful narrative, as he builds an expectation oftreachery through skilful disposition of information and throughmanipulation of viewpoint as we follow the jealous gaze of Haraldr
watching his rival from a balcony, and enter the darkened chamberwith the doomed Einarr. Within Haralds saga as a whole the episodecontributes to the portrayal of the power-hungry monarch who so welldeserved his nickname har›rá›i ‘the hard-ruler, the ruthless’, and it
explores themes which run throughout Heimskringla: law, leadership,
and the precarious balance of power between the royal descendants ofHaraldr hárfagri, the dynasty of the Hla›ajarlar, the lendir menn andthe free farmers. Both extracts also illustrate the construction of prose

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VII: Heimskringla

narratives from the suggestions of skaldic verses, of which Snorri cites
over six hundred in the work as a whole.
Most of the events told in the two extracts appear in others of theSagas of Kings, but never with the same literary or ideologicalemphasis. There is, for instance, a strongly clerical flavour to theaccount of Óláfr’s baptism in Oddr Snorrason’s Óláfs saga Tryggvasonar and The Greatest Saga of Óláfr Tryggvason (Óláfs saga Tryggvasonar en mesta; this is partly dependent on Heimskringla). The
Morkinskinna account of the death of Einarr ﬂambarskelfir contains
some of the same fine dramatic strokes as Snorri’s, including Einarr’s
words, Myrkt er í málstofu konungs, ‘it is dark in the king’s councilchamber’, but the circumstances leading up to his killing are quite
different, and, as in Fagrskinna, the narrative is much more favourable
to King Haraldr. Snorri’s account bears a strong resemblance to thatin the fragmentary Hákonar saga Ívarssonar (an unusual early
thirteenth-century Icelandic biography of an eleventh-century
Norwegian chieftain who was neither a king nor a saint), but being
more streamlined it has greater dramatic impact.
Snorri Sturluson had much experience of the world, which to someextent conditioned his view of the past. An ambitious Icelandic magnatehonoured with office at the Norwegian court, lawyer, poet and mythographer, he lived at a time when struggles between the leading Icelandicfamilies, tensions between ecclesiastical and secular powers andpressure from Norway were opening the way for Iceland’s formal
submission to the Norwegian crown in 1262–64. His fascination withthe complexities of political and social relationships is as apparent in
Heimskringla as it is in Snorri’s own life as glimpsed through Sturlunga
saga and other prose works (see further Bagge 1991; Whaley 1991).
The present text is based on the manuscript readings presented in
Finnur Jónsson’s four-volume Heimskringla (1893–1901, I 307–18
and III 132–37), supplemented by Bjarni A›albjarnarson’s edition(Íslenzk fornrit XXVI 264–72 and XXVIII 122–26). Of themanuscripts, Kringla, a thirteenth-century vellum of which only one
leaf survives, is considered to have, in general, the text closest to
Snorri’s original; and it is from its opening words Kringla heimsins‘the circle of the world’, that the grandiose modern title of the work
derives. The text of Kringla is preserved in seventeenth-century copies,
especially AM 35, 36 and 63 fol. (which cover the three parts ofVII: Heimskringla

87

Heimskringla respectively and are referred to in the notes as K), and18 fol. in the Royal Library Stockholm (Stock. papp. fol. nr 18). The‘K’ readings have been adopted except where an alternative is clearlysuperior. The manuscripts most closely related to K are AM 39 fol.
(= 39) and Codex Frisianus or Fríssbók (= F), while a second group isformed by Jöfraskinna (surviving mainly in two paper copies known
as J1 and J2) and AM 47 fol. (= 47), known as Eirspennill, whichcontains little more than the final third of Heimskringla.
Chapter headings are taken from 18; most are supported in at least
one other manuscript, often J2.
Bibliography
Editions: Heimskringla. Nóregs konunga sögur af Snorri Sturluson I–IV, ed.
Finnur Jónsson (1893–1901); Snorri Sturluson, Heimskringla I–III, ed.
Bjarni A›albjarnarson, ÍF 26–28 (1941–51).
Translations: Snorri Sturluson, Heimskringla. Part One: The Olaf Sagas I–II,
tr. Samuel Laing, revised Jacqueline Simpson (1964); Part Two: Sagas of
the Norse Kings, tr. Samuel Laing, revised Peter Foote, Everyman’s Library(1961). Heimskringla or the Lives of the Norse Kings, tr. Erling Monsen
and A. H. Smith (1932); Heimskringla. History of the Kings of Norway by
Snorri Sturluson, tr. Lee M. Hollander (1964, repr. 1977).
Background:
Diana Whaley, Heimskringla: An Introduction. Viking Society for Northern
Research (1991).
Sverre Bagge, Society and Politics in Snorri Sturluson’s Heimskringla (1991).
Bo Almqvist, Norrön niddiktning I: Nid mot furstar (1965).
Hákonar saga Ívarssonar, ed. Jón Helgason and Jakob Benediktsson, Samfund
til Udgivelse af Gammel Nordisk Litteratur 62 (1952).
R. Meissner, Die Kenningar der Skalden (1921).
For other Kings’ Sagas see Introduction and Bibliography to VI above.

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VII: Heimskringla
VII A: ÓLÁFS SAGA TRYGGVASONAR
Chapter 30: Herna›r Óláfs konungs

Sí›an helt Óláfr Tryggvason til Englands ok herja›i ví›a um landit.
Hann sigldi allt nor›r til Nor›imbralands ok herja›i ﬂar. ﬁa›an helt
hann nor›r til Skotlands ok herja›i ﬂar ví›a. ﬁa›an sigldi hann til
Su›reyja ok átti ﬂar nƒkkurar orrostur. Sí›an helt hann su›r til Manar
6 ok bar›isk ﬂar. Hann herja›i ok ví›a um Írland. ﬁá helt hann til
Bretlands ok herja›i ví›a ﬂat land, ok svá ﬂar er kallat er Kumraland.
ﬁa›an sigldi hann vestr til Vallands ok herja›i ﬂar. ﬁá sigldi hann
9 vestan ok ætla›i til Englands. ﬁá kom hann í eyjar ﬂær er Syllingar
heita, vestr í hafit frá Englandi. Svá segir Hallfre›r vandræ›askáld:1
3

12

15

18

21

24

27

Ger›isk ungr vi› Englaofvægr konungr bægja.
Naddskúrar ré› nœrir
Nor›imbra sá mor›i.
Eyddi ulfa greddirógnblí›r Skotum ví›a(ger›i seims) me› sver›i(sver›leik í Mƒn sker›ir).
†drógar lét œgireyverskan her deyja— T‡r var tjƒrva d‡rra
tírar gjarn — ok Íra.
Bar›i brezkrar jar›ar
byggvendr ok hjó tyggi— grá›r ﬂvarr geira hrí›argjó›i — kumrskar ﬂjó›ir.
Óláfr Tryggvason var fjóra vetr í herna›i sí›an er hann fór af Vin›landi
til ﬂess er hann kom í Syllingar.

22 t‡jar K; most manuscripts have tírar.

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Chapter 31: Skír›isk Óláfr konungr í SyllingumÓláfr Tryggvason, ﬂá er hann lá í Syllingum, spur›i hann at ﬂar í 30
eyjunni var spáma›r nƒkkurr, sá er sag›i fyrir óor›na hluti, ok ﬂóttimƒrgum mƒnnum ﬂat mjƒk eptir ganga. Ger›isk Óláfi forvitni á atreyna spádóm manns ﬂess. Hann sendi ﬂann af mƒnnum sínum er 33
frí›astr var ok mestr, ok bjó hann sem vegligast, ok ba› hann segja athann væri konungr, ﬂví at Óláfr var ﬂá frægr or›inn af ﬂví um ƒll lƒndat hann var frí›ari ok gƒfugligri ok meiri en allir menn a›rir. En sí›an 36
er hann fór ór Gar›aríki haf›i hann eigi meira af nafni sínu en kalla›isik Óla ok kvazk vera gerzkr.
En er sendima›r kom til spámannsins ok sag›isk vera konungr, ﬂá 39
fekk hann ﬂessi andsvƒr:‘Ekki ertu konungr, en ﬂat er rá› mitt at ﬂú sér trúr konungi ﬂínum.’
Ekki sag›i hann fleira ﬂessum manni. Fór sendima›r aptr ok segir 42Óláfi, ok f‡sti hann ﬂess at meir at finna ﬂenna mann er hann heyr›islík andsvƒr hans, ok tók nú ifa af honum at hann væri eigi spáma›r.
Fór ﬂá Óláfr á hans fund ok átti tal vi› hann ok spur›i eptir hvat 45
spáma›r seg›i Óláfi fyrir, hvernug honum myndi ganga til ríkis e›aannarrar hamingju.
48
Einsetuma›rinn svara›i me› helgum spádómi:‘ﬁú munt ver›a ágætr konungr ok ágæt verk vinna. ﬁú munt mƒrgum
mƒnnum til trúar koma ok skírnar. Muntu bæ›i ﬂér hjálpa í ﬂví okmƒrgum ƒ›rum. Ok til ﬂess at ﬂú ifir eigi um ﬂessi mín andsvƒr, ﬂá 51
máttu ﬂat til marks hafa: ﬂú munt vi› skip ﬂín svikum mœta ok flokkum,
ok mun á bardaga rœtask, ok muntu t‡na nƒkkuru li›i ok sjálfr sár fá,
ok muntu af ﬂví sári banvænn vera ok á skildi til skips borinn. En af 54
ﬂessu sári muntu heill ver›a innan sjau nátta ok brátt vi› skírn taka.’
Sí›an fór Óláfr ofan til skipa sinna, ok ﬂá mœtti hann ﬂar ófri›armƒnnum ﬂeim er hann vildu drepa ok li› hans. Ok fóru ﬂeira vi›skipti 57
svá sem einsetuma›r haf›i sagt honum, at Óláfr var sárr borinn á skip
út, ok svá at hann var heill á sjau nóttum. ﬁóttisk ﬂá Óláfr vita at
ﬂessi ma›r myndi honum sanna hluti sagt hafa ok ﬂat, at hann var 60
sannr spáma›r, hva›an af sem hann hef›i ﬂann spádóm.
Fór ﬂá Óláfr annat sinn at finna ﬂenna mann, tala›i ﬂá mart vi›hann, spur›i vendiliga hva›an honum kom sú speki er hann sag›i 63
fyrir óor›na hluti. Einsetuma›r segir at sjálfr Gu› kristinna manna lét
hann vita allt ﬂat er hann forvitna›isk, ok segir ﬂá Óláfi mƒrg stórmerki

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Gu›s. Ok af ﬂeim fortƒlum játti Óláfr at taka skírn, ok svá var at Óláfr
var skír›r ﬂar ok allt fƒruneyti hans.2 Dval›isk hann ﬂar mjƒk lengi ok
nam rétta trú, ok haf›i ﬂa›an me› sér presta ok a›ra lær›a menn.

69

Chapter 32: Óláfr fekk Gy›uÓláfr sigldi ór Syllingum um haustit til Englands, lá ﬂar í hƒfn einni,
fór ﬂá me› fri›i, ﬂví at England var kristit ok hann var ok kristinn. En
72 ﬂar fór um landit ﬂingbo› nƒkkut, ok allir menn skyldu til ﬂings koma.
En er ﬂing var sett, ﬂá kom ﬂar dróttning ein er Gy›a er nefnd,
systir Óláfs kvárans er konungr var á Írlandi í Dyflinni. Hon haf›i
75 gipt verit á Englandi jarli einum ríkum. Var sá ﬂá anda›r, en hon helt
eptir ríkinu. En sá ma›r var í ríki hennar er nefndr er Alvini, kappi
mikill ok hólmgƒnguma›r. Hann haf›i be›it hennar, en hon svara›i
78 svá at hon vildi kjør af hafa, hvern hon vildi eiga af ﬂeim mƒnnum er
í hennar ríki váru, ok var fyrir ﬂá sƒk ﬂings kvatt at Gy›a skyldi sérmann kjósa. Var ﬂar kominn Alvini ok búinn me› inum beztum
81 klæ›um, ok margir a›rir váru ﬂar vel búnir. Óláfr var ﬂar kominn ok
haf›i vásklæ›i sín ok lo›kápu ‡zta, stó› me› sína sveit út í frá ƒ›rummƒnnum.
Gy›a gekk ok leit sér á hvern mann ﬂann er henni ﬂótti nƒkkut
84
mannsmót at. En er hon kom ﬂar sem Óláfr stó›, ok sá upp í andlit
honum ok spyrr hverr ma›r hann er, hann nefndi sik Óla.
‘Ek em útlendr ma›r hér,’ segir hann.
87Gy›a mælti, ‘Viltu eiga mik, ﬂá vil ek kjósa ﬂik.’‘Eigi vil ek neita ﬂví,’ segir hann.
Hann spur›i hvert nafn ﬂessarar konu var, ætt e›a ø›li.
90‘Ek em,’ segir hon, ‘konungsdóttir af Írlandi. Var ek gipt higat til
lands jarli ﬂeim er hér ré› ríki. Nú sí›an er hann anda›isk, ﬂá hefi ek
93 st‡rt ríkinu. Menn hafa be›it mín ok engi sá er ek vilda giptask. En ek
heiti Gy›a.’
Hon var ung kona ok frí›. Tala ﬂau sí›an ﬂetta mál ok semja ﬂat sín
96 á milli. Festir Óláfr sér Gy›u.
Alvina líkar nú ákafliga illa. En ﬂat var si›r á Englandi, ef tveir
menn kepptusk um einn hlut, at ﬂar skyldi vera til hólmganga. B‡›r
99 Alvini Óláfi Tryggvasyni til hólmgƒngu um ﬂetta mál. ﬁeir leggja me›sér stefnulag til bardaga, ok skulu vera tólf hvárir. En er ﬂeir finnask,
mælir Óláfr svá vi› sína menn at ﬂeir geri svá sem hann gerir. Hann

VII: Heimskringla

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haf›i mikla øxi. En er Alvini vildi hƒggva sver›i til hans, ﬂá laust 102
hann sver›it ór hƒndum honum ok annat hƒgg sjálfan hann, svá at
Alvini fell. Sí›an batt Óláfr hann fast. Fóru svá allir menn Alvina at
ﬂeir váru bar›ir ok bundnir ok leiddir svá heim til herbergja Óláfs. 105
Sí›an ba› hann Alvina fara ór landi brott ok koma eigi aptr, en Óláfr
tók allar eigur hans. Óláfr fekk ﬂá Gy›u ok dval›isk á Englandi en108
stundum á Írlandi.
ﬁá er Óláfr var á Írlandi, var hann staddr í herfer› nƒkkurri, ok fóru
ﬂeir me› skipum. Ok ﬂá er ﬂeir ﬂurftu strandhƒggva, ﬂá ganga menn‹á land› ok reka ofan fjƒl›a búsmala. ﬁá kømr eptir einn bóndi ok ba› 111
Óláf gefa sér k‡r ﬂær, er hann átti. Óláfr ba› hann hafa k‡r sínar, ef
hann mætti kenna.
114‘Ok dvel ekki fer› vára.’Bóndi haf›i ﬂar mikinn hjar›hund. Hann vísa›i hundinum í nautaflokkana, ok váru ﬂar rekin mƒrg hundru› nauta. Hundrinn hljóp um
alla nautaflokkana ok rak brott jafnmƒrg naut sem bóndi sag›i at hann 117
ætti, ok váru ﬂau ƒll á einn veg mƒrku›. ﬁóttusk ﬂeir ﬂá vita at hundrinn
myndi rétt kennt hafa. ﬁeim ﬂótti hundr sá fur›u vitr. ﬁá spyrr Óláfr ef
120
bóndi vildi gefa honum hundinn.
‘Gjarna,’ segir bóndi.
Óláfr gaf honum ﬂegar í sta› gullhring ok hét honum vináttu sinni.
Sá hundr hét Vígi ok var allra hunda beztr. Átti Óláfr hann lengi sí›an.3 123

Chapter 33: Frá Haraldi Gormssyni
Haraldr Gormsson Danakonungr spur›i at Hákon jarl haf›i kastat
kristni en herjat land Danakonungs ví›a. ﬁá bau› Haraldr Danakonungr 126
her út ok fór sí›an í Nóreg. Ok er hann kom í ﬂat ríki er Hákon jarlhaf›i til forrá›a, ﬂá herjar hann ﬂar ok eyddi land allt ok kom li›inu í
eyjar ﬂær er Sólundir heita. Fimm einir bœir stó›u óbrenndir ‹í Sogni› 129
í Læradal, en fólk allt fl‡›i á fjƒll ok markir me› ﬂat allt er komask
mátti.
ﬁá ætla›i Danakonungr at sigla li›i ﬂví til Íslands ok hefna ní›s 132
ﬂess, er allir Íslendingar hƒf›u hann níddan. ﬁat var í lƒgum haft áÍslandi, at yrkja skyldi um Danakonung ní›vísu fyrir nef hvert er á
var landinu.4 En sú var sƒk til, at skip ﬂat, er íslenzkir menn áttu, braut 135
í Danmƒrk, en Danir tóku upp fé allt ok kƒllu›u vágrek, ok ré› fyrir

92

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bryti konungs, er Birgir hét. Var ní› ort um ﬂá bá›a. ﬁetta er í ní›inu:5
138

141

144

ﬁá er sparn á mó Marnarmor›kunnr Haraldr sunnan,var› ﬂá Vin›a myr›ir6
vax eitt, í ham faxa,
en bergsalar Birgirbƒndum rækr í landi— ﬂa‹t› sá ƒld — í jƒldu
óríkr fyrir líki.7

Haraldr konungr bau› kunngum manni at fara í hamfƒrum til Íslands
ok freista hvat hann kynni segja honum.8 Sá fór í hvalslíki. En er hannkom til landsins, ﬂá fór hann vestr fyrir nor›an landit. Hann sá at fjƒll
ƒll ok hólar váru fullir af landvéttum, sumt stórt en sumt smátt.9 En er
150 hann kom fyrir Vápnafjƒr›, ﬂá fór hann inn á fjƒr›inn ok ætla›i á landat ganga. ﬁá fór ofan ór dalnum dreki mikill ok fylg›u honum margir
ormar, pƒddur ok e›lur ok blésu eitri á hann. En hann lag›isk í brott
153 ok vestr fyrir land, allt fyrir Eyjafjƒr›. Fór hann inn eptir ﬂeim fir›i.
ﬁar fór móti honum fugl svá mikill at vængirnir tóku út fjƒllin tveggja
vegna, ok fjƒl›i annarra fugla, bæ›i stórir ok smáir. Braut fór hann
156 ﬂa›an ok vestr um landit ok svá su›r í Brei›afjƒr› ok stefndi ﬂar inn áfjƒr›. ﬁar fór móti honum gri›ungr mikill ok ó› á sæinn út ok tók atgella ógurliga. Fjƒl›i landvétta fylg›i honum. Brott fór hann ﬂa›an ok
159 su›r um Reykjanes ok vildi ganga upp á Víkarsskei›i. ﬁar kom í móti
honum bergrisi ok haf›i járnstaf í hendi, ok bar hƒfu›it hæra en fjƒllin,ok margir a›rir jƒtnar me› honum.10
162
ﬁa›an fór hann austr me› endlƒngu landi.
‘Var ﬂá ekki,’ segir hann, ‘nema sandar ok ørœfi ok brim mikit fyrir
útan, en haf svá mikit millim landanna,’ segir hann, ‘at ekki er ﬂar
165 fœrt langskipum.’ﬁá var Brodd-Helgi í Vápnafir›i, Eyjólfr Valger›arson í Eyjafir›i,ﬁór›r gellir í Brei›afir›i, ﬁóroddr go›i í ¯lfusi.11
168
Sí›an snøri Danakonungr li›i sínu su›r me› landi, fór sí›an til
Danmerkr, en Hákon jarl lét byggva land allt ok galt enga skatta sí›an
Danakonungi.
147

138 mƒrnis K, Mƒrnar Jómsvíkinga saga (291).
Jómsvíkinga saga (291).

145 ríki K, líki J1, F,

VII: Heimskringla

93

Notes
1 The following two stanzas belong to a sequence of verses aboutÓláfr’s viking exploits which also appears in Oddr Snorrason’s Óláfs
saga Tryggvasonar and in Fagrskinna and is edited by Finnur Jónsson
in Skj A I 156–59, B I 148–50, where the two are printed as stanzas 8
and 9. Oddr Snorrason and the Fagrskinna author quote 8a and 9b as
a single stanza, then 8b (lines 7–8 then 5–6) and 9a as another. Bjarne
Fidjestøl suggests that Snorri’s ordering and his prefatory prose
represent a rearrangement in the interests of greater geographicalcoherence (Det norrøne fyrstediktet, 1982, 106–09).
2 According to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (E and F versions), Óláfr

(Anlaf) was confirmed at Andover in 994, with King Æthelred as hissponsor.
3 The faithful Vígi is portrayed as pining to death after his master’s fallin Oddr Snorrason’s saga and The Greatest Saga of Óláfr Tryggvason.
4 One verse per head (literally ‘nose’) of the population would of course

have resulted in an impossibly long poem, unless only the chieftains
were meant; but it is likely that each person was supposed to contribute a single free-standing verse (lausavísa). As Almqvist (1965, 164–
65 and 232) suggests, this may be a play on the idea of a poll-tax.
5 This verse is also quoted in AM 291 4to, a manuscript of Jómsvíkingasaga. Almqvist (1965, 119–85 and 221–35) gives a full discussion of
the verse and the whole episode.
6 Almqvist (1965, 182–84) suggests that Vin›a myr›ir ‘slayer of Wends’

and mor›kunnr ‘battle-famed’ may be ironic, taunting the Danes fortheir lack of success against the Wends.
7 Birgir is fyrir ‘in front’, and í . . . jƒldu líki ‘in a mare’s form’ neatly

parallels í ham faxa ‘in the shape of a horse’, hence implying a jibe
about passive homosexuality of the sort common in ní› ‘slander’. The
association of horses with sexual energy is also traditional.
8 The following episode is virtually unique to Heimskringla. Elsewhere

Snorri frequently prefers more rational explanations to supernaturalones, but here he vividly dramatises the hazards of sailing a fleet to aland whose coast is unfamiliar and inhabitants hostile. In The Greatest
Saga of Óláfr Tryggvason these are merely presented in the form of94

VII: Heimskringla

sober arguments which dissuade Haraldr from his intended invasion.
9 The landvættir (or landvéttir: ‘land-beings’ or ‘land-spirits’) appear
in other sources, including Landnámabók, as supernatural guardiansor rulers of the land.
10 The resemblance of the four main creatures — a dragon, a hugebird, an ox and a giant — to the Evangelist symbols of Christian iconography has been pointed out, e.g. by Einar Ól. Sveinsson in Minjar ok
Menntir, Afmælisrit helga› Kristjáni Eldjárn (1976), 117–29, but
Almqvist (1965, 136–47 and 225–27) argues for origins in the native
concepts of fetches, shape-shifters and dream figures. Whether or notthese four are to be counted among the landvættir is unclear. The caseagainst is put by Almqvist (1965, 147–50 and 227–28), who is supported by Jón Hnefill A›alsteinsson, ‘Landvættir, verndarvættir lands’,
in Skæ›agrös (1997), 83. The four figures were adopted to support thearmorial bearings of Iceland in 1919.
11 The neat representation of all four quarters of Iceland by fabulous

defenders and a parallel set of prominent chieftains is characteristic ofSnorri’s often systematic approach. Almqvist points out (1965, 146–47
and 227) the match of ﬁór›r gellir’s nickname, which means ‘bellower’and is recorded as a name for an ox, with the bellowing ox ofBrei›afjƒr›r.
Verses in prose word orderLines 11–18: Ungr, ofvægr konungr ger›isk bægja vi› Engla. Sá nœrir
naddskúrar ré› mor›i Nor›imbra. Ógnblí›r greddir ulfa eyddi Skotum ví›ame› sver›i. Sker›ir seims ger›i sver›leik í Mƒn.
Lines 19–26: See Section C below.
Lines 138–45: ﬁá er mor›kunnr Haraldr sparn sunnan á mó Marnar í ham
faxa, var› myr›ir Vin›a ﬂá vax eitt, en óríkr Birgir, rækr bƒndum bergsalarí landi, fyrir í líki jƒldu. ¯ld sá ﬂa‹t›. [Understand var› to be repeated before
fyrir.]

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95

VII B: HARALDS SAGA SIGUR‹ARSONAR
Chapter 40: Frá Einari ﬂambarskelfi
Einarr ﬂambarskelfir var ríkastr lendra manna í ﬁrándheimi.12 Heldr var
fátt um me› ﬂeim Haraldi konungi. Haf›i Einarr ﬂó veizlur sínar, ﬂær
sem hann haf›i haft me›an Magnús konungr lif›i. Einarr var mjƒkstórau›igr. Hann átti Bergljótu, dóttur Hákonar jarls, sem fyrr var ritat.13E‹i›ndri›i var ﬂá alroskinn, sonr ﬂeira. Hann átti ﬂá Sigrí›i, dóttur
Ketils kálfs ok Gunnhildar, systurdóttur Haralds konungs. Eindri›i
haf›i frí›leik ok fegr› af mó›urfrændum sínum, Hákoni jarli e›a sonum
hans, en vƒxt ok afl haf›i hann af fƒ›ur sínum, Einari, ok alla ﬂá atgørvi
er Einarr haf›i um fram a›ra menn. Hann var inn vinsælsti ma›r.14

3

6

9

Chapter 42: Frá Haraldi konungi
Haraldr konungr var ríklunda›r, ok óx ﬂat sem hann festisk í landi‹nu›, 12
ok kom svá at flestum mƒnnum dug›i illa at mæla í móti honum e›adraga fram annat mál en hann vildi vera láta. Svá segir ﬁjó›ólfr skáld:15
Gegn skyli herr sem hugnar
hjaldrvitja›ar sitja
dolgstœranda d‡rum
dróttinvandr ok standa.
L‡tr folkstara feiti(fátt er til nema játta
ﬂat sem ﬂá vill gotnum)
ﬂjó› ƒll (konungr bjó›a).

15

18

21

Chapter 43: Frá Einari ﬂambarskelfi
Einarr ﬂambarskelfir var mest forstjóri fyrir bóndum allt um ﬁrándheim. 24
Helt hann upp svƒrum fyrir ﬂá á ﬂingum er konungs menn sóttu. Einarr
kunni vel til laga. Skorti hann eigi dirf› til at flytja ﬂat fram á ﬂingum,ﬂó at sjálfr konungr væri vi›. Veittu honum li› allir bœndr. Konungr 27
reiddisk ﬂví mjƒk, ok kom svá at lyk›um at ﬂeir ﬂreyttu kappmæli.
Segir Einarr at bœndr vildu eigi ﬂola honum ólƒg, ef hann bryti landsrétt á ﬂeim. Ok fór svá nƒkkurum sinnum milli ﬂeira. ﬁá tók Einarr at 30
hafa fjƒlmenni um sik heima, en ﬂó miklu fleira ‹ﬂá› er hann fór til

96

VII: Heimskringlab‡jar svá at konungr var ﬂar fyrir. ﬁat var eitt sinn at Einarr fór inn til
33 b‡jar ok haf›i li› mikit, langskip átta e›a níu ok nær fimm hundru›ummanna. En er hann kom til bœjar, gekk hann upp me› li› ﬂat. Haraldr
konungr var í gar›i sínum ok stó› út‹i› í loptsvƒlum ok sá er li› Einars
36 gekk af skipum, ok segja menn at Haraldr kva› ﬂá:16

39

42

45

48

Hér sé ek upp enn ƒrvaEinar, ﬂann er kann skeina
ﬂjalfa, ﬂambarskelfi,
ﬂangs, fjƒlmennan ganga.
Fullafli bí›r fyllar(finn ek opt, at drífr minna)
hilmis stóls (á hælahúskarla li› jarli).
Rjó›andi mun rá›aranda bliks ór landi
oss,17 nema Einarr kyssiøxar munn enn ﬂunna.
Einarr dval›isk í b‡num nƒkkura daga.
Chapter 44: Fall Einars ok Eindri›a

51 Einn dag var átt mót, ok var konungr sjálfr á mótinu. Haf›i verit tekinn

í b‡num ﬂjófr einn ok var haf›r á mótinu. Ma›rinn haf›i verit fyrrme› Einari, ok haf›i honum vel getizk at manninum. Var Einari sagt.
54 ﬁá ﬂóttisk hann vita at konungr myndi eigi manninn láta undan ganga
fyrir ﬂví at heldr ﬂótt Einari ﬂœtti ﬂat máli skipta. Lét ﬂá Einarr vápnaskli› sitt, ok ganga sí›an á mótit. Tekr Einarr manninn af mótinu me›
57 valdi. Eptir ﬂetta gengu at beggja vinir ok báru sáttmál milli ﬂeira.
Kom ﬂá svá at stefnulagi var á komit. Skyldu ﬂeir hittask sjálfir.
Málstofa var í konungsgar›i vi› ána ni›ri. Gekk konungr í stofuna
60 vi› fá menn, en annat li› hans stó› úti í gar›inum. Konungr lét snúafjƒl yfir ljórann, ok var lítit opit á. ﬁá kom Einarr í gar›inn me› sittli›. Hann mælti vi› Eindri›a, son sinn:‘Ver ﬂú me› li›inu úti, vi› engu mun mér ﬂá hætt.’63
39 ﬂjalma K, ﬂjalfa Hulda, Hrokkinskinna, Flateyjarbók; -skelmi K, -skelfi
39, Fagrskinna (B), Hulda.

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97

Eindri›i stó› úti vi› stofudyrrin. En er Einarr kom inn í stofuna,mælti hann:‘Myrkt er í málstofu konungsins.’
66
Jafnskjótt hljópu menn at honum, ok lƒg›u sumir en sumir hjoggu.
En er Eindri›i heyr›i ﬂat, brá hann sver›inu ok hljóp inn í stofuna.
Var hann ﬂegar felldr ok bá›ir ﬂeir.
69
ﬁá hljópu konungsmenn at stofunni ok fyrir dyrrin, en bóndum fellusk
hendr, ﬂví at ﬂeir hƒf›u ﬂá engan forgƒngumann. Eggja›i hverr annan,
segja at skƒmm var er ﬂeir skyldu eigi hefna hƒf›ingja síns, en ﬂó 72
var› ekki af atgƒngunni. Konungr gekk út til li›s síns ok skaut á fylking
ok setti upp merki sitt, en engi var› atganga bóandanna. ﬁá gekk
konungr út á skip sitt ok allt li› hans, røri sí›an út eptir ánni ok svá út 75
á fjƒr› lei› sína.
Bergljót, kona Einars, spur›i fall hans.18 Var hon ﬂá í herbergi ﬂví er
ﬂau Einarr hƒf›u haft út í bœnum. Gekk hon ﬂegar upp í konungsgar›, 78
ﬂar sem bóndali›it var. Hon eggja›i ﬂá mjƒk til orrostu, en í ﬂví bili
røri konungr út eptir ánni. ﬁá mælti Bergljót:‘Missum vér nú Hákonar Ívarssonar, frænda míns. Eigi mundu 81
banamenn Eindri›a róa hér út eptir ánni, ef Hákon stœ›i hér áárbakkanum.’Sí›an lét Bergljót búa um lík ﬂeira Einars ok Eindri›a. Váru ﬂeir 84
jar›a›ir at Óláfskirkju hjá lei›i Magnúss konungs Óláfssonar.
Eptir fall Einars var Haraldr konungr svá mjƒk óﬂokka›r af verki
ﬂessu at ﬂat einu skorti á, er lendir menn ok bœndr veittu eigi atfer› 87
ok heldu bardaga vi› hann, at engi var› forgƒnguma›r til at reisa merki
fyrir bóandaherinum.

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VII: Heimskringla
Notes

12 Einarr ﬂambarskelfir Eindri›ason’s adult life spans the first half ofthe eleventh century, and he plays a prominent role in the sagas ofseveral rulers of Norway (see the Fagrskinna extract in this volume).
The meaning of his nickname has been debated, but ‘bow-string
trembler’ or ‘paunch-shaker’ are among the possible interpretations(B. Fidjestøl argues for the former in Nordica Bergensia 14 (1997),
6–8). Lendir menn, literally ‘landed men’, were powerful royal officers who had been granted rights to revenues and entertainment fromfarms in a certain territory. Veizla, literally ‘grant, allowance’, hence‘feast’, was applied to the entertainment of the lendr ma›r and his
followers, and extended to encompass broader rights and the farms
from which they were extracted. According to Óláfs saga helga ch. 21
in Heimskringla, Einarr’s veizlur in ﬁrándheimr go back to the reignof the earls Eiríkr and Sveinn at the beginning of the eleventh century,
as does his marriage to their sister Bergljót.
13 See Óláfs saga Tryggvasonar (in Heimskringla) ch. 19.
14 Ch. 41, an account of Ormr jarl and other descendants of the earls of

Hla›ir, still a notable force in Norway at this time, is omitted here.
15 The stanza is from Sexstefja ‘Poem with six refrains’; its second

half comprises the only one of these that is preserved. It is also quotedin Hákonar saga Ívarssonar p. 7 and in the manuscripts Hulda andHrokkinskinna.
16 The next stanza is also in Hákonar saga Ívarssonar p. 8, Fagrskinna(manuscripts B, A), Hulda, Hrokkinskinna and Flateyjarbók; in Snorra
Edda the second half (only) is quoted to illustrate the use of húskarlar
to refer to hir›menn ‘king’s followers, retainers’. The following halfstanza is also in Hákonar saga Ívarssonar p. 9, Fagrskinna (manuscripts B, A), Hulda, Hrokkinskinna and Flateyjarbók.
17 The pronoun oss ‘us’ seems to be used here for sg. ‘me’ — perhaps
an instance of the ‘royal we’, though such use of pl. personal pronouns for sg. is common in skaldic poetry. Alternatively, the sense
could be ‘me and mine’.
18 Bergljót was the daughter of Earl Hákon inn ríki (‘the mighty’)Sigur›arson. Her fleeting appearance as a ‘female inciter’ figure here

VII: Heimskringla

99

is emphasised in manuscripts 39, F and 47, where this sentence begins
a new chapter, headed Frá Bergljót (39), Frá Bergljótu H. dóttur (47;
untitled in F). On this figure, see J. M. Jochens, ‘The female inciter inthe Kings’ Sagas’, Arkiv för nordisk filologi 102 (1987), 100–19.
Bergljót’s scene is absent from Morkinskinna and Fagrskinna.

Verses in prose word orderLines 15–22: Gegn herr hjaldrvitja›ar skyli sitja ok standa dróttinvandr, sem
hugnar d‡rum dolgstœranda. ¯ll ﬂjó› l‡tr feiti folkstara; fátt er til nema
játta ﬂat sem konungr vill ﬂá bjó›a gotnum.
Lines 37–44: Hér sé ek enn ƒrva Einar ﬂambarskelfi, ﬂann er kann skeina
ﬂjalfa ﬂangs, ganga upp fjƒlmennan. Fullafli bí›r fyllar stóls hilmis; finn ek
opt, at minna li› húskarla drífr á hæla jarli.
Lines 45–48: Rjó›andi bliks randa mun rá›a oss ór landi, nema Einarr kyssi
enn ﬂunna munn øxar.

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VII C: THE ART AND CRAFT OF THE SKALDIC STANZAThis section offers a brief introduction to the techniques of skaldic
poetry as illustrated by a stanza from VII A above. It was composed,
according to medieval sources, by Hallfre›r vandræ›askáld (‘troublesome poet’) in praise of King Óláfr Tryggvason at the end of the tenthcentury. It has been chosen here because it typifies in so many ways
the court poetry which is the best-known application of the skaldic
art. The text follows the Heimskringla version (see VII A above, andGlossary and Notes; also Den norsk-islandske Skjaldedigtning, ed.
Finnur Jónsson (1912–15), A I 158–9 for text in manuscript spellingwith variant readings).
†drógar lét œgireyverskan her deyja— T‡r var tjƒrva d‡rra
tírar gjarn — ok Íra.
Bar›i brezkrar jar›ar
byggvendr ok hjó tyggi,— grá›r ﬂvarr geira hrí›argjó›i — kumrskar ﬂjó›ir.
Stanza reordered as if prose:Œgir ‡drógar lét eyverskan her ok Íra deyja. T‡r d‡rra tjƒrva var
gjarn tírar. Tyggi bar›i byggvendr brezkrar jar›ar ok hjó kumrskar
ﬂjó›ir. Grá›r ﬂvarr gjó›i hrí›ar geira.
Translation:
The foe of the bow-string [warrior] caused the island army and the
Irish to die. The T‡r of precious swords [warrior] was eager for glory.
The prince beat the inhabitants of the ‘British’ land and felled the
Cumbrian peoples. Hunger diminished for the osprey of the storm ofspears [battle > raven].
Metrical features:
The metre is dróttkvætt ‘court metre’, that of some five-sixths of theskaldic corpus. Its main features, setting aside certain licences, variations and complications, are these:i. The stanza (vísa) consists of eight lines (vísuor›). The two halfstanzas (vísuhelmingar or helmingar, sg. helmingr) are metrically in-VII: Heimskringla

101

dependent and often syntactically so. (In some cases they are also preserved as separate entities.)
ii. Each line has six syllables.
iii. Each line ends with a trochee (´– x, i.e. heavy, stressed syllable
followed by an unstressed one).
iv. Lines are linked in pairs by alliteration, shown here in bold: twoalliterating sounds (stu›lar) in each odd line and one (the hƒfu›stafr‘chief stave/post’) in the first stressed syllable of each even line. Any
vowel or diphthong alliterates with any other, though preferably an
unlike one (as in lines 1–2 of the stanza above, where it will also be
noted that the pattern of alliteration helps to mark the clause boundaries).
v. Individual lines contain pairs of internal rhymes or hendingar,
indicated here by italics. These link the sounds in stressed syllables,
the second rhyme in the line always falling on the penultimate syllable. The rhyme involves the vowel (or diphthong) in each syllable andone or more postvocalic consonant(s), but where there is no postvocalic
consonant belonging to the same syllable, the rhyme consists of vowel
only. There are two types of internal rhyme. Odd lines normally have
half-rhyme (skothending) in which the vowels are different but one ormore of the postvocalic consonants are identical. Even lines have fullrhyme (a›alhending ‘chief rhyme’) in which vowels and one or more
postvocalic consonant(s) are identical. Quite frequently an a›alhending
is introduced into an odd line, as in lines 3 and 5 of the stanza above.
vi. There are further constraints on the patterns of stress within theline, and on the distribution of alliteration and internal rhyme.
Clause arrangement and word order:
The highly inflected nature of the Old Norse language means that syntactic relations can usually be made clear by grammatical endings andare less heavily dependent on word order than they are in languages
such as modern English; and the skalds exploit this potential flexibility to an often quite extraordinary extent. Within clauses there are frequent departures from the ‘normal’, ‘prose’ order, though because thesyntax is usually quite straightforward this rarely causes real difficulties. It is in the arrangement of clauses within the helmingr that skaldic
style differs most from the everyday. Although skalds frequently use astraightforward sequential pattern, each clause finishing before the102

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next starts (pattern ab, or abc etc.), they also play with clause boundaries, suspending a clause while interrupting with another and hence
making what can be termed ‘frame’ patterns (as in the first helmingrof the specimen stanza, where the clauses form a pattern aba) or ‘interlace’ patterns (abab etc.). Combined patterns are also possible, as
in the second helmingr of the specimen stanza. This could be analysedin two ways: i) as ‘sequence’ and ‘frame’ in the pattern abcb, since
the a clause bar›i . . . byggvendr could be understood as complete,with an understood ‘he’ as subject of bar›i; or ii) as ‘frame’ and ‘interlace’ in the pattern abacb, since once tyggi in line 6 has been reached,it can be taken as subject of bar›i in the a clause as well as of hjó inthe b clause. This is the analysis represented above in ‘Stanza re-ordered
as if prose’. By breaking the linear flow of language, the skalds canallow phrases to float free, resonating with more than one clause in
the helming, and they can also produce special effects, for instancemimicking simultaneous actions or expressing the brokenness of intense emotion.
Content:
The stanza promotes a general military ideology and the reputation ofa specific, though unnamed, viking leader, who is grammatical subject of four out of the five verbs. The defeated enemy is always referred to by collective terms, and is always the grammatical and conceptual object. The claims about the slaughter of these enemies are
extremely generalised, as are the intercalated clauses about the hero’s
desire for glory and the waning of the raven’s hunger (because, it isunderstood, the hero provides carrion), and all these belong to an informal repertoire of motifs which are constantly deployed, and ingeniously varied, by skalds.
Diction:Much of the skalds’ virtuosity goes into expressing recurrent key
concepts such as ‘man, ruler, battle, ship, sword, gold, woman’ bymeans ofi. Poetic appellations known as heiti, such as tjƒr(r) ‘sword’ (or possibly ‘spear’), and tyggi ‘ruler, prince’ in the stanza by Hallfre›r. Heiti
are words which are rare or non-occurring in prose, and often redolent
with connotations in addition to the main concepts to which they refer. Thus hilmir ‘ruler, prince’ has etymological associations with

VII: Heimskringla

103

hjalmr ‘helmet’ and therefore may hint at a ‘helmet-provider’, ‘helmetbearer’ or ‘defender’, while huginn ‘raven’ contains a mythologicalallusion since it is a generalised application of a proper name referring
to one of Ó›inn’s two raven scouts.
ii. Kennings, stereotyped and more or less figurative periphrases
consisting of at least two elements, usually heiti, one functioning as
the ‘base word’ and the other as the ‘determinant’ or qualifier. Thebase word is in whatever grammatical case is required by the syntax,
while the determinant is either in the genitive case and separate fromthe base word, as in grœ›is hestr ‘ocean’s horse’ = ship, or is compounded with the base word, as in sk‡rann ‘cloud-hall’ = sky. Somekennings, including one in the Hallfre›r stanza, are ‘double’ (tvíkennt)
since the determinant of a kenning is itself a kenning. Where this device is repeated, the kenning is ‘extended’, ‘driven’ or perhaps ‘inlaid’ (rekit).
The kennings in the specimen stanza are:‡drógar œgir: ‘bow-string’s terrifier / foe’ = warrior.
T‡r tjƒrva d‡rra: ‘T‡r (god) of precious swords = warrior’: theadj. d‡rra ‘precious’ is not essential to the working of the kenning.
geira hrí›: ‘spears’ storm’ = battle, its gjó›r ‘osprey’ = raven; atvíkennt expression.
The elements are juxtaposed according to certain stereotyped patterns
which are almost infinitely variable. Here battle is ‘spears’ storm’, butalmost any word for weather could be substituted, and any word forweapons or armour.
The difficulty of skaldic poetry:
Skaldic poetry has a reputation for tortuous and riddling complexity,
and some poems, for example the best of the tenth-century pagan compositions, are indeed extremely challenging to the textual skills, mythical knowledge and historical imagination of modern readers. Verses
such as the specimen here, however, are (local textual problems aside)
readily interpretable. Although the skalds liked to surprise by novelty
and by ingenious variation on themes, their art is very much based on
the fulfilment of expectations, grammatical and poetic. In the verse
above, for example, the past tense lét ‘caused’ is extremely likely to
be completed by an infinitive, so that although deyja is separated fromit by three words, the audience will be listening or looking for such a

104

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completion. The god-name T‡r similarly sets up the expectation of a‘warrior’ or ‘man’ kenning with a term for battle, weapon, ship or
treasure as its determinant, and this is fulfilled almost immediately bytjƒrva ‘of swords’ (cf. Meissner 1921, 259–63, 273–79). Again, since
many skaldic battle poems refer to the beasts of battle (raven, eagle orwolf) being fed or cheered (since the hero makes carrion of his
enemies), grá›r ‘hunger, greed’ triggers anticipation of a motif of thiskind. It is therefore fully possible for modern readers, like the original
early Nordic audiences, to acquire a set of frameworks for interpretation, above all by gaining experience of the poetry, but also by consulting reference works on poetic diction such as Snorri Sturluson’s Edda,
the medieval ﬂulur or lists of heiti (printed in Skj A I 649–90; B I 656–80), LP, or Meissner 1921, though in all these cases we should bewareof a too normative approach, and in the last two cases the examples
are sometimes based on heavily emended texts.
Preservation:
On the preservation of skaldic poetry in general, see p. xxv above.
The specimen stanza, together with others in praise of Óláfr, is preserved in the Óláfs saga Tryggvasonar by Oddr Snorrason ch. 82,
Fagrskinna ch. 23, Óláfs saga Tryggvasonar ch. 30 in Heimskringla,and Óláfs saga Tryggvasonar en mesta ch. 77 (cf. note 1 on p. 87
above; on these sources see p. 60 above). In the first two sources, thisand others of Hallfre›r’s verses about Óláfr are cited continuously,
whereas in the last two they are punctuated by prose narrative and arein a somewhat different order. The two helmingar of the specimen
above do not form a single stanza in Oddr’s saga and Fagrskinna but
are the second helmingar of two different stanzas.
Editions:
The entire corpus of skaldic poetry from the beginnings to c.1400 isedited in Den norsk-islandske Skaldedigtning, ed. Finnur Jónsson(1912–15), A 1–II (edited text) and B I–II (diplomatic text). A newnine-volume edition, with English translation and notes, is in preparation as Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages: A New
Edition, of which two volumes are now published: II Poetry from theKings’ Sagas 2, ed. Kari Ellen Gade (2009) and VII Poetry on Christian Subjects, ed. Margaret Clunies Ross (2007).

VIII: Ari ﬁorgilsson: ÍSLENDINGABÓK
Ari ﬁorgilsson was probably born in 1068 on the Snæfellsnes peninsula of Iceland and died in 1148. He lost his father and grandfather
while still a boy and at the age of seven went to live with a maternal
relative, Hallr ﬁórarinsson of Haukadalr (cf. line 184) in the southwestern part of the country. At Haukadalr he must have come into
contact with some of the most prominent, learned and travelled Icelanders of the time, in particular various members of the great
Mosfellingar family (cf. note 35 below) to which belonged the firstbishops of Iceland, Ísleifr Gizurarson and his son, Gizurr Ísleifsson,
who would have resided at Skálaholt some 25 km. away. And Ísleifr’s
son Teitr (cf. line 8) actually lived in Haukadalr where he ran a small
school. Ari became one of Teitr’s pupils and he refers to him as his
fóstri ‘fosterer’ and the wisest man he knew. It must have been at
Haukadalr and under the influence of men like Teitr and Hallr that Ari
developed his interest in history and related subjects. Ari tells us inch. 9 of Íslendingabók that he spent fourteen winters at Haukadalr,
which means he must have quit the place in about 1089. We have no
precise knowledge of how and where he spent the remaining years of
his long life. But he was an ordained priest and it can reasonably beinferred that he lived for some of this time at least in his ancestral areaof Snæfellsnes. He could well have held a chieftaincy (go›or›) there.
Ari’s only preserved work, the second version of his Íslendingabók,
covers less than twenty pages in its main manuscript. Its contents may
be summarised as follows.
The Prologue (= lines 1–6) tells us of the circumstances surrounding the writing of the first (now lost) version of the work and, in rather
unclear terms, of the changes made in producing the second version.
There follows a genealogy (which may well be a later interpolation)of Haraldr hárfagri going back to the Swedish king Óláfr trételgja.
Then comes a list of contents of the book’s ten chapters. Chapter 1(lines 7–34) deals with the settlement of Iceland, presenting Ingólfr as
the first settler. Chapter 2 names four main settlers of the east, south,
west and north of the country and tells (lines 35–43) how a Norwegian called Úlfljótr first ‘brought law’ out to Iceland. Chapter 3 (lines
44–63) deals with the establishment of the Alﬂingi. Chapter 4 gives anaccount of certain changes made in the Icelandic calendar (see HOIC,
44–45). Chapter 5 describes the events which led to the division of the

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country into quarters (see HOIC, 49–52). A short chapter 6 (lines 64–74) and a lengthier chapter 7 (lines 75–149) cover respectively thediscovery and settlement of Greenland by Eiríkr enn rau›i and theformal acceptance of Christianity by the Icelandic Alﬂingi. Chapter 8
tells of the so-called ‘foreign’ or ‘missionary’ bishops who visited
Iceland in the tenth and eleventh centuries (see HOIC, 138–44) and of
events during the long lawspeakership of Skapti ﬁóroddsson (1004–30), including the establishment of the so-called Fifth Court (see HOIC,
70–74; Laws I, 83–88, 244–45). Ísleifr Gizurarson, the first man to beformally consecrated as bishop of Iceland (1056–80), is the subject ofChapter 9 (see HOIC, 144–46). And the final chapter 10 (of whichlines 150–97 form a major part) deals with Gizurr Ísleifsson (bishopof Iceland from 1082 to 1106; bishop of Skálaholt from 1106 to 1118).
Although the last words of ch. 10 are Hér l‡ksk sjá bók (‘This bookends here’), two further items follow in both the extant manuscripts:(i) genealogies from original settlers of Iceland down to these fivebishops: Ísleifr Gizurarson and his son Gizurr, Jón ¯gmundarson (cf.
line 191), ﬁorlákr Rúnólfsson (cf. line 1) and Ketill ﬁorsteinsson (cf.
also line 1); (ii) a genealogy from the mythical Yngvi Tyrkjakonungr
down to Ari himself, ending with the words en ek heitik Ari, ‘and I am
called Ari’.
As noted, Ari’s information in his Prologue on the changes he madein the first version of his work to produce the second is rather unclear
and there has been much modern scholarly discussion on the matter.
This has led to only uncertain and differing conclusions. The primaryissue to be addressed in this context is whether the second version ofÍslendingabók represents an abridgement or an expansion of the first(cf. notes 1 and 3 below).
It is normally assumed that Ari had virtually no written sources about
the early history of Iceland. But he may well have used Sæmundr Sigfússon’s now lost work on the Norwegian kings which, it is assumed, waswritten in Latin (see p. 62 above; cf. line 145). And there is evidence
to suggest that he knew such written works on non-Icelandic mattersas Adam of Bremen’s Gesta Hammaburgensis ecclesiae pontificum(cf. again p. 62), various works by the Venerable Bede and, quite clearly,
a life of the martyr King Edmund, whoever its author (cf. lines 12–14).
But it was primarily oral sources that he relied on for information
about Icelandic history. He obviously learnt a great deal from acquain-

VIII: Íslendingabók

107

tances from his time at Haukadalr: Teitr Ísleifsson would have been ofparticular importance to him in this respect (cf. lines 8–9, 36, 144), as
well as Hallr ﬁórarinsson, Sæmundr Sigfússon (cf. lines 2, 145) andbishop Gizurr Ísleifsson himself. He also received information frompeople from his home area in the west of Iceland, his uncle ﬁorkell
Gellisson (cf. lines 10, 73–74) and ﬁórí›r Snorradóttir (cf. line 11). At
least two lawspeakers, Markús Skeggjason (cf. line 152) and Úlfhe›inn(cf. line 55) would have been his informants (cf. note 51 below).
The preserved version of Íslendingabók was, then, based on an earlier one which Ari says he wrote for the bishops ﬁorlákr Rúnólfsson
and Ketill ﬁorsteinsson and subsequently showed to them and to thepriest Sæmundr Sigfússon. From the wording of his statement andother factors it is clear that the first version must have been written
between 1122 (when Ketill became bishop) and 1133 (when bothﬁorlákr and Sæmundr died). The preserved version of Íslendingabók
refers to the lawspeakership of Go›mundr ﬁorgeirsson (lines 170–71)
which ran from 1123 to 1134. If this reference is original to the second
version, then it must, of course, have been written in or after 1134.
But there are good reasons for assuming that it is a later interpolation.
Further there are reasons for thinking that Ari wrote his first version
fairly early on in the period 1122–33 and produced the second version
within four or five years of it.
Ari’s work has great importance for the study of Icelandic history
and literature. It is, in effect, the oldest original prose work in Icelandic and decades passed before other works of historiography were
written in that language. Íslendingabók exercised considerable influence on later Icelandic literature, as did Landnámabók, the original(and now lost) version of which is probably also from his hand. Snorri
Sturluson, writing some hundred years later, makes particular reference
to him in the prologue to his Heimskringla. It is Ari’s specific mentionof his oral sources and his careful attention to chronology in Íslendingabók that give his work such value. It is true that he does not always tellhis story well. For example, his description of the foundation of theAlﬂingi (lines 44–55) is somewhat inconsequential. But his accountof the conversion of Iceland shows him as an excellent narrator. And
however desultory Ari’s narrative may occasionally seem, the valueof his whole book can hardly be overestimated.
Although there are various minor witnesses, we have to rely mainly

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VIII: Íslendingabók

on two seventeenth-century paper manuscripts written by Jón
Erlendsson (died 1672) for our text of the second version ofÍslendingabók. AM 113 b fol. (the better of the two) and AM 113 a fol.
both go back directly to a lost original probably written about 1200 or
perhaps a little earlier (and thus, of course, not Ari’s original). AM
113 a fol. was written in 1651, AM 113 b fol. probably rather later.
The text of the selections here is based on AM 113 b fol. (designated‘A’) as follows: (a): f. 1r2–11; (b): ff. 1v4–2r14; (c): ff. 2r23–3r9; (d):f. 4r25–v13; (e): ff. 4v14–6v10; (f): ff. 8r17–9v2. Most of the emendations are from AM 113 a fol. (designated ‘B’).

Bibliography
Facsimile edition: Jón Jóhannesson (ed.), Íslendingabók Ara fró›a. AM 113 aand 113 b, fol. Íslenzk handrit. Icelandic manuscripts I (1956). [Contains a
useful ‘Introduction’ in English]
Critical edition: Ari ﬁorgilsson hinn fró›i, Íslendingabók, ed. Anne Holtsmark(1951); rev. Hallvard Magerøy and Tor Ulset (1978).
Normalised edition with English translation: Ari Thorgilsson, The Book of the
Icelanders (Íslendingabók), ed. and tr. Halldór Hermannsson (1930).
Íslenzk fornrit edition (ÍF I): Íslendingabók. In Íslendingabók, Landnámabók,
ed. Jakob Benediktsson (1968).
Background reading:Björn ﬁorsteinsson, Thingvellir. Iceland’s National Shrine, tr. Peter Foote(1987).
The Book of the Settlements. Landnámabók, tr. Hermann Pálsson and Paul
Edwards (1972).
Finn Gad, The History of Greenland, I. Earliest Times to 1700, tr. Ernst Dupont(1970).
Jónas Kristjánsson, Eddas and Sagas, tr. Peter Foote (1988), Index, under‘Ari ﬁorgilsson the Wise’.
Gwyn Jones, The Norse Atlantic Saga, 2nd ed. (1986).
Knud J. Krogh, Viking Greenland (1967).
MS, under Íslendingabók.
Dag Strömbäck, The Conversion of Iceland, tr. Peter Foote (1975).
G. Turville-Petre, Origins of Icelandic Literature (1953), 88–108.

VIII: Íslendingabók

109

VIII: Ari ﬁorgilsson: ÍSLENDINGABÓK
(a) Prologue1‹Í›slendingabók gør›a ek fyrst byskupum órum, ﬁorláki ok Katli, oks‡ndak bæ›i ﬂeim ok Sæmundi presti.2 En me› ﬂví at ﬂeim líka›i svá
at hafa e›a ﬂar vi›r auka, ﬂá skrifa›a ek ﬂessa of et sama far, fyr útanáttartƒlu ok konungaævi,3 ok jókk ﬂví er mér var› sí›an kunnara ok
nú er gerr sagt á ﬂessi en á ﬂeirri. En hvatki es mi‹s›sagt es í frœ›um
ﬂessum, ﬂá er skylt at hafa ﬂat heldr, er sannara reynisk . . .

36(b) The settlement of Iceland4
Chapter 1‹Í›sland bygg›isk fyrst úr Norvegi á dƒgum Haralds ens hárfagra,5Hálfdanar sonar ens svarta, í ﬂann tí› — at ætlun ok tƒlu ﬂeira Teitsfóstra míns,6 ﬂess manns er ek kunna spakastan, sonar Ísleifs byskups; 9ok ﬁorkels fƒ›urbró›ur míns Gellissonar, er langt mun›i fram;7 okﬁórí›ar Snorra dóttur go›a,8 es bæ›i vas margspƒk ok óljúgfró› — esÍvarr, Ragnars sonr lo›brókar,9 lét drepa Eadmund enn helga Engla- 12
konung.10 En ﬂat vas sjau tegum ‹vetra› ens níunda hundra›s eptirbur› Krists, at ﬂví es ritit es í sƒgu hans.11
Ingólfr hét ma›r nórœnn, es sannliga er sagt at fœri fyrst ﬂa›an til 15Íslands, ﬂá es Haraldr enn hárfagri var sextán vetra gamall, en í annat
sinn fám vetrum sí›arr.12 Hann bygg›i su›r í Reykjarvík. ﬁar er Ingólfshƒf›i kalla›r fyr austan Minﬂakseyri, sem hann kom fyrst á land, en 18
ﬂar Ingólfsfell fyr vestan ¯lfossá, es hann lag›i sína eigu á sí›an.
Í ﬂann tí› vas Ísland vi›i vaxit á mi›li fjalls ok fjƒru.13
ﬁá váru hér menn kristnir, ﬂeir er Nor›menn kalla papa.14 En ﬂeir 21
fóru sí›an á braut, af ﬂví at ﬂeir vildu eigi vesa hér vi› hei›na menn,ok létu eptir bœkr írskar ok bjƒllur ok bagla; af ﬂví mátti skilja at ﬂeir
24
váru menn írskir.15
En ﬂá var› fƒr manna mikil mjƒk út hingat úr Norvegi til ﬂess unz
konungrinn Haraldr banna›i, af ﬂví at honum ﬂótti landau›n nema. ﬁásættusk ﬂeir á ﬂat, at hverr ma›r skyldi gjalda konungi fimm aura,16 sá 27
er eigi væri frá ﬂví skili›r ok ﬂa›an fœri hingat. En svá er sagt at
4 jóki A. 5 nú sagt A.

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30

33

VIII: Íslendingabók

Haraldr væri sjau tegu vetra konungr ok yr›i áttrœ›r. ﬁau hafa upphƒf
verit at gjaldi ﬂví es nú er kallat landaurar.17 En ﬂar galzk stundum
meira en stundum minna, unz Óláfr enn digri18 gør›i sk‡rt at hverrma›r skyldi gjalda konungi hálfa mƒrk, sá er fœri á mi›li Norvegs okÍslands, nema konur e›a ﬂeir menn es hann næmi frá. Svá sag›i ﬁorkell
oss Gellissonr.
(c) The establishment of the Alﬂingi19
Chapter 2

36

39

42

. . . En ﬂá es Ísland vas ví›a byggt or›it, ﬂá haf›i ma›r austrœnn fyrstlƒg út hingat úr Norvegi sá er Úlfljótr hét — svá sag›i Teitr oss — okváru ﬂá Úlfljótslƒg kƒllu› — hann var fa›ir Gunnars er Djúpdœlir eru
komnir frá í Eyjafir›i20 — en ﬂau váru flest sett at ﬂví sem ﬂá váru
Golaﬂingslƒg e›a rá› ﬁorleifs ens spaka Hƒr›a-Kárasonar21 váru til,hvar vi› skyldi auka e›a af nema e›a annan veg setja. Úlfljótr var
austr í Lóni. En svá es sagt at Grímr geitskƒr væri fóstbró›ir hans, sá
er kanna›i Ísland allt at rá›i hans, á›r Alﬂingi væri átt. En honum fekk
hverr ma›r penning til á landi hér, en hann gaf fé ﬂat sí›an til hofa.22
Chapter 3

45

48

51

54

57

‹A›lﬂingi vas sett at rá›i Úlfljóts ok allra landsmanna ﬂar er nú es. En
á›r vas ﬂing á Kjalarnesi, ﬂat es ﬁorsteinn Ingólfs sonr landnámamanns, fa›ir ﬁorkels mána lƒgsƒgumanns, haf›i ﬂar, ok hƒf›ingjar
ﬂeir es at ﬂví hurfu.23 En ma›r haf›i sekr or›it of ﬂræls mor› e›aleysings, sá er land átti í Bláskógum; hann es nefndr ﬁórir kroppinskeggi; en dóttursonr hans es kalla›r ﬁorvaldr kroppinskeggi, sá es
fór sí›an í Austfjƒr›u ok brenndi ﬂar inni Gunnar, bró›ur sinn. Svá
sag›i Hallr Órœkjusonr.24 En sá hét Kolr es myr›r var. Vi› hann es
kennd gjá sú es ﬂar es kƒllu› sí›an Kolsgjá, sem hræin fundusk. Landﬂat var› ‹sí›an› allsherjarfé, en ﬂat lƒg›u landsmenn til Alﬂingis neyzlu.
Af ﬂví es ﬂar almenning at vi›a til Alﬂingis í skógum ok á hei›umhagi til hrossa hafnar. ﬁat sag›i Úlfhe›inn oss.
Svá hafa ok spakir menn sagt at á sex tegum vetra yr›i Ísland albyggt
svá at eigi væri meirr sí›an.

51 Órœkjasonr A. 53 sí›an B.

VIII: Íslendingabók

111

ﬁví nær tók Hrafn lƒgsƒgu,25 Hœngs sonr landnámamanns, næstr
Úlfljóti, ok haf›i tuttugu sumur; hann var úr Rangárhverfi. ﬁat var sex
tegum vetra eptir dráp Eadmundar konungs, vetri e›a tveim á›r Haraldr
enn hárfagri yr›i dau›r, at tƒlu spakra manna. ﬁórarinn Ragabró›ir,
sonr Óleifs hjalta, tók lƒgsƒgu næstr Hrafni ok haf›i ƒnnur tuttugu;
hann vas borgfirzkr.

6063(d) The settlement of Greenland26
Chapter 6‹L›and ﬂat es kallat es Grœnland fannsk ok bygg›isk af Íslandi. Eiríkr
enn rau›i hét ma›r brei›firzkr es fór út he›an ﬂangat ok nam ﬂar lander sí›an es kalla›r Eiríksfjƒr›r.27 Hann gaf nafn landinu ok kalla›iGrœnland ok kva› menn ﬂat myndu f‡sa ﬂangat farar, at landit ættinafn gott.28
ﬁeir fundu ﬂar manna vistir bæ›i austr ok vestr á landi,29 ok keiplabrot
ok steinsmí›i ﬂat es af ﬂví má skilja at ﬂar haf›i ﬂess konar ﬂjó› farit
es Vínland hefir byggt ok Grœnlendingar kalla Skrælinga.30
En ﬂat vas, es hann tók byggva landit, fjórtán vetrum e›a fimmtán
fyrr en kristni kvæmi hér á Ísland, at ﬂví er sá tal›i fyrir ﬁorkeli
Gellissyni á Grœnlandi er sjálfr fylg›i Eiríki enum rau›a út.31

66

69

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(e) The Alﬂingi accepts Christianity32
Chapter 7‹Ó›láfr rex Tryggva sonr, Óláfs sonar, Haralds sonar ens hárfagra, kom
kristni í Nóreg ok á Ísland.33
Hann sendi hingat til lands prest ﬂann er hét ﬁangbrandr ok hér
kenndi mƒnnum kristni ok skír›i ﬂá alla es vi› trú tóku.34 En Hallr áSí›u, ﬁorsteins sonr, lét skírask snimhendis, ok Hjalti Skeggjasonr
úr ﬁjórsárdali ok Gizurr enn hvíti Teits son, Ketilbjarnar sonar, frá
Mosfelli, ok margir hƒf›ingjar a›rir.35 En ﬂeir váru ﬂó fleiri es í gegnmæltu ok neittu. En ﬂá er hann haf›i hér verit einn vetr e›a tvá, ﬂá fór
hann á braut ok haf›i vegit hér tvá menn e›a ﬂrjá ﬂá er hann hƒf›unítt.36 En hann sag›i konunginum Óláfi es hann kom austr allt ﬂat es
hér haf›i yfir hann gingit, ok lét ørvænt at hér mundi kristni enn takask.
60 vetrum A. 63 borgfir›ir A.

75

78

81

84

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VIII: Íslendingabók

En hann37 var› vi› ﬂat rei›r mjƒk ok ætla›i at láta mei›a e›a drepa
87 ossa landa fyrir, ﬂá es ﬂar váru austr.
En ﬂat sumar et sama kvámu útan he›an ﬂeir Gizurr ok Hjalti, okﬂágu ﬂá undan vi› konunginn, ok hétu honum umbs‡slu sinni til á
90 n‡ja leik at hér yr›i enn vi› kristninni tekit, ok létu sér eigi annars ván
en ﬂar mundi hl‡›a. En et næsta sumar eptir fóru ﬂeir austan, ok prestr
sá es ﬁormó›r hét, ok kvámu ﬂá í Vestmannaeyjar es tíu vikur váru af
93 sumri,38 ok haf›i allt farizk vel at. Svá kva› Teitr ﬂann segja es sjálfr
var ﬂar.39 ﬁá vas ﬂat mælt et næsta sumar á›r í lƒgum at menn skyldi
svá koma til Alﬂingis es tíu vikur væri af sumri, en ﬂangat til kvámu
96 viku fyrr.
En ﬂeir fóru ﬂegar inn til meginlands ok sí›an til Alﬂingis ok gátu at
Hjalta at hann vas eptir í Laugardali me› tólfta mann, af ﬂví at hann
99 haf›i á›r sekr or›it fjƒrbaugsma›r et næsta sumar á Alﬂingi of go›gá.40
En ﬂat vas til ﬂess haft, at hann kva› at Lƒgbergi kvi›ling ﬂenna:41
102

Vil ek eigi go› geyja;
grey ﬂykir mér Freyja.42

En ﬂeir Gizurr fóru unz ﬂeir kvámu í sta› ﬂann í hjá ¯lfossvatni, es
kalla›r es Vellankatla, ok gør›u or› ﬂa›an til ﬂings, at á mót ﬂeim
105 skyldi koma allir fulltingsmenn ﬂeira, af ﬂví at ﬂeir hƒf›u spurt at
andskotar ﬂeira vildi verja ﬂeim vígi ﬂingvƒllinn. En fyrr en ﬂeir fœriﬂa›an, ﬂá kom ﬂar rí›andi Hjalti ok ﬂeir er eptir váru me› honum. En
108 sí›an ri›u ﬂeir á ﬂingit, ok kvámu á›r á mót ﬂeim frændr ﬂeira ok
vinir, sem ﬂeir hƒf›u æst. En enir hei›nu menn hurfu saman me›alvæpni ok haf›i svá nær at ﬂeir myndi berjask at ‹eigi› of sá á mi›li.
111
En annan dag eptir gengu ﬂeir Gizurr ok Hjalti til Lƒgbergs ok báru
ﬂar upp erindi sín. En svá er sagt, at ﬂat bæri frá, hvé vel ﬂeir mæltu.
En ﬂat gør›isk af ﬂví, at ﬂar nefndi annarr ma›r at ƒ›rum vátta, ok
114 sƒg›usk hvárir úr lƒgum vi› a›ra, enir kristnu menn ok enir hei›nu,
ok gingu sí›an frá Lƒgbergi.
ﬁá bá›u enir kristnu menn Hall á Sí›u at hann skyldi lƒg ﬂeira upp
117 segja, ﬂau es kristninni skyldi fylgja. En hann leystisk ﬂví undan vi›
ﬂá, at hann keypti at ﬁorgeiri lƒgsƒgumanni, at hann skyldi upp segja;
en hann vas enn ﬂá hei›inn.43 En sí›an er menn kvámu í bú›ir,44 ﬂá

106 ﬂingvellinn A. 110 eigi] a space is left for this word in A.

VIII: Íslendingabók

113

lag›isk hann ni›r ﬁorgeirr ok breiddi feld sinn á sik ok hvíldi ﬂann
dag allan ok nóttina eptir ok kva› ekki or›. En of morguninn eptir
settisk hann upp ok gør›i or› at menn skyldi ganga til Lƒgbergis.
En ﬂá hóf hann tƒlu sína upp, es menn kvámu ﬂar, ok sag›i at honumﬂótti ﬂá komit hag manna í ón‡tt efni ef menn skyldi eigi hafa allir lƒg
ein á landi hér, ok tal›i fyrir mƒnnum á marga vega at ﬂat skyldi eigiláta ver›a, ok sag›i at ﬂat mundi at ﬂví ósætti ver›a, es vísaván vas atﬂær barsmí›ir gør›isk á mi›li manna es landit eyddisk af. Hann sag›i
frá ﬂví, at konungar úr Norvegi ok úr Danmƒrku hƒf›u haft ófri› okorrostur á mi›li sín langa tí›, til ﬂess unz landsmenn gør›u fri› á mi›li
ﬂeira, ﬂótt ﬂeir vildi eigi. En ﬂat rá› gør›isk svá, at af stundu sendusk
ﬂeir gersemar á mi›li; enda helt fri›r sá me›an ﬂeir lif›u.45‘En nú ﬂykkir mér ﬂat rá›,’ kva› hann, ‘at vér látim ok eigi ﬂá rá›aer mest vilja í gegn gangask, ok mi›lum svá mál á mi›li ﬂeira, athvárirtveggju hafi nakkvat síns máls, ok hƒfum allir ein lƒg ok einnsi›. ﬁat mon ver›a satt, es vér slítum í sundr lƒgin, at vér monum slíta
ok fri›inn.’
En hann lauk svá máli sínu at hvárirtveggju játtu ﬂví, at allir skyldi
ein lƒg hafa, ﬂau sem hann ré›i upp at segja.
ﬁá vas ﬂat mælt í lƒgum at allir menn skyldi kristnir vesa ok skírntaka, ﬂeir er á›r váru óskír›ir á landi hér. En of barna útbur› skyldu
standa en fornu lƒg ok of hrossakjƒts át.46 Skyldu menn blóta á laun,ef vildu, en var›a fjƒrbaugsgar›r ef váttum of kvæmi vi›. En sí›ar
fám vetrum var sú hei›ni af numin sem ƒnnur.
ﬁenna atbur› sag›i Teitr oss at ﬂví er kristni kom á Ísland.
En Óláfr Tryggvason fell et sama sumar at sƒgu Sæmundar prests.47
ﬁá bar›isk hann vi› Svein Haraldsson Danakonung ok Óláf enn sœnska
Eiríks son at Uppsƒlum Svíakonungs, ok Eirík, es sí›an vas jarl at
Norvegi, Hákonarson.48 ﬁat vas ﬂremr tegum vetra ens annars hundra›septir dráp Eadmundar, en ﬂúsundi eptir bur› Krists at alﬂ‡›u tali.49

120

123

126

129

132

135

138

141

144

147

(f) Events during Gizurr’s episcopacy50
Chapter 10. . . Gizurr byskup vas ástsælli af ƒllum landsmƒnnum en hverr ma›rannarra ﬂeira es vér vitim hér á landi hafa verit. Af ástsæld hans ok af
148 vetrum A. 151 vitam A.

150

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153

156

159

162

165

168

171

174

177

180

183

186

189

VIII: Íslendingabóktƒlum ﬂeira Sæmundar me› umbrá›i Markúss lƒgsƒgumanns51 vas
ﬂat í lƒg leitt, at allir menn tƒl›u ok vir›u allt fé sitt ok sóru at rétt virtværi, hvárt sem vas í lƒndum e›a í lausaaurum, ok gør›u tíund af
sí›an.52 ﬁat eru miklar jartegnir, hvat hl‡›nir landsmenn váru ﬂeim
manni, es hann kom ﬂví fram at fé allt vas virt me› svardƒgum ﬂat esá Íslandi vas, ok landit sjálft ok tíundir af gƒrvar ok lƒg á lƒg›, at svá
skal vesa, me›an Ísland es byggt. Gizurr byskup lét ok lƒg leggja á
ﬂat, at stóll byskups ﬂess es á Íslandi væri skyldi í Skálaholti vesa, ená›r vas hvergi, ok lag›i hann ﬂar til stólsins Skálaholtsland ok margra
kynja au›œfi ƒnnur, bæ›i í lƒndum ok í lausum aurum.53 En ﬂá eshonum ﬂótti sá sta›r hafa vel at au›œfum ﬂróazk, ﬂá gaf hann meir en
fjór›ung byskupsdóms síns til ﬂess at heldr væri tveir byskupsstólar á
landi hér en einn, svá sem Nor›lendingar æstu hann til.54 En hann
haf›i á›r látit telja búendr á landi hér, ok váru ﬂá í Austfir›ingafjór›ungi
sjau hundru› heil, en í Rangæingafjór›ungi tíu, en í Brei›‹fir››ingafjór›ungi níu, en í Eyfir›ingafjór›ungi tólf, en ótal›ir váru ﬂeir es eigiáttu ﬂingfararkaupi at gegna of allt Ísland.55‹Ú›lfhe›inn Gunnars sonr ens spaka tók lƒgsƒgu eptir Markús ok
haf›i níu sumur; ﬂá haf›i Bergﬂórr Hrafnssonr sex, en ﬂá haf›iGo›mundr ﬁorgeirssonr tólf sumur.56 Et fyrsta sumar es Bergﬂórr sag›ilƒg upp vas n‡mæli ﬂat gƒrt at lƒg ór skyldi skrifa á bók at Hafli›aMássonar of vetrinn eptir at sƒgu ok umbrá›i ﬂeira Bergﬂórs ok annarra
spakra manna ﬂeira er til ﬂess váru teknir.57 Skyldu ﬂeir gørva n‡mæliﬂau ƒll í lƒgum er ﬂeim litisk ﬂau betri en en fornu lƒg. Skyldi ﬂau
segja upp et næsta sumar eptir í lƒgréttu ok ﬂau ƒll halda es enn meiri
hlutr manna mælti ﬂá eigi gegn. En ﬂat var› at fram fara, at ﬂá vas
skrifa›r Vígsló›i ok margt annat í lƒgum ok sagt upp í lƒgréttu af
kennimƒnnum of sumarit eptir.58 En ﬂat líka›i ƒllum vel, ok mælti ﬂvímanngi í gegn.
ﬁat vas ok et fyrsta sumar es Bergﬂórr sag›i lƒg upp, ﬂá var Gizurr
byskup óﬂingfœrr af sótt. ﬁá sendi hann or› til Alﬂingis vinum sínum
ok hƒf›ingjum at bi›ja skyldi ﬁorlák Rúnólfs son ﬁorleiks sonar, bró›ur
Halls í Haukadali,59 at hann skyldi láta vígjask til byskups. En ﬂat
ger›u allir svá sem or› hans kvámu til, ok fekksk ﬂat af ﬂví, at Gizurr
haf›i sjálfr fyrr mjƒk be›it, ok fór hann útan ﬂat sumar en kom út etnæsta eptir ok vas ﬂá víg›r til byskups.
Gizurr vas víg›r til byskups ﬂá es hann var fertøgr.60 ﬁá vas Gregóríus
septimus páfi.61 En sí›an vas hann enn næsta vetr í Danmƒrku ok kom

VIII: Íslendingabók

115

of sumarit eptir hingat til lands. En ﬂá es hann haf›i verit fjóra vetr ok
tuttugu byskup, svá sem fa›ir hans, ﬂá vas Jóan ¯gmundarsonr víg›rtil byskups fyrstr til stóls at Hólum;62 ﬂá vas hann vetri mi›r en hálf- 192
sextøgr. En tólf vetrum sí›ar, ﬂá es Gizurr haf›i alls verit byskup
sex vetr ens fjór›a tegar, ﬂá vas ﬁorlákr víg›r til byskups; hann lét
Gizurr vígja til stóls í Skálaholti at sér lifanda. ﬁá vas ﬁorlákr tveim 195
vetrum meir en ﬂrítøgr, en Gizurr byskup anda›isk ﬂremr tegum nátta
sí›ar í Skálaholti á enum ﬂri›ja degi í viku ‹quinto› kalendas Junii63...

193 hálffertøgr A. 196 náttum A.

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Notes

1 On the Prologue to Íslendingabók and the difficulties it presents,
see Turville-Petre 1953, 88–102; Jón Jóhannesson 1956, xiv–xxiii.
The problems revolve around: (a) the meaning of fyr útan; (b) what
the words áttartala and konungaævi refer to; and to some extent (c)the meaning of of et sama far. On these problems see note 3 below
and NION III, s.v. far.
2 Sæmundr Sigfússon was a member of the Oddaverjar family, with

its ancestral home at Oddi, just east of where the River Rangá in ‡tri
flows into ﬁverá (south-western Iceland) (cf. HOIC 231–32, 362).
He studied on the Continent and is credited with a now lost synoptic
work about the kings of Norway believed to have been written in
Latin. After his death, he became a legendary figure in Icelandic
folklore and, for example, the poems of the Elder Edda were wrongly
attributed to him (cf. Jónas Kristjánsson 1988, 25–26). Like Ari
ﬁorgilsson, he was nicknamed inn fró›i, ‘the Learned’. Cf. p. 62 above;
Turville-Petre 1953, 81–87; MS, s.v. Sæmundr Sigfússon inn fró›i.
3 of et sama far: ‘on the same subject’; or ‘covering the same ground’(so ION 207); or possibly ‘in the same way’.
The majority of scholars understand fyr útan to mean ‘without’, i.e.
that áttartala and konungaævi, which were to be found in the earlier
version of Íslendingabók, have been omitted in the second, preserved,
version. But others have suggested that they mean ‘apart from’ andthat the áttartala and konungaævi are an addition to the earlier version
and are to be found in the preserved version.
áttartƒlu is formally singular but is probably used here in a collective
sense; the element -ævi in konungaævi is plural. The first word may
be roughly translated ‘genealogies’, the second ‘lives of kings’. Precisely
what are referred to here is less certain and depends to some extent
on the interpretation fyr útan in line 3. If fyr útan is taken to mean
‘apart from’ and the items referred to are assumed to be present in thepreserved version of Íslendingabók, then the word áttartala mightrefer (for example) to the genealogies of the bishops following ch. 10(referred to by Ari himself as kyn byskupa Íslendinga ok áttartala),
and konungaævi might refer to various chronological statements inthe present Íslendingabók relating events in Icelandic history to theVIII: Íslendingabók

117

lives of foreign kings (cf. lines 7–14, 145–49). If the items in question
were in the earlier version but have been removed in the preserved
one, then this matter becomes a much more speculative one, and one
which has received much scholarly attention (cf. note 20 below).
4 On the discovery and settlement of Iceland, see BS; Jones 1986,

especially 27–72; MS, s.v. Iceland; HOIC 1–34.
5 While it is not possible to give exact dates, Haraldr hárfagri probably

lived from about 855 to about 935. He is said to have been descended
from the Swedish Yngling dynasty and his father, Hálfdan inn svarti,
was king of Vestfold. Haraldr succeeded to the throne as a young
man and, partly in alliance with the earl of Hla›ir, Hákon Grjótgar›sson, extended a hegemony widely in Norway. Sometime in the 890s
he won a decisive sea-battle at Hafrsfjorden (near Stavanger) and in
so doing established control of the south-western part of the country.
He may, to a certain extent, therefore, be regarded as the first ruler of
all Norway, though when written sources represent his tyranny as amajor cause of emigration by Norwegian chieftains to Iceland, there
is doubtless some exaggeration involved. Cf. MS, s.v. Haraldr hárfagri(“fair-hair”) Hálfdanarson.
6 Teitr, a son of Ísleifr Gizurarson, was Ari’s main mentor and teacher(cf. fóstri). It is he whom Ari refers to most frequently as an informant(cf. lines 36, 93, 144). He seems to have had several other pupils aswell as Ari. He died in 1110.
7 ﬁorkell Gellisson is also mentioned in Laxdœla saga. He is said tohave lived at the important farm of Helgafell on Snæfellsnes. See
also note 31 below.
8 ﬁórí›r died in 1112 at the age of 88. Her father, Snorri go›i ﬁorgríms-son (d. 1031), appears in Eyrbyggja saga as a major character and inseveral other sources.
9 Ívarr was a prominent Viking chieftain of the second half of theninth century. The sources about him include, in addition to Icelandic
ones, The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, Irish annals, Adam of Bremen’s

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Gesta (cf. p. 62 above) and Saxo Grammaticus’s Gesta Danorum. He
was presumably a leader of the large Danish army which invaded
East Anglia in 865 (cf. note 10 below). He also took part in an attack
on York at about the same time in which the rival English kings Ællaand Osbert were killed. The Annals of Ulster describe him as the‘king of the Northmen of all Ireland and Britain’. He died in about
873. The legendary Ragnarr lo›brók could well represent a
combination of two different historical figures, one of whom is likely
to have been a parent of the historical Ívarr. However this may be,
Ari probably conceived lo›brók as a nickname for Ragnarr and thenin some such sense as ‘shaggy breeches’. Cf. Rory McTurk, Studies
in Ragnars saga lo›brókar and its major Scandinavian analogues(1991).
10 Edmund the Martyr, king of the East Angles, resisted the Danish

invasion of his kingdom, was taken prisoner and, when he rejectedÍvarr’s demands for tribute and allegiance, was put to death (20thNovember 869) by being shot with arrows. On the apparent discrepancy between the date of Edmund’s death in 869 and that given
by Ari in lines 13–14 (i.e. 870), see note 49 below.
11 It is uncertain what written work about St Edmund is referred to.

De miraculis Sancti Eadmundi, written shortly before 1100 by the
English cleric Hermannus, is perhaps the most likely, though Abbo
of Fleury’s Passio Sancti Eadmundi (written c.988) is anotherpossibility. Cf. Strömbäck 1975, 19 note 1.
12 Ingólfr is traditionally regarded as the first Scandinavian settler in

Iceland and founder of modern Reykjavík. Ari gives no name for his
father but some later sources refer to him as the son of ¯rn, others ofBjƒrnólfr, the latter perhaps more correctly. Cf. HOIC 13 footnote 35.
13 Modern research supports the suggestion here that, at the time ofits settlement, Iceland was much more extensively wooded than in
Ari’s own. In the intervening period, over-exploitation by man andovergrazing by livestock led to deforestation. The birch continues tobe the main type of tree in Iceland, but various kinds of willow, as
well as the rowan and juniper, are also found quite widely.

VIII: Íslendingabók

119

14 papar (the word goes back ultimately to Latin papa, ‘father’) wereIrish anchorite monks who had found their way to the Scottish islands, the Faroes and Iceland. Their presence in these places is suggested by place-names containing the element pap- (e.g. Papa Stourin Shetland, Papey off eastern Iceland). The Irish monk Dicuil, writing about 825, gives an account of an island in the far north he calls
Thile which was visited by clerics some thirty years earlier. Most
scholars have identified this with Iceland and Irishmen would thus
have been first to set foot in Iceland, as early as the beginning of theninth century. See Dicuili Liber de mensura orbis terrae, ed. and tr. J.
J. Tierney (1967), 75–77; HOIC 3–7; Strömbäck (1975), 60–67; A
History of Norway and The Passion and Miracles of the Blessed Óláfr,
tr. Devra Kunin, ed. with introduction and notes by Carl Phelpstead(2001), 8 and 84–85.
15 It is not certain that books actually written in Irish are meant; books

which were ‘Irish’ in their appearance, style and decoration may rather
be intended. Cf. Ian McDougall, ‘Foreigners and Foreign Languages
in Medieval Iceland’, Saga-Book XXII (1986–89), 180–82. The Irish
monks would doubtless have counted their books great treasures.
Bagall is a loan-word probably either from Old Irish (bachall) or Old
English (cf. Middle English bag(h)el), both words themselves being
ultimately derived from Latin baculus. The Icelandic word is oftentranslated ‘crozier’ but may refer rather to the long stout walkingsticks (Latin cambutta) used by Irish monks. For illustrations ofmedieval croziers (though of a later date) found in Iceland, see HOIC
398 and Björn ﬁorsteinsson 1987, 52. Bjƒllur probably means small
hand-bells. Such items have been found in Iceland and some of them,though they must derive from a date later than any Irish presence
there, may have associations with the British Isles. See further P. W.
Joyce, A Social History of Ancient Ireland (1903), I 343, 352–54,
372–78.
16 An ounce (eyrir) was a weight of about 27 g., and while basicallyused of silver as a medium of exchange, was also transferred tomeasure other media (homespun in ells, for instance) by a system of
equivalences. There were eight ounces (aurar) to a mark (mƒrk) (cf.
line 32 below). Cf. HOIC 328–35; Laws II 386, 389–90.

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17 Landaurar, ‘land dues’, were primarily a toll which Icelanders were

obliged to pay the king of Norway on arrival in that country. It was
abolished by Gamli sáttmáli, ‘the Old Pact’, of 1262–64 which brought
Iceland under Norwegian rule. But the word is also used in somesources of a tax imposed on those leaving Norway for other places.
See HOIC 109–17, 282–87; Laws II 211 note 100.
18 Óláfr enn digri or Óláfr helgi Haraldsson is one of the most important

figures of the Viking Age and the sources about him are numerous
and diverse. He was a great-great-grandson of Haraldr enn hárfagri,
born in Norway in about 995. He appears to have participated in wideranging Viking raids at an early age which took him to places as far
apart as Finland and Spain. He was involved in the Danish attacks on
England in the years 1009–1014 and was baptised in Rouen in
Normandy at about this time. He returned to Norway in 1015 andestablished himself as the first effective ruler of the whole country.
During his reign, Óláfr consolidated his power by the elimination ofvarious petty chieftains and strengthening the civil administration of
the country. He also continued the process of the conversion in whichÓláfr Tryggvason had earlier played such an important part (cf. note
33 below). Because of external threats, primarily from Canute theGreat, he was forced to seek asylum with Yaroslav in Russia in 1028
but returned two years later with a small army only to be defeatedand killed at the Battle of Stiklarsta›ir (modern Stiklestad) in
Trøndelag on 29th July 1030. Although never officially canonised,Óláfr became the object of a considerable cult after his death and isregarded as patron saint of Norway. His shrine in the cathedral at
Trondheim became a place of pilgrimage and a number of churches(not least in the British Isles) are dedicated to him. See MS, s.v. Óláfr,
St.; Óláfs saga helga.
19 On Ari’s account of Úlfljótr’s Law and the establishment, site andinstitutions of the Alﬂingi, see HOIC 35–93; Laws I 1–6, 53–138;
Björn ﬁorsteinsson 1987; MS, s.v. Alﬂingi. Some scholars take Ari’s
statements about Úlfljótr’s Law as historically suspect (see note 21
below). Certainly the clauses found in various sources purporting tobe from Úlfljótr’s Laws (cf. Halldór Hermannsson in Ari Thorgilsson
1930, 76–77) are probably most reasonably regarded as antiquarianreconstructions from the twelfth or thirteenth century.

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20 Certain critics who think that Ari omitted the áttartala found in theearlier version of Íslendingabók when he made his second version(see note 3 above) have pointed to the words in this parenthesis as apossible vestige of material he unwittingly left behind when otherwise
removing genealogical material (see Jón Jóhannesson 1956, xxi).
21 Golaﬂingslƒg was the law for western and southern Norway (cf.

MS 385–86). It has been argued that Golaﬂingslƒg was not establisheduntil about 950, i.e. at a time later than the events here described.
Further, the fact that the preserved Golaﬂingslƒg and laws of the
Icelandic Commonwealth are so different makes it seem improbablethat the former influenced the latter at an earlier stage of the development of both.
ﬁorleifr is a shadowy figure who appears in a number of Kings’
Sagas. Some sources make him a relation of Úlfljótr or connect him
with the establishment of Golaﬂingslƒg.
22 What Ari says of Grímr’s mission here is not entirely clear. The

purpose of his search may have been to find a suitable meeting-place
for the Alﬂingi. But it may have been to collect views on the very
establishment of the assembly. The statement that each man gave
Grímr a penny is also problematic. If he indeed gave the money tothe temples (hof ), this would suggest a close association between
these institutions and the political administration of Iceland in heathen
times. Cf. HOIC 38–39, 54–55.
23 It is disputed whether the reference is to a local assembly or tosome sort of forerunner to the Alﬂingi. For a review of the arguments,
see Halldór Hermannsson in Ari Thorgilsson 1930, 78; HOIC 35–40.
A local assembly called Kjalarnessﬂing certainly existed during theCommonwealth period (see HOIC 76–77).
24 Little or nothing is known of this informant of Ari’s. He may have

hailed from eastern Iceland.
25 The lawspeaker of the medieval Icelandic Commonwealth waselected for a period of three years, though he could always be reelected. It was his duty to recite all sections of the law at Lƒgberg (seenote 41 below) during his term of office and the Assembly Procedures

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Section (ﬂingskaparﬂáttr) every year. He received a fee and half ofthe fines imposed by judgments at the General Assemby. Cf. Strömbäck
1975, 15 and note; HOIC 47–49; Laws I 187–88, 249–50; II 384–85.
26 On the discovery and settlement of Greenland by Scandinavians,

see BS 48–50; HOIC 98–101; Krogh 1967; Gad 1970; Jones 1986,
73–114; MS, s.v. Greenland, Norse in.
27 The main sources for Eiríkr the Red and his family are Íslendinga-

bók, Landnámabók, Grœnlendinga saga and Eiríks saga rau›a (cf.
Jones 1986, 142–235). Eiríkr is said to have lived in the inner part of
Eiríksfjƒr›r at Brattahlí› (Qassiarsuk), where extensive Norse archaeological remains have been found. Eiríksfjƒr›r, together with Einarsfjƒr›r immediately to the south of it, formed the central part of
Eystribygg› (‘Eastern Settlement’), the more southerly of the twomedieval Scandinavian settlements in Greenland. The other settlement,
Vestribygg› (‘Western Settlement’), lay in the area to the east ofGreenland’s present-day capital, Nuuk. Both settlements were on thesouthern part of the west coast of Greenland. See maps in ÍF IV.
28 It is easier to understand the reasoning attributed to Eiríkr here if

we remember that, as well as denoting the colour green, Old Norsegrœnn can mean ‘good; hopeful; advantageous’, where no notion ofphysical colour is present (cf. C–V 218). Thus in Finnboga saga ch. 6(ÍF XIV 262), the superlative of the adjective is used with anunderstood noun kostr, the expression meaning ‘the best alternative’:sá mun grænstr at segja satt. Further, the noun kostr is used in thecompound land(s)kostir, ‘quality, potential of (a) land for settlement’(cf. Eiríks saga rau›a ch. 11 (ÍF IV (1985), 430); Vatnsdœla saga ch.
15 (ÍF VIII 40–41).
29 austr ok vestr á landi is probably a reference to the two Scandinavian

settlements in Greenland, Eystribygg› and Vestribygg› (cf. note 27
above).
30 The first element of the compound keiplabrot appears to be genitive

plural of keipull, attested otherwise only in SnE, Skáldskaparmál 128.
Different etymologies have been suggested for keipull: it may be a

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123

loan-word (cf. Latin caupulus, Old English cuopel, ‘small ship’; Welshceubol, ‘ferry-boat’). Or it may be a diminutive of keipr, ‘boat’. It is
not certain that the word keipull by itself necessarily denoted a skinboat, though doubtless it was remains of skin boats of some kind that
Eiríkr and his men found. But for these, the word hú›keipr was themost precise term, e.g. in Flóamanna saga ch. 23 (ÍF XIII 289), andwas used of the vessels of the Skrælingar in Grœnlendinga saga ch. 4(ÍF IV (1985), 255–56, alongside keipr) and Eiríks saga rau›a ch. 11(ÍF IV (1985), 428).
The artefacts referred to by Ari in this paragraph were probably left
behind by some early culture of Inuit, most probably the Dorset
culture, which had visited and moved on from the areas of Greenlandin question centuries before the arrival of the Scandinavians. Certainly
vestiges of Dorset-culture settlement have been found in both the
Eastern and Western Settlements by modern archaeologists. Vínland(literally ‘Wine-land’) refers to some area on the eastern side of theNorth American continent visited by Scandinavians from about AD
1000 onwards. The name is also known to us from Adam of Bremen’s
Gesta (see p. 62 above) and e.g. Grœnlendinga saga and Eiríks sagarau›a. Although we do not know its exact definition, it may have included
Newfoundland, on the northern tip of which island a Scandinavian
site has been discovered at L’Anse aux Meadows. While there isarchaeological evidence to suggest that there may have been contacts
between Scandinavians and Dorset-Inuits in Newfoundland, we haveno need to assume that in using the word Skrælingar here Ari isreferring specifically to Dorset-Inuits. The word seems to have been
applied indiscriminately by medieval Scandinavians to any nonScandinavian people they encountered in Greenland or North America.
Moreoever, it is perfectly possible that the Scandinavians had not
met with the Inuit in Greenland at the time from which Ari has his
information; the Thule-Inuit (ancestors of the Inuit of modern Greenland) probably did not enter the northern part of the country from the
Canadian islands until about AD 1100 at the earliest.
31 ﬁorkell’s visit to Greenland, which must have taken place in the

period c.1050–70 (cf. ÍF I 14 note 3), is mentioned only here. For
another example of Ari mentioning his informants’ own sources, seelines 93–94 below and note 39.

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32 On the conversion of Iceland, see Turville-Petre 1953, 48–69; HOIC

118–38; Strömbäck 1975; MS, s.v. Conversion. In addition to thisaccount by Ari, the chief primary sources are Theodoricus monachus’s
Historia de antiquitate regum Norwagiensium, Historia Norwegiae,Ágrip, Oddr Snorrason’s Óláfs saga Tryggvasonar, Snorri Sturluson’s
Heimskringla, Njáls saga, Kristni saga and Óláfs saga Tryggvasonaren mesta. The account in Kristni saga is particularly detailed.
33 At an early age (he was born c.968) Óláfr Tryggvason took part inViking expeditions and The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle tells of his attacks
on England in the early 990s (which involved the extortion ofDanegeld). According to some sources, he was baptised in the Islesof Scilly (cf. pp. 89–90 above). He became king of Norway in 995
and during his short reign strove to further the cause of Christianity
not only in Norway itself but also in the Scandinavian colonies in thewest. In Norway his success was only partial. He died fighting King
Sveinn Haraldsson (see lines 145–49 below and Text VI above). Cf.
Strömbäck 1975, 31–37; MS, s.v. Óláfr Tryggvason; Óláfs saga
Tryggvasonar.
Ari uses a number of Latin words (such as rex instead of konungr)and Latinisms in Íslendingabók (cf. line 197 below). This he may
have done under the influence of specific Latin sources.
34 ﬁangbrandr (also known as Theobrand(us)) is mentioned in a

number of sources (cf. note 32 above), some of which cite what are
ostensibly contemporary verses about him. He appears to have beenof either Flemish or Saxon origin. The element ﬁangbrand- appears
in a number of Icelandic place-names, suggesting perhaps that hetravelled widely in the country; see HOIC 128–31; Strömbäck 1975,
25–26.
35 Hjalti Skeggjason was Gizurr enn hvíti’s son-in-law, and plays an impor-tant part in Njáls saga. Gizurr belonged to what was perhaps one of
the most distinguished Icelandic families of the Commonwealth period,
the descendants of Ketilbjƒrn the Old, the original settler of a largepart of south-western Iceland which included Mosfell, Skálaholt andHaukadalr. As seen here, he played an important part in the introduction of Christianity into Iceland and is a major figure in Njáls

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125

saga. Among his descendants were his son Ísleifr, first bishop of
Iceland (1056–80), Gizurr, second bishop of Iceland (1082–1106) andfirst bishop of Skálaholt (1106–18), and Gizurr ﬁorvaldsson (1208–
68), who played an important part in the history of Iceland leading up
to the end of the Commonwealth (see Text III above). The family (orparts of it) are sometimes referred to as the Mosfellingar, sometimes
as the Haukdœlir.
36 ﬂá er hann hƒf›u nítt, ‘who had insulted him’; probably more

specifically ‘who had composed scurrilous verses about him’ The
noun ní› has roughly the sense of ‘defamation’, often of a sexual
character; cf. Preben Meulengracht Sørensen, The Unmanly Man.
Concepts of Sexual Defamation in Early Northern Society, tr. Joan
Turville-Petre (1983), 28–32, 79–81; Laws II 197 note 16. Some ofthe verses said to have been composed about ﬁangbrandr have beenpreserved.
37 I.e. Óláfr Tryggvason.
38 The first day of summer was Thursday, 9th–15th April (cf. Laws II

15 note 84). Gizurr and Hjalti’s arrival in Iceland must have been
18th–24th June and thus more or less coincided with the beginningof the Assembly (Alﬂingi) (cf. Laws I 57).
39 Strömbäck (1975, 19) cites this sentence as an instance of how

meticulous Ari could be in referring to his informants and their sources:‘We may note, for example, that he establishes the fact that the twochieftains who were to bring Christianity to Iceland first landed in
mid-June . . . in Vestmannaeyjar by referring to one of his bestinformed source-men [i.e. Teitr; cf. lines 8–9, 36, 144], who had
himself been told this by a man who was there on the islands at thetime.’
40 Fjƒrbaugsgar›r, ‘lesser outlawry’, involved banishment from

Iceland for three years (see Laws I 250). Under the laws of theCommonwealth, the penalty for reciting shaming slander (ní›; seenote 36 above) about another person was full outlawry (skóggangr);
see Laws II 197–99.

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41 On Lƒgberg, see Laws I 251; HOIC 41–44; Björn ﬁorsteinsson

1987, 41–42 and passim. It was at Lƒgberg that the recital of the lawsby the lawspeaker took place (cf. note 25 above).
42 At geyja go› probably means ‘to blaspheme (the) gods’; cf. theword go›gá (line 99) which must mean ‘blasphemy’ (the second
element of this word comes from the same root as geyja). The verse
is ironical: ‘I do not wish to blaspheme the gods; (but) Freyja seems
to me to be a bitch.’ It is in the metre málaháttr with internal and endrhymes (cf. ION 317; SnE, Háttatal st. 83, or, in some versions, st.
80, 81, 85, 88, and p. 87). On the voluptuous fertility-goddess Freyja,
see MRN 175–79; MS, s.v. Freyr and Freyja. In OddrÓT, Njáls saga(ch. 102) and Óláfs saga Tryggvasonar en mesta two further lines areadded: Æ mun annat tveggja / Ó›inn grey e›a Freyja, ‘One of thetwo, either Ó›inn or Freyja, will always be a bitch.’ Cf. Strömbäck
1975, 13–14.
43 It seems probable that Hallr was simply bribing ﬁorgeirr; OddrÓT

says that Óláfr Tryggvason had given Gizurr and Hjalti a substantial
sum of money before they left Norway ‘to make friends with chieftains’. Cf. Strömbäck 1975, 30–31.
44 bú›ir were the temporary shelters used by those attending theAlﬂingi at ﬁingvellir and assemblies elsewhere in Iceland. Their walls
would have been made of turf and stone and when in use they would
have been roofed with awnings of canvas or homespun. See Björn
ﬁorsteinsson 1987, 32–34.
45 ﬁorgeirr’s exemplum cited here is not historical and no real events

are referred to. In Kristni saga the names of the two fictitious kings
are given as Tryggvi (of Norway) and Dagr (of Denmark).
46 The exposure of unwanted infants (especially females) after birth(barna útbur›r) appears to have been practised in heathen Icelandand is referred to in the sagas (e.g. Gunnlaugs saga ormstungu ch. 3).
There was general Christian opposition to the consumption of horsemeat (hrossakjƒts át) in the Middle Ages, probably due to its association with heathen ritual rather than to the Mosaic Law, and, as Ari

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127

implies, it was later forbidden in the laws of the Icelandic Commonwealth (cf. Laws I 49). Cf. Strömbäck 1975, 17 note 1 and 29 note 2.
47 The location of the battle is disputed. It may have taken place off

the German island of Rügen (cf. p. 58 above and Svƒl›r in NION III).
48 Sveinn Haraldsson (Sven Forkbeard) revolted against his father,

Haraldr Gormsson, to ascend the throne of Denmark in about 986. In
the 990s he was involved in attacks on England, one of them together
with Óláfr Tryggvason. He also laid claim to Norway and after his
defeat of Óláfr Tryggvason recorded here had control of much of thatcountry. In 1013 he led a speedy invasion of England. Ethelred the
Unready was driven into exile and Sveinn was king of the country fora few months until his death at Gainsborough on 3rd February 1114.
Cf. MS, s.v. Sven Haraldsson (Forkbeard).
Óláfr enn sœnski (known in Swedish as Olof Skötkonung), son ofKing Erik the Victorious, ruled from c.995 and died c.1021. He is
probably the first king who could be said to have ruled all Sweden,
though only for a limited time. He embraced Christianity himself andattempted to impose it on his subjects, but was eventually frustrated
by the heathen faction.
Eiríkr Hákonarson was son of Hákon Sigur›arson Hla›ajarl who
had ruled Norway c.970–95. After the fall of Óláfr Tryggvason, Eiríkr
and his brother Sveinn had control of parts of the country, though as
subordinates of Sveinn Haraldsson. After Eiríkr was summoned toEngland by Canute in 1015, Óláfr Haraldsson (digri) returned to
Norway and defeated Sveinn at the Battle of Nesjar. Eiríkr died inEngland as earl of Northumbria in about 1024.
49 Modern chronological investigations suggest that Christianity wasin fact accepted at the Alﬂingi in June 999, and that Óláfr Tryggvason
fell in battle in the September of that same year. The apparent
discrepancy arises from the fact that Ari began his year on 1st September, as was not uncommon at the time. Cf. Strömbäck 1975, 2 note 1.
By the expression at alﬂ‡›u tali Ari refers to the system (nowcommon) of dating historical events from the birth of Christ. Thiswas introduced by Dionysius Exiguus (fl. AD 500) and fostered by the
Venerable Bede (d. 735). Systems using other dates for Christ’s birth

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were known in medieval Iceland, including that connected with
Gerlandus of Besançon (fl. AD 1100) which assumes that Christ wasborn seven years later than Dionysius and Bede reckoned.
50 On Bishop Gizurr Ísleifsson, see HOIC 147–53; Turville-Petre 1953,

79–82. He was son of Ísleifr, first bishop of Iceland, and grandson of
Gizurr enn hvíti who played such a notable role in the introduction of
Christianity to Iceland (see lines 80, 88, 111 above). He was born in1042, consecrated in 1082 (cf. note 60 below) and died in 1118. On
laws of tithe, see Laws II 221–35, 398–99 and references; HOIC
147–50, 169–78. On the writing down of the secular laws, cf. HOIC
89–93; Laws I 9–16. And on Jón ¯gmundarson and the foundation of
the see of Hólar, see Turville-Petre 1953, 109–42, 197–99; HOIC 153–
56; MS, s.v. Jóns saga ens helga. Cf. note 62 below and Text XIV.
51 Earlier in chapter 10 of Íslendingabók, Ari mentions Markús as his

informant for the terms of office of all the lawspeakers before his
own time and gives Markús’s sources for the lawspeakers before his(Markús’s) time. Markús was a poet and composed, for example, amemorial poem in honour of King Eirik Ejegod of Denmark (d. 1103).
52 Iceland was the first of the Scandinavian countries to introduce

tithes, at the Alﬂingi in 1096 or 1097. The amount was one per centof a man’s unencumbered possessions; one quarter was sent to thebishop, a second quarter to the priest, a third to the local church and afourth to the poor.
53 The land at Skálaholt had originally been part of Gizurr’s family

estate (cf. note 35 above). After the death of his mother, Gizurr had it
established by law that the bishop of Iceland should live at Skálaholt.
Before that, no particular place of residence had existed.
54 The diocese of Skálaholt was to cover the eastern, southern andwestern quarters, while that of Hólar (established in 1106) was tocover the northern quarter. But the northern quarter was the largest
and most populous, so Gizurr was giving up claim to more than one
fourth of the tithes he had previously received. See HOIC 151.

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55 For the boundaries of the four quarters of medieval Iceland, see themap in Laws I 280. Rangæingafjór›ungr is often called Sunnlendingafjór›ungr, Brei›fir›ingafjór›ungr Vestfir›ingafjór›ungr and Eyfir›ingafjór›ungr Nor›lendingafjór›ungr. Most (but not all) scholars regard
the word hundra›, ‘hundred’, used here as referring to the so-called‘long’ or ‘duodecimal’ hundred (i.e. 120) rather than the ‘decimal’hundred (i.e. 100) (cf. C–V 292–93; Gr 3.4.1). If this is right, then
the total number of farmers who paid assembly attendance dues in
Iceland was about 4,560, otherwise about 3,800. These figures havebeen used to calculate the total population of Iceland at the end of theeleventh century and have produced estimates as high as 80,000.
ﬁingfararkaup was paid by every householder with means above aprescribed level if he or a proper substitute did not attend the General
Assembly and was received by those who did attend (cf. HOIC 61;
Laws II 366 and references; Björn ﬁorsteinsson 1987, 25).
56 The words en ﬂá haf›i Go›mundr ﬁorgeirssonr tólf sumur are prob-

ably not original to the second version of Íslendingabók, that is, they
were very likely added to it later, either by Ari himself or by someone
else. Cf. p. 107 above.
57 Hafli›i Másson (d. 1130) lived at Brei›abólssta›r (in modern Vestur-

Húnavatnss‡sla). He was one of the most powerful chieftains of histime. His feud with ﬁorgils Oddason over the years 1117–21 is the
subject of ﬁorgils saga ok Hafli›a, one of the sagas of the compilation
known as Sturlunga saga (cf. p. 29 above). The text written at
Brei›abólssta›r in the winter of 1117–18, referred to by modern
scholars as ‘Hafli›askrá’, is mentioned in the Konungsbók version of
Grágás, the laws of the Icelandic Commonwealth, where it is said
that ‘everything in the book which Hafli›i had made is to be accepted
unless it has since been modified, but only those things in the accounts
given by other legal experts which do not contradict it, though anything
in them which supplies what is left out there or is clearer is to be
accepted’; cf. Laws I 190–91, 4–5, 9–16.
58 It was probably read out by clerics rather than by the lawspeaker,

Bergﬂórr, because the latter could not read.

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59 It was at Hallr’s home in Haukadalr that Ari was brought up (cf. p.

105 above). Hallr has been referred to as ‘one of the main channels
through which tradition flowed from ancient to medieval Iceland’(Turville-Petre 1953, 89). He died at the age of ninety-four in 1089.
Although he could neither read nor write, he had an excellent memoryand could, for example, remember his baptism by the missionaryﬁangbrandr. He had been in the service of King Óláfr Haraldsson of
Norway and was renowned for his good works.
60 Gizurr’s consecration was attended with certain difficulties. Gizurr

would normally have been consecrated by the archbishop of Hamburg–
Bremen, under whose authority the church in Iceland came. In theInvestiture Controversy between the papacy and the German Empire(cf. DMA VI, 498–500 and references), however, the archbishop of
the time, Liemarus, had allied himself with the Emperor (Henry IV)
against Pope Gregory VII (see note 61 below) who had then suspended
and excommunicated him (1074). Gizurr, who supported the Pope,
was therefore forced to travel to visit Gregory to seek advice, and it
was at his bidding that Gizurr was consecrated by archbishop Hartwig
of Magdeburg (on 4th September 1082). It was partly these circumstances which were the cause of the relatively long interval betweenÍsleifr’s death (5th July 1080) and Gizurr’s consecration. Cf. HOIC 147.
61 Gregory VII (originally Hildebrand) is regarded as one of the greatreforming popes of the Middle Ages. His letters attest to his concern
for the fortunes of the Church in places as far apart as Spain, Norway
and Hungary.
62 Jón ¯gmundarson was born about 1052 and was first bishop of

Hólar from 1106 until his death in 1121. Hafli›i Másson may havebeen involved in the choice of Hólar as a suitable location for thecentre of the northern see (cf. HOIC 153). As bishop, Jón establisheda school at Hólar and also planned the foundation of the first Icelandic
monastery at ﬁingeyrar, though this was not established until 1133.
He strove against the remnants of heathen practice and belief whichwere still alive in his diocese. For example, he forbade the naming of
the days of the week after the pagan gods and this prohibition isreflected in present-day Icelandic (see XIV:79–82 below). The Alﬂingi

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131

officially endorsed the cult of Jón as a saint in 1200. See referencesin note 50 above.
63 quinto kalendas Junii is short for quinto die ante kalendas Junii,‘the fifth day before the calends of June’. According to the Roman
calendar, the calends (kalendae) of a month was its first day. The
ordinal numeral quintus is inclusive, counting the days at both ends
(i.e. the day referred to and the day of the calends). The date is,therefore, 28th May. The addition of the word quinto is made on thebasis of Hungrvaka, a synoptic history of the early bishops of Iceland.
On the Roman calendar, see e.g. Benjamin Hall Kennedy, The Revised
Latin Primer, ed. and revised by James Mountford (1962), 215–17.

IX: ﬁRYMSKVI‹A
ﬁrymskvi›a, an eddic poem in which the god ﬁórr, disguised as thegoddess Freyja, recovers his hammer from the giant ﬁrymr, who has
refused to give it back unless he is granted Freyja in marriage, is preserved only in the Codex Regius of the Poetic Edda, GkS 2365 4to.
This manuscript dates from the second half of the thirteenth century,
but gives clear signs of having been copied from an older exemplar.
Few scholars would now accept E. V. Gordon’s view (ION, 136) thatﬁrymskvi›a ‘was probably composed about 900’; compelling reasons
have been adduced for regarding it as much younger than that, perhaps even from the first half of the thirteenth century. One of these is
the fact that it departs occasionally from the traditional rules of Old
Norse alliterative poetry; in its first two lines it uses end-rhyme, andin line 112, which echoes line 104, it appears to sacrifice alliteration
for an effect of near-repetition. With its frequent use of repetition,indeed (most notably at lines 10, 35 and 45), it may show the influence of European ballad poetry, Scandinavian examples of which are
not reliably attested until the thirteenth century. Furthermore, the fundamentally comic tone and subject-matter of ﬁrymskvi›a strongly suggest that, in the many cases where it shows close similarity of wording
to other eddic poems, it is more likely to have been the borrower thanthe lender, since the contexts in which the relevant words occur in theother poems are mostly serious, and the borrowing of a serious passage for comic purposes in a poetic tradition is a more likely development than the reverse process. This at least suggests that ﬁrymskvi›ais relatively late among the surviving eddic poems, even if it does nottell us much about its precise date. Examples are ﬁrymskvi›a line 5(repeated at lines 10, 35 and 45), which is word for word the same as
the line in Brot af Sigur›arkvi›u (st. 6) introducing Gu›rún Gjúkadóttir’s question to her brothers about the whereabouts of her husband
Sigur›r, whom they have slain; ﬁrymskvi›a line 23 (echoed at line25), which is identical with the sybil’s rhetorical question about theend of the world in Vƒluspá (st. 48); ﬁrymskvi›a lines 53–55, which
are identical with the lines in Baldrs draumar (st. 1) describing thedebate among the gods and goddesses as to the reason for Baldr’s
ominous dreams; and ﬁrymskvi›a lines 108–09, which recall thedescription in Gu›rúnarkvi›a I (st. 27) of how Brynhildr Bu›ladóttir’seyes flashed fire at the sight of Sigur›r’s dead body. In at least one

134

IX: ﬁrymskvi›acase, rather than placing a serious passage from an earlier eddic poem
in a comic context, ﬁrymskvi›a may be building on a situation in sucha poem where elements of comedy are already present. It is especiallytempting, for example, to regard Loki’s words to ﬁórr in line 69, ﬂegi
ﬂú, as an echo of Lokasenna, where the phrase occurs altogether sixteen times, and is four times used by ﬁórr in addressing Loki with theaccompanying insult rƒg vættr ‘effeminate creature’ (Lokasenna, st.
57, 59, 61, 63); in ﬁrymskvi›a it is used by Loki in addressing ﬁórr at
the very moment when ﬁórr is afraid of being accused of effeminacy
himself, as a result of having to dress up as a bride. The comic tone ofﬁrymskvi›a does not in itself justify the view that the poem is of late,post-pagan date. ‘It does not follow that those who told humorous
tales about the gods had ceased to believe in them’ (Turville-Petre
1953, 19). On the other hand, the fact that virtually no record is foundoutside ﬁrymskvi›a, either in Snorri Sturluson’s Prose Edda or elsewhere, of a myth of ﬁórr’s loss and recovery of his hammer, mightsuggest, together with the tone of the poem, that ﬁrymskvi›a was composed as a relatively late, comic, literary response to pre-Christian
Scandinavian mythology, and that the story it tells was largely the
product of literary invention.
It was considerations of this kind that led Peter Hallberg (1954, 51–77) to argue that Snorri Sturluson (died 1241) was the author ofﬁrymskvi›a. Snorri, with his vast knowledge of Old Norse mythology
and poetry, would certainly have been well equipped to compose aconvincing pastiche of a mythological eddic poem. In doing so in thecase of ﬁrymskvi›a, according to Hallberg, Snorri invented the ‘myth’of ﬁórr’s loss and recovery of his hammer, but was too conscientious
a scholar to include any reference to it in his Prose Edda, which wasintended as, among other things, a compendium of ancient myths. Taking the view that Snorri was especially fascinated by the idea of an
awe-inspiring glance of the eye, Hallberg compared lines 108–09 ofﬁrymskvi›a to the description of ﬁórr hooding his eyes in Gylfaginning
37/18–21 and to the description of King Eiríkr Bloodaxe’s piercing
gaze in Arinbjarnarkvi›a (st. 5), a poem attributed in Egils saga Skallagrímssonar, of which Hallberg believed Snorri was the author, to thetenth-century poet Egill Skallagrímsson, the saga’s hero (see ÍF II
259). It has recently been argued by Baldur Hafsta› (1994) that Snorri
was the author of Arinbjarnarkvi›a itself, as well as of Egils saga.

IX: ﬁrymskvi›a135This view, if it can be accepted, might lend some slight support toHallberg’s argument.
Those who wish to argue for a late date for ﬁrymskvi›a cannot afford to ignore (as Hallberg seems to do) the fact that it makes frequent
use of the particle um (or of ) before verbs, whether in the past tense(as in lines 2, 5, etc.), the past participle (as in lines 26, 81, 93, 128,etc.) or the infinitive (as in line 101, cf. line 109). In ﬁrymskvi›a thisparticle occurs in contexts where, in Primitive Norse, the verbs in question would have had a prefix; in the case of um komit, line 93, forexample, the prefix would have been *ga-, cognate with the prefix gefound in certain circumstances in verbs and other parts of speech in
Old English and Modern German. Whereas in Old Norse, as the
Glossary confirms, the of/um particle is meaningless, the prefixes it
has replaced would in the prehistory of Old Norse have modified to agreater or lesser extent the senses of the words in which they occur;
the prefix *ga-, for example, might have imparted a perfective aspect
or perhaps the sense of ‘together’ to the verb in which it occurred, sothat the primitive Norse equivalent of um komit in ﬁrymskvi›a line 93
might have meant ‘come together’, ‘assembled’. The fact that, from ahistorical-linguistic point of view, the of/um particle seems to be used
‘correctly’ in ﬁrymskvi›a, i.e. in positions where, in Primitive Norse,a prefix would have occurred, strongly suggests that the poem is considerably older than Hallberg (for example) would claim. On the other
hand, while it is uncertain how knowledgeable Old Norse speakers
were of ancient forms of their language (see Einar Ól. Sveinsson 1966,
especially 38–42), the possibility that the ﬁrymskvi›a poet was using
the particle as a deliberate means of archaising his style should not be
discounted (though see Fidjestøl 1999, 228); and John McKinnell has
recently argued (2000, 2, 14; 2001, 333, 335) that the poet has here
been influenced by the use of the prefix ge- in late Old English verse.
These considerations may not weigh heavily enough to allow for adate of as late as the thirteenth century for the composition ofﬁrymskvi›a, however, and Hallberg’s view that the poem dates fromthat century, and particularly his view that it was composed by Snorri
Sturluson, should be treated with caution.

136

IX: ﬁrymskvi›aBibliography

Stanza numbers of Eddic poems correspond to those in PE (1962).
Beowulf and the Fight at Finnsburg, ed. Fr. Klaeber, 3rd ed. (1950).
Margaret Clunies Ross, ‘Reading ﬁrymskvi›a’, in The Poetic Edda: Essays
on Old Norse Mythology, ed. Paul Acker and Carolyne Larrington (2002),
177–94.
Einar Ól. Sveinsson, ‘Kormakr the Poet and his Verses’, Saga-Book XVII:1(1966), 18–60.
Bjarne Fidjestøl, The Dating of Eddic Poetry: a Historical Survey and Methodological Investigation, ed. Odd Einar Haugen, Bibliotheca ArnamagnæanaXLI (1999).
John Frankis, ‘Sidelights on Post-Conquest Canterbury: towards a Context
for an Old Norse Runic Charm (DR 419)’, Nottingham Medieval Studies 44(2000), 1–27.
Baldur Hafsta›, ‘Er Arinbjarnarkvi›a ungt kvæ›i?’ in Sagnaﬂing helga› Jónasi
Kristjánssyni sjötugum 10. apríl 1994, ed. Gísli Sigur›sson et al. (1994),
19–31.
Peter Hallberg, ‘Om ﬁrymskvi›a’, Arkiv för nordisk filologi 69 (1954), 51–77.
Hervarar saga ok Hei›reks, ed. G. Turville-Petre (1956).
Jonna Louis-Jensen, ‘“Halt illu fran Bufa!” — til Tolkningen af KvinnebyAmuletten fra Öland’, in Northern Lights: Following Folklore in NorthWestern Europe. Aistí in adhnó do Bho Almqvist: Essays in Honour of Bo
Almqvist, ed. Séamas Ó Catháin et al. (2001), 111–26 (with English summary, p. 124).
John McKinnell, ‘Myth as Therapy: the Usefulness of ﬁrymskvi›a’, MediumÆvum 69 (2000), 1–20.
John McKinnell, ‘Eddic poetry in Anglo-Scandinavian Northern England’,ch. 19 in Vikings and the Danelaw. Select Papers from the Proceedings of
the Thirteenth Viking Congress, Nottingham and York, 21–30 August 1997,
ed. James Graham-Campbell et al. (2001), 327–44.
Jón Karl Helgason, ‘ “ﬁegi ﬂú, ﬁórr!”: Gender, Class, and Discourse inﬁrymskvi›a’, in Cold Counsel: Women in Old Norse Literature and Mythology: a Collection of Essays, ed. Sarah M. Anderson with Karen Swenson(2002), 159–66.
Preben Meulengracht Sørensen, The Unmanly Man: Concepts of Sexual Defamation in Early Northern Society, tr. Joan Turville-Petre (1983).
Richard Perkins, ‘ﬁrymskvi›a, Stanza 20, and a Passage from Víglundar saga’,
Saga-Book XXII:5 (1988), 279–84.
Richard Perkins, ‘The Eyrarland Image: ﬁrymskvi›a, stanzas 30–31’, in
Sagnaﬂing helga› Jónasi Kristjánssyni sjötugum 10. apríl 1994, ed. Gísli
Sigur›sson et al. (1994), 653–64.
Folke Ström, Ní›, ergi and Old Norse Moral Attitudes, The Dorothea Coke
Memorial Lecture in Northern Studies delivered at University College
London 10 May 1973 (1974).

IX: ﬁrymskvi›a137Sƒrla ﬂáttr, in Fornaldarsögur Nor›urlanda, ed. Gu›ni Jónsson (1950), I
365–82.
G. Turville-Petre, Origins of Icelandic literature (1953).
ﬁi›riks saga af Bern, ed. Henrik Bertelsen (1905–11).
The notes below are highly selective. Entries for mythical and legendary figures and locations mentioned in the poem will be found in Rudolf Simek,
Dictionary of Northern Mythology, tr. Angela Hall (1993), in Andy Orchard,
Dictionary of Norse Myth and Legend (1997), and in John Lindow, Handbookof Norse Mythology (2001). Although it has entries for only the major mythological figures, much useful information, including an entry on ﬁrymskvi›aitself (by Alfred Jakobsen), will be found in MS. John Lindow’s descriptive
bibliography, Scandinavian Mythology: an Annotated Bibliography, Garland
Folklore Bibliographies 13 (1988), supplied as it is with a 90-page Index, will
also be found helpful. Readers of German will find indispensable the commentary on ﬁrymskvi›a in Klaus von See et al., Kommentar zu den Liedern
der Edda II: Götterlieder (Skírnismál, Hárbar›sljó›, Hymiskvi›a, Lokasenna,ﬁrymskvi›a) (1997), 508–75.

138

IX: ﬁrymskvi›a
IX: ﬁRYMSKVI‹A

3

6

Rei›r var ﬂá Ving-ﬁórr er hann vakna›i
ok síns hamars um sakna›i;skegg nam at hrista, skƒr nam at d‡ja,ré› Jar›ar burr um at ﬂreifask.
Ok hann ﬂat or›a alls fyrst um kva›:‘Heyr›u nú, Loki, hvat ek nú mæli,er engi veit jar›ar hvergi
né upphimins: Áss er stolinn hamri!’

12

Gengu ﬂeir fagra Freyju túna,
ok hann ﬂat or›a alls fyrst um kva›:‘Muntu mér, Freyja, fja›rhams ljá,1
ef ek minn hamar mættak hitta?’

15

Freyja kva›:‘ﬁó mynda ek gefa ﬂér, ﬂótt ór gulli væri,ok ﬂó selja, at væri ór silfri.’18

Fló ﬂá Loki, fja›rhamr dun›i,
unz fyr útan kom Ása gar›aok fyr innan kom jƒtna heima.

21

ﬁrymr sat á haugi, ﬂursa dróttinn,2
greyjum sínum gullbƒnd snøri
ok mƒrum sínum mƒn jafna›i.

24

ﬁrymr kva›:‘Hvat er me› Ásum? Hvat er me› álfum?
Hví ertu einn kominn í Jƒtunheima?’

9‘Illt er me› Ásum, ‹illt er me› álfum›;hefir ﬂú Hlórri›a hamar um fólginn?’

IX: ﬁrymskvi›a‘Ek hefi Hlórri›a hamar um fólginn
átta rƒstum fyr jƒr› ne›an;hann engi ma›r aptr um heimtir,
nema fœri mér Freyju at kvæn.’Fló ﬂá Loki, fja›rhamr dun›i,
unz fyr útan kom jƒtna heima
ok fyr innan kom Ása gar›a;mœtti hann ﬁór mi›ra gar›a,ok ﬂat hann or›a alls fyrst um kva›:‘Hefir ﬂú erindi sem erfi›i?
Seg›u á lopti lƒng tí›indi;
opt sitjanda sƒgur um fallaskok liggjandi lygi um bellir.’‘Hefi ek erfi›i ok ørindi;
ﬁrymr hefir ﬂinn hamar, ﬂursa dróttinn;hann engi ma›r aptr um heimtir
nema hánum fœri Freyju at kván.’Ganga ﬂeir fagra Freyju at hitta,
ok hann ﬂat or›a alls fyrst um kva›:‘Bittu ﬂik, Freyja, brú›ar líni.
Vit skulum aka tvau í Jƒtunheima.’3
Rei› var› ﬂá Freyja ok fnasa›i;allr Ása salr undir bif›isk;stƒkk ﬂat it mikla men Brísinga.4‘Mik veiztu ver›a vergjarnasta,
ef ek ek me› ﬂér í Jƒtunheima.’
Senn váru Æsir allir á ﬂingi
ok Ásynjur allar á máli,ok um ﬂat ré›u ríkir tívar
hvé ﬂeir Hlórri›a hamar um sœtti.
32 ok unz R. 48 fnasasi R.

139
27

30

33

36

39

42

45

48

51

54

140

IX: ﬁrymskvi›a57

ﬁá kva› ﬂat Heimdallr, hvítastr Ása —vissi hann vel fram, sem Vanir a›rir 5 —‘Bindu vér ﬁór ﬂá brú›ar líni;
hafi hann it mikla men Brísinga.

60

63

66

69

72

75

Látum und hánum hrynja lukla
ok kvennvá›ir um kné falla,en á brjósti brei›a steina,
ok hagliga um hƒfu› typpum.’ﬁá kva› ﬂat ﬁórr,‘Mik munu Æsiref ek bindask læt

ﬂrú›ugr Áss:6
argan7 kalla,
brú›ar líni.’ﬁá kva› ﬂat Loki Laufeyjar sonr:‘ﬁegi ﬂú, ﬁórr,8 ﬂeira or›a;ﬂegar munu jƒtnar Ásgar› búa,
nema ﬂú ﬂinn hamar ﬂér um heimtir.’
Bundu ﬂeir ﬁór ﬂá brú›ar líni
ok inu mikla meni Brísinga;
létu und honum hrynja lukla,
ok kvennvá›ir um kné falla,en á brjósti brei›a steina,
ok hagliga um hƒfu› typ›u.

78ﬁá kva› ﬂat Loki Laufeyjar sonr:‘Mun ek ok me› ﬂér ambótt vera;
vit skulum aka tvau í Jƒtunheima.’9

81

Senn váru hafrar heim um reknir,
skyndir at skƒklum, skyldu vel renna.
Bjƒrg brotnu›u, brann jƒr› loga,ók Ó›ins sonr í Jƒtunheima.

84

IX: ﬁrymskvi›aﬁá kva› ﬂat ﬁrymr, ﬂursa dróttinn:‘Standi› upp, jƒtnar, ok strái› bekki!
Nú fœri› mér Freyju at kván,
Njar›ar dóttur ór Nóatúnum.
Ganga hér at gar›i gullhyrndar k‡r,
øxn alsvartir jƒtni at gamni;fjƒl› á ek mei›ma, fjƒl› á ek menja,
einnar mér Freyju ávant ﬂykkir.’
Var ﬂar at kveldi um komit snimma,
ok fyr jƒtna ƒl fram borit;
einn át oxa, átta laxa,
krásir allar ﬂær er konur skyldu;
drakk Sifjar verr sáld ﬂrjú mja›ar.
ﬁá kva› ﬂat ﬁrymr, ﬂursa dróttinn:‘Hvar sáttu brú›ir bíta hvassara?
Sáka ek brú›ir bíta in brei›ara,
né in meira mjƒ› mey um drekka.’
Sat in alsnotra ambótt fyrir,
er or› um fann vi› jƒtuns máli:‘Át vætr Freyja átta nóttum,
svá var hon ó›fús í Jƒtunheima.’
Laut und línu, lysti at kyssa,
en hann útan stƒkk endlangan sal.
‘Hví eru ƒndótt augu Freyju?
ﬁykki mér ór augum ‹eldr um› brenna.’
Sat in alsnotra ambótt fyrir,
er or› um fann vi› jƒtuns máli:‘Svaf vætr Freyja átta nóttum,
svá var hon ó›fús í Jƒtunheima.’

141

87

90

93

96

99

102

105

108

111

142

IX: ﬁrymskvi›a114

Inn kom in arma jƒtna systir,10
hin er brú›fjár11 bi›ja ﬂor›i.
‘Láttu ﬂér af hƒndum hringa rau›a,
ef ﬂú ƒ›lask vill ástir mínar,ástir mínar, alla hylli.’

117

120

123

126

129

ﬁá kva› ﬂat ﬁrymr, ﬂursa dróttinn:‘Beri› inn hamar brú›i at vígja;leggi› Mjƒllni í meyjar kné;vígi› okkr saman Várar hendi.’12
Hló Hlórri›a hugr í brjósti
er har›huga›r hamar um ﬂek›i.
ﬁrym drap hann fyrstan, ﬂursa dróttinn,ok ætt jƒtuns alla lam›i.
Drap hann ina ƒldnu jƒtna systur,hin er brú›fjár of be›it haf›i;hon skell um hlaut fyr skillinga
en hƒgg hamars fyr hringa fjƒl›.
Svá kom Ó›ins sonr endr at hamri.

IX: ﬁrymskvi›a

143

Notes
1 fja›rhams: what seems to be involved here is a flying suit which canbe worn without the wearer himself (or herself) changing into the formof a bird. While the motif of transformation into a bird for purposes offlight is common enough in Old Norse mythology and elsewhere, theidea of a detachable and transferable flying apparatus is relatively rarely
attested. See McKinnell 2000, 2, 14, and McKinnell 2001, 335–36.
ljá: if four is taken as the minimum number of syllables per halfline in the metre to which ﬁrymskvi›a conforms, i.e. fornyr›islag (cf.
ION §180), the monosyllable ljá, following here the disyllable
fja›rhams, means that the half-line in which it occurs is of the ‘short’
type, having only three syllables. Such ‘short types’ are also known as‘reduced’ half-lines (see ION §178), since they reflect a reduction insyllable number resulting from various sound changes that took placein the course of the development of Old Norse from Primitive Norse.
While reduced half-lines were apparently regarded as ‘permissible
variants’, there can be little doubt that the metre of the poem would
have sounded more regular if, in this line, the older (disyllabic) form
léa had been employed in recitation. This consideration may be used
together with the one involving the of/um particle (see the introduction above) as an argument either for the poem’s antiquity or, alternatively, for the view that the poet was making deliberate use of archaism.
See also the notes to lines 65, 69 and 115 below.
2 ﬁrymr sat á haugi: E. V. Gordon, in his note to this line (ION, 241),emphasises the royal and chieftainly associations of mounds. It may
also be worth noting here that in the eddic poem Hlƒ›skvi›a (PE 302–12), st. 14, Hlƒ›r, the illegitimate son of King Hei›rekr, is referred toas sitting on a mound by one of the other characters in the poem inwhat appears to be a disparaging statement; this at any rate was theview of G. Turville-Petre, who in commenting on this stanza acknowledged that a king’s authority might be symbolised by his sitting on amound, but mainly emphasised that ‘it was the practice of herdsmen
to watch their stock from a mound, and there was no trade more deeply
despised than that of the herdsman’ (see Hervarar saga ok Hei›reks
1956, 87).
ﬂursa dróttinn: this phrase, which is repeated in lines 41, 85, 98,
119 and 125, also occurs in the Canterbury and Sigtuna runic charms,

144

IX: ﬁrymskvi›adating probably from the eleventh and tenth centuries respectively,
where it is used in each case as a hostile term of address with reference to the disease or infection against which the charm is directed.
On these see John Frankis 2000 and Jonna Louis-Jensen 2001. On thepossible significance of this usage for the interpretation of ﬁrymskvi›a,see note 12 below.
3 It is not clear whether it is ﬁórr or Loki who is speaking here. For acompelling argument that it is ﬁórr, see Perkins 1988. The view that it
is ﬁórr is apparently also accepted by McKinnell 2000, 5; see further
note 9 below.
4 men Brísinga: Freyja’s necklace. From parts of Snorri’s Skáldskapar-

mál for which Snorri cites as sources the poems Húsdrápa andHaustlƒng, by Úlfr Uggason (tenth century) and ﬁjó›ólfr of Hvinir(ninth century) respectively, it is possible to piece together a story of
how Loki stole the Brísingamen from Freyja and how the god Heimdallr
recovered it after he and Loki had contended for it in the form of seals(see SnE, Skáldskaparmál 19–20, 32). The anonymous fourteenthcentury Sƒrla ﬂáttr tells how Freyja obtained a necklace as a result of
sleeping in turn with each of the four dwarves who made it; how Lokistole this necklace at Ó›inn’s request by biting Freyja in the form of aflea while she was asleep, thus causing her to move so that he could
unclasp it from her neck; and how Ó›inn returned the necklace to
Freyja after she had undertaken to start a fight between two kings thatwould constantly renew itself until a Christian warrior should intervene and kill them (this is the battle known as Hja›ningavíg, of which
Snorri gives an account, also in SnE, Skáldskaparmál 72–73). The
Brísinga men of Old Norse sources may or may not be identical with
the Brosinga mene of Beowulf, line 1199, which according to that poem
(lines 1197–1201) was carried off to a ‘bright stronghold’ by one Hama,
who was escaping the hostility of Eormenric, and who ‘chose eternal
gain’ (see Beowulf and the Fight at Finnsburg 1950, 45, 177–79).
This story has an analogue in the mid-thirteenth-century Norwegianﬁi›riks saga af Bern, based on Low German sources. ﬁi›riks saga
does not mention any Brísinga men, but tells in chs 345 and 430 how
Heimir (cf. Hama) was forced to flee the enmity of Erminrikr (cf.
Eormenric) and entered a monastery, bringing with him, among otherIX: ﬁrymskvi›a145

things, ten pounds’ worth of movable property (ﬁi›riks saga af Bern,
1905–11, II 176–77, 375–77). For the view that in ﬁrymskvi›a the
Brísingamen is a symbol of female sexuality, corresponding to thehammer as a symbol of male sexuality, see McKinnell 2000, 3–7, andcf. note 12 below.
5 sem Vanir a›rir: the natural meaning of these words is ‘like other

Vanir’, but since Heimdallr was one of the Æsir, not one of the Vanir,as the preceding line confirms, this half-line might perhaps be translated ‘like those others, the Vanir’. But if the poem was written in
Christian times, the lines may reflect the confusion of the author about
the categories of Norse mythology.
6 ﬂrú›ugr Áss: another ‘reduced’ half-line of only three syllables, wherean older, disyllabic form of Áss (cf. Primitive Norse *ansuR) would
have allowed perfect metrical regularity; cf. note 1 above.
7 argan: for valuable studies of what is conveyed by this adjective in

Old Norse, see Ström 1974, and Meulengracht Sørensen 1983.
8 ﬂegi ﬂú, ﬁórr: since the two syllables of ﬂegi are ‘resolved’, count-ing metrically as one (see ION §177), this amounts to another‘reduced’ half-line of only three syllables, in which an older, disyllabic form of ﬁórr (cf. Primitive Norse *ﬂunraR) would have allowed
perfect metrical regularity; cf. note 1 above.
9 Note the exact repetition here of line 47. There the use of the neuter

plural form tvau, which would be expected where the two referred toare of different sexes, is plainly justified by the fact that a god (whetherﬁórr or Loki, cf. note 3 above), is addressing a goddess, Freyja. Here,however, the god Loki is addressing another god, ﬁórr. As McKinnell(2000, 5) points out, the use of tvau here has usually been interpreted
in terms of gender role, i.e. as mockery of ﬁórr, with Loki addressingﬁórr as a woman now that he is dressed like one; this is clearly theview of Perkins (1988, 282, 284). McKinnell (2000, 5–6) argues interestingly that it is to be explained rather in terms of Loki literally
turning into a female, and ﬁórr, though disguised as a female, actuallyremaining male.

146

IX: ﬁrymskvi›a

10 jƒtna systir, here and in line 127, may be just a kenning for ‘troll-wife’ rather than meaning literally ‘giants’ sister’.
11 hin er brú›fjár (cf. also line 128): since hin er might very well havebeen pronounced as one syllable (with substitution of older es for er
permitting the elided form hin’s), this (like the identical first half ofline 128) is probably to be taken as a metrically ‘reduced’ half-line, inwhich the older, disyllabic element -féar (as opposed to the monosyllabic -fjár) in brú›fjár would have allowed perfect metrical regularity; cf. note 1 above.
12 Richard Perkins (1994) argues that ﬁórr’s hammer is a phallic sym-bol, and that the placing of a hammer in the bride’s lap was a featureof pagan Scandinavian wedding ceremonies. His view that ﬁrymskvi›a
is about the loss and recovery of ﬁórr’s virility may be interestingly
compared with McKinnell’s view (2000) of the poem in terms of Jungian psychology as being about the male fear of lost manhood (symbolised by the stolen hammer) and the female fear of male betrayal(symbolised by the broken necklace), cf. note 4 above. Frankis (2000,
2–5), on the other hand, suggests that the verb vígja ‘to bless’ as usedin line 122 may carry with it something of the sense of ‘consign toperdition’, in which, he believes, the same verb is used in the Canterbury runic charm, where the object of the verb, ﬂik, has the same referent as the phrase ﬂursa dróttinn (cf. ﬁrymskvi›a, lines 19, 41, 85,
98, 119 and 125), which immediately follows it, and which evidently
refers to the blood-poisoning against which the charm is directed. In
this view, ﬁórr’s recovery of his hammer and his use of it to destroy
ﬁrymr immediately afterwards would presumably symbolise recovery from, or the successful treatment of, some kind of medical condition.
Vár, according to SnE, Gylfaginning 29/36–38, ‘listens to people’s
oaths and private agreements that women and men make between eachother. Thus these contracts are called várar. She also punishes those
who break them.’X: V¯LUNDARKVI‹AVƒlundarkvi›a, which immediately follows ﬁrymskvi›a in the Codex
Regius, has long been regarded as one of the oldest eddic poems, i.e.
as dating from the ninth century. A recent argument that it shows theinfluence of late Old English verse (see McKinnell 2001, 331–35),
however, implies a date of composition in the tenth century or evenlater. It tells how Vƒlundr and his two brothers meet and marry threeswan-maidens, who after nine years fly away and leave them. While
two of the brothers, Egill and Slagfi›r, go in search of their wives,Vƒlundr stays behind, working at the craft of ring-making, and hopingfor his wife’s return. He is then robbed by King Ní›u›r of one of therings he has made, is captured by him and hamstrung, and forced toserve him as a smith. After discovering that the stolen ring has been
given to the king’s daughter, Bƒ›vildr, Vƒlundr takes revenge, first by
beheading the king’s two young sons and presenting their parents andBƒ›vildr with some bowls, gems and brooches made from the boys’skulls, eyes and teeth respectively; and secondly by seducing Bƒ›vildr,
after assuring her that he will repair the ring, the breaking of which
she has feared to reveal to anyone but him. Able now to fly, Vƒlundr
responds from the air to a question from Ní›u›r about the fate of his
two sons by first enjoining him to swear not to harm the woman bywhom he, Vƒlundr, may have a child, and then telling him how he has
disposed of the two princes, and that Bƒ›vildr is pregnant. He flies
off, leaving the distraught Ní›u›r to hear from Bƒ›vildr herself about
the nature of her relations with Vƒlundr.
This story finds a lengthy parallel in that of Velent (= Vƒlundr),
which forms part of ﬁi›reks saga af Bern, a thirteenth-century Old
Norse prose presentation of what are mainly German narrative traditions. Velent, the son of the giant Va›i, is trained in smithcraft by two
dwarves, of whose intention to kill him, however, he learns from hisfather before the latter’s death. Velent kills the dwarves and takes possession of their tools and precious metal. He builds a kind of submarine by hollowing out a tree-trunk and fitting it with glass windows,
and arrives in this vessel in the realm of King Ní›ungr, whose service
he enters and who at first treats him well. The king’s smith, Amilias,
challenges him to make a sword that will cut through some armour
that Amilias himself undertakes to make. Taking up the challenge,
and dissatisfied with the first sword he makes, Velent reduces it to148

X: Vƒlundarkvi›adust by filing, feeds the file-dust to some poultry, and makes anothersword from the birds’ droppings. Still not fully satisfied, he follows
the same procedure with the second sword, thus making a third, which
he calls Mímungr. With Mímungr, he cuts through Amilias’s armour
and kills him, in accordance with the terms of the challenge. He replaces him as the king’s smith, and becomes famous as such. His
fortunes then change, however. King Ní›ungr, marching to meet aninvading army, realises after five days’ march that he has not broughtwith him his victory stone, and fears defeat as a result. He promises
his daughter and half his kingdom to the man who can bring him thestone by the following morning, and Velent, the only one to undertakethe task, manages by riding on his horse Skemmingr to fetch the stone
on time. On his return, however, the king’s steward attempts to bribe
Velent into giving him the stone so that he, rather than Velent, canclaim the king’s reward, whereupon Velent kills the steward. He conveys the stone to the king, whose victory is thus assured, but the king,angered by the killing of the steward, who had been his favourite retainer, makes Velent an outlaw. Velent then tries to take revenge on the
king by poisoning him, but is foiled in the attempt, and is punished for
it by having tendons cut in both his legs, so that he is unable to walk.
He adjusts to this situation by feigning willingness to comply with the
king’s requirement that he resume work as his smith. When two of theking’s three sons ask him to make missiles for them he says that theymust first visit him walking backwards soon after a fall of snow, which
they do the next day after snow has fallen in the night. Velent kills
them, and makes various items of household equipment for the kingfrom their bones, including cups from their skulls. When the king’s
daughter breaks her finest ring (not one of Velent’s in this account)and fears to admit it to her parents, Velent tells her maid that the princess herself must visit him before he will repair it. When she does so,
he locks her in the smithy with him and has intercourse with her. Having sent for his brother Egill, a skilled archer, Velent obtains from him
the feathers of some birds he has shot, and uses them to make a feathercostume, which enables him to fly. In it he flies onto a tower, fromwhich he reveals to Ní›ungr what he has done with his sons’ bones,
and taunts him with the likelihood that he has made his daughter pregnant. He then flies off. The king orders Egill on pain of death to shootat Velent, but Egill aims deliberately at Velent’s left armpit, knowing

X: Vƒlundarkvi›a149that Velent has secreted there a bladder filled with the blood of theking’s slain sons. He punctures the bladder, and Ní›ungr, seeing theblood, believes Velent dead. When Ní›ungr dies soon afterwards, his
surviving son succeeds him, and Velent establishes friendly relations
with him and marries his sister, who by now has given birth to Velent’sson, Vi›ga, to whom Velent passes on in due course the sword Mímungr
and a shield on which a golden serpent is depicted.
While there are obviously close similarities between these two accounts, the differences between them make it safest to assume a common source for them both, rather than a direct relationship between
them. Echoes of the story they tell are found in various Old English
poems: in Deor, where Welund (= Vƒlundr, Velent) and Beadohild (=Bƒ›vildr) are dwelt on as examples of patience under suffering —Welund because of his subjection to bondage by Ni›had (= Ní›u›r),
and Beadohild because her discovery that she was pregnant caused
her even more distress than the death of her brothers; in Waldere, whereWeland’s (sic) skills as a smith are praised, and from which it emergesthat ﬁeodric (= ﬁi›rikr) intended to give Widia (= Vi›ga), the grandson of Ni›had and son of Weland, the sword Mimming (= Mímungr),
because he, Widia, had once saved ﬁeodric; and in Beowulf, where afine battle-dress is described as ‘the work of Weland’. In a verse passage in King Alfred’s Old English translation of Boethius’s De
consolatione Philosophiae reference is made to ‘the bones of the wise
Weland, that goldsmith who was long ago most famous’; and in the
medieval German Latin poem Waltharius there is mention of a coat of
mail made by Weland, Wielandia fabrica, that shields Waltharius (=Waldere) from his attackers. Pictorial representations of the story arefound in carvings on the whalebone casket of Northumbrian origin
known as the Franks casket, dated to c.700, and preserved in the British Museum; on the picture stone Ardre VIII, dated c.800, on the Swedish island of Gotland; and in stone carvings from northern Englanddating from the ninth and tenth centuries, found variously on a hogback
tomb preserved fragmentarily in Bedale Church, North Yorkshire, andon stone crosses preserved, more or less fragmentarily, in the Parish
Church and the City Museum of Leeds, West Yorkshire, and in Sherburn
Church, near Filey, North Yorkshire. Weland and Wade (= Va›i) havecome to be associated through local legend with specific places inEngland, Denmark, and Germany; and Chaucer twice mentions Wade,150

X: Vƒlundarkvi›aonce in Troilus and Criseyde and once in The Canterbury Tales, referring in the latter instance, in the Merchant’s Tale, to ‘Wades boot’(Wade’s boat) in a context of ‘muchel craft’ — an allusion, surely, tothe underwater boat made, according to ﬁi›riks saga, by Velent, sonof Va›i. This list of reflexes of the story is by no means exhaustive.
BibliographyÁsgeir Blöndal Magnússon, ‘Um ögurstund’, in Sjötíu ritger›ir helga›ar
Jakobi Benediktssyni 20. júlí 1977, 2 vols, ed. Einar G. Pétursson and Jónas
Kristjánsson (1977), I 20–29.
Finn Hødnebø, Ordbog over Det gamle norske Sprog af Dr. Johan Fritzner:
rettelser og tillegg (= vol. IV of the four-volume 4th edition of Fritzner’s
dictionary, published in 1973) (1972).
Hans Kuhn, Edda: die Lieder des Codex Regius nebst verwandten Denkmälern,
herausgegeben von Gustav Neckel: II. Kurzes Wörterbuch, 3rd revised edition of Neckel’s Kommentierendes Glossar (1968).
Beatrice La Farge and John Tucker, Glossary to the Poetic Edda: based on
Hans Kuhn’s Kurzes Wörterbuch (1992).
Alec McGuire and Ann Clark, The Leeds Crosses. Drawings by Peter Brears(1987).
John McKinnell, ‘Eddic Poetry in Anglo-Scandinavian Northern England’,ch. 19 in Vikings and the Danelaw: Select Papers from the Proceedings of
the Thirteenth Viking Congress, Nottingham and York, 21–30 August 1997,
ed. James Graham-Campbell et al. (2001), 327–44.
John McKinnell, ‘The context of Vƒlundarkvi›a’, in The Poetic Edda: Essays
on Old Norse Mythology, ed. Paul Acker and Carolyne Larrington (2002),
195–212.
The Poetic Edda II: Mythological Poems, ed. Ursula Dronke (1997), 239–328.
Paul Beekman Taylor, ‘Vƒlundarkvi›a’, in MS, 711–13.
Tvær kvi›ur fornar: Völundarkvi›a og Atlakvi›a me› sk‡ringum, ed. Jón
Helgason (1966).
ﬁi›riks saga af Bern, ed. Henrik Bertelsen, 2 vols (1905–11), I lxxvi–viii,
73–139.
ﬁorgils saga ok Hafli›a, ed. Ursula Brown (1952).
The notes below are more selective than in the case of ﬁrymskvi›a. Exhaustive notes on Vƒlundarkvi›a will be found in Dronke’s edition (in The Poetic
Edda II (1997) and (in Icelandic) in that of Jón Helgason (Tvær kvi›ur fornar(1966)), both listed in the Bibliography above. Entries on ‘Völund’ and‘Völundarkvida’ (sic) will be found in Andy Orchard’s Dictionary of Norse
Myth and Legend (1997), and reference may also be made to John Lindow’s
Scandinavian Mythology: an Annotated Bibliography, Garland Folklore Bibliographies 13 (1988).

X: Vƒlundarkvi›a151

X: V¯LUNDARKVI‹A
Frá VƒlundiNí›u›r hét konungr í Svíﬂjó›. Hann átti tvá sonu ok eina dóttur;hon hét Bƒ›vildr. Brœ›r ‹váru› ﬂrír, synir Finnakonungs. Hét einn 3
Slagfi›r, annarr Egill, ﬂri›i Vƒlundr. ﬁeir skri›u ok veiddu d‡r.
ﬁeir kvámu í Úlfdali ok ger›u sér ﬂar hús. ﬁar er vatn er heitirÚlfsjár. Snemma of morgin fundu ﬂeir á vatnsstrƒndu konur ﬂrjár, 6
ok spunnu lín. ﬁar váru hjá ﬂeim álptahamir ﬂeira. ﬁat váru
valkyrjur. ﬁar váru tvær dœtr ‹H›lƒ›vés konungs, Hla›gu›r svanhvít
ok Hervƒr alvitr. En ﬂri›ja var ¯lrún, Kíars dóttir af Vallandi. ﬁeir 9hƒf›u ﬂær heim til skála me› sér. Fekk Egill ¯lrúnar, en Slagfi›r
Svanhvítar, en Vƒlund‹r› Alvitrar. ﬁau bjuggu sjau vetr. ﬁá flugu
ﬂær at vitja víga ok kvámu eigi aptr. ﬁá skrei› Egill at leita ¯lrúnar, 12
en Slagfi›r leita›i Svanhvítar, en Vƒlundr sat í Úlfdƒlum. Hann
var hagastr ma›r, svá at menn viti, í fornum sƒgum. Ní›u›r konungr
15
lét hann hƒndum taka, svá sem hér er um kve›it.
Frá Vƒlundi ok Ní›a›i
Meyjar flugu sunnan, myrkvi› í gƒgnum,
Alvitr unga, ørlƒg dr‡gja;ﬂær á sævar strƒnd settusk at hvílask,
drósir su›rœnar,d‡rt lín spunnu.
Ein nam ﬂeira
Egil at verja,fƒgr mær fira, fa›mi ljósum;ƒnnur var Svanhvít,svanfja›rar dró;
en in ﬂri›ja, ﬂeira systir,var›i hvítan háls Vƒlundar.
Sátu sí›ansjau vetr at ﬂat,en inn átta allan ﬂrá›u,
en enn níunda nau›r um skil›i;meyjar f‡stusk á myrkvan vi›,
Alvitr unga,ørlƒg dr‡gja.

11, 13 Svanhvítrar CR. 25 ¯nundar CR.

18

21

24

27

30

152

33

36

39

42

45

48

X: Vƒlundarkvi›a
Kom ﬂar af vei›ive›reygr skyti;
Slagfi›r ok Egill
sali fundu au›a;
gengu út ok inn
ok um sásk.
Austr skrei› Egill at ¯lrúnu,
en su›r Slagfi›r at Svanhvítu.
En einn Vƒlundr
sat í Úlfdƒlum;Hann sló gull rauttvi› gimfastan,1luk›i hann alla
lindbauga vel;svá bei› hannsinnar ljós‹s›ar
kvánar, ef hánum koma ger›i.
ﬁat spyrr Ní›u›r,
Níara dróttinn,
at einn Vƒlundr
sat í Úlfdƒlum;nóttum fóru seg‹g›ir,
negldar váru brynjur,
skildir bliku ﬂeira vi› inn skar›a mána.
Stigu ór sƒ›lum
at salar gafli,
gengu inn ﬂa›an
endlangan sal;sá ﬂeir á bast bauga dregna,sjau hundru› allra,
er sá seggr átti.
Ok ﬂeir af tóku, ok ﬂeir á létu,
fyr einn útan,er ﬂeir af létu.

51

54

57

Kom ﬂar af vei›ive›reygr skyti,Vƒlundr, lí›andi
um langan veg.
Gekk brúnni beru hold steikja;
hár brann hrísi, allﬂur‹r› fura,vi›r enn vin‹d›ﬂurri,
fyr Vƒlundi.
Sat á berfjalli,bauga tal›i,álfa ljó›i, eins sakna›i;
hug›i hann at hef›iHlƒ›vés dóttir,
Alvitr unga, væri hon aptr komin.

31 vegreygr CR.

34 skrei›r CR.

43 váru CR.

X: Vƒlundarkvi›a
Sat hann svá lengi
at hann sofna›i,ok hann vakna›i vilja lauss;vissi sér á hƒndum hƒfgar nau›ir,en á fótum fjƒtur um spenntan.

153
60

63

‘Hverir ro jƒfrar, ﬂeir er á lƒg›ubestibyrsíma2 ok mik bundu?’
Kalla›i nú Ní›u›r,
Níara dróttinn:‘Hvar gaztu, Vƒlundr, vísi álfa,vára aura í Úlfdƒlum?’

66‘Gull var ﬂar eigi á Grana3 lei›u,fjarri hug›a ek várt landfjƒllum Rínar;man ek at vér meirimæti áttum,
er vér heil hjú heima várum.

69

72‘Hla›gu›r ok Hervƒr
borin var Hlƒ›vé,
kunn var ¯lrún, Kíars dóttir.’
Hon inn um gekk
ennlangan sal,stó› á gólfi,stillti rƒddu:‘Era sá nú h‡rr, er ór holti ferr.’75

Ní›u›r konungr gaf dóttur sinni Bƒ›vildi gull‹h›ring ﬂann er hann 78
tók af bastinu at Vƒlundar. En hann sjálfr bar sver›it er Vƒlundr
átti. En dróttning kva›:‘Tenn hánum teygjask,
er hánum er tét sver›ok hann Bƒ›vildar
baug um ﬂekkir;ámun eru augu ormi ﬂeim enum frána;
sní›i› ér hann sina magni
ok seti› hann sí›aní sævar stƒ›.’4

81

84

Svá var gƒrt, at skornar váru sinar í knésfótum, ok settr í hólm einn
er ﬂar var fyrir landi, er hét Sævarsta›r.5 ﬁar smí›a›i hann konungi 87
83 amon CR. 85 setti› CR.

154

X: Vƒlundarkvi›aalls kyns gørsimar. Engi ma›r ﬂor›i at fara til hans nema konungr
einn.
Vƒlundr kva›:
90

93

96

99

‘Skínn Ní›a›isver› á linda,
ﬂat er ek hvesta,
sem ek hagast kunna,ok ek her›ak sem mér hœgst ﬂótti:sá er mér, frán‹n› mækir,æ fjarri borinn;sékka ek ﬂann Vƒlundi
til smi›ju borinn.
Nú berr Bƒ›vildr brú›ar minnar— bí›ka ek ﬂess bót —bauga rau›a.’
Sat hann, né hann svaf, ávalt, ok hann sló hamri;
vél gør›i hann heldr hvatt Ní›a›i.
Drifu ungir tveir
á d‡r sjá,
synir Ní›a›ar,í sævar stƒ›.

102

105

108

111

114

117

Kómu ﬂeir til kistu,krƒf›u lukla,
opin var illú›,er ﬂeir í sá;fjƒl› var ﬂar menja, er ﬂeim mƒgum s‡ndisk
at væri gull rautt
ok gørsimar.
‘Komi› einir tveir,komi› annars dags!
Ykkr læt ek ﬂat gull um gefit ver›a.
Segi›a meyjum né salﬂjó›um,
manni øngum, at it mik fyndi›.’Snemma kalla›‹i›seggr ‹á› annan,Bró›ir á bró›ur:‘Gƒngum baug sjá!’
Kómu til kistu,krƒf›u lukla,
opin var illú›,er ﬂeir í litu.
Snei› af hƒfu› húna ﬂeira,ok undir fen fjƒturs fœtr um lag›i;en ﬂær skálar, er und skƒrum váru,
sveip hann útan silfri, seldi Ní›a›i.
92 hagazt CR. 115 log›i CR.

X: Vƒlundarkvi›a
En ór augum
jarknasteina
sendi hann kunnigri
konu Ní›a›ar;en ór tƒnnum tveggja ﬂeira
sló hann brjóstkringlur,sendi Bƒ›vildi.
ﬁá nam Bƒ›vildr
baugi at hrósa,
er brotit haf›i:‘ﬁoriga ek at segja, nema ﬂér einum.’

155

120

123

Vƒlundr kva›:‘Ek bœti svá
brest á gulli,
at fe›r ﬂínum fegri ﬂykkir,
ok mœ›r ﬂinni miklu betri,ok sjálfri ﬂér at sama hófi.’Bar hann hana bjóri, ﬂví at hann betr kunni,
svá at hon í sessi
um sofna›i.
‘Nú hefi ek hefnt
harma minna,
allra nema einna ívi›gjarnra.
‘Vel ek,’ kva› Vƒlundr,‘ver›a ek á fitjum6
ﬂeim er mik Ní›a›arnámu rekkar.’Hlæjandi Vƒlundr hófsk at lopti.
Grátandi Bƒ›vildr
gekk ór eyju,
treg›i fƒr fri›ils ok fƒ›ur rei›i.
Úti stendr kunnig
kván Ní›a›ar,
ok hon inn um gekk
endlangan sal;en hann á salgar›
settisk at hvílask:‘Vakir ﬂú, Ní›u›r, Níara dróttinn?’‘Vaki ek ávalt,
vilja laus‹s›,sofna ek minnst
sízt mína sonu dau›a;kell mik í hƒfu›, kƒld eru mér rá› ﬂín,
vilnumk ek ﬂess nú,
at ek vi› Vƒlund dœma.

133 ívi›gjarira CR. 143 vilja ek CR.

126

129

132

135

138

141

144

156

X: Vƒlundarkvi›a147‘Seg ﬂú mér ﬂat, Vƒlundr, vísi álfa:af heilum hvat var›húnum mínum?’

150

153

156

159

162

165

168

171

174

‘Ei›a skaltu mér á›ralla vinna,at skips bor›iok at skjaldar rƒnd,at mars bœgiok at mækis egg,at ﬂú kveljat kván Vƒlundar,né brú›i minni at bana ver›ir,ﬂótt vér kván e‹i›gim,ﬂá er ﬂér kunni›,e›‹a› jó› eigim
innan hallar.
‘Gakk ﬂú til smi›ju
ﬂeirar er ﬂú gør›ir,
ﬂar fi›r ﬂú belgi
bló›i stokkna.
Snei› ek af hƒfu›húna ﬂinna,
ok undir fen fjƒturs
fœtr um lag›ak.
‘En ﬂær skálar, er und skƒrum váru,
sveip ek útan silfri, senda ek Ní›a›i;en ór augum jarknasteina
senda ek kunnigri
kván Ní›a›ar.
‘En ór tƒnnum tveggja ﬂeira
sló ek brjóstkringlur, senda ek Bƒ›vildi;
nú gengr Bƒ›vildr
barni aukin,
eingadóttir
ykkur beggja.’‘Mæltira ﬂú ﬂat mál
er mik meirr tregi,né ek ﬂik vilja, Vƒlundr,verr um níta;
erat svá ma›r hár
at ﬂik af hesti taki,
né svá ƒflugr at ﬂik ne›an skjóti,
ﬂar er ﬂú skollirvi› sk‡ uppi.’Hlæjandi Vƒlundr
hófsk at lopti,
En ókátr Ní›u›r sat ﬂá eptir.

148 sonum CR.

X: Vƒlundarkvi›a‘Upp rístu, ﬁak‹k›rá›r,ﬂræll minn inn bezti,bi› ﬂú Bƒ›vildi,
meyna bráhvítu,
ganga fagrvari›vi› fƒ›ur rœ›a.’

157

177

‘Er ﬂat satt, Bƒ›vildr,
er sƒg›u mér:sátu› it Vƒlundr saman í hólmi?’‘Satt er ﬂat, Ní›a›r,
er sag›i ﬂér:sátu vit Vƒlundr
saman í hólmi
eina ƒgurstund7 —æva skyldi!
Ek vætr hánum‹vinna› kunnak,
ek vætr hánum vinna máttak.’

180

183

158

X: Vƒlundarkvi›aNotes

1 vi› gimfastan: the Codex Regius here has vi› gimfástaN. La Farge
and Tucker (1992, 85), following Hans Kuhn (1968, 75), understand
gimfastan as the masculine accusative singular of a compound adjective gimfastr ‘fireproof’, formed from gim, n., a poetic word for ‘fire’,and from the adjective fastr, meaning ‘fast’ in the sense of ‘firm’,‘fixed’. On this basis they take gimfastan to refer here to the fireproof
quality of an anvil, a suggestion which involves assuming the implicit
presence in the sentence of the noun ste›i, m., ‘anvil’ in its accusative
singular form, ste›ja. The phrase vi› gimfastan ‹ste›ja› would thus
mean ‘on a fireproof anvil’. Another possible reading is vi› gim fastan,which would involve taking gim as the accusative singular of a masculine noun *gimr ‘gem’, which is not otherwise attested in Old Norse(where, however, the compound gimsteinn, m. ‘precious stone’ isfound). Since gim, m., is the usual Old English word for ‘gem’, ‘jewel’,
McKinnell (2001, 331), who adopts this reading, sees gim here as one
example of Old English influence on Vƒlundarkvi›a. The meaning of
the phrase, in this reading, would be ‘round the firmly-held gem’ (cf.
also The Poetic Edda II, ed. U. Dronke (1997), 245, 308). A third
possibility is to read vi› gim fástan, with gim taken once again as theaccusative singular of a masculine noun meaning ‘gem’ and as qualified by fástan, the masculine accusative singular of the superlative
form, fástr, of the adjective fár (found most often in compounds suchas dreyrfár ‘blood-coloured’), meaning ‘multicoloured’ or ‘highly
coloured’, ‘bright’. This reading, which would give the meaning ‘roundthe brightest (of) gem(s)’, is the one adopted in Jón Helgason’s edition, Tvær kvi›ur fornar (1966), 59. Of these three possibilities, it is
the first that is favoured here.
2 bestibyrsíma: previous commentators have found the element -byr-

problematic, and have preferred to discount it by emending to bestisíma,taking -síma as the accusative singular of sími, m., ‘rope’, ‘cord’, ‘bond’(or of síma, n., ‘thread’), and as forming together with besti, n., ‘bast’,‘bark-fibre’ (= bast, n., cf. line 47) a compound noun bestisími, m. (orbestisíma, n.), meaning ‘bast rope’, ‘cord made of bark-fibre’. It may
be noted, however, that Hødnebø (1972, 67), gives under byrr, m.
(‘fair wind [for sailing]’, ‘favourable wind’), the phrase binda byr vi›

X: Vƒlundarkvi›a159

as meaning ‘to delay’, ‘hold back’, though it is not clear from the example he gives whether these meanings are to be understood in a transitive or intransitive sense: ‘bundu eigi lengi sí›an byr vi› ok ri›u aptr
sí›an skyndiliga.’ What seems to emerge from this example (which isfrom ﬁorgils saga ok Hafli›a, cf. the edition of Ursula Brown (1952,
37, 89)) is that the phrase means ‘to restrict (or tie) one’s time ofdeparture to (the opportunity afforded by) a fair wind’, i.e. to delay or
postpone a projected journey until such time as conditions arefavourable. If the phrase may be taken as indicating that the noun byrr
had associations of delay or restraint (as well as of auspiciousness), it
is conceivable that byrsími, m., or byrsíma, n., might be interpreted asmeaning ‘a rope or cord used for the purpose of (temporarily)
restraining someone’, i.e. for tying someone up (until the time is ripefor his or her release). On this basis it may be very tentatively suggested
that what is present here is the accusative singular of either bestibyrsími,m., or bestibyrsíma, n., meaning ‘a restrictive rope or cord made ofbast or bark-fibre’.
3 Grana: Grani was the horse ridden by Sigur›r Fáfnisbani (see theintroduction to IV, above), and used by him for, among other things,
transporting the gold he won as a result of slaying the dragon Fáfnir;
see PE, 188. Grana lei› ‘Grani’s path’ therefore presumably means
Gnitahei›r (PE 180), which together with the mention of the mountains of the Rhine in the next line suggests that there has been somecontamination of the story of Vƒlundr with that of Sigur›r.
4 sævar stƒ›: ‘landing place by the sea’. The landing place in question

seems to have been on an island, to judge from the phrases ór eyju andí hólmi, the former occurring in line 137 and the latter in lines 179,
181. Although sær can mean ‘lake’ as well as ‘sea’, the latter meaning
seems the more likely one in the present context, in view of the possible
tidal connotations of the word ƒgurstund, see the note on that word
below. The writer of the prose narrative accompanying Vƒlundarkvi›ain the Codex Regius has clearly understood the expression sævar stƒ›as a place-name (see note 7, below), and as the name of an island, seelines 86-87.
5 Here the expression sævar stƒ› (see the previous note) appears to160

X: Vƒlundarkvi›ahave been understood as a place-name, with the noun stƒ›, f., ‘landing
place’, ‘place where boats are beached’, being replaced by the nounsta›r, m. ‘place of settlement’, here suffixed to Sævar-.
6 ver›a ek á fitjum: ‘if I could get (or rise?) on upward-pushing feet’.

One meaning of fit, f., is the ‘web’ of the kind found on the feet ofcertain aquatic birds, which might suggest that Vƒlundr is here speakingof himself as partaking of the nature of such a bird, and envisaging
leaving the island referred to in line 137 either by swimming or flying.
Another meaning is the ‘hind flipper’ of a seal or walrus; according to
Jón Helgason (Tvær kvi›ur fornar 1966, 74), the expression ver›a á
fitjum would express well the idea of a seal moving into an uprightposition by sitting up on its hind flippers. Given the German connections of the story (see the Introduction) it is likely that the noun fit also
carries here something of the sense of Middle Low German vittek‘wing’ (cf. Tvær kvi›ur fornar 1966, 74, and La Farge and Tucker
1992, 61).
7ƒgurstund: Ásgeir Blöndal Magnusson (1977) argues convincinglythat this word as used here reflects two meanings: (1) ‘the (brief) periodof time between the reaching by the tide of its highest level and its
beginning to ebb’, for which the Modern Icelandic dialect expressiona› bí›a eftir ögrinu ‘to wait for the turning of the tide’ provides
evidence; and (2) ‘a time of great distress’, which finds support inevidence from c.1500, cited by Ásgeir Blöndal and also by Jón
Helgason (Tvær kvi›ur fornar 1966, 80), that ögr, ögur, n., could mean‘heavy heart’. The meaning here may well be no more than ‘a brieftime of great distress’, though it is perfectly possible that the tidal
associations are present here as well; cf. note 4, above.

XI: ﬁi›reks saga

161

XI: ﬁI‹REKS SAGAThis extract from ﬁi›reks saga af Bern (cf. the introduction to X,
above) has been chosen for the Reader partly because of the relative
simplicity of its style, which makes it easy for beginners to read, andpartly because it offers an opportunity for comparison of German
treatments of the story of the fall of the Burgundians (called the
Niflungar in the extract) with the Old Norse ones. The German traditions of this event are chiefly represented by the Nibelungenlied, an
epic poem in Middle High German dating from c.1205, and the Old
Norse ones by the anonymous mid thirteenth-century Icelandic proseVƒlsunga saga and its eddic sources, most especially (as far as theextract is concerned) the anonymous poems Atlakvi›a and Atlamál.
What is described in the extract is the reception by Grímhildr of her
brothers at the court of her husband, the Hunnish king Attila, where
she has urged him to invite them (see ﬁi›riks saga, ed. H. Bertelsen,
II, 279–80); in ﬁi›reks saga his court is located at Soest in Westphalia,
as the name Susa in the extract (line 11) shows. In the Nibelungenlied
the reason for the invitation is the wish of Kriemhilt (as Grímhildr isthere named) to be avenged on her brothers for the slaying of her
former husband Siegfried, who corresponds to the Sigur›r (or in ﬁi›rekssaga Sigur›r sveinn) of Old Norse sources. In Vƒlsunga saga and its
relevant sources, the invitation comes from Atli (the Attila of theextract), whose motive is lust for the treasure that Sigur›r had won byhis slaying the dragon Fáfnir, and which, after Sigur›r had marriedGu›rún (the Grímhildr of the extract), had been acquired by her
brothers (i.e. the Burgundians) when they brought about his death.
Gu›rún had then reluctantly married Atli, who now covets the treasure.
Of these two versions of the story, the Old Norse one is thought to be
the older. ﬁi›reks saga, itself an Old Norse work, though containing
mainly German narrative material, is in general closer to the German
version than to the Old Norse one, but falls somewhere between the
two. From the extract it is clear, for example, that while Grímhildr
deeply mourns the death of her former husband, which is consistent
with the revenge motive of the German version, she is also interested
in whether her brothers have brought the treasure of the Niflungar
with them, which is consistent with the emphasis in the Old Norseversion on her new husband’s lust for it. The present discussion, which

162

XI: ﬁi›reks saga

is aimed at providing an immediate context for the extract below,
concentrates on the events and characters of the story as it is told in
ﬁi›reks saga; neither the extract itself, nor what is said here specifically about ﬁi›reks saga, should be allowed to give rise to assumptions
about the content of the story as told elsewhere, whether in the German
or Old Norse versions. Parts of the story not covered by the extract
are referred to by volume and page numbers of Bertelsen’s edition.
In the extract (lines 15–18), it is said that fires were prepared for
the Niflungar on their arrival at Attila’s court, and that they driedthemselves. This is to be understood in the light of the fact, reported
shortly before the extract begins, that they had encountered badweather on their way to Soest and got wet (II, 295). It is also perhaps
intended to recall the fact that, earlier on their journey, their ship had
capsized while they were crossing the Rhine, after which they driedthemselves by fires at the castle of Ro›ingeirr, Margrave of Bakalar(Pöchlarn) (who also features in the extract; see below) (II, 286–92).
On that occasion the business of drying themselves had exposed thebright armour they were wearing, as it also does in the scene describedin the extract (lines 18–19). The brothers of Grímhildr mentioned in
the extract are Gunnarr, Gíslher and Gernoz (see lines 28–30 and 54).
Hƒgni is their half-brother, having been conceived as a result of theirmother sleeping with a supernatural being in the temporary absenceof their father (I, 319–23). In referring to himself (as he seems to be
doing in line 25 of the extract) as óvin, a word which can mean ‘devil’as well as ‘enemy’, Hƒgni is probably alluding partly to his semisupernatural, illegitimate origins and partly to the fact that Grímhildr
has little reason to feel friendly towards him, because it was he who
had killed her husband Sigur›r sveinn, as she had suspected from thestart; he had in fact speared him between the shoulder-blades (II, 264–68), where Grímhildr, in the extract (line 35), recalls that he waswounded. Fólkher is a kinsman of the Niflungar, as the extract makes
clear (line 55), and Aldrian (line 44) is the son of Attila and Grímhildr(II, 308). ﬁi›rekr, for whom the Ostrogothic king Theoderic (d. 526)
is the historical prototype, is of course the main character of ﬁi›rekssaga, from which the extract is taken; and Ro›ingeirr and Hildibrandr(lines 56–57) are among the many heroic figures with whom ﬁi›rekr
becomes associated in the course of his career, which, as T. M.
Andersson (1986, 368–72) has shown, constitutes the backbone of

XI: ﬁi›reks saga

163

the saga’s plot. Hildibrandr had been ﬁi›rekr’s foster-father when he
was a boy (I, 34), and Ro›ingeirr, who had been present with ﬁi›rekr
at the marriage of Grímhildr to Attila and been given by Gunnarr onthat occasion the sword Gramr, which had belonged to Sigur›r sveinn(II, 278–79), gave the sword to Gíslher (II, 294) when the Niflungar
visited him, as described above, on their way to Attila’s court, on
which journey he then joined them (II, 295). Ironically and tragically,
it is with this same sword that Gíslher kills Ro›ingeirr in the battle
that follows what is described in the extract (II, 320–21). ﬁi›rekr, it isemphasised near the end of the extract (line 73), was the first to warn
the Niflungar — albeit obliquely — of the hostile intentions ofGrímhildr and her husband. That they hardly needed any warning,
however, is apparent from Hƒgni’s no less oblique words to Grímhildron his arrival (line 25), and from the fact that, earlier in the story, he
had suspected treachery and advised his half-brothers against accepting the invitation (II, 281–84).
There are three main manuscripts of ﬁi›reks saga: a Norwegianvellum (Stock. Perg. fol. nr 4) marred by several lacunae and datingfrom the late thirteenth century, and two complete Icelandic paper
manuscripts (AM 177 fol. and AM 178 fol.), both dating from theseventeenth century. The Norwegian manuscript, Stock. Perg. fol. nr
4, is referred to by Bertelsen and here as Mb. The present extract,which is in normalised spelling, has been prepared with the help ofBertelsen’s and Gu›ni Jónsson’s editions and collated with the relevant
part of the text as it appears in the facsimile edition of Mb producedby P. Petersen and published in 1869. It is from this facsimile edition
that the readings from Mb given below in footnotes are taken. The
editor is grateful to David Ashurst for supplying photocopies of therelevant pages, 119r–120r, from the copy of this edition held in the
British Library, and for guidance as to the meaning of Hƒgni’s words
to Grímhildr in reply to her question about the treasure of the Niflungar.

164

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Bibliography

Theodore M. Andersson, ‘The epic source of Niflunga saga and the Nibelungenlied’, Arkiv för nordisk filologi 88 (1973), 1–54.
Theodore M. Andersson, The Legend of Brynhild (1980).
Theodore M. Andersson, ‘An interpretation of ﬁi›reks saga’, in Structureand Meaning in Old Norse Literature: New Approaches to Textual Analysis
and Literary Criticism, ed. John Lindow et al. (1986), 347–77.
Theodore M. Andersson, ‘Composition and Literary Culture in ﬁi›reks saga’,in Studien zum Altgermanischen: Festchrift für Heinrich Beck, ed. Heiko
Uecker (1994), 1–23.
M. J. Driscoll, review of The Saga of Thidrek of Bern, tr. E. R. Haymes (seebelow), Journal of English and Germanic Philology 89 (1990), 389–93.
R. G. Finch, ‘ﬁi›reks saga af Bern’, in MS 662–63.
Das Nibelungenlied, ed. Helmut de Boor (on the basis of Karl Bartsch’s
edition, first published in 3 vols, 1870–80), 13th ed., revised (1956).
The Nibelungenlied, tr. A. T. Hatto (1969).
Photo-lithographisk Aftryk af Pergamentscodex No. IV Folio i det kongelige
Bibliothek i Stockholm, indeholdende Didrik af Berns Saga. Udført i
Opmaalingscontorets photographiske Anstalt af P. Petersen (Christiania,
1869).
The Poetic Edda I: Heroic Poems, ed. Ursula Dronke (1969).
The Saga of Thidrek of Bern, tr. Edward R. Haymes (1988) (cf. the review ofM. J. Driscoll, above).
The Saga of the Volsungs: the Norse Epic of Sigurd the Dragon Slayer, tr.
Jesse L. Byock (1990).
ﬁi›reks saga af Bern, ed. Gu›ni Jónsson, 2 vols (1954).
ﬁi›riks saga af Bern, ed. Henrik Bertelsen, 2 vols (1905–11).
Vƒlsunga saga. The Saga of the Volsungs, ed. and tr. R. G. Finch (1965).

XI: ﬁi›reks saga

165

XI: ﬁI‹REKS SAGA
Frá drottning‹u› Grímhildi
Drottning Grímhildr stendr í einum turn ok sér fƒr brœ›ra sinna ok
ﬂat, at ﬂeir rí›a nú í borgina Susa. Nú sér hon ﬂar margan n‡jan skjƒld 3
ok marga hvíta brynju ok margan d‡rligan dreng.
Nú mælti Grímhildr, ‘Nú er ﬂetta it grœna sumar fagrt. Nú faramínir brœ›r me› margan n‡jan skjƒld ok marga hvíta brynju, ok nú 6
minnumk ek hversu mik harmar in stóru sár Sigur›ar sveins.’
Nú grætr hon allsárliga Sigur› svein ok gekk í móti ﬂeim Niflungum
ok ba› ﬂá vera vel komna ok kyssir ﬂann er henni var næstr, ok hvern 9at ƒ›rum. Nú er ﬂessi borg náliga full af mƒnnum ok hestum, ok ﬂar
eru ok fyrir í Susa mƒrg hund‹r›u› manna ok svá hesta, svá at ei færtƒlu á komit.
12
Frá brœ›rum Grímhildar
Attila konungr tekr vel vi› sínum mágum, ok er ﬂeim fylgt í hallirnar,ﬂær sem búnar eru, ok ger‹v›ir fyrir ﬂeim eldar. En Niflung‹ar› fara 15
ekki af sínum brynjum, ok ekki láta ﬂeir sín vápn at sinni.
Nú kemr Grímhildr inn í hƒllina, ﬂar er fyrir váru hennar brœ›r vi›
eld ok ﬂurka sik. Hon sér hversu ﬂeir lypta upp sínum kyrtlum ok ﬂar 18
undir eru hvítar brynjur. Nú sér Hƒgni sína systur Grímhildi ok tekr
ﬂegar sinn hjálm ok setr á hƒfu› sér ok spennir fast ok slíkt it sama
Fólkher.
21
Frá Grímhildi ok brœ›rumﬁá mælti Grímhildr: ‘Hƒgni, sitt‹u› heill. Hvárt hefir ﬂú nú fœrt mér
Niflungaskatt ﬂann er átti Sigur›r sveinn?’
24‹ﬁá svarar Hƒgni,› ‘Ek fœri ﬂér,’ segir hann, ‘mikinn óvin; ﬂar fylgir
minn skjƒldr ok minn hjálmr me› mínu sver›i, ok eigi lei‹f››a ek
mína brynju.’27
Nú mælti Gunnarr konungr vi› Grímhildi: ‘Frú systir, gakk hingat
ok sit hér.’
Nú gengr Grímhildr at sínum unga brœ›r Gíslher ok kyssir hann ok 30
sitr í hjá honum ok milli ‹ok› Gunnars konungs, ok nú grætr hon
sárliga.
11 hunda› Mb. 14 fylkt Mb.

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XI: ﬁi›reks saga

Ok nú spyrr Gíslher, ‘Hvat grætr ﬂú, frú?’
Hon svarar, ‘ﬁat kann ek vel ﬂér segja. Mik harmar ﬂat mest nú
sem jafnan ﬂau stóru sár, er haf›i Sigur›r sveinn sér mi›il her›a ok
36 ekki vápn var fest á hans skildi.’ﬁá svarar Hƒgni, ‘Sigur› svein ok hans sár látum nú vera kyrr okgetum eigi. Attila konung af Húnalandi, gerum hann nú svá ljúfan
39 sem á›r var ﬂér Sigur›r sveinn. Hann er hálfu ríkari, en ekki fær nú atgert at grœ›a sár Sigur›ar sveins. Svá ver›r ﬂat nú vera sem á›r eror›it.’
42ﬁá stendr upp Grímhildr ok gengr í brott.
ﬁví næst kemr ﬂar ﬁi›rekr af Bern ok kallar at Niflungar skulu fara
til bor›s. Ok honum fylgir son Attila konungs, Aldrian. Nú tekr
45 Gunnarr konungr sveininn Aldrian ok berr í fa›mi sér út. En ﬁi›rekr
konungr af Bern ok Hƒgni eru svá gó›ir vinir, at hvárr ﬂeira leggrhƒnd sína yfir annan ok ganga svá út ór hƒllinni ok alla lei› ﬂar til er
48 ﬂeir koma til konungs hallar. Ok á hverjum turn ok á hverri hƒll ok á
hverjum gar›i ok á hverjum borgarvegg standa nú kurteisar konur,ok allar vilja Hƒgna sjá, svá frægr sem hann er um ƒll lƒnd af hreysti
51 ok drengskap. Nú kómu ﬂeir í ‹hƒll Attila konungs›.
33

Frá Attila konung‹i ok› brœ›rum Grímhildar
Attila konungr sitr nú í sínu hásæti ok setr á hœgra veg sér Gunnar
konung, sinn mág, ok ﬂar næstr sitr junkherra Gíslher, ﬂá Gernoz, ﬂáHƒgni, ﬂá Fólkher, ﬂeira frændi. Á vinstri hli› Attila konungs sitr
ﬁi›rekr konungr af Bern ok Ro›ingeirr margreifi, ﬂá meistari Hildi57 brandr. ﬁessir allir sitja í hásæti me› Attila konungi. Ok nú er skipat
ﬂessi hƒll fyrst me› inum tignustum mƒnnum ok ﬂá hverjum at ƒ›rum.
ﬁeir drekka ﬂat kveld gott vín, ok hér er nú in d‡rligsta veizla ok me›
60 alls konar fƒngum er bezt megu vera, ok eru nú kátir. Ok nú er svá
mikill fjƒl›i manna kominn í borgina, at hvert hús er fullt náliga íborginni. Ok ﬂessa nótt sofa ﬂeir í gó›um fri›i ok eru nú allkátir ok
63 me› gó›um umbúna›i.
ﬁá er morgnar ok menn standa upp, kemr til Niflunga ﬁi›rekr
konungr ok Hildibrandr ok margir a›rir riddar‹ar›. Nú spyrr ﬁi›rekr
66 konungr hversu ﬂeim hafi sofizk ﬂá nótt. ﬁá svarar Hƒgni ok lætr sér
hafa vel sofnat:
54

38 sjá Mb.

XI: ﬁi›reks saga

167

‘En ﬂó er mitt skap ekki betra en til me›allags.’
Nú mælir ﬁi›rekr konungr, ‘Ver kátr, minn gó›i vin Hƒgni, ok gla›r 69
ok me› oss vel kominn ok vara ﬂik hér í Húnalandi, fyrir ﬂví at ﬂín
systir Grímhildr grætr enn hvern dag Sigur› svein, ok alls muntu ﬂessvi› ﬂurfa, á›r en ﬂú komir heim.’
72
Ok nú er ﬁi›rekr inn fyrsti ma›r, er varat hefir Niflunga. ﬁá er ﬂeir
eru búnir, ganga ﬂeir út í gar›inn. Gengr á a›ra hli› Gunnari konungi
ﬁi›rekr konungr, en á a›ra meistari Hildibrandr, ok me› Hƒgna gengr 75
Fólkher. Ok nú eru allir Niflungar upp sta›nir ok ganga um borgina
ok skemta sér.

XII: Tristrams saga

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XII: SAGA AF TRISTRAM OK ÍS¯ND
The Saga af Tristram ok Ísƒnd, also known as Tristrams saga okÍsƒndar, occupies an important position in the history of medieval
literature. In part this is because it provides the only complete, thoughcondensed, account of the twelfth-century Roman de Tristan byThomas (of Britain, or d’Angleterre), which now exists otherwise
only in fragments, but which formed the basis for Gottfried vonStrassburg’s unfinished masterpiece, Tristan und Isold. From the nineteenth century to the present day the saga has therefore been a major
source for the study of the Tristan legend. And the legend itself continues
to fascinate now, as it did in the Middle Ages, because it is thequintessential tale of a compulsive love that transcends all other loyalties.
The importance of this saga specifically for Old Norse–Icelandic
studies is that it was probably the first of the large-scale works to betranslated from French at the behest of Hákon Hákonarson, king of
Norway 1217–63. As such it helped to create an enthusiasm in thenorth for stories of the romance type — which show a concern forlove as well as fighting, for the fantastic, for emotions quite freely
expressed, for beauty and other sensory delights, for elegant manners,
for costly display, and not least for accomplishments such as theknowledge of languages and music. The romance translations madefor King Hákon, which embody these characteristics, make up asignificant corpus in their own right. They would still do so, assumingthat they had survived, even if they had not exerted influence beyond
Norway; but in fact they soon arrived in Iceland, where themes andconcerns from them were drawn into the Sagas of Icelanders, andwhere native imitations started to be written and to develop a characterof their own. Eventually the romantic sagas, generally known today
as riddarasögur (Sagas of Knights), came to be one of the dominantgenres of Old Icelandic literature.
As regards the saga’s origin, the main piece of evidence is theprologue found in the seventeenth-century Icelandic manuscript AM
543 4to, which contains the earliest complete version of the work
now extant. This states that the translation was made at Hákon’scommand in 1226 by a certain Brother Robert. Such attributions
always leave room for scepticism, but in this case there is wide
agreement that the statements of the prologue are highly plausible,
for in most of its parts the saga bears a strong stylistic likeness to170

XII: Tristrams sagaother romance translations made for King Hákon that are preservedin Iceland, and also — most significantly — to Strengleikar, acollection of short pieces based on Breton lais, which has survived ina Norwegian manuscript from c.1270 and is probably close to its
original form. It is apparent, nevertheless, that the Saga af Tristramok Ísƒnd as we have it is by no means identical to Brother Robert’s
version and that it has been modified, as one would expect, during
the centuries of its transmission in Iceland. It was probably Roberthimself who pushed the material in the direction of native sagas byconcentrating on the story and omitting the many long passages ofreflection that may be said to adorn, or alternatively to clog, the French
text; but the very few leaves of the saga surviving from medieval
manuscripts, which are themselves Icelandic and no earlier than the
mid-fifteenth century, render Thomas’s words at somewhat greater
length than is the case with the later manuscripts, and thus show thatthe saga has undergone at least one further round of shortening. There
are signs too of material being added from sources other than Thomas.
The consequence is that the work contains many discontinuities andinconsistencies, some of which are mentioned in the notes to the extract
given here; but often enough, when Thomas or Gottfried seem bent on
maximum elaboration, the saga strikes to the heart of the matter in a
way that is astute, honest and humane (see note 11 below, for example).
One of the most noticeable features of the Saga af Tristram ok Ísƒnd
is the style in which many of its parts are written. It is not unlikelythat this so-called ‘court style’, which is common to the Hákonianromances, was established by Brother Robert, or perhaps developed
for the very first time, in this particular saga. The most obvious
characteristics are the following: the frequent use of constructions
based on present participles, which is regarded as unidiomatic inclassical Old Norse; a good deal of alliteration, whether in formal
pairs or in longer ad hoc strings; the habitual use of synonymous
doublets, with or without alliteration; and repetitions of an underlying
lexical item in varied forms. There is also the occasional recourse torhyme and other forms of wordplay. These mannerisms derive frommedieval Latin prose and can also be observed, in different concentrations, in the ‘learned style’ translations of Latin texts and in the‘florid style’ of later religious works; but in the court romances they
are integrated with the relatively plain manner displayed by native

XII: Tristrams saga

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Icelandic sagas, eschewing simile and working for the most part insentences that are not especially complex. No doubt the purpose of
the verbal decorations was to dignify the prose in general, and inparticular to indicate the importance of passages where such decorations are in high density.
All the stylistic features just mentioned, except rhyme, are well
represented in the extract given here, which comes from the last thirdof the saga when Tristram and Ísƒnd have been forced to part, Tristram
to live in Brittany and Ísƒnd to remain with her husband in Cornwall.
The description of the Hall of Statues is not extant in the fragmentsof Thomas’s work (nor did Gottfried reach so far in the story), but theepisode must originally have been present in the poem because oneof the fragments (lines 941–1196) begins with Tristan recalling his
love and kissing his beloved’s image, corresponding to a point in ch.
81 of the saga. Grotesque though the episode may seem to modern
taste, it clearly caught the Icelandic imagination, as shown by thefact that it is echoed in several native romances (cf. Schach 1968),
notably in Rémundar saga keisarasonar ch. 7.
The passage has been transcribed from the manuscript mentioned
above, AM 543 4to. Norwegianisms of the types listed on page 65
above do not occur in the manuscript orthography of the extract except
for the occasional appearance of y in place of i; this feature has beenretained here only for the name Bryngvet, which is consistently spelledthus. In general the spelling of the manuscript is post-medieval but
has been normalised in line with the usage of ÍF, and the following
substitutions have been made: konungr for kóngur, inn for hinn etc.,
lifanda for the Norwegian neuter form lifandi and eigi for ei.
Bibliography
Primary:
Saga af Tristram ok Ísönd samt Möttuls saga, ed. Gísli Brynjólfsson (1878).
Tristrams saga ok Ísondar, ed. Eugen Kölbing (1878).
Saga af Tristram og Ísönd, ed. Bjarni Vilhjálmsson in Riddarasögur I (1951),
1–247.
Paul Schach, ‘An Unpublished Leaf of Tristrams Saga: AM 567 Quarto,
XXII, 2’, Research Studies (Washington State University) 32 (1964), 50–62.
Paul Schach, ‘The Reeves Fragment of Tristrams saga ok Ísöndar’, inEinarsbók. Afmæliskve›ja til Einars Ól. Sveinssonar. 12 desember 1969,

172

XII: Tristrams sagaed. Bjarni Gu›nason, Halldór Halldórsson and Jónas Kristjánsson (1969),
296–308.
Saga af Tristram og Ísönd, ed. Vésteinn Ólason (1987).
Tristrams saga ok Ísöndar, ed. and tr. Peter Jorgenson in Norse Romance,
ed. Marianne E. Kalinke, I (1999) 23–226.
The Saga of Tristram and Ísönd, tr. Paul Schach (1973).
Gottfried von Strassburg, Tristan und Isold, ed. Friedrich Ranke (1961).
Rémundar saga keisarasonar, ed. Bjarni Vilhjálmsson in Riddarasögur V(1951), 161–339.
Strengleikar: An Old Norse Translation of Twenty-one Old French Lais, ed.
and tr. Robert Cook and Mattias Tveitane (1979). Norrøne Tekster 3.
Thomas, Le Roman de Tristan, ed. Joseph Bédier (1902).
Background:
Geraldine Barnes, ‘The Riddarasögur: A Medieval Exercise in Translation’,
Saga-Book 19 (1974–77), 403–41.
Geraldine Barnes, ‘The Riddarasögur and Medieval European Literature’,
Medieval Scandinavia 8 (1975), 140–58.
Foster W. Blaisdell Jr., ‘The So-called “Tristram-Group” of Riddarasögur’,
Scandinavian Studies 46 (1974), 134–39.
Alison Finlay, ‘“Intolerable Love”: Tristrams saga and the Carlisle Tristan
Fragment’, Medium Ævum LXXIII.2 (2004), 205–24.
Peter Hallberg, ‘Is There a “Tristram-Group” of Riddarasögur?’, Scandinavian
Studies 47 (1975), 1–17.
Sylvia C. Harris, ‘The Cave of Lovers in the Tristramssaga and Related
Tristan Romances’, Romania 98 (1977), 306–30 and 460–500.
Henry Goddard Leach, ‘Tristan in the North’, in Angevin Britain andScandinavia (1921), 169–98.
Paul Schach, ‘The Style and Structure of Tristrams saga’, in Scandinavian
Studies: Essays Presented to Dr Henry Goddard Leach on the Occasionof His Eighty-fifth Birthday, ed. Carl F. Bayerschmidt and Erik J. Friis,(1965), 63–86.
Paul Schach, ‘Some Observations on the Influence of Tristrams saga okÍsöndar on Old Icelandic Literature’, in Old Norse Literature andMythology. A Symposium, ed. Edgar C. Polomé (1968), 81–129.
Maureen F. Thomas, ‘The Briar and the Vine: Tristan Goes North’, Arthurian
Literature 3 (1983), 53–90.

XII: Tristrams saga173

XII: SAGA AF TRISTRAM OK ÍS¯ND
Chapter 80
Nú lætr Tristram skunda smí›inni ﬂat er hann má, ok líkar honum ﬂar
vel undir fjallinu. Smí›a ﬂar trésmi›ir ok gullsmi›ir, ok var nú alltkompásat ok búit saman at fella. Tristram lofa›i ﬂá smi›unum heim 3
at fara, ok fylg›i ﬂeim til ﬂess ‹er› ﬂeir váru ór eynni komnir ok sí›anh‹eim› til síns fóstrlands. Nú hefir Tristram øngvan félaga ﬂar hjá sérnema jƒtuninn;1 ok báru ﬂeir nú allt starf smi›anna ok felldu saman 6
hválfhúsit, svá sem efnit var á›r af smi›unum til búit, allt steint okgyllt me› inum bezta hagleik.2 Ok mátti ﬂá berliga sjá smí›ina
9fullgƒrva, svá at enginn kunni betr œskja.
Undir mi›ju hválfinu reistu ﬂeir upp líkneskju eina, svá hagliga at
líkams vexti ok andliti at enginn ásjáandi ma›r kunni annat at ætla enkvikt væri í ƒllum limunum, ok svá frítt ok vel gƒrt at í ƒllum heiminum 12
mátti eigi fegri líkneskju finna.3 Ok ór munninum stó› svá gó›r ilmr
at allt húsit fylldi af, svá sem ƒll jurtakyn væri ﬂar inn‹i›, ﬂau sem
d‡rust eru. En ﬂessi inn gó›i ilmr kom me› ﬂeiri list ór líkneskjunni, 15
at Tristram haf›i gƒrt undir geirvƒrtunni jafnsítt hjartanu eina boru á
brjóstinu, ok setti ﬂar einn bauk fullan af gullmƒlnum grƒsum, ﬂeimsœtustum er í váru ƒllum heiminum. Ór ﬂessum bauk stó›u tveir 18
reyrstafir af brenndu gulli, ok annarr ﬂessara skaut ilm út undan
hnakkanum ﬂar sem mœttisk hárit ok holdit, en annarr me› samahætti horf›i til munnsins. ﬁessi líkneskja var, at skƒpun, fegr› ok 21
mikilleik, svá lík Ísƒnd dróttningu svá sem hon væri ﬂar sjálf standandi,
ok svá kviklig sem lifandi væri. ﬁessi líkneskja var svá hagliga skorin
ok svá tignarliga klædd sem sóm›i inni tignustu dróttningu. Hon haf›i 24
á hƒf›i sér kórónu af brenndu gulli, gƒrva me› alls konar hagleik —ok sett me› inum d‡rustum gimsteinum ok ƒllum litum.4 En í ﬂví
laufinu sem framan var í enninu stó› einn stórr smaragdus, at aldri 27
bar konungr e›r dróttning jafngó›an. Í hœgri hendi líkneskjunnar stó›eirvƒndr e›r valdsmerki, í inum efra endanum me› flúrum gƒrt, innar
hagligustu smí›ar: leggr vi›arins var allr klæddr af gulli ok settr me› 30
fingrgullssteinum; gulllaufin váru it bezta Arabíagull; en á inu efra
laufi vandarins var skorinn fugl me› fjƒ›rum ok alls konar litum
fja›ranna ok fullgƒrt at vængjum, blakandi sem hann væri kvikr ok 33
18 bauk] bau›k.

32 lifum, but corrected in the manuscript.

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XII: Tristrams saga

lifandi. ﬁessi líkneskja var klædd inum bezta purpura me› hvítum
skinnum; en ﬂar fyrir var hon klædd purpurapelli, at purpurinn merkir
36 harm, hryg›, válk ok vesƒl› er Ísƒnd ﬂol›i fyrir ástar sakir vi› Tristram.
Í hœgri hendi helt hon fingrgulli sínu, ok ﬂar var á ritat or› ﬂau erÍsƒnd dróttning mælti í skilna› ﬂeira: ‘Tristram,’ kva› hon, ‘tak ﬂetta
39 fingrgull í minning ástar okkar, ok gleym eigi hƒrmum okkar, válk‹i›ok vesƒl›um, er ﬂú hefir ﬂolat fyrir mínar sakir ok fyrir ﬂínar.’5
Undir fótum hennar var einn fótkistill steyptr af kopar í líking ﬂess
42 vánda dvergs er ﬂau haf›i rœgt fyrir konunginum ok hrópat;6 líkneskjan stó› á brjósti honum ﬂví líkast sem hon skipa›i honum undirfœtr sér, en hann lá opinn undir fótum hennar ﬂví líkt sem hann væri45 grátandi. Hjá líkneskjunni var gƒr af brenndu gulli lítil skemtan, rakki
hennar, hƒfu› sitt skakandi ok bjƒllu sinni hringjandi, gƒrt me› miklum
hagleik.7 En ƒ›ru‹m› megin dvergsins stó› ein líkneskja lítil, eptir
48 Bryngvet, fylgismey dróttningar; hon var vel skƒpu› eptir fegr› sinni
ok vel skr‡dd inum bezta búna›i, ok helt sér í hendi keri me› loki,
bjó›andi Ísƒnd dróttningu me› blí›u andliti. Umbergis kerit váru ﬂau
51 or› er hon mælti: ‘Ísƒnd dróttning, tak drykk ﬂennan, er gƒrr var áÍrlandi Markis konungi.’8 En ƒ›ru‹m› megin í herberginu, sem inn
var gengit, haf›i hann gƒrt eina mikla líkneskju í líking jƒtunsins, svá
54 sem hann stœ›i ﬂar sjálfr einfœttr ok reiddi bá›um hƒndum járnstaf
sinn yfir ƒxl sér at verja líkneskjuna; en hann var klæddr stóru
bukkskinni ok lo›nu — ok tók kyrtillinn honum skammt ofan, ok var
57 hann nakinn ni›r frá nafla — ok gnísti tƒnnum, grimmr í augum, sem
hann vildi berja alla ﬂá er inn gengu.9 En ƒ›ru‹m› megin dyrannastó› eitt mikit león steypt af kopar ok svá hagliga gƒrt at enginn hug›i
60 annat en lifanda væri, ﬂeir er ﬂat sæi. ﬁat stó› á fjórum fótum okbar›i hala sínum um eina líkneskju, er gƒr var eptir ræ›ismanni ﬂeim
er hrópa›i ok rœg›i Tristram fyrir Markis konungi.10
Enginn kann at tjá né telja ﬂann hagleik er ﬂar var á ﬂeim líkneskjum
63
er Tristram lét ﬂar gøra í hválfinu. Ok hefir hann nú allt gƒrt ﬂat er
hann vill at sinni, ok fær nú í vald jƒtunsins ok bau› honum, sem
66 ﬂræli sínum ok ﬂjónustumanni, ﬂetta svá vel at var›veita at ekki skyldi
ﬂar nærri koma; en hann sjálfr bar lyklana bæ›i at hválfhúsinu oklíkneskjunum. En jƒtunninn haf›i allt fé sitt frjálst annat. Ok líka›i
69 ﬂetta Tristram vel, er hann hefir slíku á lei› komit.
42 hƒf›u.

XII: Tristrams saga

175

Chapter 81
Sem Tristram haf›i lokit starfi sínu, ﬂá rei› hann heim til kastala síns
sem hann var vanr, etr ok drekkr ok sefr hjá Ísodd, konu sinni, ok varkærr me› félƒgum sínum.11 En eigi er honum hugr at eiga líkamslosta 72
vi› konu sína, en ﬂó fór hann leynt me›, ﬂví engi ma›r mátti ætlan
hans né athœfi finna, ﬂví allir hug›u ‹at› hann bygg›i hjónskapliga
sem hann skyldi me› henni. En Ísodd er ok svá lundu› at hon leyndi 75
fyrir hverjum manni svá tryggiliga at hon birti hvárki fyrir frændum
sínum né vinum.12 En ﬂá er hann var í burtu ok gør›i líkneskjur ﬂessar,ﬂá ﬂótti henni mjƒk kynligt, hvar hann var e›a hvat hann gør›i.
78
Svá rei› hann heim ok heiman um einn leynistíg at enginn var›varr vi› hann, ok kom svá til hválfhússins. Ok jafnan sem hann kom
inn til líkneskju Ísƒndar, ﬂá kyssti hann hana svá opt sem hann kom, 81
ok lag›i hana í fang sér ok hendr um háls sem hon væri lifandi, okrœddi til hennar mƒrgum ástsamligum or›um um ástarﬂokka ﬂeira
ok harma. Svá gør›i hann vi› líkneskju Bryngvetar, ok minntisk á ƒll 84or› ﬂau er hann var vanr at mæla vi› ﬂær. Hann minntisk ok á alla ﬂá
huggan, skemtan, gle›i ok yn›i er hann fekk af Ísƒnd, ok kyssti hvert
sinn líkneskit, er hann íhuga›i huggan ﬂeira; en ﬂá var hann hryggr 87
ok rei›r, er hann minntisk á harm ﬂeira, vás ok vesal›ir, er hann ﬂol›ifyrir sakir ﬂeira er ﬂau hrópu›u, ok kennir ﬂat nú líkneskju hins vánda
90
ræ›ismanns.

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XII: Tristrams saga
Notes

1 The giant, Moldagog, is introduced in ch. 73 as the owner anddefender of the land. Tristram defeats him in single combat by chopping
off one of his legs, at which point the giant swears loyalty to Tristramand surrenders his treasures along with his territory; in return Tristram
fashions a wooden leg for his new vassal (ch. 76).
2 Ch. 78 says that the main structure of the vaulted building had been

made by an earlier giant who abducted the daughter of a certain Duke
Orsl and brought her to the place, where he inadvertently killed her
because of his size and weight (sakir mikilleik‹s› hans ok ﬂunga) while
trying to have sex. The fragments of Thomas’s poem do not containthis story, but versions of it are told by Wace and Geoffrey of Monmouth.
3 Kvikt and subsequent words modifying líkneskja have the neuter

form, perhaps by attraction to annat. But fullgƒrt in line 33 (modifyingfugl) and gƒrt in line 46 (modifying skemtan or rakki) are also neuter
where one would expect masculine or feminine forms, and it is probably
to be explained as the use of ‘natural’ gender (or rather referring toanimals and statues as neuter, as often in English) and the tendency
to looseness in grammar that is common in seventeenth-century
manuscripts and was reversed by nineteenth-century purists. In all
three cases the adjective is separated from its noun. Cf. Gr 3.9.8.2.
4 The words kórónan var are to be understood in front of sett.
5 The full account of the parting is in ch. 67.
6 In the Norwegian original there would have been perfect alliterationon rœgt and hrópat (rópat; the initial breathing in such words is earlylost in Norwegian, see p. 65 above); likewise on the phrase hryggr okrei›r in the final sentence of the extract. The dwarf, who appears forthe first time in ch. 54, tries to gather evidence against the lovers bysprinkling flour between their beds so that King Markis will see
Tristram’s footprints (ch. 55). He is with the king when the lovers are
discovered embracing in an orchard — the event that brings about
their separation (ch. 67). There is no indication in the rest of the sagathat he is ever punished for his enmity towards Tristram and Ísƒnd, orthat he regrets it at all; nevertheless his tears, as depicted in the sculpture, are to be understood primarily as signifying remorse, though with

XII: Tristrams saga

177

overtones of cowardice. In much Old Norse literature it is shamefulfor males to weep except when mourning a person of rank, but in theromances it is common even for heroes to weep at moments of strong
emotion, as Tristram himself does when he parts from Ísƒnd (ch. 68).
7 Ísƒnd’s dog, a gift from Tristram, came originally from Elfland(Álfheimar, ch. 61). In the saga he is portrayed as a large animal that
hunts wild boar and deer when Tristram and Ísƒnd are living together
in the woods (chs 63 and 64); but Gottfried (line 16,659) specifies
two separate animals and represents the one of elvish origin as a small
lapdog (line 15,805). Ch. 61 of the saga lays much emphasis on thedelights of sensory perception, commenting on the silkiness andwonderful colours of the dog’s coat, and saying that the sound of hisbell transported Tristram ‘so that he hardly knew whether he was thesame man or another one’ (svá at hann kenndi varla hvárt hann var
inn sami e›a annarr).
8 Ísƒnd’s mother prepares a wine-like love potion and tells Bryngvet

to serve it to Ísƒnd and King Markis on their wedding-night; but before
Bryngvet can do so another servant finds it and unwittingly gives
some to Ísƒnd and Tristram, thus causing all the pain that ensues fromtheir love (ch. 46). Bryngvet perseveres with her instructions andserves more of the potion to Markis and his bride; on the evidence ofthe statue it appears that she hoped to rectify the situation by allowingÍsƒnd to fall in love with Markis, but ch. 46 says only that she gave
the potion to the king without his knowledge, and that Ísƒnd did not
drink it on that occasion.
9 The giant’s trouserless condition is not mentioned elsewhere.

Possibly it is meant to recall what was said of the chamber’s previous
owner and his size (note 2 above); but in any case its message isclearly ‘Keep out, or else’.
10 Maríadokk, the steward referred to, is introduced as Tristram’s friend

and bed-partner, and as the man who first discovered the adulterous
affair: he woke up in the night, noticed that Tristram was missing,
went out in search of him and heard him talking with Ísƒnd (ch. 51).
In the same chapter the saga states that it was not until a long timeafter this event that ‘malicious persons’ (ƒfundarmenn) told Markis

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XII: Tristrams saga

what was going on, and Maríadokk is not actually named as one of
the tell-tales. Gottfried, however, states in his poem that the corresponding character, Marjodoc, quickly went to the king and pretended
to have heard rumours (lines 13, 637–51). The end-on approach of
the lion, which appears only in this passage, no doubt involves
maximum disgrace for the steward.
11 After parting with Ísƒnd, Tristram marries Ísodd, daughter of theduke of Brittany. The saga states bluntly that he does so either in thehope that new love will drive out old or because he wants a wife ‘forbenefit and pleasure’ (til gagns ok gamans, ch. 69), this and the next
sentence standing in place of much logic-chopping in Thomas (lines
235–420). On his wedding night, however, Tristram decides not to
consummate the marriage because thoughts of Ísƒnd intrude, and hepretends to be ill (ch. 70). The assertion that his sickness was nothingelse than pining for the other Ísƒnd (ekki var ƒnnur sótt Tristrams en
um a›ra Ísƒnd, ch. 70) confirms that in the saga, as in the poems ofThomas and Gottfried, the two women originally had the same name.
12 Ísodd has promised Tristram not to tell anyone that they do nothave sex (ch. 70). Ch. 96 suggests that at one point she thinks hewants to become a priest or monk — possibly a joke. Eventually achance event forces her to tell her brother Kardín, who then construes
Tristram’s behaviour as an insult to the family (chs 82 and 83); but
Kardín abandons any thought of a feud with Tristram when he sees
the statue of Bryngvet, which he initially mistakes for a real woman,and falls in love (ch. 86). This, in fact, is the only narrative function
fulfilled by the episode of the statues.

XIII: Maríu saga

179

XIII: MARÍU SAGAA Miracle of the Virgin Mary
Biographies of the saints and stories of miracles demonstrating theirsanctity were among the most popular and influential literary forms of
the Middle Ages. The earliest written texts brought to Iceland by
Christian missionaries included Latin hagiographic narratives, andscholars have argued that they exerted seminal influence on the origins
of Icelandic literature (see Turville-Petre 1953; Jónas Kristjánsson 1981
and 1986; Foote 1994).
Among the saints a special and pre-eminent place was accorded toMary, the mother of Jesus. Her cult gained increasing importance intwelfth- and thirteenth-century Europe and in the thirteenth century
the Marian prayer Ave Maria (known as Maríuvers in Old Norse)
became one of the few texts all Christians were required to know byheart. Twice as many churches were dedicated to Mary as to the next
most popular saint in pre-Reformation Iceland (St Peter) and she was
the patron saint of Hólar Cathedral. Several Marian feasts wereprominent in the Icelandic calendar and four were provided withsermons in the Old Icelandic Homily Book. A sizeable corpus of Marian
poetry in Old Icelandic also survives (on the cult of Mary in Iceland
see Cormack 1994, 126–29; some Marian poetry is accessible in
Wrightson 2001).
Maríu saga is an Icelandic prose account of the life of the Virgin
Mary that, unusually for this type of text, intersperses biographicalnarrative with theological reflection on a wide range of more or lessclosely related topics. The deeply learned saga-writer drew on a numberof source texts including the Gospels of Matthew and Luke, theapocryphal Gospel known as Pseudo-Matthew, and especially Evangelium de nativitate Mariae, an apocryphal account of the birth andearly life of Mary believed during the Middle Ages to be by St Jerome.
For historical background the writer used Books 16 and 17 of Antiquities of the Jews by the first-century Jewish historian Flavius Josephus;and other sources include various books of the Old and New Testaments and texts by Saints Jerome, Gregory the Great, Augustine andJohn Chrysostom.
A detailed description of the Fourth Lateran Council in chapter 23
of Maríu saga indicates that the saga must have been written after

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XIII: Maríu saga

1215. Gu›mundar saga records that a saga of the Virgin Mary was
written by a priest called Kygri-Bjƒrn Hjaltason (died 1237/38) and as
there is no evidence of any Maríu saga other than the one whichsurvives circulating in Iceland before the sixteenth century it seems
probable that Kygri-Bjƒrn composed the surviving text. This would
mean it was written sometime between 1216 and 1236 (in which year
Kygri-Bjƒrn was elected bishop of Hólar; he then went abroad, possibly
to have his election confirmed, and died shortly after his return).
Turville-Petre has suggested a slightly narrower dating of between
1224 and 1236 (Turville-Petre 1972, 107).
Fourteen of the nineteen surviving manuscripts of Maríu saga include
collections of miracle stories involving the Virgin Mary (the otherfive manuscripts are fragments and may originally have included
miracle stories too). An additional twenty-five manuscripts contain
only miracle stories, without the saga, but as these are fragmentarymanuscripts it remains unclear whether the saga and miracles wereever transmitted separately. The miracle collections vary in size,
contents and origin; they appear in manuscripts dating from c.1225–
50 onwards.
Unger’s edition of Maríu saga (1871) prints two slightly different
texts of the saga (from Holm perg. 11 4to and AM 234 fol.) and over
200 miracle stories, many of them in more than one version. Threedifferent versions of a miracle of the Virgin are given below in texts
normalised from Unger’s edition (this miracle story, also known from
Latin and Old French sources, is briefly discussed in Widding 1965,
132–35). The three versions illustrate three different prose styles. The
earliest of the three is found in AM 232 fol., a fourteenth century
manuscript (c.1350). The writer has rendered the narrative in a concise
and straightforward style free of rhetorical elaboration and like thatcharacteristic of the Sagas of Icelanders. The version in AM 635 4to,a paper manuscript from the early eighteenth century (c.1700–25),translates more closely from Latin, attempting greater fidelity to thestyle and language of the original and also providing much morecircumstantial detail than AM 232 fol. The third text comes from Holmperg. 11 4to (c. 1325–75; some readings have been adopted from Holmperg. 1 4to (c. 1450–1500)). This is written in the so-called florid style,a ‘high’ style developed during the second half of the thirteenth century
especially in religious writing. Characteristic features of the florid styleXIII: Maríu saga

181

found in the extract below include extensive use of adjectives andadverbs, the use of doublets, and use of the present participle where
Saga Style would prefer a clause with a finite verb. A delight in rhetorical amplification that is another characteristic of the Florid Style isalso notable in this, the longest of the three accounts of the miracle.
Bibliography
C. R. Unger, ed., Mariu saga: Legender om Jomfru Maria og hendes jertegn(1871). [The standard edition]Ásdís Egilsdóttir, Gunnar Har›arson, Svanhildur Óskarsdóttir, eds, Maríukver: sögur og kvæ›i af heilagri gu›smó›ur frá fyrri tí› (1996). [An editionof the saga, selected miracles and a variety of other medieval Icelandic
Marian texts, in modernised Icelandic]
Margaret Cormack, The Saints in Iceland: Their Veneration from theConversion to 1400, Subsidia hagiographica 78 (1994).
Margaret Cormack, ‘Sagas of Saints’, in Margaret Clunies Ross, ed., Old
Icelandic Literature and Society (2000), 302–25.
Peter Foote, ‘Saints’ Lives and Sagas’, in Hans Bekker-Nielsen and Birte
Carlé, eds, Saints and Sagas: A Symposium (1994), 73–88.
Jónas Kristjánsson, ‘Learned Style or Saga Style?’ in Ursula Dronke et al.,eds, Speculum Norroenum: Norse Studies in Memory of Gabriel TurvillePetre (1981), 260–92.
Jónas Kristjánsson, ‘The Roots of the Sagas’, in Rudolf Simek, et al., eds,
Sagnaskemmtun: Studies in Honour of Hermann Pálsson on his 65th
Birthday, 26 May 1986 (1986), 183–200.
G. Turville-Petre, Origins of Icelandic Literature (1953).
G. Turville-Petre, ‘The Old Norse Homily on the Assumption and Maríusaga,’ Mediaeval Studies 9 (1947), 131–40; reprinted in his Nine Norse
Studies (1972), 102–17.
Ole Widding et al., ‘The Lives of the Saints in Old Norse Prose: A Handlist,’
Mediaeval Studies 25 (1963), 294–337. [Lists manuscripts of Maríu saga
and the associated miracle stories on pp. 321–24]
Ole Widding, ‘Jartegn og Maríu saga. Eventyr’, in Hans Bekker-Nielsen etal., Norrøn fortællekunst: kapitler af den norsk–islandske middelalderlitteraturs historie (1965), 127–36.
Ole Widding, ‘Norrøne Marialegender på europæisk baggrund’, Opuscula
X, Bibliotheca Arnamagnæana XL (1996), 1–128. [A detailed comparisonof the contents of the surviving Norse miracle collections and analysis of
their relations to contemporary Latin collections; English summary on
pp. 125–28]
Kellinde Wrightson, ed., Fourteenth-Century Icelandic Verse on the Virgin
Mary. Drápa af Maríugrát. Vitnisvísur af Maríu. Maríuvísur I–III (2001).

182

XIII: Maríu saga
XIII: MARÍU SAGAA Miracle of the Virgin Mary

AM 232 fol.:
Munklífi eitt var í fjalli ﬂví, er Tumba1 heitir. ﬁar stó› Mikjáls kirkja
hjá munklífinu. Í musterinu var Maríu líkneskja, ok svá ger sem
3 Dróttinn sæti í knjám henni, ok var silkidúkr breiddr yfir hƒfu› ﬂeim.
ﬁar kómu opt rei›ar stórar ok eldingar, ok laust eitt sinn svá kirkjuna,
at hon brann ƒll, en líkneskja Maríu var heil, ok svá stallrinn, er hon
6 stó› á. Hvergi var á silkidúkinn runnit, er á líkneskjunni var. Munkarl‡stu ﬂessi jartegn, ok lofu›u allir Gu›, ﬂeir er heyr›u. Vér eigum
ﬂess Gu› at bi›ja, at hann leysi oss svá frá eilífum eldi sem líkneskit
9 frá ﬂessum eldshita.
AM 635 4to:
Eldr brenndi eigi líkneski várrar frú
Í fjalli ﬂví, er Tumba heitir í sjónum, er kirkja hins helga Michaelis
engils. Í ﬂeim sta› er mikill fjƒl›i munka, er ﬂar ﬂjóna Gu›i. ﬁat bar
til einn tíma, at me› leyndum Gu›s dómi2 sló elding kirkjuna ok
brenndi hana alla. ﬁar var líkneskja Gu›s mó›ur Marie ger me› tré. Yfir
15 hƒf›inu líkneskjunni var einn silkidúkr. Sem eldrinn kom til ﬂesssta›ar, er skriptin stó› í, brenndi hann allt umkringis, en sjálfa líkneskjuna tók ekki, sem hann ótta›isk at koma henni nær, svá at eigi brann
18 ﬂat silkitjald sem var yfir líkneskjunni, ok eigi døkkna›i ﬂat sjálft afreyk e›r hita. Eitt flabellum gert me› páfuglafjƒ›rum, er studdisk vi›
líkneskit, brann ok eigi. Ger›i Gu› ﬂessa jartegn at s‡na vi›rkvæmiligt
21 vera, at eigi mætti eldrinn granda líkneskju ﬂeirar, sem me› hjarta ok
líkam helt heilagt skírlífi me› ƒ›rum dyg›um, svá at engi hiti lostasemi
mátti tendrask me› henni. Svá hlíf›i Gu›s mó›ir, sem ﬂér heyr›u›,
24 sinni líkneskju í eldinum s‡nandi me› ﬂví, at hon má au›veldligame› Gu›s miskunn frelsa frá helvítis eldi ﬂá sem henni ﬂjóna.
12

2 musterinn.

XIII: Maríu saga

183

Holm perg. 11 4to:
Eldr granda›i eigi líkneski várrar frú.
Svá er sagt, at eitt munklífi me› miklum mannfjƒl›a í regluligum 27
lifna›i hreins skírlífis stendr á fjalli ﬂví, er Tumba heitir. ﬁar er
Michials kirkja hjá munklífinu. Í ﬂví musteri var líkneski várrar frú
sancte Marie sœmiliga me› tré formeru› á ﬂann hátt, sem Dróttinn 30
várr sæti í knjám henni ok væri dúkr af silki breiddr yfir hƒfu› ﬂeim.
Í sƒg›um sta› kómu opt stórar rei›arﬂrumur ok eldingar, ok einn tíma
kom svá hryggiliga til efnis, at kirkjuna laust, svá at hon brann ƒll ok 33
hvert ﬂat herbergi, sem ﬂar stó› nærri umbergis. En fyrr sƒg› líkneskjaGu›s mó›ur var heil ok óskƒdd, svá sem eldrinn hef›i hana óttazk,t‡nandi allri sinni grimm›arnáttúru svá framarliga, at engis kyns 36
reykjarﬂefr e›a eldsbrunalitr haf›i heldr snortit sag›an dúk en sjálfa
líkneskjuna, slíkt sama fótstallinn, er hon stó› á. L‡stu munkar ﬂessi
jartegn, ok lofu›u allir Gu›, er heyr›u. ﬁat var vi›rkvæmiligt ok vel 39
trúanligt, sem birtisk í sƒg›u stórtákni, at ﬂessa heims eldr ﬂyr›i eigi
at snerta ﬂeirar líkneskju, sem bæ›i var hrein mær í hug ok líkama,flekklaus me› ƒllum greinum af hverjum sem einum bruna veraldligra 42
girnda. Nú sem Gu›s mó›ir sancta María, vernda‹n›di sína líkneskju,
sem vér sƒg›um, af ﬂeim eldsbruna, gefr oss fullkomliga skilja, at sér
ﬂjónandi menn má hon au›veldliga frelsa af eilífum eldi, ﬂví 3 sém 45‹vér› i›uliga verandi í hennar ﬂjónustu standandi, at hon sé oss veitandi
sem vér erum mest ﬂurfandi, sem ‹er› alla hluti fáandi, af sínum sœtasta
syni ﬂiggjandi, ﬂeim er lifir ok ríkir me› fe›r ok helgum anda útan enda. 48
Amen.

40 ﬂessi Holm perg. 11 4to. 43 verndandi Holm perg. 1 4to; vernda›i Holmperg. 11 4to. 46 vér i›uliga Holm perg. 1 4to; iduligast Holm perg. 11 4to.

184

XIII: Maríu saga
Notes

1 A church was built on Mount Tumba, near Avranches in south

Normandy, after an apparition of the Archangel St Michael there in
the eighth century. In AD 1000 a Benedictine monastery was establishedon the mount, which now takes its name, le Mont-Saint-Michel, fromthe Archangel who appeared there.
2 In Latin occulto Dei iudicio, a phrase often used of events in which

God moved in a mysterious way. Cf. Job 11: 7–9; Romans 11: 33. Cf.
also XIV:11 below.
3 ﬂví (‘for this reason’) seems to introduce the main clause in this im-mensely complicated sentence.

XIV: Jóns saga helga

185

XIV: JÓNS SAGA HELGA
The first native bishop in Iceland was Ísleifr Gizurarson. He wasconsecrated in 1056 as bishop of the whole population. He was
succeeded in 1081 by his son, Gizurr (died 1118), whose patrimony,
Skál(a)holt, in the south of the country, was made the official episcopal
seat by an act of the Alﬂingi. About 1100 Bishop Gizurr agreed thatthe people of the Northern Quarter should have a bishop of their own,with a cathedral at Hólar in Hjaltadalr (Skagafjƒr›r). With the approvalof clergy and people he selected a middle-aged priest from the Southof Iceland, Jón ¯gmundarson (born 1052), as the first bishop of Hólar.
Jón duly went abroad to seek archiepiscopal and papal sanction andin 1106 was consecrated in Lund (then of course in Denmark) by¯zurr (Asser), bishop there since 1089 but now newly installed asarchbishop and metropolitan of the Scandinavian churches. Jón
returned to Iceland by way of Norway where he collected a cargo oftimber for the new church he intended to build as his cathedral. We
have no contemporary record of his activities as diocesan of theNorthern Quarter. He died in 1121.
In 1193 Bishop ﬁorlákr ﬁórhallsson of Skálholt died and miracles
attributed to his intercession were soon reported. His cult was formallyestablished by the Alﬂingi in 1199. This seems to have prompted theNortherners to seek a saint for themselves. Invocation of Jón¯gmundarson, their first bishop, was deemed successful, and Jón’s
dies natalis, 23 April, was made a day of national observance in 1200.
Soon after, as was essential, a work on the new saint’s vita et acta wascomposed in Latin by Gunnlaugr Leifsson, Benedictine monk ofﬁingeyrar (born c.1140, died 1219; cf. note 4 to extract below). At thesame time, a similar book was composed in Icelandic; the author
apparently borrowed some material from Gunnlaugr’s work. This Jóns
saga Hólabyskups ins helga is known in three recensions but only oneof them exists as a unified work. This is the so-called S text, foundwhole in AM 234 fol., written c.1340, and in fragments in othermanuscripts, the oldest in AM 221 fol., written c.1300. This recension
is in a plain style and is an abridgment of an early work which is also
represented in the so-called H recension. This is known only in two
manuscripts, paper from the early seventeenth century, Holm papp.
4:o nr 4 and AM 392 4to, independent copies of a late medieval
exemplar. Its style is like that of the S recension but it is generally

186

XIV: Jóns saga helga

fuller and probably often closer to the early text that was their common
original. Unfortunately, it is defective at the beginning and has a large
lacuna in the middle. The third recension, called L, is a revision, madec.1320–30, of a text more like H than S. It survives incomplete inHolm perg. fol. nr 5, written c.1365; part of the text missing there is
supplied by fragments in AM 219 fol. from about 1400. The saga inthis form has a good many passages rewritten in the Latinate style that
became fashionable in Iceland towards 1300 and flourished especiallybetween about 1320 and 1350 (cf. the introduction to extract XIII
above). It is also unique in introducing two whole ﬂættir, one concerning Sæmundr inn fró›i Sigfússon (1056–1133), which is not foundelsewhere, and one concerning Gísl Illugason, known separately inthe compilation of kings’ sagas found in the codexes called Hulda andHrokkinskinna but adapted in L to suit the hagiographer’s purpose.
The text printed below follows the S recension but with preference
given to H in lines 17, 115–16, 128, 133–38 and 142, and to L in lines
155, 165–91 (see notes below). In this last passage typical features of‘florid’ style and vocabulary are sag›ra 168, 172, hvern 169, prédikandi
176, undir stjórn ok yfirbo›i 177, ritandi 178, mektugir 182, jungfrú
185, sƒg›um 186, kynnandi 190.

Bibliography
The text here is based on that in Biskupa sögur I (2003), ÍF XV, 202–20.
There is a translation in Origines Islandicae, ed. and tr. Gudbrand Vigfusson
and F. York Powell (1905, repr. 1976), I 534–67, and several extracts,
including some of the text printed here, but from the L redaction, in The
Northmen Talk, tr. Jaqueline Simpson (1965), 65–76.

XIV: Jóns saga helga

187

XIV: JÓNS SAGA HELGA
Chapter 8
Á ﬂessu sumri hóf Jón byskup yfirfƒr sína yfir ríki sitt ok tók at st‡raGu›s kristni med mikilli stjórn. Hirti hann vánda menn af ﬂví veldi erhonum var gefit af Gu›s hálfu, en styrkti gó›a menn ok si›láta í 3mƒrgum gó›um hlutum.
Inn helgi Jón byskup haf›i skamma stund at stóli setit at Hólum á›ren hann lét leggja ofan kirkju ﬂá er ﬂar var. Sjá kirkja haf›i gjƒr verit 6næst ﬂeiri er Oxi Hjaltason haf›i gjƒra látit. ﬁat hyggja menn at sú
kirkja hafi mest gjƒr verit undir tréﬂaki á ƒllu Íslandi er Oxi lét gjƒra, oklag›i til ﬂeirar kirkju mikil au›ræ›i ok lét hana búa innan vel ok 9
vandliga ok ﬂekja bl‡i alla. En sú kirkja brann upp ƒll med ƒllu skrú›isínu at leyndum dómi Gu›s.1 Enn helgi Jón byskup lét gjƒra kirkju at
Hólum mikla ok vir›uliga, sú er stendr ﬂar í dag, ok hefir hún ﬂó verit 12bæ›i ﬂaki› ok margir hlutir a›rir at gjƒrvir sí›an.2 Enn helgi Jón byskup
spar›i ekki til ﬂessar kirkjugjƒr›ar ﬂat er ﬂá væri meiri Gu›s d‡r› ená›r ok ﬂetta hús væri sem fagrligast gjƒrt ok búit. Hann val›i ﬂann 15
mann til kirkjugjƒr›arinnar er ﬂá ﬂótti einnhverr hagastr vera. Sá hétﬁóroddr ‹Gamlason›,3 ok var bæ›i at inn helgi Jón spar›i eigi at rei›ahonum kaupit mikit ok gott, enda leysti hann ok sína s‡slu vel ok 18
gó›mannliga. ﬁat er sagt frá ﬂessum manni at hann var svá næmr ﬂá erhann var í smí›inni, ﬂá heyr›i hann til er prestlingum var kennd íﬂrótt
sú er grammatica heitir, en svá loddi honum ﬂat vel í eyrum af miklum 21
næmleik ok athuga at hann gjƒr›isk enn mesti íﬂróttama›r í ﬂess konar
námi.
ﬁá er Jón haf›i skamma stund byskup verit, ﬂá lét hann setja skóla 24
heima ﬂar at sta›num vestr frá kirkjudyrum ok lét smí›a vel ok vandliga,
ok enn sér merki húsanna.4 En til ﬂess at st‡ra skólanum ok kenna
ﬂeim mƒnnum er ﬂar settisk í, ﬂá val›i hann einn enn bezta klerk ok enn 27
snjallasta af Gautlandi. Hann hét Gísli ok var Finnason. Hann reiddi
honum mikit kaup til hvárstveggja, at kenna prestlingum ok at veita
slíkt upphald heilagri kristni me› sjálfum byskupi sem hann mátti sér 30vi› koma í kenningum sínum ok formælum. Ok ávalt er hann prédika›ifyrir fólkinu, ﬂá lét hann liggja bók fyrir sér ok tók ﬂar af slíkt er hanntala›i fyrir fólkinu, ok gjƒr›i hann ﬂetta mest af forsjá ok lítillæti, at 33
11 ok S. 17 from H and L.

22 næmlæk S.

188

XIV: Jóns saga helga

ﬂar hann var ungr at aldri ﬂótti ﬂeim meira um vert er til hl‡ddu at ﬂeir
sæi ﬂat at hann tók sínar kenningar af helgum bókum en eigi af einu
36 saman brjóstviti. En svá mikil gipt fylg›i ﬂó hans kenningum atmenninir ﬂeir er til hl‡ddu kómusk vi› mjƒk ok tóku mikla skipan ok
gó›a um sitt rá›. En ﬂat er hann kenndi í or›unum ﬂá s‡ndi hann ﬂat í
39 verkunum. Kenningar hans váru linar ok léttbærar ƒllum gó›ummƒnnum, en vitrum mƒnnum ﬂóttu vera skapligar ok skemtiligar, en
vándum mƒnnum var› ótti at mikill ok sƒnn hirting. Um allar stórhátí›ir
42 ﬂá var ﬂar fjƒlmenni mikit, ﬂví at ﬂannug var ﬂá mikit erendi margra
manna, fyrst at hl‡›a tí›um, svá fagrliga sem ﬂær váru fram fœr›ar,
ﬂar me› bo›or›um byskups ok kenningum ﬂeim hinum d‡r›ligum er
45 ﬂar var ﬂá kostr at heyra, hvárt sem heldr váru fram fluttar af sjálfum
byskupi e›a ﬂessum manni er nú var frá sagt.
Skamma stund haf›i enn helgi Jón byskup verit á›r hann tók at fœra48 si›u manna ok háttu mjƒk í annat efni en á›r haf›i verit, gjƒr›isk
hirtingasamr vi› ósi›amenn, en var blí›r ok hœgr ƒllum gó›um mƒnnum,
en s‡ndi á sjálfum sér at allt ﬂat er hann kenndi í or›unum, ﬂá fylldi
51 hann ﬂat í verkunum. S‡ndisk svá vitrum mƒnnum ﬂeim er gjƒrst vissu
hans rá› at hann yr›i sjaldan afhuga ﬂví er sjálfr Dróttinn mælti til
sinna lærisveina: ‘Luceat lux vestra coram hominibus ut videant opera
54 vestra bona et glorificent patrem vestrum qui in celis est.’5 ﬁessi or›mæla svá: ‘L‡si ljós y›art fyrir mƒnnum til ﬂess at ﬂeir sjái gó› verky›ur ok d‡rki ﬂeir fƒ›ur y›arn ﬂann er í himnum er.’57
Enn helgi Jón byskup lag›i ríkt vi› ﬂat sem sí›an hefir haldizk, atmenn skyldu sœkja til tí›a á helgum dƒgum e›a á ƒ›rum van›atí›um,
en bau› prestunum at segja optliga ﬂá hluti er ﬂeir ﬂyrftu at vita. Hann
60 bau› mƒnnum at hafa hversdagliga háttu sem kristnum mƒnnum sómir,en ﬂat er at sœkja hvern dag sí› ok snemma kross e›a kirkju ok flytja
ﬂar fram bœnir sínar me› athuga. Hann bau› at menn skyldu hafa,
63 hverr í sínu herbergi, mark ins helga kross til gæzlu sjálfum sér. Ok
ﬂegar er ma›rinn vakna›i, ﬂá skyldi hann signa sik ok syngja fyrst
Credo in Deum ok segja svá trú sína almáttkum Gu›i ok ganga svá
66 sí›an allan daginn vápna›r med marki heilags kross, ﬂví er hann merkti
sik me› ﬂegar er hann vakna›i, en taka aldrigi svá mat e›a svefn e›adrykk at ma›r signi sik eigi á›r. Hann bau› hverjum manni at kunna
69 Pater noster ok Credo in Deum ok minnask sjau sinnum tí›a sinna á
55 til ﬂess repeated over column break. 59 prestinum S.

XIV: Jóns saga helga189

hverjum degi, en syngja skylduliga hvert kveld á›r hann sofna›i Credo
in Deum ‹ok› Pater noster.6
Ok at vér lúkum ﬂessu máli í fám or›um, ﬂá fekk hann svá samit 72
si›u sinna undirmanna á skƒmmu brag›i me› Gu›s fulltingi at heilug
kristni í Nor›lendingafjór›ungi hefir aldrigi sta›it me› slíkum blóma,
hvárki á›r né sí›an, sem ﬂá stó› me›an fólkit var svá sælt at ﬂeir 75hƒf›u slíks byskups stjórn yfir sér. Hann banna›i ok me› ƒllu allaóháttu ok forneskju e›a blótskapi, gjƒrninga e›a galdra ok reis í móti
ﬂví me› ƒllu afli, ok ﬂví haf›i eigi or›it af komit me› ƒllu me›an 78
kristnin var ung. Hann banna›i ok alla hindrvitni ﬂá er fornir mennhƒf›u tekit af tunglkvámum e›a dœgrum e›a eigna daga hei›nummƒnnum e›a gu›um, sem er at kalla Ó›ins dag e›a ﬁórs, ok alla ﬂá 81
hluti a›ra er honum ﬂóttu af illum rótum rísa.7
Leikr sá var mƒnnum tí›r er ófagrligr er, at kve›ask skyldu at,karlma›r at konu en kona at karlmanni, klækiligar vísur ok hæ›iligar 84
ok óáheyriligar. En ﬂat lét hann af takask ok banna›i me› ƒllu at gjƒra.
Mansƒngs kvæ›i e›a vísur vildi hann eigi heyra kve›in ok eigi láta
kve›a.8 ﬁó fekk ‹hann› ﬂví eigi me› ƒllu af komit.
87
ﬁat er sagt ífrá at hann kom á hljó› at Klœngr ﬁorsteinsson, sá er
sí›an var› byskup í Skálaholti, en var ﬂá prestlingr ok ungr at aldri,las bók ﬂá er kƒllu› er Ovidius Episto‹la›rum.9 Í ﬂeiri bók b‡r mansƒngr 90
mikill. En hann banna›i honum at lesa ﬂess konar bœkr ok kalla›i ﬂó
hverjum manni mundi œrit hƒfugt at gæta sín vi› líkamligri munú› okrangri ást, ﬂó at hann kveykti eigi upp hug sinn til ﬂess me›r ne einum 93
si›um e›a ﬂess konar kvæ›um.
Hann var ok i›inn at ﬂví at sní›a af mƒnnum ljóta ‹lƒstu›, ok svá fór
hann kœnliga me› ﬂví at sá kom náliga engi á hans fund at eigi fengi 96
hann á nƒkkura lund lei›réttan fyrir sakir gu›ligrar ástar ok kostgæfi
ﬂeirar er hann lag›i á hverjum manni at hjálpa. Ok ef hann lag›imƒnnum har›ar skriptir á hendr fyrir sakir mikilla glœpa, en ﬂeir gengi 99
undir vel ok lítillátliga, ﬂá var skammt at bí›a á›r helgasta hans brjóst,
ﬂat er heilagr andi haf›i valit sér til bygg›ar, ﬂá samharma›i ﬂeira
meinlætum ok létti ‹hann› ﬂá nƒkkut skriptunum. Ok ﬂá sƒmu menn10 er 102
hann haf›i fyrr bar›a fyrir sakir gu›ligrar ástar ok umvandanar, ﬂeim
hinum sƒmum líkna›i hann ﬂá miskunnsamliga er ﬂeir váru vi› skil›ir
sína annmarka. Ok sá er alla sína undirmenn elska›i sem brœ›r e›a 105
101 samharma›i] + hann S.

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XIV: Jóns saga helga

syni, ﬂá fœddisk hann af engra manna annmƒrkum e›a vanhƒgum, en
samfagna›i ﬂví er ƒ›rum gekk vel en harma›i ﬂat allt er annan veg
108 var›. Hann var ma›r svá huggó›r at varla mátti hann sjá e›a vita ﬂat
er mƒnnum var til meins, en svá ƒrr ok mildr vi› fátœka menn at varla
haf›i hans maki fengizk. Hann var sannr fa›ir allra fátœkra manna.
111 Hugga›i hann ekkjur ok fƒ›urlausa, ok engi kom svá harmﬂrunginn áhans fund at eigi fengi á nƒkkurn veg huggan af hans tilstilli. Svá var
hann ástsæll vi› allt fólk at engi vildi náliga honum í móti gjƒra, ok var
114 ﬂat meirr fyrir sakir gu›ligrar ástar ﬂeirar er allir menn unnu honum
en líkamligrar hræzlu. ‹Skƒrugliga flutti hann fram alla ﬂá hluti er til
byskupligs embættis kómu,›11 ok ﬂar er hann braut sína f‡si í marga
117 sta›i en gjƒr›i Gu›s vilja, ef hann fann ﬂat at ﬂat var eigi allt eitt fyrir
sakir líkamligs e›lis, ﬂá launa›i Gu› honum ﬂat svá í hƒnd ﬂegar athann oka›i undir hann alla hans undirmenn í heilagri hl‡›ni.
120
En heilagr Johannes lif›i líf sitt eptir gu›ligri setningu ok gó›ra
manna dœmum, var á bœnum nætr ok daga, vak›i mikit ok fasta›ilƒngum ok deyddi sik í mƒrgum hlutum til ﬂess at ﬂá mætti hann meira
123 ávƒxt gjalda Gu›i en á›r af ﬂeim hlutum ƒllum er honum váru á hendi
fólgnir. Ok til ﬂess at hann mætti ﬂá vera frjálsari en á›r tí›ir at veitae›a formæli e›a a›ra hluti ﬂá fram at fœra er Gu›s kristni væri mest
126 upphald at, ﬂá val›i hann menn til forrá›a fyrir sta›inn me› sér ﬂá er
fyrir skyldu sjá sta›arins eign, me› húsfreyju ﬂeiri gƒfugri er hann
haf›i á›r átta ‹er Valdís hét›.12 Einn af ﬂeim mƒnnum var prestr vir›uligr
129 sá er Hámundr hét Bjarnarson. Hann var afi Hildar nunnu ok einsetukonu sem enn man getit ver›a sí›ar í ﬂessu máli. Næst Hámundi var
at rá›um prestr sá er Hjalti hét ok var frændi byskups. Af leikmƒnnum
132 var sá ma›r me‹st› í rá›um er var gƒfugr at ætt. Hann hét ¯rn ok var
son ﬁorkels af Ví›im‡ri. ﬁessir menn hƒf›u a›ra menn at undir sér,ﬂá er sumir ƒnnu›usk um eign sta›arins e›a lƒnd, en sumir um vinnu
135 e›a a›ra i›ju á sta›num, sumir at hir›a verkfœri e›r grei›a fyrir um
verkrei›a, ‹sumir› til fer›a, sumir til atflutninga til sta›arins, sumir at
ﬂjóna fátœkum mƒnnum, ok var byskup áminnandi at ﬂat væri myskunn138 samliga gjƒrt, sumir at taka vi› gestum ok veita ﬂeim beina,13 ﬂví at á
hverri hátí› sóttu menn á fund byskups, hundra› manna e›a stundum
tvau hundru› e›a nƒkkuru fleiri, ﬂví at hinn heilagi Jón byskup haf›i
115–16 inserted from H. 128 inserted from H. 130 Hámunda S. 133–38
ﬁessir . . . beina thus H.

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ﬂat í formælum sínum at honum ﬂótti ﬂví at einu til fulls ef hverr ma›r 141í ‹hans s‡slu ok allra helzt innan› hera›s, sá er fƒng hef›i á, kœmi um
sinn hit sjaldnasta at vitja sta›arins at Hólum á tólf mánu›um. Ok fyrirﬂá sƒk var› ﬂar svá fjƒlmennt at skírdegi e›a páskum at ﬂar skorti ﬂá 144
eigi fjƒgur hundru› manna allt saman, karlar ok konur. Ok ﬂó at margir
af ﬂessum mƒnnum hef›i vistir me› sér, ﬂá váru hinir fleiri er á byskups
kosti váru, ok af honum váru saddir bæ›i andligri fœzlu ok líkamligri, 147
ok styrktir me› byskupligri blezan fóru me› fagna›i til sinna heimkynna.
Margir si›látir menn ré›usk ﬂangat heim til sta›arins ok gáfu fé 150me› sér, en sumir fœddu sik sjálfir til ﬂess at hl‡›a kenningum byskups
ok tí›agjƒr›, ok gjƒr›u sér hús umhverfis kirkjugar›inn.
Heilagr Jón byskup tók marga menn til læringar ok fekk til gó›a 153
meistara at kenna ﬂeim, Gísla Finnason, er fyrr gátum vér, at kenna grammaticam, en ‹einn franzeis,› Ríkina prest, kapulán sinn ok ástvin, at
kenna sƒng e›a versagjƒr›, ﬂví at hann var ok hinn mesti lærdómsma›r.14 156
ﬁá var ﬂat ekki hús náliga er eigi væri nƒkkut i›nat í ﬂat er til nytsem›arvar. ﬁat var hinna ellri manna háttr at kenna hinum yngrum, en hinir
yngri ritu›u ﬂá er náms var› í milli. ﬁeir váru allir samﬂykkir, ok eigi 159
deildu ﬂeir ok engi ƒfunda›i annan. Ok ﬂegar er til var hringt tí›a, ﬂá
kómu ﬂeir ﬂar allir ok fluttu fram tí›ir sínar me› miklum athuga. Varekki at heyra í kórinn nema fagr sƒngr ok heilagt bœnahald. Hinir ellri 162
menn kunnu sér at vera vel si›a›ir, en smásveinar váru svá hirtir af
meistƒrum sínum at ﬂeir skyldu eigi treystask me› gáleysi at fara.
Allir hinir sœmiligstu kennimenn í Nor›lendingafjór›ungi váru 165nƒkkura hrí› til náms at Hólum, ﬂá sem várr aldr, segir bró›ir
Gunnlaugr, mátti muna, sumir af barndómi, sumir á fulltí›a aldri.
Margir af sag›ra meistara lærisveinum ƒndu›usk á várum dƒgum. 168
En einn af ﬂeim var› Ísleifr Hallsson, hvern Jón byskup œskti at ver›askyldi byskup næst eptir hann ok téna›armann15 síns byskupsdóms
ef hann mœddi elli, en hann anda›isk fyrr en herra byskup. En at ek 171
nefna nƒkkura sag›ra lærisveina, ﬂá er ek sá mínum augum, var einn
af ﬂeim Klœngr er sí›an var byskup í Skál‹a›holti. Var hann tólf vetra
gamall á hendi fólginn Jóni byskupi af mó›ur sinni til frœ›ináms, ok 174
var› hann hinn bezti klerkr ok var lengi sí›an sœmiligr kennima›r í
Hólakirkju, hinn mesti upphaldsma›r kristninnar, prédikandi fagrliga
142 inserted from H. hera›inu S. til S. 155 inserted from L. 165–91 from L.

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177 Gu›s or› undir stjórn ok yfirbo›i tveggja Hólabyskupa, Ketils ok

Bjarnar. Haf›i hann marga vaska lærisveina undir sér, ritandi bœkrmargar ok merkiligar, ﬂær sem enn tjásk at Hólum ok ví›a annars
180 sta›ar. Vilmundr var ﬂar ok lær›r, er fyrstr var ábóti á ﬁingeyrum,
svá ok Hreinn er ﬂar var hinn ﬂri›i ábóti. Margir váru ok ﬂar a›rir ískóla, ﬂeir er sí›an ur›u mektugir kennimenn, Ísleifr Grímsson, frændi
183 byskups, Jón svarti, Bjarni Bergﬂórsson, Bjƒrn, er sí›an var hinn ﬂri›ibyskup at Hólum, ok margir a›rir ﬂeir er langt er frá at segja. ﬁar var
ok í frœ›inæmi hreinfer›ug jungfrú er Ingunn hét. Øngum ﬂessum
186 var hon lægri í sƒg›um bóklistum. Kenndi hon mƒrgum grammaticam
ok frœddi hvern er nema vildi. Ur›u ﬂví margir val menntir undir
hennar hendi. Hon rétti mjƒk latínubœkr, svá at hon lét lesa fyrir sér,
189 en hon sjálf sauma›i, tefldi e›a ‹vann› a›rar hannyr›ir me›r heilagra
manna sƒgum, kynnandi mƒnnum Gu›s d‡r› eigi at eins me›r or›um
munnnáms heldr ok me›r verkum handanna.16

187 margir val repeated.

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193

Notes
1 at leyndum dómi Gu›s = Latin occulto Dei iudicio. Cf. XIII:13 above

and note.
2 According to H and L, Bishop Jón shipped a cargo of Norwegiantimber to Iceland on his return voyage from Lund. (Icelanders had
the right to free timber from Norwegian forests that were royalproperty; cf. Laws II 211.) This information is omitted in S. Oxi
Hjaltason’s church was probably built about 1050. It is not known
when it burned down and when it was replaced by the church Bishop
Jón demolished to make way for his new cathedral. Jón’s church stood,
though repaired from time to time, until about 1290.
3 ﬁóroddr is called Gamlason in H and L. He has been identified as

the ﬁóroddr rúnameistari mentioned in connection with a grammaticaltreatise, possibly the man of the same name who was a householder
in Dalas‡sla (western Iceland) in the first half of the twelfth century.
4 ok enn sér merki húsanna is absent in H. L has hvern [sc. skóla] vér

sám me› várum augum, segir bró›ir Gunnlaugr, er latínusƒguna hefir
saman sett.
5 ‘Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your goodworks, and glorify your Father which is in heaven’ (Matt. 5: 16).
6 The Apostles’ creed and the Lord’s prayer were obligatory learning;see Laws I 26. In the course of the thirteenth century the Hail Marywas included as part of this basic Christian knowledge. The ultimate
source for the seven canonical hours observed daily by men in secularorders and members of monastic foundations was Psalm 119: 164(Vulgate 118: 164), ‘Seven times a day do I praise thee . . .’ (so in the
Authorised Version). Laymen were also encouraged to observe themas far as possible.
7 The reform which abolished old weekday names that had reference

to pagan deities is attributed to St Silvester (pope 313–35). It became
common form in the Latin liturgical calendar but elsewhere in Western
Europe was effective, at least in large part, only in Icelandic andPortuguese.

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8 Exchange of scurrilous or lewd verses, often impromptu, is attested

in various sources though, naturally enough, few texts of this kind
have survived. Such pastimes were always frowned on by churchmen.
Mansƒngr, literally ‘maid-song’, referred to love-poetry in general;making and repeating such verse could be counted an offence punishable at law; see Laws II 198. The term mansƒngr was later used of theconventional introduction to rímur, often addressed to a lady or ladies,but not always with love as the theme. See e.g. W. A. Craigie, Specimensof Icelandic Rímur I (1952), 291–93; T. Gunnell, The Origins of Dramain Scandinavia (1995), 85–86, 144, 346–48.
9 Ovid’s verse-epistles are Epistulae Heroidum and Epistulae ex Ponto,

and presumably the title in S and H refers to the former (on the fatefulloves of notable ladies). For the summary remark in S, Í ﬂeiri bók b‡rmansƒngr mikill, H has: En í ﬂeiri bók kennir ﬂeim er les brƒg› til
ﬂess er horfir til saurlífis ok muna›semi; and L has: En í ﬂeiri bók
talar meistari Ovidius um kvenna ástir ok kennir me›r hverjum hætti
menn skulu ﬂær gilja ok nálgask ﬂeira vilja. These descriptions andthe account of Bishop Jón’s reaction are much more appropriate to
Ovid’s Ars amatoria, as the title in L, de arte, makes explicit. The
switch to [liber] Epistolarum in the joint source of S and H may stemfrom some editorial delicacy. All Ovid’s works, including the Art ofLove, were common school reading in the Middle Ages.
10 The object of líkna›i is ﬂá sƒmu menn . . . ﬂeim inum sƒmum. The

first phrase is acc., the second dat.; líkna normally takes the dat., andthe explanation of the discrepancy is presumably that the writer did
not know what verb was to come when he began writing the sentence.
Cf. Text I, footnote to line 27 above, and Gr 3.9.8.2.
11 The words Skƒrugliga . . . kómu are introduced from H.
12 These men and Bishop Jón’s wife, Valdís, are not mentioned inother sources.
13 ﬁessir menn (line 133) . . . veita ﬂeim beina: thus H. S has: ﬁessirmenn ƒnnu›usk mest ﬂat er til sta›arins kom ok skipu›u mƒnnum tils‡slu, sumum til atflutningar vi› sta›inn um ﬂá hluti er ‹vi› ﬂótti›ﬂurfa. Sumir váru settir til verkna›ar, sumir at ﬂjóna fátœkum
mƒnnum, ok var byskup vandr at ﬂví at ﬂat væri miskunnsamliga gjƒrt,XIV: Jóns saga helga

195

sumir at taka vi› gestum. L says only: Sumir menn váru skipa›ir attaka me›r gestum.
14 Ríkini has a German name and was probably Frankish rather thanFrench. The description, einn franzeis, is in L, not in S; H lacks thisparagraph and the rest of the extract.
15 -mann: the case form is influenced by hvern, and would be correct

in an acc. and inf. construction after œskti. It is possibly an instance ofanacoluthon rather than an instance of the acc. form mann for nom.
ma›r, a substitution sometimes found in late fourteenth-century
manuscripts.
16 Lines 165–91 are from the L recension. A comparable passage in S

is an abridgment of a similar text. Ketill ﬁorsteinsson was bishop of
Hólar 1122–45, Bjƒrn Gilsson 1147–62. Vilmundr ﬁórólfsson was
the first abbot of ﬁingeyrar, 1133–48; Hreinn Styrmisson was the third
abbot there, 1166–71. The identity of Ísleifr Grímsson and Jón svarti
is uncertain. Bjarni Bergﬂórsson is thought to be a priest of that name
who is mentioned in other sources as an expert in computus (mathematics and astronomy) and nicknamed inn tƒlvisi; he died in 1173.
Ingunn was probably the Ingu›r Arnórsdóttir who is recorded as an
informant in a list in OddrÓT, a list which is thought to be derived
from Gunnlaugr Leifsson’s work on the same king.

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197

XV: LAXDŒLA SAGALaxdœla saga is generally thought to have been written about the
middle of the thirteenth century, because of its fully developed styleand structure, the reference made in it to earlier sagas and other written
sources, and the apparent influence on it of European romance. At its
centre is the ‘love triangle’ story involving Kjartan, Gu›rún and Bolli,
which echoes, and probably draws upon, the plot common to poets’sagas such as Kormaks saga and Bjarnar saga Hítdœlakappa (seeFinlay 1997), but its range is much wider. It is the saga that perhaps
most fully deserves the label ‘Family Saga’: not only is the descentof all the important characters traced from the one Norwegianchieftain, Ketill flatnefr, but many of the disputes that arise in its
course involve family relationships, often the problematic ones
between half- and foster-brothers, and marriage and divorce are amongits prevailing themes. This in itself has the consequence that the roleand concerns of women are unusually prominent in the saga, and theauthor’s evident interest in and sympathy for a woman’s point ofview has led to speculation that the author may have been a woman(e.g. Kress 1986). It is not out of the question, of course, that a maleauthor could enter into this point of view (an alternative candidate
for authorship is Óláfr ﬁór›arson hvítaskáld, nephew of Snorri Sturluson and author of a treatise on prosody), particularly if, for whateverreason, he was writing for a predominantly female audience.
The feminine perspective is clear from the beginning of the saga in
the unusually prominent role given to Unnr in djúpú›ga, daughter of
Ketill flatnefr, who takes on the conventionally masculine task offounding a settlement and a dynasty in Iceland; she is the ancestressof the Laxdœlir (‘people of Laxárdalr’), the family from whom thesaga derives its name, and to which Kjartan and Bolli belong. The
saga relates the evolution of this family over several generations beforeGu›rún Ósvífrsdóttir (whose family is descended from one of Unnr’s
brothers) is introduced. The unusual elaboration of this early part ofthe saga, which goes far beyond the brevity of the conventional saga
prelude, has prompted much discussion of the saga’s structure; it isgenerally felt to introduce and define themes that play a part in thecentral conflict of the saga. Some have gone so far as to argue that,rather than building up a background against which Kjartan and Bolli
can be seen as idealised and heroic figures (as Madelung 1972, for

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example, suggests), the opening chapters present Unnr as an exemplary
figure, representing family loyalty and generosity, against which the
behaviour of the three central figures is measured and found wanting(Conroy and Langen 1988). Ursula Dronke argues for a further moral
decline in what she calls the ‘Age of Pewter’ (1979, 137) after thedeath of Kjartan.
The position of Gu›rún as the focus of the saga is established not
only by her dominant personality — believed to be partly modelledon two heroic women in the poems of the Poetic Edda, her namesakeGu›rún Gjúkadóttir and the valkyrie Brynhildr, who is also cheatedof the man she should have married — but also by the saga’s marking
out of her four marriages as a narrative sequence. This is achieved byGu›rún’s four dreams in Chapter 33, which foreshadow the fourmarriages that the saga subsequently relates. The tidily predictedsequence is interrupted by her love for and loss of Kjartan, a patternrepeated in her dialogue at the very end of the saga with her son
Bolli, who asks her ambiguously which man (ma›r ‘man’, but possibly
also ‘husband’) she has loved most. At first she responds with acomparison of the four men she has married; but her final reply, ﬁeim
var ek verst er ek unna mest (‘I treated worst the one I loved best’),must surely refer to Kjartan — though the question is debated to this day.
The earliest surviving (but fragmentary) manuscripts of Laxdœla
saga are from the end of the thirteenth century. The only complete
medieval version of the saga is in the mid-fourteenth-century Mö›ruvallabók, in which other Sagas of Icelanders (including Kormaks saga
and Njáls saga) are also preserved (see Text XVIII). Editions of thesaga are based on this text. The extract edited here follows the text ofMö›ruvallabók as it is represented in the editions of Kålund and Einar
Ól. Sveinsson. The textual notes show where readings other than thoseof Mö›ruvallabók have been adopted; these readings are from latepaper manuscripts, and may in many cases be scribal corrections.
The Mö›ruvallabók text shows signs of later alteration which sometimes obscures the original reading; examples of this have not been
noted here if the likely original reading is indicated by the evidenceof other manuscripts.

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BibliographyLaxdœla saga, ed. Einar Ól. Sveinsson (1934). ÍF V.
Laxdœla saga, ed. Kr. Kålund (1889–91).
The Saga of the People of Laxardal, tr. Keneva Kunz. In CSI V 1–120. Other
translations of the saga are reviewed in Auerbach 1998–2001.
Loren Auerbach, ‘Female Experience and Authorial Intention in Laxdœla
saga’. Saga-Book XXV (1998–2001), 30–52.
Heinrich Beck, ‘Laxdœla saga — A Structural Approach’. Saga-Book XIX(1974–77), 383–402.
Patricia Conroy and T. C. S. Langen, ‘Laxdœla saga: Theme and Structure’.
Arkiv för nordisk filologi 103 (1988), 118–41.
Robert Cook, ‘Women and Men in Laxdœla Saga’. Skáldskaparmál 2 (1992),
34–59.
Ursula Dronke, ‘Narrative insight in Laxdœla saga’. In J. R. R. Tolkien,
Scholar and Story-teller: Essays in Memoriam. Ed. Mary Salu and Robert
T. Farrell (1979), 120–37.
Alison Finlay, ‘Betrothal and Women’s Autonomy in Laxdœla saga and the
Poets’ Sagas’. Skáldskaparmál 4 (1997), 107–28.
Hjalmar Falk, Altwestnordische Kleiderkunde (1919).
Judith Jesch, Women in the Viking Age (1991).
Jenny Jochens, Women in Old Norse Society (1995).
Helga Kress, ‘“You will find it all rather monotonous”; on Literary Tradition
and the Feminine Experience in Laxdœla saga’. In The Nordic Mind.
Current Trends in Scandinavian Literary Criticism. Ed. Frank Egholm
Andersen and John Weinstock (1986), 181–95. [Originally published in
Icelandic in Konur skrifa, til hei›urs Önnu Sigur›ardóttur (1980), 97–
109.]
Laws of Early Iceland I–II, tr. A. Dennis et al. (1998–2000).
Margaret Arendt Madelung, The Laxdœla Saga: Its Structural Patterns(1972). University of North Carolina Studies in the Germanic Languages
and Literatures, 74.

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XV: LAXDŒLA SAGA
Chapter 34: Af ﬁorvaldi

ﬁorvaldr hét ma›r, sonr Halldórs Garpsdalsgo›a. Hann bjó í Garpsdal
3 í Gilsfir›i, au›igr ma›r ok engi hetja.1 Hann ba› Gu›rúnar Ósvífrs-dóttur á Alﬂingi ﬂá er hon var fimmtán vetra gƒmul. ﬁví máli var eigi
fjarri tekit, en ﬂó sag›i Ósvífr at ﬂat myndi á kostum finna, at ﬂau
6 Gu›rún váru eigi jafnmenni. ﬁorvaldr tala›i óhar›fœrliga, kvazk konubi›ja, en ekki fjár. Sí›an var Gu›rún fƒstnu› ﬁorvaldi, ok ré› Ósvífr
einn máldaga, ok svá var skilt, at Gu›rún skyldi ein rá›a fyrir fé ﬂeira
9 ﬂegar er ﬂau koma í eina rekkju, ok eiga alls helming, hvárt er samfarar
ﬂeira væri lengri e›a skemmri. Hann skyldi ok kaupa gripi til handa
henni svá at engi jafnfjá› kona ætti betri gripi, en ﬂó mætti hann
12 halda búi sínu fyrir ﬂær sakar. Rí›a menn nú heim af ﬂingi. Ekki var
Gu›rún at ﬂessu spur›, ok heldr ger›i hon sér at ﬂessu ógetit, ok varﬂó kyrrt.2 Brú›kaup var í Garpsdal at tvímánu›i. Lítt unni Gu›rún
15 ﬁorvaldi ok var erfi› í gripakaupum; váru engar gersimar svá miklar
á Vestfjƒr›um at Gu›rúnu ﬂœtti eigi skapligt at hon ætti, en galt
fjándskap ﬁorvaldi ef hann keypti eigi, hversu d‡rar sem metnar váru.
18 ﬁór›r Ingunnarson3 ger›i sér dátt vi› ﬂau ﬁorvald ok Gu›rúnu ok var
ﬂar lƒngum, ok fell ﬂar mƒrg umrœ›a á um kærleika ﬂeira ﬁór›ar ok
Gu›rúnar. ﬁat var eitt sinn at Gu›rún beiddi ﬁorvald gripakaups.
21 ﬁorvaldr kva› hana ekki hóf at kunna ok sló hana kinnhest.4 ﬁá mælti
Gu›rún:‘Nú gaftu mér ﬂat er oss konum ﬂykkir miklu skipta at vér eigim vel at
24 gƒrt, en ﬂat er litarapt gott, ok af hefir ﬂú mik rá›it brekvísi vi› ﬂik.’
ﬁat sama kveld kom ﬁór›r ﬂar. Gu›rún sag›i honum ﬂessa svívir›ing
ok spur›i hann hverju hon skyldi ﬂetta launa. ﬁór›r brosti at ok mælti:‘Hér kann ek gott rá› til. Ger›u honum skyrtu ok brautgangs hƒfu›27
smátt ok seg skilit vi› hann fyrir ﬂessar sakar.’5
Eigi mælti Gu›rún í móti ﬂessu, ok skilja ﬂau talit. ﬁat sama vár
30 segir Gu›rún skilit vi› ﬁorvald ok fór heim til Lauga. Sí›an var gƒrtféskipti ﬂeira ﬁorvalds ok Gu›rúnar, ok haf›i hon helming fjár alls,
ok var nú meira en á›r. Tvá vetr hƒf›u ﬂau ásamt verit. ﬁat sama vár
33 seldi Ingunn land sitt í Króksfir›i ﬂat sem sí›an heitir á Ingunnarstƒ›um, ok fór vestr á Skálmarnes; hana haf›i átt Glúmr Geirason,
3–4 svarat M.

13 ógott (?) M.

19 mjƒk M.

24 ﬂú] written twice in M.

XV: Laxdœla saga

201

sem fyrr var ritat. Í ﬂenna tíma bjó Hallsteinn go›i á Hallsteinsnesi
fyrir vestan ﬁorskafjƒr›; hann var ríkr ma›r ok ‹me›allagi› vinsæll. 36

Chapter 35: Af Kotkeli ok Grímu
Kotkell hét ma›r er ﬂá haf›i út komit fyrir litlu. Gríma hét kona hans;ﬂeira synir váru ﬂeir Hallbjƒrn slíkisteinsauga ok Stígandi. ﬁessir menn 39
váru su›reyskir. ¯ll váru ﬂau mjƒk fjƒlkunnig ok inir mestu sei›menn.
Hallsteinn go›i tók vi› ﬂeim ok setti ﬂau ni›r at Ur›um í Skálmar‹fir›i›,ok var ﬂeira bygg› ekki vinsæl.
42
ﬁetta sumar fór Gestr ‹til ﬂings ok fór› á skipi til Saurbœjar sem hannvar vanr. Hann gisti á Hóli í Saurbœ. ﬁeir mágar lé›u honum hesta,
sem fyrr var vant.6 ﬁór›r Ingunnarson var ﬂá í fƒr me› Gesti ok kom 45
til Lauga í Sælingsdal. Gu›rún Ósvífrsdóttir rei› til ﬂings ok fylg›ihenni ﬁór›r Ingunnarson. ﬁat var einn dag er ﬂau ri›u yfir Bláskógahei›i — var á ve›r gott — ﬂá mælti Gu›rún:
48‘Hvárt er ﬂat satt, ﬁór›r, at Au›r, kona ﬂín, er jafnan í brókum oksetgeiri í, en vafit spjƒrrum mjƒk í skúa ni›r?’7
Hann kvazk ekki hafa til ﬂess fundit.
51‘Lítit brag› mun ﬂá at,’ segir Gu›rún, ‘ef ﬂú finnr eigi, ok fyrir hvat
skal hon ﬂá heita Bróka-Au›r?’
ﬁór›r mælti, ‘Vér ætlum hana litla hrí› svá hafa verit kalla›a.’
54
Gu›rún svarar, ‘Hitt skiptir hana in meira, at hon eigi ﬂetta nafn
lengi sí›an.’
Eptir ﬂat kómu menn til ﬂings; er ﬂar allt tí›indalaust. ﬁór›r var 57
lƒngum í bú› Gests ok tala›i jafnan vi› Gu›rúnu. Einn dag spur›iﬁór›r Ingunnarson Gu›rúnu hvat konu var›a›i ef hon væri í brókum
jafnan svá sem karlar. ‹Gu›rún svarar:›
60‘Slíkt víti á konum at skapa fyrir ﬂat á sitt hóf sem karlmanni, ef
hann hefir hƒfu›smátt ‹svá› mikla at sjái geirvƒrtur hans berar, brautgangssƒk hvárttveggja.’863ﬁá mælti ﬁór›r, ‘Hvárt ræ›r ﬂú mér at ek segja skilit vi› Au›i hér áﬂingi e›a í hera›i, ok gera ek ﬂat vi› fleiri manna ‹rá››, ﬂví at menn eru
skapstórir, ﬂeir er sér mun ﬂikj‹a› misbo›it í ﬂessu?’
66
Gu›rún svarar stundu sí›ar, ‘Aptans bí›r óframs sƒk.’ﬁá spratt ﬁór›r ﬂegar upp ok gekk til Lƒgbergs ok nefndi sér vátta
at hann segir skilit vi› Au›i, ok fann ﬂat til saka at hon skarsk í 69
setgeirabrœkr sem karlkonur.9 Brœ›rum Au›ar líkar illa ok er ﬂó kyrrt.

202

XV: Laxdœla sagaﬁór›r rí›r af ﬂingi med ﬂeim Ósvífrssonum. En er Au›r spyrr ﬂessi
tí›indi, ﬂá mælti hon:Vel er ek veit ﬂat,
var ek ein um látin.
75 Sí›an rei› ﬁór›r til féskiptis vestr til Saurbœjar me› tólfta mann ok
gekk ﬂat greitt, ﬂví at ﬁór›i var óspart um hversu fénu var skipt. ﬁór›r
rak vestan til Lauga mart búfé. Sí›an ba› hann Gu›rúnar; var honum
78 ﬂat mál au›sótt vi› Ósvífr, en Gu›rún mælti ekki í móti. Brullaup
skyldi vera at Laugum at tíu viku‹m› sumars; var sú veizla allskƒrulig.
Samfƒr ﬂeira ﬁór›ar ok Gu›rúnar var gó›. ﬁat eitt helt til at ﬁorkell
81 hvelpr ok Knútr fóru eigi málum á hendr ﬁór›i Ingunnarsyni, at ﬂeir
fengu eigi styrk til. Annat sumar eptir hƒf›u Hólsmenn selfƒr í Hvammsdal; ‹var› Au›r at seli. Laugamenn hƒf›u selfƒr í Lambadal; sá gengr
84 v‹est›r í fjƒllin af Sælingsdal. Au›r spyrr ﬂann mann er smalans gætti
hversu opt hann fyndi smalamann frá Laugum. Hann kva› ﬂat jafnanvera, sem líkligt var, ﬂví at háls einn var á milli seljanna. ﬁá mælti Au›r:
87‘ﬁú skalt hitta í dag smalamann frá Laugum, ok máttu segja mér
hvat manna er at vetrhúsum e›a í seli, ok rœ› allt vingjarnliga til
ﬁór›ar, sem ﬂú átt at gera.’
90
Sveinninn heitr at gera svá sem hon mælti. En um kveldit, er smalama›r kom heim, spyrr Au›r tí›inda. Smalama›rinn svarar:‘Spurt hefi ek ﬂau tí›indi er ﬂér munu ﬂykkja gó›, at nú er breitt
93 hvílugólf milli rúma ﬂeira ﬁór›ar ok Gu›rúnar, ﬂví at hon er í seli enhann heljask á skálasmí›, ok eru ﬂeir Ósvífr tveir at vetrhúsum.’‘Vel hefir ﬂú njósnat,’ segir hon, ‘ok haf sƒ›lat hesta tvá er menn
96 fara at sofa.’
Smalasveinn ger›i sem hon bau›, ok nƒkkuru fyrir sólarfall sté
Au›r á bak, ok var hon ﬂá at vísu í brókum. Smalasveinn rei› ƒ›rum
99 hesti ok gat varla fylgt henni, svá knú›i hon fast rei›ina. Hon rei›su›r yfir Sælingsdalshei›i ok nam eigi sta›ar fyrr en undir túngar›i
at Laugum. ﬁá sté hon af baki, en ba› smalasveininn gæta hestanna
102 me›an hon gengi til húss.
Au›r gekk at durum ok ‹var opin hur››; hon gekk til eldhúss ok at
lokrekkju ﬂeiri er ﬁór›r lá í ok svaf. Var hur›in fallin aptr en eigi
105 lokan fyrir. Hon gekk í lokrekkjuna, en ﬁór›r svaf ok horf›i í lopt
72

82 Lamba- M. 84 at baki dalnum M. 85 ﬁór›ar M. 86 dalrinn M.
M. 103 inn M. 105 at lockreckiunni M.

ánnaXV: Laxdœla saga

203

upp. ﬁá vak›i Au›r ﬁór›, en hann snerisk á hli›ina er hann sá at ma›r
var kominn. Hon brá ﬂá saxi ok lag›i at ﬁór›i ok veitti honum áverka
mikla ok kom á hƒndina hœgri; var› hann sárr á bá›um geirvƒrtum. 108
Svá lag›i hon til fast at saxit nam í be›inum sta›ar. Sí›an gekk Au›rbrott ok til hests ok hljóp á bak ok rei› heim eptir ﬂat.
ﬁór›r vildi upp spretta er hann fekk áverkann, ok var› ﬂat ekki, ﬂví 111
at hann mœddi bló›rás. Vi› ﬂetta vakna›i Ósvífr ok spyrr hvat títtværi, en ﬁór›r kvazk or›inn fyrir áverkum nƒkkurum. Ósvífr spyrr ef
hann vissi hverr á honum hef›i unnit, ok stó› upp ok batt um sár 114
hans. ﬁór›r kvazk ætla at ﬂat hef›i Au›r gƒrt. Ósvífr bau› at rí›aeptir henni; kva› hana fámenna til mundu hafa farit, ok væri henni
skapat víti. ﬁór›r kva› ﬂat fjarri skyldu fara; sag›i hana slíkt hafa at 117gƒrt sem hon átti.
Au›r kom heim í sólarupprás, ok spur›u ﬂeir brœ›r hennar hvert
hon hef›i farit. Au›r kvazk farit hafa til Lauga ok sag›i ﬂeim hvat til 120
tí›inda haf›i gƒrzk í fƒrum hennar. ﬁeir létu vel yfir ok kvá›u of lítit
mundu at or›it. ﬁór›r lá lengi í sárum, ok greru vel bringusárin, en súhƒndin var› honum hvergi betri til taks en á›r.
123
Kyrrt var nú um vetrinn. En eptir um várit kom Ingunn, mó›ir ﬁór›ar,
vestan af Skálmarnesi. Hann tók vel vi› henni. Hon kvazk vilja rá›ask
undir árabur› ﬁór›ar; kva› hon Kotkel ‹ok konu hans ok sonu› gera 126
sér óvært í fjárránum ok fjƒlkynngi, en hafa mikit traust af Hallsteinigo›a. ﬁór›r veiksk skjótt vi› ﬂetta mál ok kvazk hafa skyldu rétt af
ﬂjófum ﬂeim ﬂótt Hallsteinn væri at móti; snarask ﬂegar til fer›ar vi› 129
tíunda mann. Ingunn fór ok vestr me› honum. Hann haf›i ferju ór
Tjaldanesi. Sí›an heldu ﬂau vestr til Skálmarness. ﬁór›r lét flytja til
skips allt lausafé ﬂat er mó›ir hans átti ﬂar, en smala skyldi reka fyrir 132
innan fjƒr›u. Tólf váru ﬂau alls á skipi; ﬂar var Ingunn ok ƒnnur kona.
ﬁór›r kom til bœjar Kotkels me› tíunda mann; synir ﬂeira Kotkels
váru eigi heima. Sí›an stefndi hann ﬂeim Kotkeli ok Grímu ok sonum 135
ﬂeira um ﬂjófna› ok fjƒlkynngi ok lét var›a skóggang; hann stefndi
sƒkum ﬂeim til Alﬂingis ok fór til skips eptir ﬂat.
ﬁá kómu ﬂeir Hallbjƒrn ok Stígandi heim er ﬁór›r var kominn frá 138
landi, ok ﬂó skammt; sag›i Kotkell ﬂá sonum sínum hvat ﬂar haf›i ígƒrzk me›an ﬂeir váru eigi heima. ﬁeir brœ›r ur›u ó›ir vi› ﬂetta ok
kvá›u menn ekki hafa fyrr gengit í berhƒgg vi› ﬂau um svá mikinn 141
140 ﬂat M.

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XV: Laxdœla saga

fjándskap. Sí›an lét Kotkell gera sei›hjall mikinn; ﬂau fœr›usk ﬂar á
upp ƒll; ﬂau kvá›u ﬂar ‹har›snúin› frœ›i. ﬁat váru galdrar.10 ﬁví næst144 laust á hrí› mikilli. ﬁat fann ﬁór›r Ingunnarson ok hans fƒrunautar,‹ﬂar sem hann var á sæ staddr›, ok til hans var gƒrt ve›rit. Keyrir
skipit vestr fyrir Skálmarnes. ﬁór›r s‡ndi mikinn hraustleik í sæli›i.
147 ﬁat sá ﬂeir menn er á landi váru at hann kasta›i ﬂví ƒllu er til ﬂunga
var, útan mƒnnum. Væntu ﬂeir menn er á landi váru ﬁór›i ﬂá landtƒku,ﬂví at ﬂá var af farit ﬂat sem skerjóttast var. Sí›an reis bo›i skammt
150 frá landi, sá er engi ma›r mun›i at fyrr hef›i uppi verit, ok laust
skipit svá at ﬂegar horf›i upp kjƒlrinn. ﬁar drukkna›i ﬁór›r ok alltfƒruneyti hans, en skipit braut í spán, ok rak ﬂar kjƒlinn er sí›an heitir
153 Kjalarey; skjƒld ﬁór›ar rak í ﬂá ey er Skjaldarey er kƒllu›. Lík ﬁór›arrak ﬂar ﬂegar á land ok hans fƒrunauta; var ﬂar haugr orpinn at líkum
ﬂeira, ﬂar er sí›an heitir Haugsnes.

143 frœ›i] + sín, en M.

XV: Laxdœla saga

205

Notes
1 ﬁorvaldr and his father Halldórr, together with their location in

Garpsdalr and ﬁorvaldr’s marriage to Gu›rún, are mentioned inLandnámabók (ÍF I 160).
2 The medieval collection of laws Grágás, written mostly in thethirteenth century but incorporating earlier material, confirms that
betrothal was a contract between the prospective husband and thebride’s male relatives (Laws II 53). Some saga narratives, however,represent women protesting at not being consulted (e.g. Laxdœla sagach. 23), or suggest that a marriage arranged without the bride’s consent
could end in disaster (Njáls saga chs 9–11). Jenny Jochens (1995,
44–48) argues that this emphasis on consent arose as a response to
the Church’s insistence on marriage as a contract between equal
partners.
3 ﬁór›r was the son of the poet Glúmr Geirason (referred to in line34), some of whose verses in honour of the son and grandson of King
Haraldr hárfagri of Norway are cited in the Kings’ Sagas, but his
second name derives from the name of his mother Ingunn. He is saidin Laxdœla saga (ÍF V 87) to be sakama›r mikill ‘much given tolawsuits’; his taste for litigation is evident in this extract and leads to
his downfall.
4 In other sagas too, the disgrace of a slap in the face triggers a wife’s

rebellion against her husband (Bjarnar saga Hítdœlakappa ch. 12,
Eyrbyggja saga ch. 14, Njáls saga chs 11, 16, 48).
5 Grágás (Laws II 63–66) refers to the possibility of divorce instigatedby either party (though in this later, Christian, context the permissionof the bishop is to be sought in many cases). On the basis of observations made by Arab and other visitors to Viking cultures (Jesch 91–92),
as well as numerous references to divorce in the Sagas of Icelanders,
this situation is generally thought to represent the remaining traces ofa more liberal pre-Christian system of divorce virtually on demand,on grounds such as dishonour, or sexual or other incompatibility(Jochens 55–60). The wearing of women’s clothes, such as the lowcut shirt referred to here, by a man was an offence in law (see note 8
below), but nowhere else is this referred to as grounds for divorce.

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XV: Laxdœla saga

6 The Gestr referred to is Gestr Oddleifsson, well-known in Laxdœla

saga and elsewhere for his ability to foretell the future (in Chapter 33
he interprets the dreams of Gu›rún as foreshadowing her four marriages).
It is said on his introduction to the saga that he is in the habit ofstaying at Hóll with ﬁór›r and his two brothers-in-law (the mágar
referred to here) on his way to the Alﬂingi.
7 Brœkr ‘breeches’ here denotes an exclusively male garment. Falk

(1919, 121) considers that the word could also apply to a garment
worn by women (and that this is what makes Skarphe›inn’s gift to
Flosi of brœkr blár in chapter 123 of Njáls saga insulting), but thatthe feminine version would be open around the legs; in this case it is
the additional specification of a piece let in to form the seat (setgeirií) that identifies it as masculine wear. The word spjarrar has sometimes
been taken to refer to the integral socks attached to one kind of (men’s)
trousers (leistabrœkr), but probably means bands of cloth wrappedaround the lower legs; this is mentioned elsewhere as male dress.
8 Wearing clothes proper to the opposite sex is prohibited in Grágás(Laws II 69–70), but is not said there to be grounds for divorce: ‘Ifwomen become so deviant that they wear men’s clothing, or whatever
male fashion they adopt in order to be different, and likewise if men
adopt women’s fashion, whatever form it takes, then the penalty forthat, whichever of them does it, is lesser outlawry.’
9 karlkonur, plural of karlkona ‘masculine woman’, is found only inMö›ruvallabók (other manuscripts have karlma›r ‘man’ or karlar‘men’). The word does not occur in any other text.
10 The most detailed account of the practice of the magic rite calledsei›r, in chapter 4 of Eiríks saga rau›a, also refers to a pedestal or
platform on which the witch sits, in that case surrounded by women,
one of whom chants a traditional poem, corresponding to the galdrar
referred to here. The songs of the magician-family are said later inLaxdœla saga to sound pleasant (fƒgr var sú kve›andi at heyra); on
this later occasion they cause the victim’s immediate death, but moreusually sei›r operates by influencing the weather, as in the case ofﬁór›r.

XVI: Au›unar ﬂáttr

207

XVI: AU‹UNAR ﬁÁTTRThe word ﬂáttr (pl. ﬂættir) in Old Icelandic meant literally ‘a strand ina rope’, but early developed various metaphorical meanings with thebasic sense of ‘a subsidiary part of something’. As a literary term it
meant a short prose narrative constituting a chapter or integral episodein a saga. Though a few narratives that are classed as ﬂættir are foundas independent stories in manuscripts, the majority are found as partsof sagas, particularly Sagas of Kings. One group is associated withthe missionary kings Óláfr Tryggvason and Óláfr Haraldsson, the saint,
and the sagas of these kings contain various ﬂættir relating to the victoryof Christianity over heathendom in the late tenth and eleventh centuries.
But the largest group of ﬂættir is found in sagas of Haraldr har›rá›i(king of Norway 1046–66); some of these relate to the conflict between
Haraldr har›rá›i and his kinsman Magnús gó›i Óláfsson during theperiod of their joint rule over Norway c.1046 (see MS, s.v. ﬂáttr).
Many of the ﬂættir may be older than the sagas in which they arepreserved, and may originally have been independent stories. Linguisticarchaisms in some of them (e.g., in Au›unar ﬂáttr, of, fyr, ﬂars and thesuffixed pronoun -k) suggest that they may come from the earliest
period of saga-writing in Iceland, the late twelfth century; there islittle to support the idea that they were orally composed, but they are
all anonymous. The majority that have survived have Icelanders as
their main characters (there are 49 so-called Íslendinga ﬂættir, ‘Talesof Icelanders’, in CSI), though these are often unhistorical and theiradventures fictional. The story is often about how an insignificant
Icelander travels abroad to a foreign (usually Norwegian) court andsurmounts various difficulties to get the better of the foreigners,
including the ruler himself, and returns to Iceland having made his
fortune. Though the settings are historical, the events are mostly ofminor historical significance. But the way in which these stories musthave supported the developing feeling of Icelandic identity and national
pride is obvious.
Au›unar ﬂáttr follows this last pattern. Though nothing that happensin the story is impossible (gifts of polar bears from the Arctic toEuropean rulers were not all that uncommon in the Middle Ages), it
clearly has affinities to folk-tales (see ÍF VI, c–civ). Great emphasis islaid on the hero’s gæfa or gipta ‘luck’, ‘good fortune’ (a sort of innate
power emanating from a person predisposing his undertakings to208

XVI: Au›unar ﬂáttr

success), though Au›unn is also presented as having a deal of skill inmanaging the eminent persons with whom he comes into contact.
Au›unn is not known from other sources, though the ﬂáttr says hecame from the Western Fjords of Iceland (line 2) and the historicalﬁorsteinn Gy›uson (d. 1190; mentioned in Sturlunga saga, Gu›mundarsaga biskups and Icelandic annals; he lived on Flatey in Brei›afjƒr›r)
is said to be descended from him (line 191 below). The story is supposed
to take place about 1050–60 (the hostilities between Norway and
Denmark referred to in line 33 continued, off and on, from soon after
Magnús Óláfsson’s death in 1047 until 1064; the events of these years
are described in detail in Morkinskinna, Fagrskinna and Heimskringla;
see Gwyn Jones, A History of the Vikings (1984), 406–08).
Au›unar ﬂáttr survives in three versions. One is in Morkinskinna(GkS 1009 fol., written c.1275), a history of the kings of Norway from1035–1177 probably first compiled c.1220 (see p. 63 above). A second
is in Flateyjarbók (GKS 1005 fol.), a huge compilation of Kings’ Sagas
and other texts, written c.1387–1395, with additions made c.1450–
1500; Au›unar ﬂáttr is among these additions, in the saga of the kings
Magnús Óláfsson and Haraldr har›rá›i in a redaction deriving mainly
from the original Morkinskinna compilation. The third version appears
in two later compilations of Kings’ Sagas, Hulda (AM 66 fol., c.1350–
1375) and Hrokkinskinna (GKS 1010 fol., c.1400–1450), which arealso derived from the original Morkinskinna compilation, but have atext more similar to that in Flateyjarbók than to that in GkS 1009 fol.
(see MS, s.v. Hulda–Hrokkinskinna). The version in GkS 1009 fol.
seems likely to be closest to the original of the three, though it has
probably been shortened, while each of the three versions contains
some details that are not in either of the others.

XVI: Au›unar ﬂáttr

209

Bibliography
The Morkinskinna text is printed with original spelling in Morkinskinna, ed.
Finnur Jónsson (1932), 180–87, and in normalised spelling in ION 129–35
and ÍF VI, 359–68; the Flateyjarbók text is in Flateyjarbók, ed. Sigur›ur Nordal(1944–45), IV 195–200.
There is a translation in CSI I 369–74 and translation and discussion in
Arnold R. Taylor, ‘Au›unn and the Bear’, Saga-Book XIII (1946–53), 78–
96. The Morkinskinna version is also translated in Eirik the Red and Other
Icelandic Sagas, tr. Gwyn Jones (The World’s Classics, 1961), 163–70, andthe Flateyjarbók version in Hrafnkel’s Saga and Other Icelandic Stories, tr.
Hermann Pálsson (Penguin Books 1971), 121–28. See also MS, s.v. Au›unarﬂáttr vestfirzka; Joseph Harris, ‘Theme and Genre in Some Íslendinga ﬂættir’,
Scandinavian Studies 48 (1976), 1–28.
There is a translation of the whole of the Morkinskinna compilation in
Morkinskinna: The Earliest Icelandic Chronicle of the Norwegian Kings(1030–1157) by Theodore M. Andersson and Kari Ellen Gade (2000).

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XVI: Au›unar ﬂáttr
XVI: AU‹UNAR ﬁÁTTRFrá ﬂví er Au›unn enn vestfirzki fœr›i Sveini konungi bjarnd‡ri
Ma›r hét Au›unn, vestfirzkr at kyni ok félítill. Hann fór útan vestr ﬂarí fjƒr›um me› umbrá›i ﬁorsteins, búanda gó›s, ok ﬁóris st‡rimanns,
er ﬂar haf›i ﬂegit vist of vetrinn me› ﬁorsteini. Au›unn var ok ﬂar ok
starfa›i firir honum ﬁóri ok ﬂá ﬂessi laun af honum, útanfer›ina ok
6 hans umsjá. Hann Au›unn lag›i mestan hluta fjár ﬂess er var fyr mó›ur
sína á›r hann stigi á skip, ok var kve›it á ﬂriggja vetra bjƒrg. Ok nú
fara ﬂeir út he›an, ok fers‹k› ﬂeim vel, ok var Au›unn of vetrinn eptir
9 me› ﬁóri st‡rimanni — hann átti bú á Mœri. Ok um sumarit eptir fara
ﬂeir út til Grœnlands ok eru ‹ﬂar› of vetrinn. ﬁess er vi› getit, at Au›unnkaupir ﬂar bjarnd‡ri eitt, gjƒrsimi mikla, ok gaf ﬂar firir alla eigu sína.
12 Ok nú of sumarit eptir ﬂá fara ﬂeir aptr til Nóregs ok ver›a vel rei›fara;hefir Au›unn d‡r sitt me› sér ok ætlar nú at fara su›r til Danmerkr áfund Sveins konungs ok gefa honum d‡rit. Ok er hann kom su›r í
15 landit ﬂar sem konungr var firir, ﬂá gengr hann upp af skipi ok lei›ir
eptir sér d‡rit ok leigir sér herbergi. Haraldi konungi var sagt brátt at
ﬂar var komit bjarnd‡ri, gørsimi mikil, ok á íslenzkr ma›r. Konungr
18 sendir ﬂegar menn eptir honum, ok er Au›unn kom firir konung, kve›rhann konung vel. Konungr tók vel kve›ju hans ok spur›i sí›an:‘Áttu gjƒrsimi mikla í bjarnd‡ri?’
Hann svarar ok kvezk eiga d‡rit eitthvert.
21
Konungr mælti, ‘Villtu selja oss d‡rit vi› slíku ver›i sem ﬂú keyptir?’
Hann svara›i, ‘Eigi vil ek ﬂat, herra.’‘Villtu ﬂá,’ sag›i konungr, ‘at ek gefa ﬂér tvau ver› slík, ok mun ﬂat
24
réttara, ef ﬂú hefir ﬂar vi› gefit alla ﬂína eigu?’‘Eigi vil ek ﬂat, herra,’ sag›i hann.
Konungr mælti, ‘Villtu gefa mér ﬂá?’
27
Hann svara›i, ‘Eigi, herra.’
Konungr mælti, ‘Hvat villtu ﬂá af gjƒra?’Hann svara›i, ‘Fara,’ segir ‹hann›, ‘til Danmerkr ok gefa Sveini
30
konungi.’
Haraldr konungr sag›i: ‘Hvárt er at ﬂú ert ma›r svá óvitr at ﬂú hefir
33 eigi heyrt ófri› ﬂann er í milli er landa ﬂessa, e›a ætlar ﬂú giptu ﬂína3

4 of M. 11 sínu M. 13 me› written twice over line break M.
written twice over line break M.

25 ﬂínaXVI: Au›unar ﬂáttr211

svá mikla at ﬂú munir ﬂar komask me› gjƒrsimar er a›rir fá eigi komizk
klakklaust ﬂó at nau›syn eigi til?’Au›unn svara›i, ‘Herra, ﬂat er á y›ru valdi, en øngu játum vér ƒ›ru 36
en ﬂessu er vér hƒfum á›r ætlat.’ﬁá mælti konungr, ‘Hví mun eigi ﬂat til at ﬂú farir lei› ﬂína sem ﬂúvill, ok kom ﬂá til mín er ﬂú ferr aptr, ok seg mér hversu Sveinn konungr 39
launar ﬂér d‡rit, ok kann ﬂat vera at ﬂú sér gæfuma›r.’‘ﬁví heit ek ﬂér,’ sag›i Au›unn.
Hann ferr nú sí›an su›r me› landi ok í Vik austr ok ﬂá til Danmerkr; 42
ok er ﬂá uppi hverr penningr fjárins, ok ver›r hann ﬂá bi›ja matarbæ›i fyr sik ok fyr d‡rit. Hann kømr á fund ármanns Sveins konungs
ﬂess er Áki hét, ok ba› hann vista nokkverra bæ›i fyr sik ok fyr d‡rit. 45‘Ek ætla,’ sag›i hann, ‘at gefa Sveini konungi d‡rit.’Áki lézk selja mindu honum vistir ef hann vildi. Au›unn kvezk ekkitil hafa firir at gefa.
48‘En ek vilda ﬂó,’ sag›i hann, ‘at ﬂetta kvæmisk til lei›ar at ek mætta
d‡rit fœra konungi.’‘Ek mun fá ﬂér vistir sem it ﬂurfi› til konungs fundar, en ﬂar í móti 51
vil ek eiga hálft d‡rit, ok máttu á ﬂat líta at d‡rit mun deyja fyrir ﬂér,
ﬂars it ﬂurfu› vistir miklar, en fé sé farit, ok er búit vi› at ﬂú hafir ﬂáekki d‡rsins.’
54
Ok er hann lítr á ﬂetta, s‡nisk honum nƒkkvot eptir sem árma›rinnmælti firir honum, ok sættask ﬂeir á ﬂetta, at hann selr Áka hálft d‡rit,
ok skal konungr sí›an meta allt saman. Skulu ﬂeir fara bá›ir nú á fund 57
konungs, ok svá gjƒra ﬂeir, fara nú bá›ir á fund konungs ok stó›u fyrbor›inu. Konungr íhuga›i hverr ﬂessi ma›r mindi ‹vera› er hann kenndi
eigi, ok mælti sí›an til Au›unar:
60‘Hverr ertu?’ sag›i hann.
Hann svara›i, ‘Ek em íslenzkr ma›r, herra,’ sag›i hann, ‘ok kominn
nú útan af Grœnlandi ok nú af Nóregi, ok ætla›ak at fœra y›r bjarnd‡r 63
ﬂetta; keyptak ﬂat me› allri eigu minni, ok nú er ﬂó á or›it mikit fyrirmér: ek á nú hálft eitt d‡rit’ — ok sag›i konungi sí›an hversu farit
haf›i me› ﬂeim Áka ármanni hans. Konungr mælti:66‘Er ﬂat satt, Áki, er hann segir?’‘Satt er ﬂat,’ sag›i hann.
Konungr mælti, ‘Ok ﬂótti ﬂér ﬂat til liggja, ﬂar sem ek settak ﬂik 69
mikinn mann, at hepta ﬂat e›a tálma er ma›r gjƒr›isk til at fœra mér
36 ƒ›ru M.

59 íhuga›i written twice over line break M.

70 melma M.

212

XVI: Au›unar ﬂáttr

gørsimi ok gaf fyr alla eign, ok sá ﬂat Haraldr konungr at rá›i at látahann fara í fri›i, ok er hann várr óvinr? Hygg ﬂú at ﬂá, hvé sannligt ﬂat
var ﬂinnar handar, ok ﬂat væri makligt at ﬂú værir drepinn. En ek mon
nú eigi ﬂat gjƒra, en braut skaltu fara ﬂegar ór landinu ok koma aldrigi
75 aptr sí›an mér í augs‡n. En ﬂér, Au›unn, kann ek slíka ﬂƒkk sem ﬂúgæfir mér allt d‡rit, ok ver hér me› mér.’ﬁat ﬂekkisk hann ok er me› Sveini konungi um hrí›.
Ok er li›u nƒkkverjar stundir, ﬂá mælti Au›unn vi› konung:78‘Braut f‡sir mik nú, herra.’
Konungr svarar heldr seint, ‘Hvat villtu ﬂá,’ segir hann, ‘ef ﬂú vil
81 eigi me› oss vera?’
Hann sag›i, ‘Su›r vil ek ganga.’‘Ef ﬂú vildir eigi svá gott rá› taka,’ sag›i konungr, ‘ﬂá mindi mér
84 fyr ﬂikkja í, er ﬂú f‡sisk í brott.’
Ok nú gaf konungr honum silfr mjƒk mikit, ok fór hann su›r sí›anme› Rúmferlum, ok skipa›i konungr til um fer› hans, ba› hann koma
87 til sín er ‹hann› kvæmi aptr. Nú fór hann fer›ar sinnar unz hann kemrsu›r í Rómaborg. Ok er hann hefir ﬂar dvalizk sem hann tí›ir, ﬂá ferrhann aptr; tekr ﬂá sótt mikla, gjƒrir hann ﬂá ákafliga magran. Gengr90 ﬂá upp allt féit ﬂat er konungr haf›i gefit honum til fer›arinnar, tekr
sí›an upp stafkar‹l›s stíg ok bi›r sér matar. Hann er ﬂá kollóttr ok heldrósælligr. Hann kemr aptr í Danmƒrk at páskum ﬂangat sem konungr
93 er ﬂá staddr, en ei‹gi› ﬂor›i hann at láta sjá sik ok var í kirkjuskoti okætla›i ﬂá til fundar vi› konung er hann gengi til kirkju um kveldit. Ok
nú er hann sá konunginn ok hir›ina fagrliga búna, ﬂá ﬂor›i hann eigi
96 at láta sjá sik. Ok er konungr gekk til drykkju í hƒllina, ﬂá mata›isk
Au›unn úti, sem si›r ‹er› til Rúmferla me›an ﬂeir hafa eigi kastat stafok skreppu. Ok nú of aptaninn, er konungr gekk til kveldsƒngs, ætla›i
99 Au›unn at hitta hann, ok svá mikit sem honum ﬂótti fyrr fyr, jók nú
miklu á, er ﬂeir váru drukknir hir›menninir. Ok er ﬂeir gengu inn aptr,ﬂá ﬂek›i konungr mann ok ﬂóttisk finna, at eigi haf›i frama til at ganga
102 fram at hitta hann. Ok nú er hir›in gekk inn, ﬂá veik konungr út ok mælti:‘Gangi sá nú fram er mik vill finna; mik grunar, at sá muni verama›rinn.’ﬁá gekk Au›unn fram ok fell til fóta konungi, ok varla kenndi konungr
105
hann. Ok ﬂegar er konungr veit hverr hann er, tók konungr í hƒndhonum Au›uni ok ba› hann ‹vel› kominn.
72

75 slíku M.

98 optaninn M.

XVI: Au›unar ﬂáttr213‘Ok hefir ﬂú mikit skipazk,’ sag›i hann, ‘sí›an vit sámsk,’ — lei›ir 108
hann eptir sér inn. Ok er hir›in sá hann, hlógu ﬂeir at honum, en konungr
segir:‘Eigi ﬂurfu ﬂér at honum at hlæja, ﬂví at betr hefir hann sét fyr sinni 111
sál heldr en ér.’ﬁá lét konungr gjƒra honum laug ok gaf honum sí›an klæ›i, ok er
114hann nú me› honum.
ﬁat er nú sagt einhverju sinni of várit, at konungr b‡›r Au›uni atvera me› sér áleng›ar ok kvezk mindu gjƒra hann skutilsvein sinn ok
117
leggja til hans gó›a vir›ing. Au›unn sag›i:‘Gu› ﬂakki y›r, herra, sóma ﬂann allan, er ﬂér vili› til mín leggja,
en hitt er mér í skapi, at fara út til Íslands.’
120
Konungr sag›i, ‘ﬁetta s‡nisk mér undarliga kosit.’Au›unn mælti, ‘Eigi má ek ﬂat vita, herra,’ sag›i hann, ‘at ek hafa
hér mikinn sóma me› y›r, en mó›ir mín tro›i stafkarls stíg út á Íslandi,
ﬂví at nú er lokit ‹bjƒrg› ﬂeiri er ek lag›a til á›r ek fœra af Íslandi.’ 123
Konungr svara›i, ‘Vel er mælt,’ sag›i hann, ‘ok mannliga, ok muntuver›a giptuma›r; sjá einn var svá hlutrinn, at mér mindi eigi mislíka at126
ﬂú fœrir í braut he›an, ok ver nú me› mér ﬂar til er skip búask.’
Hann gørir svá.
Einn dag, er á lei› várit, gekk Sveinn konungr ofan á bryggjur, okváru menn ﬂá at at búa skip til ‡missa landa, í Austrveg e›a Saxland, 129
til Svíﬂjó›ar e›a Nóregs. ﬁá koma ﬂeir Au›unn at einu skipi fƒgru, okváru menn at at búa skipit. ﬁá spur›i konungr:132‘Hversu lízk ﬂér, Au›unn, á ﬂetta skip?’
Hann svara›i, ‘Vel, herra.’
Konungr mælti, ‘ﬁetta skip vil ek ﬂér gefa ok launa bjarnd‡rit.’
Hann ﬂakka›i gjƒfina eptir sinni kunnustu. Ok er lei› stund ok skipit 135
var albúit, ﬂá mælti Sveinn konungr vi› Au›un:‘ﬁó villdu nú á braut, ﬂá mun ek nú ekki letja ﬂik, en ﬂat hefi ek
spurt at illt er til hafna firir landi y›ru, ok eru ví›a ørœfi ok hætt skipum. 138
Nú br‡tr ﬂú ok t‡nir skipinu ok fénu, lítt sér ﬂat ﬂá á, at ﬂú hafir fundit
Svein konung ok gefit honum gjƒrsimi.’
141
Sí›an seldi konungr honum le›r‹hosu› fulla af silfri.
‘Ok ertu ﬂá enn eigi félauss me› ƒllu, ﬂótt ﬂú brjótir skipit, ef ﬂúfær haldit ﬂessu. Ver›a má svá enn,’ segir konungr, ‘at ﬂú t‡nir ﬂessu
108 sámdsk M. 109 hlóga M. 115–16 at vera me› written twice M. 121 at
ek vita hafa M. 138 written ƒ›ru M; corrected in manuscript. 139 fénun M.

214

XVI: Au›unar ﬂáttrfé; lítt n‡tr ﬂú ﬂá ﬂess er ‹ﬂú› fannt Svein konung ok gaft honumgjƒrsimi.’
Sí›an dró konungr ‹hring› af hendi sér ok gaf Au›uni ok mælti:‘ﬁó at svá illa ver›i at ﬂú br‹j›ótir skipit ok t‡nir fénu, eigi ertu
147
félauss ef ﬂú kemsk á land, ﬂví at margir menn hafa gull á sér í
skipsbrotum; ok sér ﬂá at ﬂú hefir fundit Svein konung, ef ﬂú heldr
150 hringinum. En ﬂat vil ek rá›a ﬂér,’ segir hann, ‘at ﬂú gefir eigi hringinn,nema ﬂú ﬂikkisk eiga svá mikit gott at launa nƒkkverjum gƒfgum
manni; ﬂá gef ﬂeim hringinn, ﬂví at tignum mƒnnum sómir at ﬂiggja.
153 Ok far nú heill.’Sí›an lætr hann í haf ok kømr í Nóreg ok lætr flytja upp varna›sinn, ok ﬂurfti nú meira vi› ﬂat en fyrr er hann var í Nóregi. Hann ferr
156 nú sí›an á fund Haralds konungs ok vill efna ﬂat er hann hét honumá›r hann fór til Danmerkr, ok kve›r konung vel. Haraldr konungr tok
vel kve›ju hans.
‘Ok sezk ni›r,’ sag›i hann, ‘ok drekk hér me› oss.’159
Ok svá gjƒrir hann. ﬁá spur›i Haraldr konungr:‘Hverju launa›i Sveinn konungr ﬂér d‡rit?’Au›unn svara›i, ‘ﬁví, herra, at hann ﬂá at mér.’
162
Konungr sag›i, ‘Launat minda ek ﬂér ﬂví hafa. Hverju launa›i hannenn?’
Au›unn svara›i, ‘Gaf hann mér silfr til su›rgƒngu.’
165
ﬁá sag›i Haraldr konungr, ‘Mƒrgum manni gefr Sveinn konungr
silfr til su›rgƒngu e›a annarra hluta, ﬂótt ekki fœri honum gørsimar.
168 Hvat er enn fleira?’‘Hann bau› mér,’ sag›i Au›unn, ‘at gørask skutilsveinn hans ok mikinn
sóma til mín at leggja.’‘Vel var ﬂat mælt,’ sag›i konungr, ‘ok launa mindi hann enn fleira.’
171
Au›unn sag›i, ‘Gaf hann mér knƒrr me› farmi ﬂeim er hingat er
bezt varit í Nóreg.’‘ﬁat var stórmannligt,’ sag›i konungr, ‘en launat minda ek ﬂér ﬂví174
hafa. Launa›i hann ﬂví fleira?’
Au›unn sag›i, ‘Gaf hann mér le›rhosu fulla af silfri ok kva› mik ﬂá
177 eigi félausan ef ek helda ﬂví, ﬂó at skip mitt bryti vi› Ísland.’
Konungr sag›i, ‘ﬁat var ágætliga gƒrt, ok ﬂat minda ek ekki gƒrthafa; lauss minda ek ﬂikkjask, ef ek gæfa ﬂér skipit. Hvárt launa›i
180 hann fleira?’
144

144 lítr M.

167 gørsimur M.

171 var ﬂat var M.

XVI: Au›unar ﬂáttr

215‘Svá var víst, herra,’ sag›i Au›unn, ‘at hann launa›i; hann gaf mér
hring ﬂenna er ek hefi á hendi, ok kva› svá mega at berask at ek t‡nda
fénu ƒllu, ok sag›i mik ﬂá eigi félausan, ef ek ætta hringinn, ok ba› 183
mik eigi lóga, nema ek ætta nƒkkverjum tignum ‹manni› svá gott atlauna at ek vilda gefa. En nú hefi ek ﬂann fundit, ﬂví at ﬂú áttir kost at
taka hvárttveggja frá mér, d‡rit ok svá líf mitt, en ﬂú lézt mik fara 186
ﬂangat í fri›i sem a›rir ná›u eigi.’
Konungr tók vi› gjƒfinni me› blí›i ok gaf Au›uni í móti gó›ar gjafará›r en ﬂeir skil›isk. Au›unn var›i fénu til Íslandsfer›ar ok fór út ﬂegar 189
um sumarit til Íslands ok ﬂótti vera inn mesti gæfuma›r.
Frá ﬂessum manni, Au›uni, var kominn ﬁorsteinn Gy›uson.

XVII: Runic Inscriptions

217

XVII: RUNIC INSCRIPTIONS
The terms ‘rune’ and ‘runic’ have been used to mean many different
things, as the relevant entries in the Oxford English Dictionary will
confirm. It is important to stress that here (as in all serious linguisticwork) ‘runes’ and ‘runic’ refer to a set of symbols used for writing
language — and nothing else. Like Roman, Greek or Cyrillic letters,
runes denote speech sounds: they are an alphabetic type of script, andcan in principle be used to write any language (indeed a fair numberof medieval runic inscriptions are in Latin). Runes do not constitute a
language in themselves. Neither are they to be associated with mysticalpoems or with fortune-telling, supernatural powers or similar mumbojumbo. It should further be noted that runes are an epigraphic script:
they are found carved or scratched into stone, wood, bone, metal,
etc., but were not normally written with ink on parchment. This meansthat the messages they carry are laconic; runic inscriptions do notpreserve lengthy pieces of literature.
The origin of the runic alphabet has been the subject of much
speculation, but as yet there is no consensus about when, where andfor what reasons it was brought into being. The oldest extant runeinscribed artefacts are dated to AD 200 or a little earlier. From thethird century we have a reasonable number. Most have been found insouthern Scandinavia, with a concentration in the area which now
comprises Denmark, but a few have an eastern European provenance.
These early inscriptions tend to consist of one or two words only andare hard to classify typologically. Names appear to be common, but it
is often difficult to decide whether a particular name refers to theobject on which it is carved, the owner, or the maker. Some of theinscriptions seem to belong to the world of trade. None obviously
reflects a religious milieu. On the basis of the available evidence it
has been suggested that the runic alphabet originated in southern
Scandinavia in the first century of the Christian era. It is argued that
Germanic peoples from this region trading with the Roman Empire
perceived the need for a system of writing. That they did not simply
adopt the Roman alphabet is put down to their distance from Roman
culture. By no means all subscribe to this thesis, however. Some havesought to derive the runes from the Greek alphabet, others from various
North Italic scripts. It has also been argued that several features of
early runic writing, for example the fact that it can run right to left as

218

XVII: Runic Inscriptions

well as left to right, point to a much earlier date of origin than thephysical evidence implies. One theory has it that runic script derives
from archaic Greek epigraphy and may be as old as the fifth or fourth
century BC. All we can say for certain is that the runes must be
somewhat older than the earliest datable inscriptions because of thelatter’s relatively wide geographical distribution. It also seems likelythat there is some connection between the runes and classical Roman
capitals: the correspondences of form and sound are too striking tobe ignored (e.g. r /r/, ˙ /h/, i /i/, t /t/, b /b/, and, less immediatelytransparent, 1 /f/, c /k/, u /u/, S /s/).
The runic alphabet of the period AD c.200–700 is known as the older
fuﬂark (fuﬂark after its first six characters), and is preserved complete
or in fragmentary form in nine inscriptions. These early recordings ofthe runic alphabet show considerable homogeneity in the form of theindividual runes and, not least, the order in which they appear. The
fact that variation exists, however, means it is more helpful for the
student to present a reconstructed older fuﬂark, based on typical forms
and the most commonly attested order.

1 u 3 å r c g 8 ˙ N i ∆ É $ % S t b ( # lÔ œD
f u ﬂ a r k g w h n i j æ p z s t b e m l E o dFig. 1 The older fuﬂark
The E symbol indicates that this rune denoted the velar nasal soundof southern English sing (possibly sometimes a following /g/ as well,as in northern English).
Virtually all meaningful inscriptions written with the older runes in
Scandinavia are in a form of language that pre-dates Old Norse. No
examples will therefore be given here. Students who wish to familiarise themselves with this early linguistic stage should consult
Antonsen (1975) or Krause (1966).
The runic alphabet did not remain unchanged. In Frisia and AngloSaxon England it was expanded to take account of sound changes in
the forms of Germanic spoken in these areas (the best account of English
runes and their uses is Page, 1999). For reasons that are by no means
clear, the Scandinavians went the opposite way from their Anglo-SaxonXVII: Runic Inscriptions

219

cousins. At a time when the number of distinctive speech sounds intheir language was rising, they ejected eight runes from the fuﬂark
and simplified the forms of many of the characters they retained. This
reform, which took place no later than c.700, seems to have been
universally accepted. The new alphabet, known to modern scholars
as the younger fuﬂark, appears in two fairly distinct variants, one
more drastically simplified than the other. The simpler runes are known
as ‘short-twig’, and are found chiefly in Sweden, Norway and theircolonies in the period c.700–1000 (less appropriate names sometimes
used of these characters are ‘Swedish-Norwegian runes’ and ‘Rök
runes’ — the latter after the famous Rök stone from Östergötland,
Sweden). The more complex runes are called ‘long-branch’ and areassociated with Denmark throughout the Viking Age and early
medieval period and with Sweden after c.1000 (less appropriate names
here are ‘Danish runes’ or ‘normal runes’). In Norway post-1000 runewriters replaced certain short-twig with long-branch characters. The
resulting alphabet is often known as the ‘Norwegian mixed fuﬂark’.
In illustrating these different manifestations of the younger fuﬂark,
reconstructed alphabets are once again presented, based on common
usage; the order of the runes is always the same.

1 u 3 à r ß ç ñ i !{ / õ « L ã / ∫ \ l «f u ﬂãr k h n i a s t b ml R
Fig. 2 The short-twig younger fuﬂark

1 u 3 à r ß ª N i n s t b %/µ l ˚
f u ﬂãr k h n i a s t b m l R
Fig. 3 The long-branch younger fuﬂark

1 u 3 ã r ß ª ñ i õ s/« L b % l ˚
f u ﬂor k h ni a s t b m l y
Fig. 4 The Norwegian mixed fuﬂark

220

XVII: Runic Inscriptions

The ã symbol indicates that this rune denoted a nasal a-sound (formost of the Viking Age, at least), as in French manger.
Towards the end of the Viking Age Christianity became the official
religion in Scandinavia, bringing with it the Roman alphabet andmedieval European culture. Conceivably, knowledge of an alphabet
in which it was possible to denote speech sounds more precisely than
the runic — with its limited inventory of sixteen characters —encouraged rune-writers to seek ways of expanding their medium.
Whatever the cause, between about 1000 and 1200 various expedientswere adopted to increase the range of runic characters available. In
some cases diacritic dots were placed on runes (ß;, for example, tended
to denote a voiced velar — and perhaps palatal — as distinct from ß,which stood for the unvoiced counterpart(s); ç was used for front
unrounded vowels lower than /i/). Another method was to differentiate
existing variants, so that what had been two forms of the same rune
became two separate characters, each denoting a different sound (õwas thus restricted to /a/ and ã to /o/, while n came to denote /æ/ andâ /&/ or /ø/). The upshot of these reforms was what is generally known
as the medieval fuﬂark. That the example given in Fig. 5 below is amodern construct must be strongly emphasised. While complete older
and younger fuﬂarks of various kinds are attested, medieval alphabet
inscriptions tend to be based firmly on the sixteen runes of the younger
fuﬂark. Odd supplementary characters may be included, but seldom
more than one or two. Quite possibly rune-writers did not consider
the medieval additions to the fuﬂark to be new runes, simply variations
on the existing sixteen.
;

1 u 3 ã r ß ª ñ i õ « L b % l ˚ 1 3; 2; ß; ç n » s L; b;; / â
f u ﬂ o r k h n i a s t b m l y f̈¨ ﬂ̈¨ ü k̈¨ ï æ c z ẗ¨ b̈¨ p ƒFig. 5 The medieval fuﬂark
Double dots are used here in transliterating dotted runes, to indicatethat not all these supplementary characters had a fixed sound value.
2; , for example, might denote /ø/ or /y/, and even /o/ in some areas,
while ç regularly stood for both /æ/ and /e/ until the differentiation ofõ and n. Occasionally a dotted rune may even have the same value as
its undotted counterpart.

XVII: Runic Inscriptions

221

During the Viking and Middle Ages many different types of runicinscription were made. Best known are perhaps the commemorative
rune stones which span the period c.750–1100. After 1100 the raisedstone with its emphasis on the commissioner(s) — the living — goesout of fashion and is replaced by the grave-slab which concentrates
attention on the dead. Inscriptions are also found on a variety of loose
objects: wood, bone, metal — even leather and pottery. Some of these
are charms, some marks of ownership, some brief letters; yet others
take the form of statements, express wishes, or record crude jokes;
not a few seem to be pure gobbledygook. There is also a substantial
corpus of runic graffiti. Those carved into the walls or furniture ofchurches are often of a pious nature, some of the other examples are
more racy. Church furniture may also carry more formal inscriptions,recording, for example, who made an object or its purpose.
After some four hundred years of coexistence with the Roman
alphabet, runes dropped out of fashion in Scandinavia. It is impossible
to give anything like a precise date for their demise since in one or
two places they continued to be used for particular purposes longafter they had been forgotten elsewhere — in Gotland until c.1600, in
Iceland until well into the seventeenth century, and in the Swedish
province of Dalarna — there increasingly mixed with letters of the
Roman alphabet — as late as the nineteenth century.
Runic inscriptions are important. Although often extremely laconic,
many of them were composed in the pre-manuscript period and —unlike most manuscript texts — are originals. They can throw lighton Scandinavian history, culture and language, not least the last. Runic
writing tends to be more orthophonic (i.e. true to the pronunciation)
than its Roman-alphabet counterpart, presumably because runes were
not learnt in a school or scriptorium and carvers adopted a lessdisciplined approach to orthography. Through runic writing we canthus learn at first hand something of the forms of Scandinavian in use
during the Viking and Middle Ages.
Each of the runic texts below is presented in four different ways:(1) by a normalised representation of the runes; (2) as a transliteration(in bold); (3) as an edited text (in italics); (4) in English translation.
The normalisation of runes is a process akin to printing handwritten
texts in the Roman alphabet: in principle each rune appears in one
form only. However, variants that are diagnostic of a particular typeof alphabet are retained.

222

XVII: Runic Inscriptions

The aim of the transliteration is to make the text more accessible to
the reader without knowledge of runes, while preserving as much of
possible of the original orthography. What is transliterated is therefore
in each case the distinctive rune (so that, for example, ß is always
rendered as k, s and « as s, and so on). While it is sensible to give one’s
transliteration a helpful phonological profile (rendering 1 u 3 as fuﬂ,for example, rather than, say, as xyz) it cannot be over-emphasisedthat we are not dealing here with phonetic transcription: ß is renderedas k whether it denotes /k/, [g] or []] (a voiced velar spirant, as the gin ON or modern Icelandic eiga, cf. NION I 11, 17), u is given as uwhichever rounded vowel it stands for (/u/, /o/, /y/, /ø/ or the semivowel [w]), etc. Nor is modern punctuation or spacing introduced in
the transliteration; the text is given line by line as it appears in theoriginal. Separation marks are however reproduced as : for convenience whatever their actual form. Round brackets indicate that arune, group of runes or separator is uncertain, square brackets thatthe material within them is conjectured or supplied from an earlier
drawing or photograph. A slur over two or more transliterated runes
marks a bind-rune (a runic ligature).
The distance of some of the edited texts from the Old Norse ofgrammars and dictionaries makes normalisation problematic. In theselection offered here Norwegian and Norwegian-inspired inscriptions
have been treated like the Icelandic texts in NION II. For Danish andSwedish inscriptions the normalisation practice of Peterson (1994)
has been used as a guideline, but the editor has felt free to departfrom it to indicate notable phonological features. Long vowels aremarked with an acute accent, as in Old Icelandic; R stands for thereflex of Germanic /z/, most recently identified as a voiced palatalfricative with sibilant quality. Note that æ can denote a short as well
as a long vowel.

XVII: Runic Inscriptions

223

Bibliography
Elmer H. Antonsen, A Concise Grammar of the Older Runic Inscriptions(1975).
Michael P. Barnes, ‘The origins of the younger fuﬂark — a reappraisal’. In
Runor och runinskrifter (1987), 29–45. Kungl. Vitterhets Historie och
Antikvitets Akademien, Konferenser 15.
Michael Barnes, ‘Standardisation and variation in Migration- and VikingAge Scandinavian’. In Útnor›r: West Nordic Standardisation and Variation,
ed. Kristján Árnason (2003), 47–66.
Solbritt Benneth et al., eds, Runmärkt: från brev till klotter — runorna undermedeltiden (1994).
Anders Bæksted, Islands runeindskrifter (1942). Bibliotheca Arnamagnæana II.
DR = Lis Jacobsen and Erik Moltke, eds, Danmarks runeindskrifter 1–2(1941–42).
Klaus Düwel, Runenkunde (3rd ed., 2001).
Katherine Holman, Scandinavian Runic Inscriptions in the British Isles: Their
Historical Context (1996). Senter for middelalderstudier, Norges teknisknaturvitenskapelige universitet, Skrifter 4.
Sven B. F. Jansson, Runes in Sweden (2nd ed., 1987).
Wolfgang Krause, Die Runeninschriften im älteren Futhark 1–2 (1966).
Abhandlungen der Akademie der Wissenschaften in Göttingen, philologischhistorische Klasse, dritte Folge, 65.
Erik Moltke, Runes and Their Origin: Denmark and Elsewhere (1985).
NIyR = Magnus Olsen et al., eds, Norges innskrifter med de yngre runer 1–6(1941, in progress).
R. I. Page, Runes (1987).
R. I. Page, An Introduction to English Runes (2nd ed., 1999).
Lena Peterson, Nordiskt runnamnslexikon (5th ed., 2007). [The 4th ed. ofthis work (2002) is available at http://www.sofi.se/SOFIU/runlex/]
Lena Peterson, Svenskt runordsregister (2nd ed. 1994). Runrön 2.
SR = Sveriges runinskrifter 1–15 (1900, in progress). (This series is subdivided by province — e.g. vol. 2 is Östergötlands runinskrifter, vols 6–9
Upplands runinskrifter — and edited by a variety of scholars.)

224

XVII: Runic Inscriptions
XVII: RUNIC INSCRIPTIONS
A: KÄLVESTEN(Photo: Michael Barnes)

XVII: Runic Inscriptions

225«Lißu « ˝ ß õr3i ˝ ß uãl3 {u ˝õ1LõuiñL«uñu«iñ ˝ « õ1iõlõu«Lr\i « õiui«li ˝ u ißiß « 1õ3iõußri\ul1 «(stikuR:karﬂi:kublﬂau:
aftauintsunusin:safialaustrmiRaiuisli:uikikRfaﬂi
aukrimulfR
StygguR(?) gær›i kumbl ﬂau aft Øyvind sunu sinn. Sá fial austrmeR Øyvísli. VíkingR fá›i auk GrímulfR.
‘StygguR(?) made these memorials after ØyvindR his son. He felleast with Øyvísl. VíkingR wrote and GrímulfR.’This inscription is designated Ög 8 in SR. It is from Östergötland incentral southern Sweden and dated to the ninth century.
In runic writing it is not uncommon for a single character to denotethe final sound of one word and the initial sound of the next, as inaukrimulfR. It is necessary only that the two sounds denoted can be
expressed by one and the same rune. The spellings kubl and uikikRreflect the omission of homorganic nasals that is a feature of runicspelling. When /m/ occurs immediately before /p/ or /b/, and /n/ before/k/, /g/, /t/ or /d/, rune-writers often do not designate the nasal; the bin kubl thus indicates /mb/, the second k in uikikR /ng/. On the possible
use of i for /y/, see Bryggen (2) below.
The word kumbl is almost always plural and is thought to denote amonument made up of more than one element. In the earliest VikingAge inscriptions, as in those from before the Viking Age, there seems
to be no way of distinguishing between ‘that’ and ‘this’: ﬂau defines
kumbl, but not obviously as something close at hand or more distant.
Aft is a short form of the preposition eptir, parallel to fyr for fyrir andund for undir. The short forms are on the whole earlier than their longer
counterparts. Sunu is an old acc. sg. form with the original -u preserved(as it may also possibly be in the -u- in StygguR, though the etymologyof this name is uncertain). The demonstratives sá, sú are regularly usedin Viking-Age runic inscriptions to denote ‘he’, ‘she’. Fial is an East226

XVII: Runic Inscriptions

Scandinavian variant of West Scandinavian fell. The preposition miR,apparently reflecting a spoken form lacking [›], is attested only in a
handful of runic inscriptions from Sweden. Outside the Swedish
province of Hälsingland, use of the verb fá to denote the making of arunic inscription is an indicator of considerable age; it is a term foundin older fuﬂark inscriptions (in the form fa(i)hido ‘[I] made’) and in
the earliest of those in the younger fuﬂark. Auk is an older form of okwith the diphthong preserved (the conjunction is related to the verb
auka ‘increase’). For personal names in the above text and for personal
and place-names in Glavendrup, Jelling, Andreas II and Gripsholm
below, see Peterson 2007.
The Kälvesten inscription is notable for being the earliest to document a Scandinavian expedition to the east. Rune forms and language
combine to suggest a date in the first half of the ninth century.

B: GLAVENDRUP(Photo and © National Museum of Denmark)XVII: Runic Inscriptions(Side A)

rnßNªiltr˝ s nti ˝ s tniN3àNsi ˝ n u1t
nln˝snulunßu3nuinl ( i ) 3sªni3uinr3nN3inßN(Photo and © National Museum of Denmark)(Side B)nln ˝ suNi˚˝ ßnr3ußubl ˝ 3nusi ˝n1t ˝ 1n3ur
siN ˝nuß ˝ªàNs ˝ßuNn ˝nu1t
unr˝ siN˝ iN˝ suti ˝ rnist ˝ ruNn˚ ˝ 3nsi ˝n1t ˝ trutiN ˝ siN3ur ˝ uißi ˝ 3nsi ˝ ruNn˚

227

228

XVII: Runic Inscriptions(Photo and © National Museum of Denmark)(Side C)nt ˝ ritn ˝ sn ˝ unr3i ˝ is ˝ stniN3nNs i
nilti ˝ i 3n nft ˝ àNàN ˝ t rnßi
(Side A)raknhiltr:sa
ti:stainﬂãnsi:auft
ala:sauluakuﬂauial(i)ﬂshaiﬂuiarﬂanﬂiakn(Side B)
ala:suniR:karﬂu
kubl:ﬂausi:aft:faﬂur
sin:auk:hãns:kuna:auft
uar:sin:in:suti:raist:run

XVII: Runic Inscriptions

229

aR:ﬂasi:aft:trutin:sin
ﬂur:uiki:ﬂasi:runaR(Side C)at:rita:sa:uarﬂi:is:stainﬂansi
ailti:iﬂa aft:ãnãn:traki
Ragnhildr satti stæin ﬂennsi aft Alla, Sƒlva go›a, véa li›s, hæi›ver›an ﬂegn. Alla syniR gær›u kumbl ﬂausi aft fa›ur sinn auk
hans kona aft ver sinn. En Sóti ræist rúnaR ﬂassi aft dróttin sinn.
ﬁórr vígi ﬂassi rúnaR. At retta(?) sá ver›i es stæin ﬂennsi ailti(?)
e›a aft annan dragi.
‘Ragnhildr placed this stone after Alli, leader of the SƒlvaR, priestof the host, a noble thane. Alli’s sons made these memorials after
their father and his wife after her husband. But Sóti carved theserunes after his lord. ﬁórr hallow these runes. May he be reckoneda pervert(?) who removes(?) this stone or drags it [for use as amemorial] after another.’This inscription has the number 209 in DR. It is from Fyn and dated
to the tenth century.
For notes on kumbl and auk, see the Kälvesten inscription above.
There is disagreement about what the sequences au, ai and ia denotein Danish inscriptions of the mid- and late Viking Age. Some argue
that after the East Scandinavian monophthongisation /au/ > /ø:/, /ei/
> /e:/, /øy/ > /ø:/, digraphic spellings were used to denote vowel sounds
for which the younger fuﬂark had no specific symbols, au denoting/ø/ or /&/ and ia or ai /æ/. Others believe that in the case of ia, at least,
some kind of diphthongisation is reflected (cf. Swedish dialectal jär
as a reflex of hér ‘here’). The question cannot easily be resolved. We
may note that au became a common way of indicating /&/ throughout
the Scandinavian runic world — including the West where there wasno monophthongisation — and that the Glavendrup inscription consistently spells historical /au/ and /ei/ digraphically, indicating perhaps
that the carver still used the historical diphthongs in his speech. In the
East Scandinavian of the Viking Age the demonstrative pronoun meaning‘this/these’ usually consisted of the basic pronoun sá, sú, ﬂat plus the230

XVII: Runic Inscriptions

deictic (pointing) particle -sa or -si. Hence ﬂennsi (acc. m. sg.), ﬂassi(< ﬂaR + si, acc. f. pl.), ﬂausi (acc. n. pl.). Acc. fa›ur lacks labial
mutation (cf. NION I 39–41), as commonly in East Scandinavian.
The sequence ala:sauluakuﬂauial(i)ﬂshaiﬂuiarﬂanﬂiakn has beentaken in different ways. DR sees sƒlva as an epithet, ‘the pale’, agreeing
with Alla; go›a is reckoned to be modified by véa (gen. pl.), giving‘priest of (the) temples’; that leaves li›s hæi›ver›an ﬂegn, which issaid to mean ‘noble thane of the retinue’, with ‘thane’ a rank in a king’s
or nobleman’s body of retainers. Further permutations are possible.
In favour of the interpretation offered on p. 223 above are the references
to nuRa kuﬂi ‘leader of the Ness-dwellers(?)’ in the Helnæs andFlemløse I inscriptions (DR 190; 192; cf. also Icelandic Ljósvetningago›i), and the suspicion that li›s would probably follow hæi›ver›anﬂegn if it modified the phrase, as véa supposedly follows go›a. With
the order li›s hæi›ver›an ﬂegn, which implies definition of ﬂegn, we
would perhaps also expect the adjective to have weak inflexion. It is
unfortunate that this part of the inscription is so hard to interpret, for it
clearly contains information on the structure of tenth-century Danish
society. As construed on p. 223 above, the man commemorated wasgo›i (secular leader?) of a group of people, véi (priest? — cf. Gothic
weiha with that meaning) of a body of men, and a ﬂegn — perhaps
the holder of some military rank. That the offices enumerated arethree may be significant. The making of the monument is attributed
to three agencies (Alli’s sons, Ragnhildr and Sóti), and the Tryggevælde inscription (DR 230), apparently commissioned by the same
Ragnhildr and also carved by Sóti, describes a (different) monument
made up of three elements.
Whatever Alli’s functions, it is clear they were not performed in a
Christian society. That is amply confirmed by the invocation ﬁórrvígi ﬂassi rúnaR; almost certainly by the final part of the inscription
too, though important elements of this are obscure. We may surmisewith Niels Åge Nielsen (Runestudier, 1968, 14–15) that rita is a wayof writing retta, from earlier *hretta and related to Old Icelandic skratti‘unmanly sorcerer’, but the meaning of ailti is hard to determine.
Conceivably we are dealing here with the verb elta ‘chase’. Whatever
the exact interpretation, the warning against tampering with the runestone has several parallels (Runestudier, 16–52), and all seem to stemfrom entirely heathen milieux. To this may be added the heathen shipsetting that forms part of the Glavendrup monument.

XVII: Runic Inscriptions

231

C: JELLING II(Side A)

Inrnltr˛ßuNuß˚˛bn3˛ßnurunßubl˛3nusi˛n1t˛ßurµ1n3ursiN
nußn1t˛3àurui˛µu3ur˛siNn˛sn
Inrnltr [ ˛ ] ins˛sà˚˝ u nN˝ tnNµnurß(Photo: Michael Barnes)(Side B)nln˝ n uß˝ N uruinß232

XVII: Runic Inscriptions(Side C)˝ n uß˛t ( à ) Ni [ ˝ ] ( ßnr3i )[ ˝ ] ßristNà(Side A)
haraltr:kunukR:baﬂ:kaurua
kubl:ﬂausi:aft:kurmfaﬂursin
aukaft:ﬂãurui:muﬂur:sina:sa
haraltr[:]ias:sãR:uan:tanmaurk(Side B)
ala:auk:nuruiak(Side C)
:auk:t(ã)ni[:](karﬂi)[:]kristnã
Haraldr konungR ba› gƒrva kumbl ﬂausi aft Gorm fa›ur sinn auk
aft ﬁórví mó›ur sína. Sá Haraldr es séR vann Danmƒrk alla auk
Norveg auk dani gær›i kristna.
‘King Haraldr ordered these memorials to be made after GormR,
his father, and after ﬁórví, his mother. That Haraldr who won for
himself all Denmark and Norway and made the Danes Christian.’This inscription has the number 42 in DR. It is from northern Jutland
and dated to the period c.960–80.
For notes on the spellings kunukR, kubl and auk, and on the word
kumbl itself, see Kälvesten above; for digraphic spellings of expectedmonophthongs and the forms ﬂausi and fa›ur, see Glavendrup.
Conceivably ã was inserted into ﬂãurui as a means of indicating
the nasal quality of the root vowel (ﬂór- < *ﬂunra-); it is otherwise
hard to understand why the name should have been written in thisway. nuruiak represents the earliest recorded form of the name
‘Norway’; it is noteworthy that it lacks the dental spirant denotationof OE Nor›weg.
The Haraldr konungR of the inscription is the Danish King Haraldr
Blue-tooth, who ruled from somewhen around the middle of the tenthcentury until c.985; GormR is his predecessor, King Gormr the Old,and ﬁórví the famed ﬁyri Danmarkar bót (‘Denmark’s betterment’,XVII: Runic Inscriptions

233

an epithet that perhaps has its origins in the Jelling I inscription —DR 41 — made by Gormr in her memory). All three figures appear invarious of the Icelandic Kings’ Sagas. Here Haraldr speaks to us
directly. The stone, he states, is raised in memory of his father andmother, but he goes on to claim mighty achievements for himself, tothe extent that the inscription is more a celebration of his own life
than that of his parents. Scholars have wondered why Haraldr would
have waited so long before erecting the memorial, and it has beensuggested the part of the inscription that records Haraldr’s deeds wasadded later (for which there is some physical evidence). It is also
possible that an earlier inscription in memory of Gormr and ﬁórvíwas replaced by Jelling II. The claim that Haraldr won for himself
the whole of Denmark is probably to be understood to mean that heconsolidated the strong position that Gormr had established, perhaps
extending his power eastwards (it is far from clear what Danmƒrk
encompassed in the tenth century). That he won Norway receives some
support from Einarr Skálaglamm’s poem Vellekla (980s?), where it issaid that Norway north of the Oslofjord area lay under Earl Hákon(stanza 17) and that konungr mykmarkar Hlƒ›vinjar ‘the King of
Jutland’ commanded the earl to defend the Dannevirke (protective
wall in southern Jutland) against the enemy (stanza 27). There aredifferent accounts of when and in what circumstances Haraldr became
Christian (940s? c.960?). The statement dani gær›i kristna must referto the introduction of Christianity as the official religion of ‘Denmark’,an event that presumably took place not long after Haraldr’s conversion. Individual families will have been Christian before this andothers will have remained heathen for a time afterwards. (The mostimportant sources for Danish history in the tenth century are presented
and translated into Danish in Jørgen Bjernum, Kilder til vikingetidens
historie, 1965. See further the collection of articles entitled ‘Jellingproblems’ in Mediaeval Scandinavia 7, 1974, 156–234; Moltke 1985,
202–20; Else Roesdahl, The Vikings, 1992, 161–65.)

234

XVII: Runic Inscriptions
D: ANDREAS II(Photo: Michael Barnes)«àñL ˛ulf˛çiñ˛«uõrLi˛rõi«Li˛ßru«˛3àñõ˛õ fLir˛õ riñ˛ãiõurß˛ßuiñu˛« iñõsãnt:ulf:hin:suarti:raisti:krus:ﬂãna:aftir:arin:biaurk:kuinu:sina
Sandulfr hinn svarti reisti kross ﬂenna eptir Arinbjƒrg, kvinnu sína.
‘Sandulfr the black raised this cross after Arinbjƒrg, his wife.’

XVII: Runic Inscriptions

235

This inscription is MM (Manx Museum) no. 131, from the far northof the Isle of Man. Together with the bulk of the Manx runic corpus it
has been dated, chiefly on art-historical grounds, to the tenth century.
For notes on the digraphic spelling of /&/, see Glavendrup.
Sandulfr, the subject of the sentence, lacks the nom. m. sg. -r ending.
Several of the Manx inscriptions show aberrant grammatical forms,
and this has been attributed to prolonged contact with speakers ofother languages (notably Gaelic). The long prepositional form aftir(see Kälvesten above) appears to conflict with the tenth-century datingof the inscription. Other runological and linguistic features of theManx inscriptions too suggest they may be later than conventionally
supposed, but art historians continue to insist on the tenth century(see Katherine Holman, ‘The dating of Scandinavian runic inscriptions
from the Isle of Man’, Innskrifter og datering/Dating Inscriptions,
1998, 43–54). Kvinna ‘woman’ ‘wife’ is a variant form of kona (whosegen. pl. is kvenna).
While ‘stones’ were raised in Denmark, Norway and Sweden, theNorse settlers in the Isle of Man (and some of the other colonies in
the British Isles) opted for crosses. The Irish tradition of raising crosses
without legend and the Norse habit of raising rune-stones seem tohave merged. Whether this apparent blending of Gaelic and Norse
culture is enough to explain the extraordinarily high level of runicactivity in Man (over 30 inscriptions or fragments thereof survive) is
uncertain. It may simply be that fashions spread more easily in a
relatively small island community.

236

XVII: Runic Inscriptions
E: GRIPSHOLM(Photo: Scott Wolter)tuln˛lit˛rnisn˛stniN˛3iNsnt˛suN˛siN˛Inrnlt˛bru3ur˛
iNßunrs˛3ni˚furu˛trißiln˛finri˛nt˛ßuli˛nuß˛n ˛ustnrlnr˛
Ni˛ßnfu˛tuu˛suNnr˛ln˛nsirß˛lnN˛ti

×:tula:lit:raisa:stain:ﬂinsat:sun:sin:haralt:bruﬂur:
inkuars:ﬂaiRfuru:trikila:fiari:at:kuli:auk:a:ustarlar:
ni:kafu:tuu:sunar:la:asirk:lan:ti
Tolla lét ræisa stæin ﬂennsa at sun sinn Harald, bró›ur Ingvars.

XVII: Runic Inscriptions

237

ﬁæiR fóru drængila
fiarri at gulli
auk austarlaærni gáfu.
Dóu sunnarla
á Serklandi.
‘Tolla had this stone raised after her son, Haraldr, Ingvarr’s brother.
They went manfully, far in search of gold, and in the east gave
[food] to the eagle. Died in the south in Serkland.’This inscription runs in one continuous line along the body of thecarved snake. It is designated Sö 179 in SR and is from Södermanland in eastern Sweden, dated to the eleventh century.
The pronoun ﬂæiR was initially forgotten and added below the line.
Although the rune-writer makes regular use of separation points, thedivision is not always between words. In two cases a single character
denotes the final sound of one word and the initial sound of the next
(ﬂinsat = ﬂennsa at, a:ustarlar:ni = austarla ærni, see Kälvesten
above), and while the separation in sunar:la:asirk:lan:ti might bethought to have morphemic (relating to word-structure) or phonological rationale, that in a:ustarlar is harder to fathom.
The small number of runes available to those who carved in theyounger fuﬂark makes a sequence like tula difficult to interpret. Initial
t may stand for /t/ or /d/, u for any rounded vowel, and l for a long or
short consonant. The guess that the stone’s commissioner was called
Tolla is prompted by the thought that tula may conceal a hypocoristicname. These are often derived from full names and tend to exhibit
weak inflexion and a long medial consonant. Tolla is a plausible
hypocoristic form of ﬁorlaug, ﬁorleif/ﬁorlƒf or ﬁorljót. The prepositionat ‘after’ ‘in memory of’ is most probably an assimilated form of aft;it triggers the accusative and is not to be confused with the at thattriggers the dative (see NION I 186; cf. NION III, at1). The adverb
suffix -la (drængila, austarla, sunnarla) is also found in Old West
Norse (e.g. har›la ‘very’, sí›la ‘late’), but is less common there.
Over twenty-five Swedish rune-stones commemorate men who
accompanied Ingvarr on an expedition to the east. There is also an
Icelandic saga telling of his exploits, Yngvars saga ví›fƒrla. Though

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this seems to be largely fiction, some of what it says agrees withother sources. Thus saga and rune-stones agree that the expedition
headed east, and the 1041 date the saga gives for Ingvarr’s death isconfirmed by three Icelandic annals. We are probably safe in assumingthat all the Ingvarr stones are from the 1040s. This great expedition
met its end in ‘Serkland’. The name occurs in Swedish runic inscriptions other than those raised in memory of Ingvarr’s followers, inskaldic verse, and in Icelandic prose literature. Scholars differ about
the location of Serkland. An influential view connects serk- with thename Saracen and holds that Ingvarr and his followers made their
way to what is now Syria and Iraq by way of the Russian rivers (see,however, Kirsten Wolf’s article ‘Yngvars saga ví›fƒrla’ and accompanying bibliography in Phillip Pulsiano and Kirsten Wolf, eds,
Medieval Scandinavia, An Encyclopedia, 1993, 740).
Apart from the raiser formula (the initial statement detailing who
commissioned the stone, after whom, and their relationship), the inscription is composed in fornyr›islag, the metre of most of the Eddic
poems. Alliteration in the first two lines is on f- (fóru, fiarri), in lines
three and four on vowels (austarla, ærni), and in the last two on s(sunnarla, Serklandi). Verse is common enough in eleventh-century
Swedish inscriptions (see Frank Hübler, Schwedische Runendichtung
der Wikingerzeit, 1996).

F: MAESHOWE no. 23«iõ ˝ IâuIr˝uõr˝f˚r˝lõ3iñ ˝Inl”r ˝ lã3brãß“r˝«˚ñçr˝ Inñõr
3niruârã ˝ I uõL çr˝«liLuârã ˝ %nñ ˝ «n%3niruârãf˚rç « çr((

sia:hƒuhr:uar:fyr:laﬂin:hæltr: loﬂbrokar:synïr:hænar
ﬂæiruƒro:huatïr:slituƒro:mæn:sæmﬂæiruƒrofyrïsïr
Sjá haugr var fyrr hla›inn heldr Lo›brókar. Synir hennar, ﬂeirvru hvatir, slíkt vru menn, sem ﬂeir vru fyrir sér.
‘This mound was built before Lo›brók’s. Her sons, they werebold. Such were men, as they were of themselves [i.e. they were
the sort of people you would really call men].’XVII: Runic Inscriptions

239(Photo: Bengt A. Lundberg,
Central Board of National Antiquities, Stockholm)

This inscription is edited in Michael P. Barnes, The Runic Inscriptionsof Maeshowe, Orkney (1994), 178–86. It is carved into two adjacentstones (the splits in the two lines of runes are indicated by spaces in thetranscription and transliteration above) of one of the walls of the prehistoric chambered cairn known as Maeshowe on the Orkney Mainland.
The likelihood is that most of the thirty-three runic inscriptions in thecairn were the work of Norwegian passers-by rather than native
Orcadians and that they were all made towards the middle of thetwelfth century.
In medieval runic inscriptions h is commonly used to denote []](see p. 216 above). The spelling laﬂin indicates Norwegian or at least
non-Icelandic authorship (contrast Icel. hla›inn). The use of heldr in

XVII: Runic Inscriptions

240

the sense ‘than’ is well documented (cf. Johan Fritzner, Ordbog overdet gamle norske Sprog, 1883–1972, I 782–83). The thrice-repeateduƒro ‘were’ indicates a labially mutated root vowel. In normalised
Old Icelandic this word is usually written váru, reflecting early thirteenthcentury coalescence of /&:/ (a long low back rounded vowel, cf. NION
I 8–9) with its non-mutated counterpart /a:/. Not all have agreed thatthe sequence slituƒro is to be interpreted slíkt vru. It has been readas part of a compound sléttvƒrumenn ‘smooth-hide men’, judged to
be used in playful antithesis to the name Lo›brók ‘shaggy breeches’.
If slit does denote slíkt we must assume a pronunciation [sli:xt], withthe unvoiced velar spirant [x] (as in Scots loch, cf. NION I 11–12,
17–18) perhaps confused with preaspiration — if indeed that featureexisted in twelfth-century Scandinavian.
The inscription apparently makes reference to the legendary character
Ragnarr lo›brók and his famous sons, but uses the feminine pronoun
hennar in the process. Three possible explanations for this suggest
themselves. (1) The grammatical gender of brók (f.) has overridden
natural gender. (2) To the carver, Lo›brók was not Ragnarr’s nickname
but the name of a woman. (3) A (puerile) joke is being made at
Ragnarr’s expense based on the feminine gender of brók. Given the
jocular nature of many of the Maeshowe graffiti, the last explanationis perhaps the most plausible.

G: BRYGGEN (BERGEN)(1) B 279; NIyR 651(Photo: J. E. Knirk; © Museum of Cultural History, University of Oslo, Norway)

3“rßn l l%˚ñL nrç « ç ñL ç r3 ç rb;; i b;; õ r(ﬂorkællmyntærïsïntïrﬂïrb̈¨ ib̈¨ arﬁorkell myntari sendir ﬂér pipar.
‘ﬁorkell moneyer sends you pepper.’XVII: Runic Inscriptions

241(2) B 17
(Side A)ã «L ˛%i ñ ˛ ßi « ˛%i ßßi(Side B)f˛ u3ã rß ˛I ñiõ « ˛ L b% l˚(Side A)
ost:min:kis:mikki(Side B)
f:uﬂork:hnias:tbmly
Ást mín, kyss mik.
‘My love, kiss me’ (accompanied by an enigmatic ki — perhaps
the beginning of a second kis — and followed or preceded by thecomplete younger runic alphabet).
(3) B 380

(Photo: J. E. Knirk; © Museum of Cultural History, University of Oslo, Norway)(Side A)Ini l ˛ « ç 3u ˛ ã ß ˛ i I u I u% ˛ ß; ã 3ã %(Photo: J. E. Knirk; © Museum of Cultural History, University of Oslo, Norway)(Side B)3ãr˛ 3i ß˛ 3 i ß; ˛ ß; i ˛ã 3ç ñ ˛ 3i ß˛niIi ˛

242

XVII: Runic Inscriptions(Side A)hæil:sïﬂu:ok:ihuhum: k̈¨ oﬂom
(Side B)ﬂor:ﬂik:ﬂi k̈¨ : k̈¨ i:oﬂïn:ﬂik:æihi:Heil(l) sé ﬂúok í hugum gó›um.
ﬁórr ﬂik ﬂiggi.
Ó›inn ﬂik eigi.
‘Be you hale and in good spirits. ﬁórr receive you. Ó›inn own you.’
Most of the Bryggen inscriptions have received only preliminary
publication. They have an archaeological number prefixed by B. Those
included in the corpus edition Norges innskrifter med de yngre runer
have an NIyR number as well. A selection of the Bryggen runic finds
was discussed by Aslak Liestøl in his article ‘Runer frå Bryggen’,
Viking 27 (1963), 5–53. Vol. 6 of NIyR deals with the inscriptions in
Latin and with those classified as business letters and owners’ tags.
The whole corpus is available on the internet at http://www.nb.no/baser/runer/ribwww/english/runeindex.html
In terms of age the Bryggen inscriptions, which can be reasonably
precisely dated by fire layers, stretch from the late twelfth to the early
fifteenth century. They are written on a variety of materials, mostcommonly wood but also bone, leather, metal, stone and pottery. Theircontent is also varied. Three fairly typical examples are presented
here: (1) is from the world of commerce, (2) expresses a lover’s heartfelt desire, (3) is of uncertain import but carries echoes of Norse poetry.
(1) is carved on a small piece of wood and was found above the1198 fire layer. It was presumably a note or label accompanying aparcel of pepper despatched by ﬁorkell. Notable in this inscription isthe doubling of l to mark a long consonant — a Roman-alphabet
practice sometimes adopted by medieval rune-writers. The spellingmyntærï suggests weakening of both vowels in the -ari suffix.
(2) is carved on both sides of a piece of wood. It was found above
the 1248 fire layer. The spelling ost indicates a pronunciation in theregion of /&:st/ (for /&:/ see p. 234 above), implying rounding of /a:/,XVII: Runic Inscriptions

243

a characteristic feature of most mainland Scandinavian dialects by
the late Middle Ages. It is strange to find kyss written kis in thethirteenth century. As long as there was no separate rune for /y(:)/,
either u or i were in theory possible symbols for this high front roundedvowel since /y/ shared the features [high] and [front] with /i/ and[high] and [rounded] with /u/ (cf. Kälvesten above). In fact u was therune normally used to denote /y(:)/ in the Viking Age; it seems tohave become the preferred symbol for all rounded vowels. Whether
kis reflects unrounding of /y/, known from a few modern Norwegian
dialects, is uncertain. Another Bryggen inscription, B 118, writes thesame word kys.
Partial or complete fuﬂarks are very common in the Bryggenmaterial. Some have attributed their use to a belief in the magic powersof the runic alphabet — the conviction that it could help ward off evilor, as here, achieve a particular aim. This is highly uncertain. Fuﬂarks
may have been carved for practice, to demonstrate literacy, or for othermundane reasons (cf. Karin Seim, De vestnordiske futhark-innskriftene
fra vikingtid og middelalder — form og funksjon, 1998, 198–335).
Notable in this fuﬂark is the use of separation points. Why there should
be a separator after the initial f is uncertain. The division of the younger
fuﬂark into three groups of six, five and five runes respectively is,however, a well-established practice — and the basis of a widespread
type of runic cryptography (cf. Page 1999, 80–88).
(3) is carved on both sides of a piece of wood. It was found underthe 1198 fire layer. On the use of h to denote []], see Maeshowe no.
23 above. The sequence sïﬂu is presumably to be construed as 2nd
sg. pres. subj. of vera ‘[to] be’ + pronoun. The verb-form lacks theusual -r ending, however, and is possibly to be seen as a cross between
subjunctive and imperative.
The text appears to be in verse. The metre has been identified as
galdralag, a variant of ljó›aháttr notorious for its irregularity (seeSnE, Háttatal 100–01). Certainly side A of the inscription not only
has alliteration, but carries distinct echoes of Hymiskvi›a 11 (PE 90):
Ver ﬂú heill, Hymir,
í hugum gó›um.
How far side B’s text is to be seen as a continuation of A’s is unclear,as is its purpose. It is hard to suppose that belief in the Norse gods

244

XVII: Runic Inscriptions

persisted in Bergen into the late twelfth century. Perhaps the writerintended a curse, along the lines of the well-documented troll hafi/
taki . . . ‘the trolls have/take . . .’. At the time the inscription was made
Ó›inn and ﬁórr might well have been regarded as trolls. Alternatively
there may be a further literary allusion here (cf., e.g., Hárbar›sljó›
60, PE 87). If the allusion is specific, however, it must be to literaturethat has not survived.

XVIII: Mö›ruvallabók

245

XVIII: MÖ‹RUVALLABÓK
The Mö›ruvallabók Text of Chapter Five of Kormaks saga:
A Palaeographical Commentary
The manuscript known as Mö›ruvallabók (AM 132 fol., Stofnun ÁrnaMagnússonar á Íslandi) got its name in the late nineteenth century
from Mö›ruvellir in Eyjafjör›ur, where Magnús Björnsson (d. 1662),
the first known owner of the book, lived. (For information about the
book’s contents and history, see Einar Ól. Sveinsson 1933.) Mö›ruvallabók is datable only by the forms of its language, spelling andletters, which suggest that it was written in the middle of the fourteenth
century. Mistakes in the names of places in eastern Iceland indicatethat the manuscript was not written in that part of the country, and areference to Mi›fjör›ur as being in the west shows that it was probably
put together in northern Iceland, for a scribe from southern or western
Iceland would think of Mi›fjör›ur as lying to the north. Mö›ruvallabók contains eleven Sagas of Icelanders and must have been expensive
to produce, for it is both large (consisting of 200 leaves measuring 34
× 24 cm) and elaborately decorated with coloured initials ornamented
with romanesque foliage or simple pen flourishes. The book was
produced by a team of scribes; one wrote the text (leaving blank spaces
for the chapter headings and the initials, as well as for the verses in
Egils saga), another copied in the missing verses and a third wrote
the chapter headings and drew and coloured the initials. A fourth scribe
wrote part of the text of Egils saga on folio 83 recto.
Chapter Five of Kormaks saga begins towards the bottom of thesecond column on fol. 121 verso. The initial ‘ﬁ’ is three lines high,indicating that it begins an ‘ordinary’ chapter. ‘Important’ chapters, suchas the first chapter of a saga, were usually given larger initials four,
five or six lines high, a graphic indication of their ‘larger’ significance.
The text is written in what is called Gothic formal textual script or
Gothic book hand (to distinguish it from the half-cursive script used in
documents). Compared with Carolingian scripts, the letters are compressed vertically, the vertical elements have been made uniform, theserifs and curved elements have been broken into angles, and the bowsof different letters that face each other are ‘fused’ or overlapped.
Characteristic letter shapes are the ‘two-storey a’, whose neck bends totouch its bow, and the tall letters such as ‘l’ and ‘k’, whose ascenders start

246

XVIII: Mö›ruvallabókwith a serif on the left instead of looping round to the right, as in halfcursive. Unlike their European counterparts, Icelandic scribes of Gothic
script did not always use round ‘s’ in final position, and they preferredan angular form of the Carolingian ‘f’ (f), except in Latin words, where
they used the proper Gothic ‘f’ that stands on the guide line. In the firsthalf of the fourteenth century, the upper arm becomes looped, and in
the second half of the fourteenth century, the bottom arm becomes looped
as well (ˆ). As with the Carolingian scripts, ‘i’ and ‘j’ are not dotted,
and ‘u’ and ‘v’ are used interchangeably for both the consonant andthe vowel (even to the extent of sometimes putting an accent over ‘v’
to indicate a long vowel). Capital initials are not regularly used at the
beginning of sentences and in proper nouns; instead, they occur at the
beginning of chapters, paragraphs, verses and speeches. Occasionallythey are used to signal important nouns, some of which may be names.
In the following transcription, letters in italics are expansions ofabbreviations. Facsimiles of the two manuscript pages can be seen at
http://vsnrweb-publications.org.uk/NION-2-facs.pdf. Compare thenormalised text in extract IV.
fol. 121v, col. 2, line 28:
ﬁorveig het kona. hon var fall ﬂorueigarsona | ›iObserve the ‘round r’ after the ‘o’ in ﬁorveig (®); the shape results fromwriting an ‘r’ using the right-hand curve of the ‘o’ for the upright. Round ‘r’is generally used after a letter with a bow, such as ‘o’ or ‘d’ (which has theform ˘). The letter above the first ‘h’ is a ‘t’, though it looks like an ‘r’.
Icelandic abbreviations generally have one of the omitted consonants above
the word, with no indication of what the omitted vowel is or whether it goes
before or after the superscript consonant. The abbreviation for hon (‘h’ withsuperscript ‘o’) breaks the rule just given for superscript letters, but it isbecause ‘h’ with a horizontal stroke through the ascender (the stroke is a
general sign of abbreviation) is the abbreviation for the extremely common
word hann. A different abbreviation must therefore be used for hon. The line
breaks off to leave space for the chapter heading, which is in red ink. The
virgule before the ‘›i’ at the very end shows that these letters belong with‘haf’ in the line above (i.e. haf›i, the last word of Chapter 4).

line 29:
miog fiolkunnig hon bio asteinstodum íNote that ‘ƒ’ is written without the hook, long vowels are usually written
without accent marks, and there is no point at the end of the sentence. All

XVIII: Mö›ruvallabók

247

these absences are common. The second ‘n’ in fjƒlkunnig is not written but
is indicated by a horizontal stroke above, which here signifies a nasal consonant. (In such abbreviations, the stroke is often to the left of the ‘n’ that is
written, making it difficult to see whether the transcription should be ‘nn’ or‘nn’.) No space separates the preposition á from its object Steinsstƒ›um; thisis a frequent practice. Also frequent is the practice of using a single consonant to represent two, resulting in ‘steinstodum’ for Steinsstƒ›um.

line 30:
mi›fir›i. hon atti .í˝. sonu. het hinn ellri
Note the regular ‘r’ after the ‘i’. Roman numerals were usually set off by apoint before and after, and the last ‘i’ took the form of ‘j’. The usual abbreviations for hon and hét appear, as well as the nasal stroke for the second ‘n’ in hinn.

line 31:
oddr en hinn yngri gu›mundr ﬂeir varo haua›amenn
Note the round ‘r’ after the letters with bows: ‘d’ (˘) in Oddr and Gu›mundrand ‘ﬂ’ in ﬂeir. There were several variants of ‘y’, but all have a dot todistinguish them from ‘ij’. Note the superscript ‘i’ above the ‘g’ in ‘yng’;
generally a superscript vowel stands for ‘r’ or ‘v’ plus that vowel, and here it
stands for ‘ri’. Two more very common abbreviations appear here: ‘ﬂr’ witha stroke through the ascender of the ‘ﬂ’ stands for ﬂeir, and ‘v’ with asuperscript ‘o’ stands for varo (i.e. váru). The stroke over ‘mn’ simply signals
an abbreviation; it is not a nasal stroke, although it looks like one.

line 32:
miklir. Oddr venr kuamur sinar itungu til
As mentioned in the introduction, Icelandic scribes did sometimes use initial
capitals for names, but it can be difficult to tell whether a letter is meant tobe large or not. The ‘O’ here is definitely large, and some would read the ‘o’at the beginning of line 31 as large as well, though it is not as large as thisone. Note the abbreviation sign over the ‘m’ in kvámur; shaped something
like ∞, it actually evolved from a round ‘r’, which as a superscript letter was
the Latin abbreviation for ‘ur’ and was so used in Icelandic.

line 33:
ﬂorkels. & sitr a tali vi› Steinger›i. ﬂorkell gerir ser dádt vi› ﬂa bræ›r
The abbreviation for all case forms of ﬁorkell is ‘ﬂ’ with a stroke throughthe ascender followed by ‘k’ with a stroke through the ascender. These strokes
are general signals of abbreviation and do not indicate nasal consonants.

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XVIII: Mö›ruvallabók

There is no indication of case; here it is expanded to ﬁorkels because thepreceding til always takes the genitive. Note the shape of the ampersand. It
is actually a ligature of ‘e’ and ‘t’, i.e. et, the Latin word for ‘and’. Although
it is borrowed from Latin, Icelandic scribes most likely thought of it as okrather than et, and it may be transcribed ok, which is how the scribe spells
the word on fol. 122r, col. 1, line 34. The scribe’s usual abbreviation for
Steinger›r (irrespective of case) appears here: a capital ‘S’, a small ‘t’, andan abbreviation sign something like a flattened ‘S’ (cf. the more rounded
form of this sign in line 36 below). The ‘v’ with superscript ‘i’ is a common
abbreviation for vi›. The zigzag over the ‘g’ in gerir (called a ‘tittle’, andmuch like the abbreviation sign in Steinger›r) stands for a front vowel ordiphthong plus ‘r’. The abbreviation for bræ›r is ‘bb’; the idea is that if one‘b’ stands for bró›ir, then two b’s stand for the plural. Note that in the text of
extract IV, the vowel æ of bræ›r is archaised/normalised to brœ›r.

line 34:& eggiar ﬂa at sitia firir kormaki. Oddr qua› ser ﬂat ecki
The abbreviation for fyrir is ‘f’ with a superscript ‘i’. This word was often
spelled firir (the unrounded first vowel resulting from low-stress conditions,cf. ﬂikkja for ﬂykkja and mindi for myndi), so without an unabbreviatedexample to guide us, we cannot be certain which spelling the scribe would
use. If the scribe does use firir when spelling it out in full, the abbreviatedform should be expanded to firir as well (a principle that applies to any
abbreviated word). Kormakr is abbreviated by a stroke through the ascenderof its first letter. The expansion here in the dative is controlled by the preceding
preposition. The spelling of kva› is unusual; the standard form would be‘k›’ with either a sign something like a ‘w’, which means ‘v’ or ‘r’ plus ‘a’,or a superscript ‘a’, also indicating ‘v’ or ‘r’ plus the vowel, but the scribe
here employs both. Although ‘qv’ is a common alternative for ‘kv’, thespelling kua› on fol. 122r, col. 1, line 4 suggests that the use of ‘q’ here isbecause it affords space for an abbreviation sign (and also avoids confusion
with the ‘k’ abbreviation for Kormakr). It therefore might be more
representative of the scribe’s orthography to expand the abbreviation with‘q’ as kua›, but ‘q’ is retained here to show what is actually on the page. Finally,
what looks like a ‘ﬂ’ with a superscript ‘a’ is more likely to be ‘ﬂ’ with astroke through the ascender, which is a very common abbreviation for ﬂat.
This abbreviation appears more clearly in the next line.

line 35:
ofrefli. ﬂat var einnhuern dag er kormakr kom i tun
Apart from the abbreviation for ﬂat, the most interesting thing to see in thisline is how the nasal stroke signifies an ‘n’ in einnhvern and an ‘m’ in kom.

XVIII: Mö›ruvallabók

249

line 36:
gu. var Steinger›r i stofu & sat a palli. ﬂorueigar synir sátv
Note the superscript ‘r’ in var and ﬁorveigar, indicating ‘ar’. Note also the
doubled ‘s’; as with the doubled ‘b’ in line 34, a single ‘s’ is an abbreviation
for son, and two s’s stand for the plural synir. This abbreviation is set off by
a point before and after.

line 37:
i stofunni & varo bunir at Ωeita kormaki til ræ›i er hann gengi
The front-vowel-plus-r sign appears over ‘bun’; here the front vowel is an‘i’. The accent over the ‘v’ must be treated as a graphical flourish, but in fol.
122r, col. 1, line 3 it represents a long vowel, cf. fol. 122r, col. 1, line 34.
The scribe often abbreviates names by putting a point after the first letter,but here he has put a point before and after the ‘k’ as well, as he did with theabbreviation for synir in the previous line. Note that the elements of thecompound word tilræ›i are separated by a space (cf. the running together ofa preposition and its object in line 29). The very common abbreviation forhann (‘h’ with a stroke through the ascender) appears at last.

line 38:
inn. en ﬂorkell hafdi sett odrum megin dyra sver›
Do not mistake the two t’s of sett for ‘ct’, despite the almost non-existentcross-bar of the first ‘t’. The round ‘r’ with a stroke through the tail in ‘odr’
is the Latin sign for ‘rum’, here yielding odrum. The scribe spells dura as
dyra (an extension of the i-mutation forms occurring in other parts of theparadigm); note the dot over the ‘y’ (see note to line 31 above). The frontvowel-plus-r sign appears over ‘sv›’; here the front vowel is an ‘e’.

line 39:brug›it. en o›rum megin setti Narfi lia i langorfi.
What looks like a majuscule ‘H’ is actually a majuscule ‘N’. This letter shapeis inherited from early Carolingian script and developed from the fashion of
making the angle of the cross-bar of the ‘N’ shallower and shallower, untilat last it was horizontal rather than diagonal. Note also how the letters of
langorfi are spread rather far apart; presumably the scribe was stretching theword so that it would reach to the end of the line.

line 40:
en ﬂa er kormakr kom at skaladyrum. skara›i ofan

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XVIII: Mö›ruvallabók

The ‘r’ over the ‘e’ is not an abbreviation; it is simply the second letter of theword written superscript, perhaps to save space. This turned out not to benecessary, for when the scribe came to write skara›i ofan, he had to space
the letters widely to fill the line. Scribes frequently faced the problem ofwhether to right-justify the line by stretching one word or compressing two.

line 41:
liainn. & mætti hann suer›ínu & brotna›i i mikit
The accent over the ‘i’ in sver›inu does not represent a long vowel; it may
be intended to help the reader distinguish between the minim of the ‘i’ andthe minims of the ‘n’. The final ‘it’ of mikit is indicated by a stroke throughthe ascender of the ‘k’; this is another common use of that sign.

fol. 122r, col. 1, line 1:skar›. ﬂa kom ﬂorkell at & qua› kormak mart illt gera & var
The expansion Kormak in the accusative case is determined by its being theobject of the preceding verb.

line 2:malo›i. snyr inn skyndiliga & kue›r Steinger›i af sto
Similarly, the expansion Steinger›i in the dative case is determined by thepreceding verb. The letters ‘sto’ at the end of the line are the first part of theword stofunni. Note that the scribe does not use a hyphen to indicate a word
divided at the line break.

line 3:funni. ganga ﬂau Ωt vm a›rar dyrr. & lykr hann hana
Here we see an accent placed over ‘v’ to indicate a long vowel. The small
capital ‘R’ with a dot over it is a combination of two abbreviations for thesame thing: small capital consonants (most frequently ‘G’, ‘N’ and ‘R’) wereused to represent geminates, but doubled consonants could also be indicatedby a dot over a single capital consonant.

line 4:
ieinu vtiburi. kua› ﬂau kormak alldri siaz skulu. kormakr
The letters ‘slu’ with a stroke through the ‘l’ is the usual abbreviation for skulu.
Perhaps to fill out the line, the scribe uncharacteristically spells out the firstsyllable of Kormakr and indicates the rest of the word with a generalabbreviation sign.

XVIII: Mö›ruvallabók

251

line 5:
gengr inn & bar hann skiotara at en ﬂa var›i. & var›line 6:ﬂeim bilt. kormakr litaz vm. & ser eigi steinger›i. en ser ﬂa bræ›r
An ‘e’ with a superscript ‘i’ was a common abbreviation for eigi.

line 7:
er ﬂeir stuku vapn sín. snyr i brott skyndiliga.
The scribe clearly writes stuku (which would normally represent stukku, thepast plural of støkkva), but this may be an error for struku (the past plural of
strjúka), which gives better sense.

line 8:& qua› visu. Hneit vi› hrungnis fota. halluitindum
The abbreviation ‘.q.v.’ for the phrase kva› vísu is common. Note the large
initial marking the start of the verse, as well as the ‘v’ (for vísa) in the space
between the columns (cf. lines 12, 19, 28). The scribe clearly writes
halluitindum, but this is an error for halluitiondum (i.e. hallvitjƒndum).

line 9:stalli. inn var ek ilmi at finna. engi sar of fenginn
The words sár and fenginn are subject to emendation because it is difficult
to interpret the line as it stands, but the letters are all quite clear.

line 10:vita skal hitt ef hann hættir. handui›ris mer grandi ne
The letters ‘sl’ with a stroke through the ‘l’ is the usual abbreviation for skal.

line 11:yggs fir lí› leggium. litis meira vitiss. kormakr finnr. Steinger›i
Note the small capital ‘G’ (without a dot) for the geminate in yggs. The spelling‘litis’ is an error for lítils. The sense of the passage shows that the scribe (orhis exemplar) has left out eigi or ecki from the phrase Kormakr finnr
Steinger›i.

line 12:& qua› visu. Braut huarf or sal sæta. sunnz erum

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XVIII: Mö›ruvallabók

Note the use of ‘z’ to represent ‘ds’. Most often it represents ‘ts’ (which is
how the two sounds in sunds would have been pronounced).

line 13:hugr a gunni. huat merkir nu herkiss haull ﬂuer
line 14:ligar alla renda ek allt it i›ra. eirar geirs at
The scribe (or his exemplar) has left out the ‘h’ in hárgeirs.

line 15:
ﬂeiri. hlins erumc haurn at finna. hus brageislum fu
What looks like ‘º’ by the ‘h’ is actually the Latin abbreviation for ‘us’ andwas so used in Icelandic.

line 16:
sir. Eptir ﬂa› geck kormakr at husi er Steinger›r var i & braut vpp husit
The scribe or his exemplar has omitted the suffixed article -nu from húsi.

line 17:& tala›i vi› Steinger›i. hon mælti. ﬂu breytir ouarliga. sækir til tals
The letters ‘mli’ with a stroke through the ‘l’ is a common abbreviation formælti. Note that the last letter of tals is superscript to keep it within the column.

line 18:vi› mik ﬂviat ﬂorveigar synir ero ætla›er til hofu›s ﬂer. ﬂaline 19:qua› kormakr. Sitia suer› & huetia. sin andskotar minirline 20:
eins karls synir inni era› ﬂeir banar minir. enn aline 21:vi›um velli. vega tueir at mer einum. ﬂa er sem æratline 22:
vlfi oræknum fior sæki. ﬂar sat kormakr vm daginn. Nu sér

XVIII: Mö›ruvallabók

253

line 23:
ﬂorkell. at ﬂetta rá› er farit er hann haf›i stofnat. Nu
The letters ‘ﬂta’ with a stroke through the ascender of the ‘ﬂ’ is the usual
abbreviation for ﬂetta.

line 24:bi›r hann ﬂorveigar sonu at sitia firir kormaki i dal einum firir vtan gar›line 25:
sinn. ﬂa mælti ﬂorkell. Narui skal fara me› ykr. en ek mun
The sign that looks like a ‘3’ after the ‘m’ of me› developed from the semicolon (;). It is a Latin abbreviation used to represent several combinations ofletters, including ‘et’. In Iceland it was adopted as an abbreviation for ‘e›’.

line 26:
vera heima & veita y›r li› ef ﬂer ﬂurfit. vm kue
line 27:
lldit ferr kormakr i brott & ﬂegar er hann kemr at dalnum sa hann menn
Note the superscript ‘o’ above ‘btt’. A superscript vowel usually stands for‘r’ or ‘v’ plus that vowel, and here it stands for ‘ro’.

line 28:.íí˝. & qua› visu. Sitia menn & meina. mer eína gnásteinaline 29:
ﬂeir hafa vilat vinna er mer var›a gna bor›a. ﬂvi meiraline 30:
skal ek ﬂeiri. er ﬂeir ala meíra aufund vm varar gongur.
line 31:ynna saulua gunni. ﬂa hliopu ﬂorueigar synir vpp & sottu at
Note the ligature of the two p’s; this is a space-saving device like the use of‘®’ after ‘o’.

line 32:
kormaki lengi. Narui skria›i vm it ytra. ﬂorkell ser heiman

254

XVIII: Mö›ruvallabók

line 33:
at ﬂeim sækiz seint & tekr Ωapn sín i ﬂvi bili kom steinger›r
The stroke over the ‘v’ is a flourish and not an indication of a long vowel.

line 34:Ωt & ser ætlan fo›ur síns. tekr hon hann hondum. ok
In contrast to the ‘Ω’ in the previous line, the stroke over the ‘v’ here is anindication of a long vowel.

line 35:
kemz hann ecki til li›s me› ﬂeim bræ›rum lauk sua ﬂvi maline 36:li at oddr fell en Gu›mundr var› ouigr & do ﬂo si›anline 37:
eptir ﬂetta for kormakr heim. en ﬂorkell ser firir ﬂeim bræ›rum litlu siline 38:›arr ferr kormakr at finna ﬂorveigu. & kuez ecki. vilia byline 39:g› hennar ﬂar i fir›inum. skaltu flytia ﬂik i brott
Note the abbreviation for skaltu: the usual abbreviation for skal (cf. line 10
above), followed by ‘tu’.

line 40:
at aque›inni stundu. en ek vil allra bota varna
The spelling of ákve›inni with a ‘q’ shows that the scribe freely uses both‘q’ and ‘k’ before ‘v’ (‘u’) even when he does not need to use ‘q’ in order tohave space above the letter for an abbreviation.

line 41:vm sonu ﬂina. ﬂorveig mælti. ﬂat er likaz at ﬂvi komir ﬂu a lei›
The abbreviation ‘m.’ could stand for either mælir or mælti, but because
the scribe writes mælti in lines 17 and 25, we assume that mælti is meant
here as well. The last letters of the line are difficult to read because theXVIII: Mö›ruvallabók

255

word was compressed to fit the tiny space left at the end of the column.

col. 2, line 1:
at ek ver›a hera› flotta en synir minir obættir. en ﬂvi skalline 2:
ek ﬂer launa at ﬂu skalt steinger›ar alldri níota. kormakr segir. ﬂuí
Note the superscript ‘i’ after the ‘d’ in ‘alld’. A superscript vowel usually
stands for ‘r’ or ‘v’ plus that vowel, and here it stands for ‘ri’. The stroke
above the ‘i’ in njóta is probably meant to distinguish the ‘i’ from the ‘n’; itdoes not indicate a long vowel. The abbreviation ‘s.’ could stand for either
segir or sag›i, and as ‘segir’ is found in line 9 below, ‘s.’ is expanded as
segir here as well.

line 3:mantu ecki ra›a en vanda kerling. Si›an ferr
Note that Si›an does not start a new chapter in this version of the text.

line 4:
kormakr at finna Steinger›i iamt sem a›r. ok eitt sinn er ﬂau tala
The nasal consonant supplied in the expansion of ‘iat’ is ‘m’ because thescribe’s spelling of jafnt without ‘f’ suggests that that his pronunciation ofthis word was /yamt/ rather than /yant/.

line 5:vm ﬂessa atbur›i. lætr hon ecki illa ifir. kormakr qua› visu. Sitia
A ligature of ‘ﬂ’ and long ‘s’, with a stroke through the ascender, is theabbreviation for ﬂess. Here the following ‘a’ gives the case ending.

line 6:
menn & meina. mer asianu ﬂína. ﬂeir hafa laugdis
line 7:
loddu. linna fætr at vinna. ﬂviat vpp skulu allar √lNote the ligature of ‘a’ and ‘v’. The scribe does not often use ligatures, and in
this case may have done so in order to fit the last word into the text column.
Instead of ‘ƒ’, itself a ligature of ‘a’ and ‘o’, the spelling ‘au’ or ‘av’ was often
used in Icelandic for the labial mutation of a (cf. haull in col. 1, line 13, above).

256

XVIII: Mö›ruvallabók

line 8:stafns a›r ek ﬂer hafna. lysigrund i landi. linnz
The letters ‘ld’ with a general abbreviation stroke stand for land.

line 9:ﬂio›ár renna. Mælﬂu eigi sua mikit vm segir Steinger›r
Note the uncial (i.e. Continental early medieval Latin) form of the capital ‘M’.

line 10:mart ma ﬂvi breg›a. ﬂa qua› kormakr visu. Hvern munderline 11:
ﬂu grundar hlin skapfraumu› linu. liknsy
line 12:nir mer luka. lios ﬂer at ver kiosa. Steinger›r segir. Bra›rline 13:munda ek blindum. bauglestir mik festa. yr›i
The exaggerated serif of the ‘d’ in blindum makes the minim before it look
like an ‘í’, but it is not.

line 14:go› sem ger›iz. go› mer & skaup fro›a. kormakr segir. Nu kaustu
The ‘z’ at the end of ger›iz stands for ‘st’, which is a late alternative for the-sk suffix (see NION I, § 3.6.5.3).

line 15:
sem vera ætti opt hefi ek higat minar kuamur
line 16:lag›ar. Nu bi›r steinger›r kormak stunda til fo›ur hennarline 17:& fa hennar & firir saker steinger›ar gaf kormakr ﬂorkatli giofum. ep
The abbreviation for hennar (‘hnar’ with a stroke through the ascender ofXVIII: Mö›ruvallabók257

the ‘h’) is unusual. Perhaps influenced by the dative case of ﬁorkatli, thescribe has put gjafar in the dative.

line 18: tir ﬂetta eigu margir menn hlut i & ﬂar kom vm si›irline 19:
at kormakr ba› Steinger›ar. & var hon honum fostnut & aque›inline 20:
brullaupsstefna & stendr nu kyrt vm hri› nuline 21:
fara or› a milli ﬂeirra. & ver›a i nockurar greinir
The letters ‘ﬂra’ with a stroke through the ascender of ‘ﬂ’ are the common
abbreviation for ﬂeirra.

line 22:vm fiarfar. & sua veík vi› breytiliga at si›an
There is a rather thick accent mark over the ‘i’ of veik which lends it the appearance of a long ‘s’, but the sense calls for veik and not vesk, which is meaningless.

line 23:
ﬂessum ra›um var ra›it. fanz kormaki fatt vm. en ﬂat var firirline 24:ﬂa sauk at ﬂorveig seiddi til at ﬂau skylldi eigi nio
line 25:
taz mega. ﬂorkell i tungu atti son roskinn erline 26:
ﬂorkell het. & var kalla›r tangniostr.hann haf›i verline 27:
it vtan vm stund. ﬂetta sumar kom hann Ωt. & var me›line 28:
fo›ur sínum. kormakr sækir eigi brullaupit. eptir ﬂvi sem a258

XVIII: Mö›ruvallabók

line 29:
kue›it var & lei› framm stundin. ﬂetta ﬂikir frænline 30:
dum Steinger›ar ouir›íng er hann breg›r ﬂessum ra›a hag & leiline 31:
Bersi het kuanfang bersa | ta ser ra›s.
As with the first line of Chapter Five, the first line of the next chapter includes
a large decorated initial to signal the start of the new chapter, the heading forwhich is in red in the centre of the line, and the end of the last line of theprevious chapter fills the space at the end of the line and is marked off by avirgule.

As has emerged from the preceding commentary, Icelandic scriptschanged over time. (For illustrations of these scripts down to 1300,
see Hreinn Benediktsson 1965.) The earliest script was the Carolingianminuscule that was current when Latin letters were first taught toIcelanders. This script was used through the first quarter of the thirteenth century, and was gradually superseded by a Carolingian Insular
script that was used through the rest of the century. By the fourteenth
century, various kinds of Gothic script had become predominant. A
formal textual Gothic was used for de luxe books, but for letters,
charters and other documents a half-cursive Gothic was used, andthis informal script gave rise to a formal half-cursive that was used inbooks. Not surprisingly, most manuscripts show signs of the transition
from one script to another, signs that help establish the date of themanuscripts. The formal textual Gothic script of Mö›ruvallabók
suggests a date of the fourteenth or fifteenth century, and the presenceof all three kinds of ‘f’ (f) on fol. 121v, col. 2, lines 29 and 30; withthe upper arm looped on fol. 121v, col. 2, lines 35 and 37; and withthe lower arm looped as well (ˆ) on fol. 121v, col. 2, line 36) somewhat
narrows the date to closer to the middle of the fourteenth century.
Scripts changed slowly, making it difficult to pinpoint the date ofan undated manuscript on that basis alone, but the Icelandic language
itself and its spelling evolved somewhat more rapidly, providing
additional evidence for a manuscript’s age. Keep in mind that scribes
often worked from written texts, and sometimes they would retainXVIII: Mö›ruvallabók259

the earlier forms that they saw in their exemplars, although in general
their copies reflect contemporary forms. This text of Kormaks saga isdefinitely from the fourteenth century; es has been replaced by er, ‘ﬂ’is absent from non-initial positions, and ‘d’ has begun to replace ‘›’.
Yet there are none of the changes that arose in the second half of the
century: á is not written ‘aa’ (cf. fol. 121v, col. 2, line 29), ‘e’ does
not become ‘ei’ before ‘ng’ and ‘nk’ (cf. fol. 121v, col. 2, line 37),
and enn or inn has not been replaced by hinn as the definite article(en is used on fol. 122r, col. 2, line 3, though hinn appears, before an
adjective, on fol. 121v, col. 2, lines 30 and 31).
It is the combination of these various factors that has led to thedating of Mö›ruvallabók to the middle of the fourteenth century. On
the basis of its orthography, it could be from the first half of the century,
but the double-looped ‘ˆ’ makes it more likely to be just a little later.
The chronological range of these palaeographic and linguistic forms
is reflected in the way the date is given in the recent analysis byDegnbol et al. 1989, which uses the formulation ‘c.1330–1370’ insteadof the near-equivalent ‘c.1350’.

Bibliography
Einar Ól. Sveinsson, ed. 1933. Mö›ruvallabók (Codex Mödruvallensis): MS.
No. 132 fol. in the Arnamagnæan Collection in the University Library of
Copenhagen. Corpus codicum islandicorum medii aevi 5.
Degnbol, Helle, Bent Chr. Jacobsen, Eva Rode and Christopher Sanders,eds 1989. Ordbog over det norrøne prosasprog / A Dictionary of Old Norse
Prose. Registre / Indices.
Hreinn Benediktsson. 1965. Early Icelandic Script as Illustrated in
Vernacular Texts from the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries. Íslenzk
handrit / Icelandic Manuscripts II.

XIX: LANDNÁMABÓK
Landnámabók (The Book of the Settlements) is thought to have been
first compiled in the first half of the twelfth century, probably by several
collaborators including Ari ﬁorgilsson, who also wrote Íslendingabók(The Book of the Icelanders, see Text VIII above), and Kolskeggr
Ásbjarnarson (see ÍF I 395; both these men were nick-named inn fró›i‘the learned’, or, in the case of the latter, inn vitri ‘the wise’). It musthave been based on information provided by contemporary landowners
in various parts of Iceland. It contains accounts of the first settlers ineach area of Iceland in the late ninth and early tenth centuries, beginning with Ingólfr Arnarson (cf. Text VIII above, note 12) in the southwest of the country, and going round the coast clockwise until it cameback to the southwest (though the original work seems to have begun in
the south, at the eastern limit of the Southern Quarter). It covers about
430 settlers (men and women), contains 3,500 personal names andabout 1500 farm-names. The genealogies of settlers are traced both down
to the time of the compilers and back to their origins in Norway orother parts of northern Europe. Since there was no state taxation of landholdings in the Icelandic Commonwealth, the original purpose of thework, insofar as it was not simply historical, may be presumed tohave had something to do with assertion of inheritance rights, or moregenerally to do with the establishment of a national identity.
The work does not survive in its original form, but a version of it,
known as Styrmisbók, was made by the priest and historian Styrmir
Kárason (died 1245; lawspeaker at the Alﬂingi 1210–14 and 1232–35;
prior of the monastery on Vi›ey near Reykjavík 1235–45). From thiswere derived the five surviving redactions. Only a fragment of the
Melabók version survives, on parts of two poorly preserved leaves
written at the end of the fourteenth or beginning of the fifteenth
century. This version was probably compiled by Snorri Markússon
of Melar in Melasveit (d. 1313) and seems to have been based fairly
closely on Styrmisbók, with some additions from Sagas of Icelanders.
Sturlubók was compiled by the historian Sturla ﬁór›arson (died 1284),
nephew of Snorri Sturluson, but is only preserved in AM 107 fol.,
written by Jón Erlendsson (died 1672). It is this version that first
introduced the changed geographical arrangement of the work,
beginning now with the settlement of Ingólfr. Sturla also added agreat deal of new material from Sagas of Icelanders and other histories

262

XIX: Landnámabók

or pseudo-historical writings (while some early Sagas of Icelanders
may have themselves included material from Styrmisbók). Hauksbók
was compiled by lƒgma›r (one of the two highest government officials
in Iceland) Haukr Erlendsson (died 1334) in 1306–08. Part of thisredaction survives in Haukr’s own hand in AM 371 4to, part in AM 105
fol., written again by Jón Erlendsson. Haukr used both Styrmisbók andSturlubok, and also introduced material from other sources, including
Sagas of Icelanders. Skar›sárbók was compiled by Björn Jónsson ofSkar›sá (died 1655) in the 1630s, and survives in various copies, themost important of which is AM 104 fol., written by Ásgeir Jónsson (died1707). It was based principally on Sturlubók and Hauksbók. Finally, thereis ﬁór›arbók, compiled by ﬁór›ur Jónsson (died 1670) probably between
1644 and 1651, and preserved in what is largely ﬁór›ur’s autograph in
AM 106 and 112 fol. It is based on Skar›sárbók and Melabók and someother sources, and can be used for reconstructing the lost Melabók text.
The extract below comprises chapters 6–9 of the Sturlubók version(AM 107 fol., ff. 2v21–5v5; S), with some corrections from Hauksbók(H). They tell mainly of the settlement of Ingólfr, held to be the first
Icelandic settler, in south-west Iceland, where he lived at what is now
the capital of Iceland, Reykjavík (there is a parallel to most of this in
Flóamanna saga chs 2–3, ÍF XIII 233–37). Like many other settlers,
he initially appropriated a huge area, comprising the whole of thesouth-western peninsular of Iceland, but this was subsequently divided
up among a number of later arrivals.
Bibliography
Landnámabók is edited by Jakob Benediktsson in ÍF I. This is based on Sturlubók, with all the divergent passages in Hauksbók printed on facing pages,
and with the whole of what survives of Melabók printed on the lower part of
the relevant pages. Variants and additional material from Skar›sárbók andﬁór›arbók are indicated in textual notes, while the whole of Skar›sárbók
with full variants and most of the additional passages from ﬁór›arbók areprinted in the same editor’s Skar›sárbók. Landnámabók Björns Jónssonar á
Skar›sá (1958 and 1966). The Sturlubók, Hauksbók and Melabók versions
are all included in full in Landnámabók (1900), ed. Finnur Jónsson. All the
primary manuscripts are reproduced in facsimile in Landnámabók. Ljósprentun handrita, ed. Jakob Benediktsson (1974), which has an introduction
in English as well as in Icelandic. Sturlubók is translated into English in BS.
There is discussion in English in Jakob Benediktsson, ‘Landnámabók. Some
Remarks on its Value as a Historical Source’, Saga-Book XVII (1969), 275–92;
MS 373–74; G. Turville-Petre, Origins of Icelandic Literature (1953), ch. 4.

XIX: Landnámabók

263

XIX: LANDNÁMABÓK
‹Chapter 6›: Frá Bjƒrnólfi‹B›jƒrnólfr hét ma›r, en annarr Hróaldr; ﬂeir váru synir Hrómundar
Gripssonar. ﬁeir fóru af ﬁelamƒrk fyrir víga sakir ok sta›festusk í 3
Dalsfir›í á Fjƒlum. Sonr Bjƒrnólfs var ¯rn, fa›ir ﬂeira Ingólfs ok Helgu,
en Hróalds son var Hró›marr, fa›ir Leifs.
ﬁeir Ingólfr ok Leifr fóstbrœ›r fóru í herna› me› sonum Atla jarls 6
ens mjóva af Gaulum, ﬂeim Hásteini ok Hersteini ok Hólmsteini. Me›
ﬂeim fóru ƒll skipti vel, ok er ﬂeir kvámu heim, mæltu ﬂeir til samfarame› sér annat sumar. En um vetrinn gør›u ﬂeir fóstbrœ›r veizlu sonum 9
jarlsins. At ﬂeiri veizlu streng›i Hólmsteinn heit at hann skyldi eiga
Helgu Arnardóttur e›r øngva konu ella. Um ﬂessa heitstrenging fannsk
mƒnnum fátt, en Leifr ro›na›i á at sjá, ok var› fátt um me› ﬂeim 12
Hólmsteini er ﬂeir skil›u ﬂar at bo›inu.
Um várit eptir bjoggusk ﬂeir fóstbrœ›r at fara í herna› ok ætlu›u til
móts vi› sonu Atla jarls. ﬁeir fundusk vi› Hísargafl, ok lƒg›u ﬂeir 15
Hólmsteinn brœ›r ﬂegar til orrostu vi› ﬂá Leif. En er ﬂeir hƒf›u barizk
um hrí›, kom at ﬂeim ¯lmó›r enn gamli, son Hƒr›a-Kára, frændi Leifs,
ok veitti ﬂeim Ingólfi. Í ﬂeiri orrostu fell Hólmsteinn, en Hersteinn 18
fl‡›i.
ﬁá fóru ﬂeir Leifr í herna›. En um vetrinn eptir fór Hersteinn at
ﬂeim Leifi ok vildi drepa ﬂá, en ﬂeir fengu njósn af fƒr hans ok gør›u 21
mót honum. Var› ﬂá enn orrosta mikil, ok fell ﬂar Hersteinn.
Eptir ﬂat dreif at ﬂeim fóstbrœ›rum vinir ﬂeira ór Fir›afylki. Váru
ﬂá menn sendir á fund Atla jarls ok Hásteins at bjó›a sættir, ok sættusk 24
ﬂeir at ﬂví at ﬂeir Leifr guldu eignir sínar ﬂeim fe›gum.
En ﬂeir fostbrœ›r bjoggu skip mikit er ﬂeir áttu, ok fóru at leita
lands ﬂess er Hrafna-Flóki haf›i fundit ok ﬂá var Ísland kallat. ﬁeir 27
fundu landit ok váru í Austfjƒr›um í Álptafir›i enum sy›ra. ﬁeim
vir›isk landit betra su›r en nor›r. ﬁeir váru einn vetr á landinu ok fóruﬂá aptr til Nóregs.
30
Eptir ﬂat var›i Ingólfr fé ﬂeira til Íslandsfer›ar, en Leifr fór í herna›
í vestrvíking. Hann herja›i á Írland ok fann ﬂar jar›hús mikit.1 ﬁar
gekk hann í, ok var myrkt ﬂar til er l‡sti af sver›i ﬂví er ma›r helt á. 33
Leifr drap ﬂann mann ok tók sver›it ok mikit fé af honum; sí›an var
2 Space is left for a large ornamented capital at the beginning of each chapter,and also at line 104. 4 Fjƒlum H, Fjƒllum S. 22 honum H, ﬂeim S.

264

XIX: Landnámabók

hann kalla›r Hjƒrleifr. Hjƒrleifr herja›i ví›a um Írland ok fekk ﬂar
mikit fé; ﬂar tók hann ﬂræla tíu er svá hétu: Dufﬂakr ok Geirrø›r,
Skjal‹d›bjƒrn, Halldórr ok Drafdittr; eigi eru nefndir fleiri. En eptir
ﬂat fór Hjƒrleifr til Nóregs ok fann ﬂar Ingólf fóstbró›ur sinn. Hann
39 haf›i á›r fengit Helgu Arnardóttur, systur Ingólfs.
36‹Chapter 7›‹ﬁ›enna vetr fekk Ingólfr at blóti miklu ok leita›i sér heilla um forlƒg
sín, en Hjƒrleifr vildi aldri blóta. Fréttin vísa›i Ingólfi til Íslands. Eptir
ﬂat bjó sitt skip hvárr ﬂeira mága til Íslandsfer›ar; haf›i Hjƒrleifr
herfang sitt á skipi en Ingólfr félagsfé ﬂeira, ok lƒg‹››u til hafs er ﬂeir
45 váru búnir.
42‹Chapter 8›‹S›umar ﬂat er ﬂeir Ingólfr fóru til at byggja Ísland, haf›i Haraldr
hárfagri verit tólf ár konungr at Nóregi; ﬂá var li›it frá upphafi ﬂessa
heims sex ﬂúsundir vetra ok sjau tigir ok ﬂrír vetr, en frá holdgan Dróttinsátta hundru› ok sjau tigir ok fjƒgur ár. ﬁeir hƒf›u samflot ﬂar til er ﬂeir
51 sá Ísland; ﬂá skil›i me› ﬂeim.
ﬁá er Ingólfr sá Ísland, skaut hann fyrir bor› ƒndugissúlum sínum
til heilla;2 hann mælti svá fyrir at hann skyldi ﬂar byggja er súlurnar
54 kœmi á land. Ingólfr tók ﬂar land er nú heitir Ingólfshƒf›i, en Hjƒrleif
rak vestr fyrir land ok fekk hann vatnfátt. ﬁá tóku ﬂrælarnir írsku ﬂatrá› at kno›a saman mjƒl ok smjƒr, ok kƒllu›u ﬂat óﬂorstlátt; ﬂeir nefndu
57 ﬂat minﬂak. En er ﬂat var til búit, kom regn mikit, ok tóku ﬂeir ﬂávatn á tjƒldum. En er minﬂakit tók at mygla, kƒstu›u ﬂeir ﬂví fyrirbor›, ok rak ﬂat á land ﬂar sem nú heitir Minﬂakseyrr. Hjƒrleifr tók
60 land vi› Hjƒrleifshƒf›a, ok var ﬂar ﬂá fjƒr›r, ok horf›i botninn inn athƒf›anum.
Hjƒrleifr lét ﬂar gjƒra skála tvá, ok er ƒnnur toptin átján fa›ma,
63 en ƒnnur nítján. Hjƒrleifr sat ﬂar um vetrinn. En um várit vildi hannsá; hann átti einn uxa ok lét hann ﬂrælana draga ar›rinn. En er ﬂeir
Hjƒrleifr váru at skála, ﬂá ger›i Dufﬂakr ﬂat rá› at ﬂeir skyldu drepa
66 uxann ok segja at skógarbjƒrn3 hef›i drepit, en sí›an skyldu ﬂeir rá›a
á ﬂá Hjƒrleif ef ﬂeir leita›i bjarnarins. Eptir ﬂat sƒg›u ﬂeir Hjƒrleifi
ﬂetta. Ok er ﬂeir fóru at leita bjarnarins ok dreif›usk í skóginn, ﬂá
48

49 vı. H, íí˝. S.

XIX: Landnámabók

265

settu ﬂrælarnir at sérhverjum ﬂeira ok myr›u ﬂá alla, jafnmarga sér. 69
ﬁeir hljópu á brutt me› konur ﬂeira ok lausafé ok bátinn. ﬁrælarnir
fóru í eyjar ﬂær er ﬂeir sá í haf til útsu›rs, ok bjoggusk ﬂar fyrir um hrí›.
Vífill ok Karli hétu ﬂrælar Ingólfs; ﬂá sendi hann vestr me› sjó at 72
leita ƒndvegissúlna sinna. En er ﬂeir kvámu til Hjƒrleifshƒf›a, fundu
ﬂeir Hjƒrleif dau›an. ﬁá fóru ﬂeir aptr ok sƒg›u Ingólfi ﬂau tí›indi;hann lét illa yfir drápi ﬂeira Hjƒrleifs. Eptir ﬂat fór Ingólfr vestr til 75Hjƒrleifshƒf›a, ok er hann sá Hjƒrleif dau›an, mælti hann:‘Lítit lag›isk hér fyrir gó›an dreng, er ﬂrælar skyldu at bana ver›a,ok sé ek svá hverjum ver›a ef eigi vill blóta.’78
Ingólfr lét búa grƒft ﬂeira Hjƒrleifs ok sjá fyrir skipi ﬂeira ok fjárhlut.
Ingólfr gekk ﬂá upp á hƒf›ann ok sá eyjar liggja í útsu›r til hafs; komhonum ﬂat í hug at ﬂeir4 mundu ﬂangat hlaupit hafa, ﬂví at bátrinn var 81
horfinn; fóru ﬂeir at leita ﬂrælanna ok fundu ﬂá ﬂar sem Ei› heitir íeyjunum. Váru ﬂeir ﬂá at mat er ﬂeir Ingólfr kvámu at ﬂeim. ﬁeir vur›ufelmsfullir ok hljóp sinn veg hverr. Ingólfr drap ﬂá alla. ﬁar heitir 84
Dufﬂaksskor er hann5 lézk. Fleiri hljópu ﬂeir fyrir berg ﬂar sem vi› ﬂá
er kennt sí›an. Vestmannaeyjar heita ﬂar sí›an er ﬂrælarnir váru drepnir,
ﬂví at ﬂeir váru Vestmenn. ﬁeir Ingólfr hƒf›u me› sér konur ﬂeira er 87
myr›ir hƒf›u verit; fóru ﬂeir ﬂá aptr til Hjƒrleifshƒf›a; var Ingólfr ﬂar
vetr annan.
En um sumarit eptir fór hann vestr me› sjó. Hann var enn ﬂri›ja vetr 90
undir Ingólfsfelli fyrir vestan ¯lfusá. ﬁau missari fundu ﬂeir Vífill ok
Karli ƒndvegissúlur hans vi› Arnarhvál fyrir ne›an hei›i.
‹Chapter 9›

93‹I›ngólfr fór um várit ofan um hei›i; hann tók sér bústa› ﬂar semƒndvegissúlur hans hƒf›u á land komit; hann bjó í Reykjarvík; ﬂar eru
enn ƒndugissúlur ﬂær í eldhúsi. En Ingólfr nam land milli ¯lfusár ok 96
Hvalfjar›ar fyrir útan Brynjudalsá, milli ok Øxarár ok ƒll nes út.
ﬁá mælti Karli: ‘Til ills fóru vér um gó› heru› er vér skulum byggja
99útnes ﬂetta.’
Hann hvarf á brutt ok ambátt me› honum. Vífli gaf Ingólfr frelsi, ok
bygg›i hann at Vífilstoptum; vi› hann er kennt Vífilsfell; ﬂar bjó ‹hann›lengi, var› skilríkr ma›r. Ingólfr lét gjƒra skála á Skálafelli; ﬂa›an sá 102
hann reyki vi› ¯lfusvatn ok fann ﬂar Karla.
101 kennt Vífilsfell first written kendr Vífilsd(alr) in S.
Skalla- S (skála also witten with -ll- in S in line 62).

102 Skála- H,

266

XIX: Landnámabók‹I›ngólfr var frægastr allra landnamsmanna, ﬂví at hann kom hér at
105 óbygg›u landi ok bygg›i fyrstr landit; gør›u ﬂat a›rir landnámsmenn

eptir hans dœmum.
Ingólfr átti Hallveigu Fró›adóttur systur 6 Lopts ens gamla; ﬂeira
108 son var ﬁorsteinn, er ﬂing lét setja á Kjalarnesi á›r Alﬂingi var sett.7
Son ﬁorsteins var ﬁorkell máni lƒgsƒguma›r, er einn hei›inna manna
hefir bezt verit si›a›r at ﬂví er menn vita dœmi til. Hann lét sik bera í
111 sólargeisla í banasótt sinni ok fal sik á hendi ﬂeim Gu›i er sólina haf›iskapat; haf›i hann ok lifat svá hreinliga sem ﬂeir kristnir menn er bezt
eru si›a›ir. Son hans var ﬁormó›r, er ﬂá var allsherjargo›i er kristni
114 kom á Ísland. Hans son var Hamall, fa›ir Más ok ﬁormó›ar ok Torf‹a›.

Notes
1 There is a record of such an event in Iceland in 874; see ÍF I cxxxvi.
2 Such high seat pillars may have had carvings of heathen gods onthem; presumably the gods were believed to guide the pillars ashore
at a propitious place, and they would bave been re-used in the settler’s
new home in Iceland. See particularly Eyrbyggja saga ch. 4 (ÍF IV 7–10).
3 There have never been any brown bears in Iceland, though polar

bears have sometimes reached there on drift ice.
4 I.e. ﬂrælarnir (so ﬁór›arbók).
5 I.e. Dufﬂakr.
6 ﬁór›arbók has, more correctly, fƒ›ursystur.
7 See Text VIII above, lines 44–47 and note 23.

XX: EAST NORSEOld Norse, as defined in NION I, 1.2, refers to Viking-Age andmedieval Icelandic (c.870–1550) and Norwegian (c.750–1350). The
term has, however, sometimes been used more widely, to include preReformation Swedish and Danish, and also the Scandinavian colonial
languages (besides Icelandic) that resulted from Viking-Age expansion
and settlement. ION, for example, has separate sections devoted to‘West Norse’ (Icelandic and Norwegian) and ‘East Norse’ (Danish
and Swedish). This terminological uncertainty has various causes.
Literary and historical scholars have tended to focus almost exclusively on the medieval writings of Iceland and Norway, so that forthem Old Norse easily became synonymous with the shared literary
idiom of those two countries. Added to that, the English word ‘Norse’is not far removed from Scandinavian norsk(r) ‘Norwegian’ (fromwhich language Icelandic is of course descended). Those concernedwith linguistic history, on the other hand, seeking English equivalents
for the Danish/Norwegian terms vestnordisk and østnordisk (Swedish
västnordiska, östnordiska), tended to alight on ‘West Norse’ and ‘East
Norse’, though some have preferred ‘Old West Scandinavian’ and‘Old East Scandinavian’.
Traditionally the East/West division is seen as the first major dialect
split in Scandinavian. Prior to that, a relatively homogeneous North
or North-West Germanic is supposed to have existed, a daughter
language of Common or Proto-Germanic, itself descended from IndoEuropean. Differences between East and West emerge during theViking Age (c.750–1050) and early Middle Ages (c.1050–1200), andare clearly manifested in the oldest preserved vernacular manuscripts
from Scandinavia (Iceland and Norway c.1150, Denmark and Swedenc.1250–75).
How far the traditional view of pre-Reformation Scandinavian
linguistic history reflects reality has increasingly been questioned. In
the light of what is currently known about language change anddiversity, it is hard to believe that a uniform speech community
stretching from Helgeland in Norway to southern Jutland, from theBaltic to the North Sea, can have existed at any period. Nor is it easy
to see how the radical changes of the Scandinavian syncope period(c.550–700), whereby a language not far removed from Common
Germanic developed into an idiom close to Old Norse, could have

268

XX: East Norse

been accomplished without considerable dialectal variation — at least
while the changes were under way. The alternative is to assume thatthroughout the Scandinavian-speaking world a rising generation began
simultaneously to alter their speech patterns in identical ways — a
scenario that runs counter to the little evidence that exists and seems
to be without parallel. It is possible that political and social factors in
the early Viking Age worked in favour of linguistic uniformity, giving
us the ‘Common Scandinavian’ of linguistic handbooks, but it is hard
to identify precisely what factors these might have been. More likely,
there was always dialectal variation of one kind or another, but thesparseness of the sources hides it from our view.
At the start of the manuscript age differences must have existed not
only between West and East Norse, but between speech communities
all over the Scandinavian world. That, at least, is what the earliest
preserved vernacular texts indicate. Beneath the overlay of regionaland scriptorium-based norms of writing, a dialect continuum can be
glimpsed, running from southern Jutland through the Danish islands
to Skåne and thence further north, east and west into Sweden and
Norway.
Medieval writings from Denmark and Sweden may thus be expected
to show features of East Norse, of regional and of local (scriptoriumbased or dialectal) type. In addition there will be variation dependingon the age of text or manuscript. The Scandinavian Middle Ages(c.1050–1550) were, like the syncope period, a time of great linguisticchange. It was then that the grammars of Danish, Norwegian andSwedish lost most of their inherited inflexions, and speech was
Germanised through the adoption of vast numbers of words, idioms
and derivational affixes from Low German, the language of the
Hanseatic traders (many of whom populated the growing Scandinavian
towns such as Bergen, Lund, Stockholm).
The West Norse/East Norse dichotomy as it appears in manuscript
sources comes down to a limited range of phonological and morphological criteria. The principal shibboleths are enumerated here (grammatical abbreviations are explained at the beginning of the glossary
in NION III).
(1) In eastern Scandinavia the falling diphthongs /ei/ /au/ /øy/ weremonophthongised to /e:/ /ø:/ /ø:/ respectively, e.g. O. Icel. steinn ‘stone’,lauf ‘foliage’, dreyma ‘[to] dream’, O. Swed. sten, løf, drøma.

XX: East Norse

269(2) Labial mutation (NION I, 3.1.7.1), although not infrequently attested
in East Scandinavian runic inscriptions, is largely absent from Danish andSwedish vernacular manuscripts, e.g. O. Icel. hƒfn ‘harbour’ kƒllu›u ‘called[3rd pl.]’, O. Dan. hafn, kallathu/o.
(3) Front mutation (NION I, 3.1.7.2) is also lacking in the East in specificcases: (a) the present tense sg. of strong verbs, e.g. O. Icel. kømr ‘comes’, O.
Swed. kom(b)er; (b) the past subjunctive of strong verbs and weak verbs of
the krefja ‘demand’ and hafa ‘have’ types, e.g. O. Icel. væri ‘would be’,hef›i ‘would have’, O. Dan. vare, hafdhe; (c) where the conditioning factors
are /gi/ /ki/, e.g. O. Icel. tekit ‘taken [supine]’, O. Swed. takit; (d) where theconditioning factor is /z/ (which ultimately developed to /r/), e.g. O. Icel.
gler ‘glass’, O. Dan. glar.
(4) In eastern Scandinavia there are more occurrences and more types ofbreaking (NION I, 3.1.7.3) than in the West, e.g. O. Icel. ek ‘I’, syngva ‘[to]sing’, O. Swed. iak, siunga.
(5) /u/ often developed to /o/ in western Scandinavia while remaining
unchanged in the East, e.g. O. Icel. bo› ‘message’ ‘command’, O. Dan. buth.
(6) The Germanic diphthong /eu/ developed regularly to [ju:] in mosteastern forms of Scandinavian, but in the West it became [jo:] immediately
before /h/, /m/ and dental consonants (and occasionally in other contexts),
e.g. O. Icel. brjóta ‘break’, O. Swed. briuta.
(7) Initial [w-] is lost in the West immediately before /r/, e.g. O. Icel.
rangr ‘crooked’ ‘wrong’, O. Swed./Dan. wrangær.
(8) Nasal + /p/ /t/ /k/ commonly assimilates to /p:/ /t:/ /k:/ in western
Scandinavia, e.g. O. Icel. kroppinn ‘crooked’, brattr ‘steep’, ekkja ‘widow’,
O. Swed. krumpin, branter, ænkia.
(9) In eastern Scandinavia the -sk form of the verb (NION I, 3.6.4, 3.6.5.3)
is simplified to -s, e.g. O. Icel. skiljask ‘[to] part [from]’, nefnask ‘[to] call
oneself’ ‘[to] be called’, O. Dan. skiljas, nefnæs.
(10) In western Scandinavia the 2nd pl. verb ending is -›, in Sweden andeastern Denmark (Skåne) -n; in the rest of Denmark the consonant is lost,leaving the ending -æ/-e, e.g. O. Icel. hafi› ‘have [2nd pl. pres.]’, O. Swed.
hauin, (central and western) O. Dan. hauæ.
(11) In western Scandinavia the dat. pl. form of the suffixed definite article
is -num, in Sweden and northern Skåne it is -in/-en, in Denmark otherwise-num/-nom, e.g. O. Icel. steinunum ‘the stones [dat. pl.]’, O. Swed. stenomen,
O. Dan. dyefflonom ‘the devils [dat. pl.]’.

The East/West division is by no means absolute (as items 10 andespecially 11 indicate). Various western features are found in Danish
manuscripts, especially those from Jutland (types of palatal mutation
as in slær ‘hits’, O. Swed. slar, lack of breaking as in æk ‘I’, O. Swed.
iak, ‘o’ rather than ‘u’ spellings as in both ‘message’ ‘command’, O.
Swed. buﬂ). Nor can the language of Gotland easily be classified as

270

XX: East Norse

West or East Norse. In common with the former it retains the falling
diphthongs, e.g. bain ‘bone’, draumbr ‘dream’, droyma ‘[to] dream’;on the other hand, it prefers /u/ even where O. Swed. and O. Dan.
have /o/, e.g. fulc ‘people’, lufa ‘[to] permit’, O. Swed. folk, loua.
Other areas of the medieval Scandinavian world also have their
linguistic peculiarities (as indicated above). Haugen offers an introduction to the variety in his ‘Checklist of dialectal criteria in O[ld]Sc[andinavian] manuscripts (1150–1350)’ (1976, 210–13).
Time as well as place can affect the language of medieval Scandinavian manuscripts. Around 1300 written Norwegian and Swedish
still by and large retained the inflexional system inherited from North
Germanic. By 1400, this system was in an advanced state of collapse.
Danish succumbed earlier. Manuscripts from around 1300 show that
Jutlandic apocope (loss of final vowels) and Zealandic reduction of
unstressed vowels to /3/ had already taken place, sweeping away the
many inflexions dependent on the /a/ /i/ /u/ trichotomy (e.g.
corresponding to O. Icel. kalla›a, kalla›i, kƒllu›u ‘called [1st sg.,
3rd sg., 3rd pl. indic.]’ we find simply kallæth or kallæthe). Only inSkåne, where little or no reduction had occurred, does the languageof the earliest Danish manuscripts regularly exhibit traditional caseendings and verbal inflexions.
By the fifteenth century the influence of Low German had begun
to make itself felt in Danish, Swedish and Norwegian manuscripts(introducing words such as æra ‘honour’, handel ‘trade’, stolter‘splendid’ ‘gallant’, bruka ‘use’ and derivational affixes like an-, be-,-aktig, -het, Middle Low German êre, handel, stolt, brûken, an-, be-,-achtich, -heit). In Norway this influence resulted in part from theSwedicisation and ultimately Danicisation of the written language.
So strong was the Danish input that by the time of the Reformation
Norwegian had all but ceased to exist as a written medium.
Four samples of eastern Scandinavian are now provided, two from
Sweden and two from Denmark. They have been selected for their
linguistic (and generic) variety. Different geographical areas are
represented, different stages in the development of Swedish and Danishand different styles. Unlike Old Icelandic and to some extent Old
Norwegian texts, those from eastern Scandinavia are not customarily
normalised. The manuscript spellings are thus retained here, althoughabbreviations are expanded without comment.

XX: East Norse

271

Bibliography
Michael P. Barnes, ‘Language’. In Medieval Scandinavia: an Encyclopedia,
ed. Phillip Pulsiano and Kirsten Wolf (1993), 376–78.
Michael [P.] Barnes, ‘Language’. In A Companion to Old Norse-Icelandic
Literature and Culture, ed. Rory McTurk (2005), 173–89.
Einar Haugen, The Scandinavian Languages: an Introduction to their History(1976).
Einar Haugen, Scandinavian Language Structures: a Comparative Historical
Survey (1982).
Åke Holmbäck and Elias Wessén, Svenska landskapslagar 1 (1933).
Gunnar Knudsen, Mariager Legende-Haandskrift Gl. kgl. Saml. 1586 4to(Samfund til udgivelse af gammel nordisk litteratur 44, 1917–30).
Erik Kroman, Danmarks gamle købstadlovgivning 1, Sønderjylland (1951).
Rolf Pipping, Erikskrönikan enligt cod. Holm. D 2 (Samlingar utgivna av
Svenska fornskrift-sällskapet, part 158, 1921; reprinted as part 231, 1963).
Rolf Pipping, Kommentar till Erikskrönikan (Svenska litteratursällskapet iFinland 187, 1926).
Jerker Rosén, ‘Erikskrönikan’, Kulturhistoriskt Lexikon för nordisk medeltid
4 (1959), 28–34.
C. J. Schlyter, Samling af Sweriges Gamla Lagar 3 (1834).
Lars Vikør, The Nordic Languages: their Status and Interrelations (3rd ed.,2002).
Elias Wessén, De nordiska språken (1965 and later printings).

272

XX: East NorseXX A: THE PROVINCIAL LAW OF UPPLAND

The age of this law is uncertain, but there are indications that parts of
it may have existed in oral form in the late Viking Age. There are fivemedieval manuscripts. The text printed below — the preface to thelaw — follows Uppsala Universitetsbibliotek B 12 (from the firsthalf of the fourteenth century), f. 1. The complete manuscript is published in Schlyter (1834), and a modern Swedish translation withextensive commentary is available in Holmbäck and Wessén (1933),
see especially 7, 10–12. Many of the sentiments expressed in thepassage about the purpose and role of the law (lines 5–10) are to befound in similar form in the prefaces to other Scandinavian provincial
law texts.

Notes on the language
1. Monophthongisation of /ei/ /au/ /øy/ is marked throughout, e.g. heﬂin(11) ‘heathen’, giøtæ (3) ‘of the Geats [gen. pl.]’, gømæs (7) ‘be observed’,
O. Icel. hei›inn, gauta, geymast.
2. Labial mutation is absent, e.g. lagh (1) ‘law’, allum (3) ‘to all [dat. pl.]’,O. Icel. lƒg, ƒllum.
3. Front mutation is absent in the past subj. form warin (10) ‘were [3rdpl.]’ and the supine (aff ) takit (18) ‘remove’, O. Icel. væri, tekit.
4. The scribe writes ‘v’ rather than ‘o’ in Gvﬂ (1) ‘God’, cf. early West
Norse go›, later gu›.
5. The scribe writes ‘iu’ rather than ‘io’ in ﬂiuffnæﬂ (24) ‘theft’, cf. O. Icel.
ﬂjófna›r.
6. Historical [w] is shown in initial position before /r/, e.g. wrangum (9)‘wrongdoers [dat. pl.]’, O. Icel. rƒngum.
7. The -sk verb form appears as -s throughout, e.g. gømæs (7) ‘be
maintained’, haldæs (7) ‘be kept’, skiptis (20) ‘is divided’, O. Icel. geymask,
haldask, skiptisk.
8. The 3rd pl. past subj. form warin (10) ‘were’ shows the -n ending typicalof O. Swed. and the O. Dan. of Skåne (contrast O. Icel. væri). Final -n was
generally lost in Viking-Age Scandinavian, but retained in certain forms in
East Norse, cf. O. Swed. øghon, O. Dan. øghæn ‘eyes’, O. Icel. augu.
9. A characteristic feature of O. Swed. is the development of /d/ between/n:/ and /r/ and /l:/ and /r/, of /b/ between /m/ and /l/ and /m/ and /r/, and of/p/ between /m/ and /n/ and /m/ and /t/ (the linguistic term for this phenomenon
is segmentation). Examples from the passage below are: aldræ (20) ‘of all[gen. pl.]’, Fæmpti (25) ‘[the] fifth’, O. Icel. allra, fimti.

XX: East Norse273

10. Characteristic of the O. Swed. of the province of Uppland is the use of‘-æ’ in unstressed syllables (especially endings) rather than ‘-a’. There areexamples throughout the passage below, e.g. sweæ (3) ‘of the Swedes’, wæræ(5) ‘[to] be’, timæ (11) ‘time [dat. sg.]’ ‘era’. In other kinds of O. Swed. wefind either ‘-a’, or a mixture of ‘-a’ and ‘-æ’ dependent either on the quantityof the preceding stressed syllable or the quality of its vowel.
11. The inflexional system inherited from Germanic is still more or lessintact in the B 12 manuscript of The Provincial Law of Uppland, though
there are signs of incipient breakdown. The genitive is not necessarily foundafter mellum ‘between’ and til ‘to’, e.g. mellum ræt ok o ræt (6–7) ‘between
right and wrong’, til næfst (8) ‘for the chastisement’, nor the dative after aff‘off’ ‘from’ and i ‘in’, e.g. aff . . . warﬂt raﬂ (17–18) ‘according to . . . ourdeliberations’, i. kristnu ræt (14) ‘in the Christian Law’. Acc. m. sg. ﬂæn‘the’ has been extended into the nom., e.g. ﬂæn fyrsti ær (21) ‘the first is’.

274

XX: East NorseXX A: THE PROVINCIAL LAW OF UPPLAND

Gvﬂ siælwær skipaﬂi fyrstu lagh. ok sændi sinu folki mæﬂ moyses.
ær fyrsti laghmaﬂær war. fore hans folki. Swa sændir ok en waldughær
3 kunungær sweæ oc giøtæ. Byrghir son magnusæ. kununx. allum ﬂem
ær byggiæ mellum haffs ok sæw strøms ok øﬂmorﬂæ bok ﬂessæ mæﬂwigers flokkum. ok laghum. upplænzkum. Lagh skulu wæræ satt ok
6 skipaﬂ almænni til styrls baﬂi rikum ok fatøkum. ok skiæl mellumræt ok o ræt. Lagh skulu gømæs ok haldæs fatøkum til wærnær.
spakum til friﬂær. æn o spakum til næfst ok ognær. Lagh skulu wæræ9 rætwisum ok snællum til sømdær. æn wrangum ok o snællum tilrætningær. warin allir rætwisir ﬂa ﬂurfpti æi lagha wiﬂ. Laghæ yrkir
war wiger spa. heﬂin i. heﬂnum timæ. Hwat ær wi hittum .i. hans
12 laghsaghu ær allum mannum ﬂarfflikt ær. ﬂæt sætium wi[r] .i. bokﬂessæ. ﬂæt o ﬂarfft ær. ok ﬂungi ær. at ﬂæt uilium wi[r] utæn lykkia.
Hwat ok ær hin heﬂne læt affat wæræ swa sum ær. i. kristnu ræt ok
15 kirkiu laghum. ﬂæt skulum wi[r] til økiæ .i. upbyriæn ﬂæssæri bok.
Ok wilium wir fylghiæ .i. laghum ﬂæmmæ warum forfæﬂrum. Erikinum hælghæ. Byrghiri iarli. ok magnus[i] kunung[i] ok aff wari
18 brysthyggiu. ok warﬂt raﬂ. hwat wir gitum til satt. ællr aff takit. sum
allum snællum samﬂykkis a. ﬂa skulum wir samæn sættiæ til ﬂarwæaldræ mannæ. ær byggiæ ﬂær wir fyrmer saghﬂum. Bok ﬂæssi skiptis
21 .i. attæ laghæ balkæ. ﬂæn fyrsti ær kirkiu balkær. ær man skal ‹sial›sinæ mæﬂ giømæ. Annær balkær ær um kunung. ok kununx eﬂsøre.
ok skipwistir hans. ok um roﬂæræt. ﬁriﬂi balkær ær um giptæ mal. ok
24 um ærffﬂir. Fierﬂi balkær ær um drap saer. ran. ﬂiuffnæﬂ. ok fyndir.
Fæmpti ær um iorﬂir. Sætti ær um løsøræ kiøp ok giæstning. Siundi
ær bygningæ balkær. Attundi ok siﬂærsti ær um ﬂingmal.

12, 13, 15, 17 letters written but subsequently erased. 21 word omitted by
scribe, supplied by Schlyter (1834, 7) from other manuscripts.

XX: East Norse275

XX B: THE TOWN LAW OF FLENSBORG
Apparently first written in Latin, this law was revised and put into
Danish about 1300. The principal manuscript of the Danish text (nowin Flensborg Stadsarkiv) stems from this period. The extracts printed
below are found on ff. 1–2 (preface and Vm arf ), 14–15 (skipthiuf,
skip i hauæn). The complete text is published (without commentary)in Kroman (1951), 113–35, the sections below on pp. 113–14, 128.

Notes on the language
1. Monophthongisation of /ei/ /øy/ is marked throughout (except in thenegative adverb ‘ey’ (6), cf. modern Danish and Swedish ej), e.g. them (5) ‘them’,
døør (8) ‘dies’, (han) gømæ (19) ‘[let him] keep’, O. Icel. ﬂeim, deyr, geymi.
2. Labial mutation is absent in (the) hafth (6) ‘they had’, O. Icel. ﬂeir
hƒf›u. It is however marked in børn (13), børnæ (11) ‘children’, logh (13)‘law’. The product of labial mutation regularly develops to /ø/ in Danish
when immediately followed by /l/ and /r/ (cf. modern Danish øl ‘beer’, ørn‘eagle’). N. pl. logh has exceptionally retained the mutated vowel (albeit
probably as /o/); other neuter nouns with root /a/ exhibit the same vowel insg. and pl., e.g. land ‘country’ ‘countries’, blath ‘leaf’ ‘leaves’. Forms suchas oll (8) ‘all’ do not reflect labial mutation, but rather rounding of /a/
immediately before /l:/ (common in manuscripts from southern Jutland), cf.
ollæ (4), olt (20) ‘all’, O. Icel. allir, allt.
3. Front mutation is absent in the sg. pres. indic. forms takær (9) ‘takes’,hauær (11) ‘has’, kummær (32) ‘comes’, O. Icel. tekr, hefr, kømr. It is however
found in fæær (19) ‘gets’, hæuær (22) ‘has’, which is in keeping with theposition in many Jutlandic dialects past and present (cf. above).
4. Breaking is absent from stæl (29) ‘steals’. Jutlandic follows West Norsein being less prone to breaking than the generality of eastern dialects, cf. O.
Icel. stelr, O. Swed. and central and eastern O. Dan. stiæl.
5. The scribe writes ‘iu’ rather than ‘io’ in iutland (5) ‘Jutland’, skipthiuf(28) ‘ship thief’, cf. O. Icel. Jótland, ﬂjófr. Note, however, the forms spiyt(15) ‘speer’, stiyp mothær (22) ‘stepmother’, nytæ (23) ‘[let them] enjoy’,which indicate the development /iu:/ > /iy:/ > /y:/ (cf. modern Danish bryde‘break’, dyb ‘deep’, nyde ‘enjoy’, but also Jylland ‘Jutland’).
6. Nasal + /t/ is unassimilated in wintær (3) ‘winters’, cf. O. Icel. vetr. We
also find ‘nt’ written where East as well as West Norse normally has ‘(t)t’,e.g. ient (29) ‘[indef. art.]’, sint (32) ‘[refl. poss.]’, O. Icel. eitt, sitt, O. Swed.
et, sit. These may be unassimilated forms too, but they could be analogicalnew formations in which the root morpheme (i)en-, sin- has been extended
into the n. sg.

276

XX: East Norse

7. The -sk verb form appears as -s throughout, e.g. byriæs (1) ‘begins’,skiftæs (21) ‘be divided’, økæs (26) ‘increases’, cf. O. Icel. byrjask, skiptask,
eyksk.
8. Characteristic of central and Jutlandic O. Dan. is the weakening of
unstressed vowels: on Zealand and the other islands they tend to be reduced to[3], commonly written ‘e’ or ‘æ’; in Jutland word-final vowels are often
apocopated (lost). The extracts below show both reduction to [3] and loss, e.g.
liuær (8) ‘lives’, theræ (26) ‘their’, kunæ (17) ‘wife’, hafth (6) ‘had’, æfn (15)‘means’, mell (26) ‘between’, scul (29) ‘are to’, cf. O. Icel. lifir, ﬂeira, konu,
hƒf›u, efni, milli, skulu.
9. Jutlandic dialects often exhibit diphthongisation of /e:/ and /o:/. In theextracts below we find, e.g., ien (9) ‘one’, gwoz (20) ‘property’. It is thisdiphthongisation that gives, for example, modern Danish hjem as opposed
to Icel. heim, Swed hem.
10. The forms iauæn (9) ‘equal’, gaghin (27) ‘gain’ may reflect thesyllabicisation of final /-n/ (cf. O. Icel. jafn, gagn), but it has also beensuggested that these spellings could represent an early attempt to mark theglottal catch (stød), characteristic of many kinds of modern Danish.
11. Little of the inherited Germanic inflexional system remains in the
Flensborg law text. With a few exceptions nominal and verbal endings areeither apocopated or appear as -æ, -ær, -æs or -s (cf. the examples under item
8 above, and additionally byriæs (1) ‘begins’, thers (27) ‘theirs’, O. Icel.
byrjask, ﬂeira). Not only have many of the traditional inflexional distinctions
disappeared, there has also been much analogical restructuring. We find, forexample, bymens (1) ‘townsmen’s’, fathærs (24) ‘father’s’, thers (27) ‘theirs’,
where the -s originally appropriate to the gen. sg. of certain nouns, pronouns
and adjectives has been generalised as a possessive ending (O. Icel. bœjarmanna, fƒ›ur, ﬂeira); further: klæthær (10) ‘clothes’ and børnæ (21)‘children’, where the plural morphemes -r and -æ/-e (the latter not uncommon
in Danish) have been extended to neuter nouns which originally had no pluralending in Old Norse (O. Icel. klæ›i, bƒrn).
12. Grammatical gender no longer follows the pattern inherited from
Germanic (and ultimately Indo-European). Masculine and feminine havelargely coalesced, while words modifying certain neuter nouns are not marked
for neuter gender, e.g. thinnæ scra (4) ‘this legal code’, O. Icel. ﬂessa skrá(acc. f. sg.), annæn kunæ (17) ‘another wife’, O. Icel. a›ra konu (acc. f. sg.),
ien par (11) ‘one pair’, O. Icel. einu pari (dat. n. sg.), hwær barn (18–19)‘each child’, O. Icel. hvert barn (nom. n. sg.). During the Middle Ages written
Danish gradually loses the features that distinguish masculine and feminine
gender, leading to the two-gender system of the modern standard language.
Most Jutlandic dialects ultimately drop the neuter sg. -t marker in adjectives,
while an area of western Jutland abandons the old gender system entirely,
introducing a new distinction between countable nouns, which are common(m. + f.) gender, and non-countables, which are neuter. The confusion seen

XX: East Norse277

in the extract below is presumably an indication of the way grammaticalgender was developing in Jutland.
13. As early as medieval Danish we find that counting between 50 and 99
may be by the score, as it is in the modern language. Here fiyrsin tiughæ (2)denotes ‘eighty’, i.e. ‘four times twenty’ (modern Danish firs).

278

XX: East NorseXX B: THE TOWN LAW OF FLENSBORGHær byriæs bymens skra af flænsborgh.
Fra wors hærræ aar, thusænd wintær. oc tuhundræth. fiyrsin tiughæ,oc fiyræ wintær. a fyrmer wor frugh aftæn.1 aldærmen oc rathmen, ocollæ bymæn i flænsborgh, lotæ scriuæ thinnæ scra, thær hærtughwoldemar af iutland gaf them. oc stathfæst mæth sin naath oc wold.
6 for thi at the hafth ey fyr stathæligh skra.
3

Vm arf.
Af husbond døør i by, oc husfrugh liuær. i oll arf skift, oc af oll arf,
hun takæ iauæn løt with aruing thær mest takær. Thær yuær ien fullsæng. Af thry par klæthær, takæ hun then mæthælst. af tu par thenkrankær. af ien par, faangær hun ekki. Af hun hauær athælkunæ børnæ.
12 the mugh krauæ theræ fæthærn, hwannær the wilæ. Enn liuær fathær,oc døør mothær. mæth engi logh, børn krauæ theræ mæthærn. tho atfathær takær annæn husfrø. Fathær scal tho giuæ hwær syn thre mark15 penning. skiold. swørth. oc spiyt. af æfn ær til.
9

Vm arf.
Thær fathær takær annæn kunæ. for brollæp. ellær brollæps dagh.
fathær gif ut børn mæthærn.2 ellær næfnæ gwoth witnæ til, mykæt hwærbarn fæær til siit mæthærn. Oc han gømæ thet e mæth the wilæ. En
for glømer han thet. tha skal olt hans gwoz, oc thet gwoz thær han
21 fæk mæth hans kunæ skiftæs iauænt i tu. oc halft takæ hans børnæ. oc
halft han mæth theræ stiyp mothær. Af hun hæuær børn fyr with annæn
sin gift man.3 the nytæ then samæ ræt, thær sagh ær. En brollups kost
24 skal af fathærs løt ut gangæ. sum mothærs iorthæ færth. af ien barn løt.4
18

Vm arf.
27

E mæth arf ær mell fathær oc børn vskift. økæs theræ gooz, ellær
nøkæs. gaghin oc skathæ wæræ oll thers.
skipthiuf30

Hwo sum stæl i skip. skipmen scul ham sættæ i ient vbygd øland
mæth tundær oc eldiærn. oc thrigi dagh cost.

XX: East Norse279

skip i hauæn
Hwannær skip kummær i hafn. ænik skipman ma føræ sint gooz af
skip, vtæn styræman, oc skipmenz orlof.
33

Notes
1 15th August, the festival of the Assumption. The Latin text of thelaw has in crastino assumptionis beatae uirginis, i.e. 16th August.
2 ‘Where the father takes another wife, the father is to distribute to

the children the inheritance which comes from the mother before thewedding or the wedding day.’3 ‘If she already has children by another husband . . .’4 ‘But the wedding expenses are to be taken from the father’s share,[just] as the mother’s funeral [expenses are to be taken] from one
child’s share [of the inheritance].’280

XX: East NorseXX C: ERIK’S CHRONICLE (ERIKSKRØNIKAN)

Erik’s Chronicle is a verse history of Swedish political affairs covering
the period from the early thirteenth century until the election of Magnus
Eriksson as king in 1319. Although the text was probably composedin the 1320s, the earliest extant manuscripts are from the second halfof the fifteenth century. The genesis of Erik’s Chronicle is poorly
understood. Some have thought to see traces of Västergötland dialect
in the text, and have connected the work to that part of Sweden, but
in the forms in which we have the poem it is the late medieval characterof the O. Swed. that is most striking. The extract printed below, lines
862–93 of the poem, is taken from p. 20 of Royal Library, Stockholm,
MS D 2, dated 1470–80. The complete manuscript is edited in Pipping(1921), and there is a detailed commentary on Erik’s Chronicle in
Pipping (1926). See also Rosén (1959).
Notes on the language
1. Monophthongisation of /ei/ /øy/ is marked throughout, e.g. swena flere(5) ‘many squires’, lππst (8) ‘untied’, O. Icel. sveinar fleiri, leyst.
2. Labial mutation is absent, e.g. haffdo (8) ‘had’, allom (11) ‘all’, margh(28, 32) ‘many a’, O. Icel. hƒf›u, ƒllum, mƒrg.
3. The scribe writes ‘u’ rather than ‘o’ in skutin (27) ‘pushed aside’, brutin(28) ‘broken’, O. Icel. skotin, brotin.
4. The scribe writes ‘iw’ rather than ‘io’ in the nickname diwr (21), O.
Icel. d‡r (<*deuRa), Faroese djór.
5. Segmentation of /d/ between /n:/ and /r/ and of /p/ between /m/ and /n/
is found (cf. passage A, Notes on the language 9), e.g. andre (5) ‘other’,kompne (3) ‘come [pp.]’, O. Icel. a›rir (< *annriR, *anﬂriR), komnir.
6. The vowels of unstressed syllables are mostly written ‘a’, ‘e’, ‘o’ as inmodern Swedish, though ‘i’ and ‘u’ also occur, e.g. thera (8) ‘their’, hallande(18) ‘Halland [dat. sg.]’, waro (3) ‘were’, bordhin (27) ‘the tables’, lupu (30)‘ran [3rd pl.]’ ‘knocked’, O. Icel. ﬂeira, Hallandi, váru, bor›in, hlupu. The
rules governing the spoken and written forms of unstressed vowels in O.
Swed. are complex, but by the second half of the fifteenth century ‘a’, ‘e’and ‘o’ predominate in writing. The form sagdo in line 11 is presumably a
scribal error, since the subject is singular.
7. M. nom. pl. -r is lost, e.g. kompne (3) ‘come [pp.]’, andre slike (21)‘other such [people]’, swena (5) ‘squires’, O. Icel. komnir, a›rir slíkir, sveinar.
This is a reflection of a general tendency in O. Swed. for historical [R] (socalled ‘palatal r’) to be dropped in unstressed position immediately following

XX: East Norse281

a vowel. The tendency is seen most clearly in certain texts from Östergötland
and Småland, and seems to weaken in dialects further north and east.
8. There is evidence for the lengthening of short stressed syllables, adevelopment that affected all forms of Scandinavian in one way or anotherbetween c.1200 and 1550, e.g. samma (2) ‘same’ (lengthened consonant),
wiid (9) ‘at’, maat (9) ‘food’ (lengthened vowel), O. Icel. sƒmu, vi›, mat.
9. The inherited Germanic inflexional system has in large part beenabandoned. This is not the result of the merger or loss of unstressed vowels
as in Zealandic and Jutlandic Danish, but stems chiefly from a failure (ofuncertain cause) to maintain the inflexional distinctions still potentiallyavailable in the language. Acc. replaces dat. in gawo sik (7) ‘gave themselves’,
aff sik (8) ‘from themselves’, O. Icel. gáfu sér, af sér; acc. replaces gen. in
jnnan then samma tiidh (2) ‘within the same period’, mellom gardhin ok ena
broo (15) ‘between the farm and a certain bridge’, O. Icel. innan + gen.
(normally), (á/í ) milli/millum + gen.; indeterminate case replaces gen. in til
swerike (22) ‘to Sweden’, O. Icel. til Svíﬂjó›ar; dat. replaces acc. in ælskade
them (26) ‘loved them’, O. Icel. elska›i ﬂá; the demands of rhyme overwhelm
the strong nom. m. sg. adjectival ending in, e.g., goodh (13) ‘fine’, stark (19)‘strong’, O. Icel. gó›r, sterkr; acc. m. sg. then has replaced nom. m. sg. sa(10) ‘that’ (a very early change in O. Swed., cf. passage A, Notes on thelanguage 11), and acc. f. sg. ﬂa (2) ‘that’ ‘the’, O. Icel. sá, ﬂá.
10. Middle Low German influence is seen in the loan words hælade (13)‘warrior’, kamp (14) ‘battle’, bestoodh (14) ‘fought’, bleff (32) ‘remained’(cf. Low German helet, kamp, bestân, blîven). Note also the prefix be- (cf.
Low German be-), which becomes productive in the mainland Scandinavian
languages. The phrases The danske (3) ‘the Danes’ and the vplænzske (12)‘the Upplanders’, with their preposed definite articles, are probably also Low
German inspired (cf. O. Icel. danir, upplendingar).
11. Danish influence, not uncommon in late O. Swed., is found in thereplacement of the reflexive pronoun and reflexive possessive by thecorresponding 3rd pl. pronoun and possessive, e.g. them (25) ‘themselves’,
thera (8) ‘their’, for sik, sina(r).

282

XX: East NorseXX C: ERIK’S CHRONICLE (ERIKSKRØNIKAN)

3

6

9

12

15

18

21

24

27

30

jNnan Etake war een striidh
tha jnnan then samma tiidh1
The danske2 waro tha kompne tiit
herra benkt aff alsπ ok palne hwit
Ok andre riddare ok swena flerewæl hwndrada πrss ok æn mere
Ok gawo sik alle godha trπstok haffdo thera plator aff sik lππst
Ok satho wiid bord ok fingo sik maat
tha πpte then man i træno saat
Ok sagdo them allom tidhandeat the vplænzske3 komo ther ridhande
Herra wlff karsson een hælade goodh
huilkin kamp han ther bestoodh
mellom gardhin ok ena broohan sagde ther aff æ til han doo
wæl twhundradhe πrss waro theeherra peder porsse aff hallande
een rasker hælade fromer ok stark
han war wt driffwen aff danmark
Ok offe diwr ok andre slike
the waro tha rymde til swerike4
Ok haffdo eth hertoghanom5 eth hald
hertoghen lente them gotz ok wald6
Swa at the matto them wæl næraok ælskade them wæl ok haffde them kærabordhin wordo tha rasklika skutin
ok margh dπr sπnder brutin
The hafdo summi latit sina hesta i stalthera swena lupu hwar annan vm koll
Thera πrss waro tha rasklika hæntmargh plata bleff ther ospent

23 eth (1)] error for aff ‘from’; the scribe probably anticipated the followingeth.

XX: East Norse

283

Notes
1 In 1277, following certain other acts of war committed by the Danesand the deposed Swedish king Valdemar Birgirsson in south-western
Sweden.
2 The Danish forces.
3 The Swedish forces, fighting on behalf of the Swedish king, Magnus

Birgirsson, younger brother of Valdemar.
4 If Peder Porsse and Offe Diwr are to be identified with the Peder

Porse and Uffo Dyre who were said to be among those responsible
for the murder of the Danish king, Erik Klipping, we have to assume
a chronological error in Erik’s Chronicle, since the murder did nottake place until 1286, nine years after the events portrayed here. Thereis evidence to suggest that at least some of those implicated in thedeath of King Erik fled to Sweden and obtained protection from King
Magnus (Pipping (1926), 339–40; see also note 5 below).
5 Before he became king of Sweden, Magnus bore the title ‘duke’. He

was elected king in 1275, but Erik’s Chronicle has got events out oforder (cf. note 4 above).
6 Magnus gave the fleeing Danes succour (hald), granting them estatesand power (i.e. fiefs).

284

XX: East NorseXX D: THE MARIAGER BOOK OF LEGENDSThe Mariager Book of Legends is the (modern) title given to manuscript GKS 1586 4to (Royal Library, Copenhagen), a compilation ofhagiographic literature and miracles translated into Danish from Latin,
focusing in particular on the life and works of St Jerome (c.345–420).
GKS 1586 4to dates itself to 1488, and states that it was written in the
Birgittine monastery of Mariager, north-eastern Jutland, by brotherNicolaus Magni. Rather than Jutlandic, the language reflects theembryonic Zealandic standard that came increasingly to characterise
late medieval written Danish, although various Jutlandic features canbe found here and there throughout the manuscript. The extract printed
below is taken from an apocryphal letter of St Cyril (c.315–86), Bishop
of Jerusalem (c.349–86), to St Augustine (354–430), Bishop of Hippo(North Africa, c.396–430), and is found on ff. 97v–98r of GKS 1586
4to. The complete manuscript is published in Knudsen (1917–30).
Notes on the language
1. Monophthongisation of /ei/ /øy/ is marked throughout (except in thenegative adverb ‘ey’ (12), cf. modern Danish and Swedish ej), e.g. them (3)‘them’, helighet (4) ‘holiness’, hørdhe (11) ‘heard [pp.]’, O. Icel. ﬂeim,
heilagleiki, heyr›.
2. Front mutation is absent in the preterite subjunctive form haffdhæ (2)‘had’ as is usual in East Norse, O. Icel. hef›ir (though it is questionable how
far a separate subjunctive mood is still a recognisable category in Danish at
this late date).
3. Breaking is found in iek (8, 12) ‘I’, O. Icel ek. The original broken form
is iak (thus O. Swed., cf. modern Swed. jag), but in Danish the [j] fronts theimmediately following /a/ (modern Dan. jeg).
4. The form sywffn (14) for earlier sjun ‘vision’ ‘revelation’, O. Icel. sjón,s‡n, seems to reflect a north-eastern Jutlandic dialect development whereby[ju:] > [yw].
5. The -sk form of the verb appears as -s in lighnes (5) ‘resembles’, O. Icel.
líkisk.
6. The segmentation of /d/, /b/ and /p/ occurs in O. Dan. as well as O. Swed.
(cf. passage A, Notes on the language 9), but in Dan. the development is in
most cases reversed during the fourteenth century. However, /d/ sometimes
remains between /n:/ and /r/, as in andhre (5) ‘other’ (<*annriR, *anﬂriR.).
7. The vowels of unstressed syllables are written ‘-e’ or ‘-æ’, both almost
certainly reflecting some form of the central vowel [3], e.g. withæ (1) ‘know’,XX: East Norse285sændhe (4) ‘sent’, sthoræ (10) ‘great’, ware (11) ‘were’, O. Icel. vita, sendir,
stóru, váru. Although the manuscript was written in Jutland, there are only
occasional signs of the apocope of word-final vowels, as in the weak adjectival
form hedherligh (15) ‘honourable’, O. Icel. hei›arligi.
8. Vowel + voiced velar spirant [\] is normally diphthongised in medieval
Danish. Following back vowels [\] > [w], which is reflected in the forms
saffdh (2) ‘told’, saw (< sagh, with analogical [\]) (15) ‘saw’, O. Icel. sagt, sá.
9. In O. Dan. /p/ /t/ /k/ > /b/ /d/ /g/ medially between vowels and finally
immediately following a vowel. This development is only sporadicallymarked in pre-Reformation writing, cf. noghet (< nokot) (3) ‘something’,
liighæ (4) ‘comparable’, but withæ (1) ‘know’, oc (passim) ‘and’, iek (8) ‘I’,
O. Icel. nƒkkut, líkr, vita, ok, ek, modern Dan. noget, lig, vide, og, jeg.
10. The inherited Germanic inflexional system has been almost wholly
abandoned and replaced by something akin to the system of standard modern
Danish. Morphological case is not much in evidence outside personal pronouns,
and verbs are inflected for number and little else (this feature was finallydiscarded from the written language in the late nineteenth century). Lack ofcase inflexion can be seen in, e.g., i thynæ breffwe (3) ‘in your letters’, affmænneske (11) ‘by people’, for manghe daghe (16) ‘many days ago’, O. Icel.
í bréfum ﬂínum, af mƒnnum, fyrir mƒrgum dƒgum (all dat.); there is no gendermarking in, e.g., thynæ breffwe (3) ‘your letters’ (with analogical plural -æ/-e,
cf. O. Icel. nom./acc. pl. bréf ﬂín), æren (5) ‘the glory’ (f. indistinguishable
from m.); the absence of personal inflexion from verbs is documented in,e.g., thu haffdhæ (2) ‘you had’, Wij som withe (9) ‘we who know’, O. Icel. ﬂú
hef›ir, vér sem vitum. Preserved inflexional distinctions are, e.g., war (4)‘was’, ware (11) ‘were’, iek (13) ‘I’, mik (16) ‘me’, Wij (9) ‘we’, oss (8) ‘us’.
11. Middle Low German influence is seen in the loan words ære(n) (5)‘honour’ ‘glory’, bewiisthe (6) ‘demonstrated’, megtughe (6) ‘powerful’,
thwiffwell (7) ‘doubt’, forklaræ (12) ‘establish’ (cf. Low German êre, bewîsen,mechtich, twîvel, vorklaren). Note also the prefixes be- and for- and the suffix-het (Low German be-, vor-, -heit), which become productive in the mainland
Scandinavian languages (as already here in, e.g., helighet (4) ‘holiness’,sandhet (8) ‘truth’, where -het is used to derive abstract nouns from native
adjectives).
12. The orthography reflects a tendency to employ superfluous consonants,
a usage which reached its culmination in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century
handwritten Danish, e.g. haffdhæ (2) ‘had’, skreffsth (3) ‘wrote’, thwiffwell(7) ‘doubt’.

286

XX: East NorseXX D: THE MARIAGER BOOK OF LEGENDS

Kæresthe Augustine sigher sanctus Cyrillus Thu skalth withæ At
manghe haffwe ther vndher paa ligherwiiss som thu haffdhæ saffdh
3 them noghet nyth oc vhørligth Ther thu skreffsth i thynæ breffwesom thu sændhe mik. at jeronimus war liighæ i helighet johanni
baptisthæ. oc andhre apostelæ Oc at han lighnes them oc i æren6 Hwicketh thu bewiisthe meth megtughe skæll oc vndherlighe sywffn
Sanneligh ther er enghen thwiffwell vppa Mæn thet er alzwærdugsth
at throo j all sannesthe sandhet oc gudelighet Oc wænther iek at oss
9 skall enghen vndher oc thwiffwell hændhe ther om Wij som withehans helgesthe leffneth. oc hans sthoræ vndherlighe jærthegnæ som
aldrigh ware førre hørdhe aff mænneske Oc forthy at thynæ skæll
12 ware swa sthoræ till at forklaræ thes sandhet Tha bør thet sik ey at iek
skall ther till legghe noghre læthæ skæll oc eenfaldughe Thy will iek
offwergiffwe them alle oc sighe aff een vndherligh sywffn som then
15 hedherligh Cyrillus biscopp i alexandria saw som han withner i sithbreff ther han sændhe mik for manghe dagheXXI: EIRÍKS SAGA RAU‹A
There are various literary sources for our knowledge of medieval Norse
visits to America (Vínland, Markland). As early as c.1073, Adam ofBremen writes in his Gesta Hammaburgensis ecclesiae pontificum (seepp. 62 and 66 above) that Sven Estridsson, the Danish king and one ofAdam’s main informants, ‘also told me of another island discoveredby many in that ocean’. Adam continues: ‘It is called Wineland because
vines grow there of their own accord, producing the most excellent
wine. Moreoever, that unsown crops abound there, we have ascertained
not from fabulous conjecture but from the reliable report of the Danes.’
Half a century or so later, Ari ﬁorgilsson in his Íslendingabók alludes
to the inhabitants of Vínland, the Skrælingar, in connection with tracesof human beings found by Eiríkr rau›i in Greenland (see p. 111 andnote 30 to Text VIII above). An Icelandic geographical treatise(landal‡sing) which may be as old as the beginning of the thirteenth
century mentions Helluland (cf. lines 21–25 below), Markland (cf.
lines 26–29 below) and Vínland and says that some people think that
Vínland is an extension of Africa (cf. HOIC 104–06; Alfræ›i íslenzk I
1908, 12). The two ‘Vínland sagas’, Grœnlendinga saga and Eiríks
saga rau›a (respectively about 25 and 40 pages in the editions in theÍslenzk fornrit series) contain circumstantial, but often unreliable,accounts of various voyages said to have been made to Vínland. An
Icelandic annal for the year 1347 records a visit to Markland by aparty of Greenlanders that must have taken place at about that time(cf. HOIC 104).
It can be safely deduced from literary evidence alone that the Norse
visited the American continent centuries before Columbus’s voyages
to it around 1500. In 1960, however, the Norwegian Helge Ingstad
made the significant archaeological discovery of a Norse site at L’Anse
aux Meadows on the northern tip of Newfoundland, and this hesubsequently excavated in the following decade together with hisarchaeologist wife, Anne Stine Ingstad. The site at L’Anse aux
Meadows consists of the remains of three largish halls and five otherbuildings, one of which was used for producing iron from local bogore. Radiocarbon analyses indicate a general dating to around the year
1000. It appears to have been occupied over a relatively short periodof time and may have lain deserted for a year or more between visits.
An important activity there seems to have been the repair of ships.

288

XXI: Eiríks saga rau›aThere is little or no archaeological sign at L’Anse aux Meadows of
any crop or animal husbandry.
Few, then, now doubt that the Norsemen visited the mainland of theNorth American continent in the Middle Ages. The historical realities
were probably somewhat as follows. The first visits can reasonably be
dated to the period 980–1010 and it is quite possible that, as some
written sources suggest, it was Leifr, son of Eiríkr rau›i, or some othermember of Eiríkr’s circle, who made the first landings. Over the next
three and a half centuries or so there would doubtless have been many
voyages to North America, of only a few of which there is any record in
the written sources. Most of these would have had their starting pointin the Eastern Settlement of the Norse colony in Greenland (cf. notes
26 and 27 to Text VIII above) and many would probably only havereached the closest part of the mainland, Labrador, from where muchneeded timber might be fetched. The finds at L’Anse aux Meadows
confirm beyond doubt the presence of the Norsemen in Newfoundland.
And it is entirely probable that they got further south, very possibly tothe southern side of the Gulf of St Lawrence (and there found the wild
grapes growing which gave rise to the name Vínland; cf. note 8 below).
On the other hand, it is far less certain that they rounded the inhospitable
coasts of Nova Scotia and penetrated further down the eastern coastsof what is now the U.S.A. In such areas as they did visit, they doubtlessencountered members of the indigenous population, whether Inuit or
Native American, whom they called ‘Skrælingar’ (cf. note 13 below).
Some of the sources (e.g. the extract from Eríks saga rau›a editedhere) suggest that permanent agrarian colonisation was intended atleast by ﬁorfinnr karlsefni ﬁór›arson. But while ﬁorfinnr may havebeen a historical figure who mounted a major expedition to Vínland(and whose son Snorri may indeed have been born in North America),
the evidence of archaeology for actual settlement is virtually nonexistent. Quite why the Norsemen failed to establish any permanent
foothold in North America is difficult to say (cf. Perkins 2004, 62–63
and references there). The sources themselves suggest that the hostilityof the Skrælingar played a major part in discouraging settlement by
the Norsemen (cf. lines 153–54 below). This may have been a factor.
But it was probably as much the length and tenuousness of lines ofcommunication with the nearest Norse settlement in Greenland, itself
small and fragile, that were decisive. At all events it seems likely that

XXI: Eiríks saga rau›a289

the last Norse voyages from Greenland to North America took placearound or not long after 1350, and by the beginning of the fifteenth
century the Greenland colony itself appears to have been in terminal
decline.
As already indicated, it is Eiríks saga rau›a and Grœnlendinga sagathat give the most detailed medieval accounts of visits to Vínland.
Eiríks saga rau›a must have been written before c.1302–10, the dateof the oldest text (in Hauksbók, AM 544 4to). There are certain reasons
to suggest that this saga was first written no earlier than 1263, butthese are not entirely decisive and some scholars believe that it may
have existed, in some version or other, as early as the first decades of
the thirteenth century (cf. ÍF IV 1985, 367–69; Perkins 2004, 34–36,
52–53). Grœnlendinga saga cannot be dated more precisely than to
between about 1200 (the time that saga-writing is thought to havebegun) and c.1387 (the date of the sole manuscript, Flateyjarbók).
Although some of the same main characters appear in the two sagas
and they both have accounts of voyages to Vínland as an importantpart of their narrative, there are also substantial differences between
the stories they tell. In addition to an initial sighting by one Bjarni
Herjólfsson, Grœnlendinga saga tells of four separate visits to Vínland,
under the leadership of Leifr (son of Eiríkr rau›i), ﬁorvaldr (alsoEiríkr’s son), ﬁorfinnr karlsefni and Freydís (said to be the daughterof Eiríkr) respectively. Eiríks saga rau›a has no mention of the sighting
by Bjarni Herjólfsson and tells of only two visits (an unplanned visit
by Leifr in ch. 5 and ﬁorfinnr karlefni’s expedition in chs 8–12). It is
uncertain what relationship there is between Grœnlendinga saga andEiríks saga rau›a and which of them is the older. It is perhaps more
likely that Grœnlendinga saga was written first and that it is, on thewhole, truer to historical reality. Eiríks saga rau›a appears to be moreconcerned with telling the life-story of ﬁorfinnr karlsefni and moreparticularly that of his wife Gu›rí›r ﬁorbjarnardóttir. But whicheverof the two sagas is taken as the older, the possibility cannot be excluded
that the author of the later of them knew the earlier in some way andused it as a source.
While the Vínland Sagas are the most detailed accounts of Norse
visits to America, their limitations as historical sources must beemphasised. They were written at the earliest some two hundred years
after the events they purport to describe took place. They contradict

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XXI: Eiríks saga rau›aeach other in various ways. They present a vague and confused pictureof the topography of the lands in the West. Some of the place-names
they mention are doubtless fictional and those that may be genuine
are difficult or impossible to locate with any degree of certainty (cf.
note 1 below). The descriptions given of the Skrælingar are distorted
in certain respects (cf. note 13 below). Alongside the named persons
in Eiríks saga rau›a and Grœnlendinga saga who probably existed inreality (e.g. Leifr Eiríksson, ﬁorfinnr karlsefni ﬁór›arson), there arealso a number who are entirely fictional. Thus the ﬁórhallr vei›ima›rof Eiríks saga rau›a is an invented character (cf. line 9 and note 2
below); and doubtless the daughter of Eiríkr rau›i called Freydís who
appears both in Eiríks saga rau›a and Grœnlendinga saga is also
entirely fictional and the expedition she and her husband are said inch. 7 of Grœnlendinga saga to have undertaken never took place; cf.
Perkins (2004, 46–53). The narratives contain much exaggeration andthe fantastic sometimes intrudes (cf. the story of Freydís in lines 132–42
and that of the uniped in lines 172–91 below). The aim of the authors
was often more to tell a good story than to record history. As historicalsources, then, the Vínland Sagas must be approached with a high degreeof circumspection and their shortcomings never lost sight of. But withthis said, it must also be stressed that the stories they tell and the picture
they give of the lands in the West must often contain some kernel ofhistorical truth, and an expedition to North America led by a historicalﬁorfinnr karlsefni very possibly really did take place.
For his account of Vínland and ﬁorfinnr karlsefni’s expedition there,
the author of Eiríks saga could well have had at least some genuine
and accurate information, quite possibly in oral form. He may wellhave read Grœnlendinga saga (see above). It has been argued that heknew at first hand Adam of Bremen’s Gesta Hammaburgensis ecclesiae
pontificum (see above) and was influenced by it. He may also havebeen influenced by sagas (such as Yngvars saga ví›fƒrla) which tellof Scandinavian expeditions in Russia and eastwards from there. The
three verses which he incorporates into his narrative (see note 11 andlines 183–90) were probably not his own compositions and must
therefore be ranked amongst the saga’s sources for the passages inwhich they occur.
The excerpts edited here are from the saga now generally known as
Eiríks saga rau›a and its heading in 557 (f. 27r1) is Saga Eiríks rau›a.

XXI: Eiríks saga rau›a291

It is possible that in 544 the saga had the heading Saga ﬁorfinns
karlsefnis, though if so it is no longer legible, and this could even havebeen its original name (cf. ÍF IV 1985, 338–41). Certainly the sagaconcerns itself more than with any other persons with ﬁorfinnr karlsefni,
son of ﬁór›r hesthƒf›i, and perhaps more particularly with Gu›rí›r,daughter of the ﬁorbjƒrn mentioned in line 16 below. Its ch. 3 tells ofGu›rí›r’s arrival in Greenland with her father, ch. 6 of her marriage toﬁorsteinn, son of Eiríkr rau›i, and ﬁorsteinn’s subsequent death. Ch. 7
introduces ﬁorfinnr karlsefni and relates how he sails to Greenland
together with Snorri ﬁorbrandsson, Bjarni Grímólfsson and ﬁórhallr
Gamlason (see lines 3–5 below); it also tells of ﬁorfinnr’s marriage tothe widowed Gu›rí›r. It has been related in ch. 5 how Leifr, son of
Eiríkr rau›i, went to Norway where King Óláfr Tryggvason bade him
preach Christianity in Greenland. We are told in the briefest terms
how, on his voyage back to Greenland, he unexpectedly came acrosslands before unknown, where grape-vines and self-sown wheat grew(ÍF IV 1985, 415). In Greenland he successfully preached the faith;further, there was much talk there of sailing in search of the country
he had discovered. At the beginning of ch. 8, the scene is set at
Brattahlí›, the home of Eiríkr rau›i in Greenland after ﬁorfinnr’s
marriage to Gu›rí›r. It should be noted that the text of 557 is here, as
elsewhere, somewhat corrupt and the start of a new chapter is notmarked. Some of the characters who play a part in the subsequentnarrative are only cursorily introduced or not at all (like Freydís,
daughter of Eiríkr rau›i and wife of ﬁorvar›r, for instance; see lines
132 and 162). On the historicity of the various characters in the saga,
see Perkins (2004, 46–53).
Eiríks saga rau›a is preserved in two vellums: (1) AM 544 4to (=544), part of the important codex Hauksbók (cf. MS 271–72) named
after Haukr Erlendsson (d. 1334) and written in the first decade of the
fourteenth century. The text of Eiríks saga was written partly by Haukr
himself and partly by two other scribes. (2) AM 557 4to (Skálholtsbók;= 557), probably written around 1420 by Óláfr Loptsson (d. c.1458).
These two manuscripts present the saga in somewhat different forms.
557 offers us an often rather garbled text written by a careless andunpractised scribe, but one which is probably more faithful to theoriginal of the saga than that of 544. 544’s text (as has been shown ingreatest detail by the Swedish scholar Sven B. F. Jansson in his 1945

292

XXI: Eiríks saga rau›amonograph) appears to have undergone substantial rationalisation andrevision by its three scribes, including both lengthening and shortening.
For this reason, 557 (ff. 32v6–33v6; 33v25–35r12) rather than 544 is
made the basis for the edition of the following excerpts from the saga(ch. 8 and chs 10, 11 and 12), though obvious errors are corrected andmissing words supplied from 544 unless otherwise stated. The text of
557 is, however, in need of substantial emendation, and while this canoften be carried out on the basis of the Hauksbók redaction (in 544), it
has not been possible to eliminate all its illogicalities (especially the
topographical ones). This should not be forgotten, and readers mustreconcile themselves to some measure of inconsistency and obscurity
remaining (e.g. at lines 146–48). In defence of the scribe of 557, it
may be said that the manuscript he was copying was quite possibly
difficult to read, and that some of the imperfections of narrative in his
text may also have been found in it. The chapter divisions and chapter
numbering are based partly on the manuscripts, partly on previous
editions. The scribe of 557 made use of various abbreviations (e.g. forthe personal name Karlsefni), which are here silently expanded.
Bibliography
Facsimile editions: Arthur Middleton Reeves (ed.), The finding of Wineland
the Good (1890 and reprints). [Contains facsimiles with parallel transcriptions of Eiríks saga rau›a from both AM 557 4to and AM 554 4to(Hauksbók) as well as of Grœnlendinga saga from Flateyjarbók]
Dag Strömbäck (ed.), The Arna-Magnæan manuscript 557, 4to containing
inter alia the history of the first discovery of America, CCIMA XIII (1940).
Jón Helgason (ed.), Hauksbók. The Arna-Magnæan manuscripts 371, 4to, 544,
4to, and 675, 4to (1960).
Critical edition: the best critical edition of Eiríks saga rau›a is that incorporated
into Sven B. F. Jansson’s study of its two main texts, Sagorna om Vinland.
I. Handskrifterna till Erik den rödes saga (1945, 26–81).
Íslenzk fornrit edition: in the original issue of ÍF IV 193–237 (1935, reprinted
with corrections 1957), which contained primarily Eyrbyggja saga, Eiríks
saga rau›a was edited mainly on the basis of AM 544 4to by Matthíasﬁór›arson, as well as Grœnlendinga saga based on its only manuscript,
Flateyjarbók. In 1985, Ólafur Halldórsson produced a supplementary volume(Vi›auki) with continuing pagination comprising a text of Eiríks saga rau›a,
now based on AM 557 4to, and a substantial introduction; the contents ofthis volume were also included as an appendix to the reprint of the 1935
edition. The whole is referred to here as ÍF IV (1985).

XXI: Eiríks saga rau›a293

English translations: numerous translations of the two Vinland sagas into
English exist. Both the following contain translations of Eiríks saga rau›abased mainly on the version in AM 557 4to (as well as translations ofGrœnlendinga saga and much background material).
Gwyn Jones, The Norse Atlantic saga, 2nd edition (1986).
Magnus Magnusson and Hermann Pálsson, The Vinland sagas. The Norse
discovery of America. Grænlendinga saga and Eirik’s saga (1965 andreprints).
Background reading: there is a huge body of secondary literature concerning
the Norsemen in America. A comprehensive bibliography (best up to 1992)
is Robert Bergersen, Vinland bibliography. Writings relating to the Norsein Greenland and America (1997). It should be noted that many contributions
to the subject have been amateurish or biased or over-speculative and shouldbe treated with circumspection.
Geraldine Barnes, Viking America. The First Millennium (2001).
William W. Fitzhugh and Elisabeth I. Ward (eds), Vikings. The North Atlantic
Saga (2000).
G. M. Gathorne-Hardy, The Norse Discoverers of America (1921); 2nd ed.
(1970) with a new preface by the author and a preface by Gwyn Jones.
Anne Stine Ingstad, The Norse Discovery of America. Volume I: Excavationsof a Norse Settlement at L’Anse aux Meadows, Newfoundland 1961–1968,
2nd edition (1985). [The fullest account of the Norse finds at L’Anse aux
Meadows, Newfoundland]
Shannon Lewis-Simpson (ed.), Vínland Revisited: the Norse World at the Turnof the First Millennium. Selected Papers from the Viking Millenium
International Symposium, 15–24 September 2000, Newfoundland andLabrador (2003).
Ian McDougall, ‘The Enigmatic einfœtingr of Eiríks saga rau›a’. In Frejas
psalter. En psalter i 40 afdelinger til brug for Jonna Louis-Jensen, ed.
Bergljót S. Kristjánsdóttir and Peter Springborg, 2nd edition (1997, 128–32).
MS, under America, Norse in; L’Anse aux Meadows; Maine coin; Viking
hoaxes; Vinland Map; Vinland Sagas.
Fridtjof Nansen, In Northern Mists I–II (1911).
Richard Perkins, ‘The Fur›ustrandir of Eiríks saga rau›a’. Mediaeval
Scandinavia 9 (1976, 51–98).
Richard Perkins, ‘Medieval Norse Visits to America: Millennial Stocktaking’.
Saga-Book 28 (2004, 29–69).
Erik Wahlgren, ‘Fact and Fancy in the Vinland Sagas’. In Old Norse Literatureand Mythology. A Symposium, ed. Edgar C. Polomé (1969, 19–80).
Erik Wahlgren, The Vikings and America (1986).
Andrew Wawn and ﬁórunn Sigur›ardóttir (eds), Approaches to Vínland. A
Conference on the Written and Archaeological Sources for the Norse
Settlements in the North-Atlantic Region and Exploration of America. The
Nordic House, Reykjavík, 9–11 August 1999 (2001).

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XXI: Eiríks saga rau›aOther works referred to:Alfræ›i íslenzk I. Ed. K. Kålund (1908).
Kenneth Baitsholts, ‘Humour, Irony, and Insight: The First European Accounts
of Native North Americans’. In Lewis-Simpson (2003, 365–75).
Andrew Breeze ‘An Irish Etymology for kjafal “hooded cloak” in ﬁorfinns
Saga’, Arkiv för nordisk filologi 113 (1998, 5–6).
Carleton S. Coon, The Hunting Peoples (1974).
Alan Crozier, ‘Arguments against the *Vinland Hypothesis’. In Lewis-Simpson(2003, 331–37).
Birgitta Wallace Ferguson, ‘L’Anse aux Meadows and Vínland’. In Wawn andﬁórunn Sigur›ardóttir (2001, 134–46).
Helgi Gu›mundsson, Um haf innan (1997).
A History of Norway and The Passion and Miracles of the Blessed Óláfr, tr.
Devra Kunin, ed. Carl Phelpstead (2001).
Kevin McAleese, ‘Skrælingar Abroad—Skrælingar at Home?’ In LewisSimpson (2003, 353–64).
Daniel Odess, Stephen Loring and William W. Fitzhugh, ‘Skræling: First
Peoples of Helluland, Markland, and Vinland’. In Fitzhugh and Ward (2000,
193–205).
Ólafur Halldórsson, ‘The Conversion of Greenland in Written Sources’. In
Hans Bekker-Nielsen, Peter Foote, Olaf Olsen (eds), Proceedings of theEighth Viking Congress. Århus 24–31 August 1977 (1981, 203–16).
Richard Perkins, ‘Potenti murmure verborum grandia cete maris in littora
trahunt’. In Heinrich Beck and Else Ebel (eds), Studien zur Isländersaga.
Festschrift für Rolf Heller (2000, 223–30).
Haakon Shetelig and Hjalmar Falk, Scandinavian Archaeology, tr. E. V. Gordon(1937).
Sverrir Jakobsson, ‘ “Black Men and Malignant-Looking”. The Place of the
Indigenous Peoples of North America in the Icelandic World View’. In Wawn
and ﬁórunn Sigur›ardóttir (2001, 88–104).
Birgitta Wallace, ‘Vínland and the death of ﬁorvaldr’. In Lewis-Simpson (2003,
377–90).

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XXI: EIRÍKS SAGA RAU‹A
ﬁorfinnr karlsefni ﬁór›arson’s expedition to Vínland‹Chapter 8›. . . Ætlu›u ﬂeir Karlsefni ok Snorri at leita Vínlands1 ok tƒlu›u menn
margt um ﬂat. En ﬂví lauk svá at ﬂeir Karlsefni ok Snorri bjuggu skip 3
sitt ok ætlu›u at leita Vínlands um sumarit. Til ﬂeirar fer›ar ré›usk
ﬂeir Bjarni ok ﬁórhallr me› skip sitt ok ﬂat fƒruneyti er ﬂeim haf›ifylgt.
6
Ma›r hét ﬁorvar›r. Hann var mágr Eiríks rau›a. ‹Hann fór ok me›
ﬂeim, ok ﬁorvaldr, son Eiríks.›ﬁórhallr var kalla›r vei›ima›r.2 Hann haf›i lengi verit í vei›ifƒrum 9me› Eiríki um sumrum ok haf›i hann margar var›veizlur. ﬁórhallr var
mikill vexti, svartr ok ﬂursligr. Hann var heldr vi› aldr, ódæll í skapi,
hljó›lyndr, fámálugr hversdagliga, undirfƒrull ok ﬂó atmælasamr ok 12
f‡stisk jafnan hins verra. Hann haf›i lítt vi› trú blandazk sí›an hon
kom á Grœnland. ﬁórhallr var lítt vinsældum horfinn, en ﬂó haf›i Eiríkr
lengi tal af honum haldit. Hann var á skipi me› ﬂeim ﬁorvaldi, ﬂví at 15
honum var ví›a kunnigt í óbygg›um. ﬁeir hƒf›u ﬂat skip er ﬁorbjƒrn
haf›i út ﬂangat ok ré›usk til fer›ar me› ﬂeim Karlsefni, ok váru ﬂar
flestir grœnlenzkir menn á. Á skipum ﬂeira var3 fjórir tigir manna annars 18
hundra›s.
Sigldu ﬂeir undan sí›an til Vestribygg›ar ok til Bjarneyja. Sigldu
ﬂeir ﬂa›an undan Bjarneyjum nor›anve›r. Váru ﬂeir úti tvau dœgr. ﬁá 21
fundu ﬂeir land ok reru fyrir á bátum ok kƒnnu›u landit ok fundu ﬂar
hellur margar ok svá stórar at tveir menn máttu vel spyrnask í iljar.
Melrakkar váru ﬂar margir. ﬁeir gáfu naf‹n› landinu ok kƒllu›u 24
Helluland.
ﬁá sigldu ﬂeir nor›anve›r tvau dœgr ok var ﬂá land fyrir ﬂeim okvar á skógr mikill ok d‡r mƒrg. Ey lá í landsu›r undan landinu ok 27
fundu ﬂeir ﬂar bjarnd‡r ok kƒllu›u Bjarney. En landit kƒllu›u ﬂeir
Markland, ﬂar er skógrinn ‹var›.
ﬁá er li›in váru tvau dœgr, sjá ﬂeir land ok ﬂeir sigldu undir landit. 30
ﬁar var nes, er ﬂeir kvámu at. ﬁeir beittu me› landinu ok létu landit á
1 No chapter division or heading in 557. 7 ﬁorvaldr 557. 14 ﬂá 557.
18 fjórir tigir] written fjƒrutigi 557. 20 Bjarmeyja 557. 22 spelt ‘kavnnavdu’
557. 29 var] editorial conjecture.

296

XXI: Eiríks saga rau›astjórnbor›a. ﬁar var ørœfi ok strandir langar ok sandar. Fara ﬂeir ábátum til lands ok fundu kjƒl af skipi ok kƒllu›u ﬂar Kjalarnes. ﬁeir
gáfu ok nafn strƒndunum ok kƒllu›u Fur›ustrandir,4 ﬂví at langt varme› at sigla. ﬁá gjƒr›isk vágskorit landit ok heldu ﬂeir skipunum at
36 vágunum.
ﬁat var ﬂá er Leifr var me› Óláfi konungi Tryggvasyni ok hann ba›
hann bo›a kristni á Grœnlandi5 ok ﬂá gaf konungr honum tvá menn
39 skozka. Hét karlma›rinn Haki en konan Hekja. Konungr ba› Leif taka
til ﬂessara manna ef hann ﬂyrfti skjótleiks vi›, ﬂví at ﬂau váru d‡rum
skjótari.6 ﬁessa menn fengu ﬂeir Leifr ok Eiríkr til fylg›ar vi› Karlsefni.
42 En er ﬂeir hƒf›u siglt fyrir Fur›ustrandir, ﬂá létu ﬂeir ena skozku menná land ok bá›u ﬂau hlaupa í su›rátt ok leita landskosta ok koma aptr
á›r ﬂrjú dœgr væri li›in. ﬁau váru svá búin at ﬂau hƒf›u ﬂat klæ›i er
45 ﬂau kƒllu›u kjafal;7 ﬂat var svá gjƒrt at hattr var á upp ok opit at hli›um
ok engar ermar á ok kneppt í milli fóta; helt ﬂar saman knappr ok
nezla, en ber váru ‹ﬂau› annars sta›ar. ﬁeir kƒstu›u akkerum ok lágu
48 ﬂar ﬂessa stund.
Ok er ﬂrír dagar váru li›nir hljópu ﬂau af landi ofan ok haf›i annat
ﬂeira í hendi vínber en annat hveiti sjálfsáit.8 Sag›i Karlsefni at ﬂau
51 ﬂóttusk fundit hafa landskosti gó›a. Tóku ﬂeir ﬂau á skip sitt ok fóru
lei›ar sinnar, ﬂar til er var› fjar›skorit. ﬁeir lƒg›u skipunum inn áfjƒr› ‹e›inn. ﬁar var ey ein út fyrir ok váru ﬂar straumar mikli‹r› ok um
54 eyna; ﬂeir kƒllu›u hana Straumsey. Fugl var ﬂar svá margr at trautt
mátti fœti ni›r koma í milli eggjanna. ﬁeir heldu inn me› fir›inum okkƒllu›u hann Straumsfjƒr› ok báru farminn af skipunum ok bjuggusk
57 ﬂar um. ﬁeir hƒf›u me› sér alls konar fé 9 ok leitu›u sér ﬂar landsnytja.
Fjƒll váru ﬂar ok fagrt var ﬂar um at litask. ﬁeir gá›u einskis nema at
kanna landit. ﬁar váru grƒs mikil. ﬁar váru ﬂeir um vetrinn ok gjƒr›isk
60 vetr mikill, en ekki fyrir unnit, ok gjƒr›isk illt til matarins, ok tókusk
af vei›arnar. ﬁá fóru ﬂeir út í eyna ok væntu at ﬂar mundi gefa nƒkkut
af vei›um e›a rekum. ﬁar var ﬂó lítit til matfanga en fé ﬂeira var› ﬂar
63 vel. Sí›an hétu ﬂeir á Gu›, at hann sendi ﬂeim nƒkkut til matfanga ok
var eigi svá brátt vi› látit sem ﬂeim var annt til.
33

33 fengu skjól 557. 35 ok heldu written twice in 557. 39 Hekja written‘h™kia’ or ‘hækia’ in 557. 41 Leifi 557. 42 written enu 557. 45 bjafal
557. hattr] hattrinn 557. 50 vínker 557. 51 ﬂóttisk 557. 53 fjƒr›inn
557. 61 vei›irnar 557.

XXI: Eiríks saga rau›a297ﬁórhallr hvarf á brott ok gengu menn at leita hans. Stó› ﬂat yfir ﬂrjú
dœgr í samt. Á hinu fjór›a dœgri fundu ﬂeir Karlsefni ok Bjarni hann 66
ﬁórhall á hamargnípu einni. Hann horf›i í lopt upp ok gap›i hannbæ›i augum ok munni ok nƒsum ok klóra›i sér ok kl‡pti sik ok ﬂul›inƒkkut. ﬁeir spur›u ﬂví hann væri ﬂar kominn. Hann kva› ﬂat øngu 69
skipta; ba› hann ﬂá ekki ﬂat undrask, kvezk svá lengst lifat hafa at
ﬂeir ﬂurftu ekki rá› fyrir honum at gjƒra. ﬁeir bá›u hann fara heimme› sér. Hann gjƒr›i svá.
72
Litlu sí›ar kom ﬂar hvalr, ok drifu menn til ok skáru hann, en ﬂó
kenndu menn eigi hvat hval‹a› ﬂat var. Karlsefni kunni mikla skyn áhvƒlum ok kenndi hann ﬂó eigi. ﬁenna hval su›u matsveinar ok átu af 75
ok var› ﬂó ƒllum illt af.
ﬁá gengr ﬁórhallr at ok mælti: ‘Var eigi svá at hinn rau›skeggja›ivar› drjúgari en Kristr y›varr? ﬁetta haf›a ek nú fyrir skáldskap minn, 78
er ek orta um ﬁór fulltrúann. Sjaldan hefir hann mér brug›izk.’Ok er menn vissu ﬂetta vildu øngvir n‡ta ok kƒstu›u fyrir bjƒrg
ofan ok sneru sínu máli til Gu›s miskunnar. Gaf ﬂeim ﬂá út at róa ok 81
skorti ﬂá eigi birg›ir.10
Um várit fara ﬂeir inn í Straumsfjƒr› ok hƒf›u fƒng af hvárutveggja
landinu, vei›ar af meginlandinu, eggver ok útró›ra af sjónum.1184......
Chapter 10
Karlsefni fór su›r fyrir land ok Snorri ok Bjarni ok annat li› ﬂeira.
ﬁeir fóru lengi ok til ﬂess er ﬂeir kvámu at á ﬂeiri er fell af landi ofan ok 87
í vatn ok svá til sjóvar. Eyrar váru ﬂar miklar fyrir árósinum, ok mátti
eigi komask inn í ána nema at háflœ›um. Sigldu ﬂeir Karlsefni ﬂá tiláróssins ok kƒllu›u í Hópi12 landit. ﬁar fundu ﬂeir sjálfsána hveitiakra 90
ﬂar sem læg›ir váru, en vínvi›r allt ﬂar sem holta kenndi. Hverr lœkrvar ﬂar fullr af fiskum. ﬁeir gjƒr›u ﬂar grafir sem landit mœttisk okfló›it gekk efst; ok er út fell váru helgir fiskar í grƒfunum. ﬁar var 93
mikill fjƒl›i d‡ra á skógi me› ƒllu móti. ﬁeir váru ﬂar hálfan mánu›
ok skemmtu sér ok ur›u vi› ekki varir. Fé sitt hƒf›u ﬂeir me› sér.

66 Bjarni] barma›i 557. 75 hvƒlum] hvalnum 557. 78 drjúgarr (spelt‘driugarr’) 557. á added after ek 557. 85 Chapter division, no heading 557.
88 eyjar 557. 91 vín- written twice 557.

298

XXI: Eiríks saga rau›aOk einn morgin snemma, er ﬂeir litu›usk um, sáu ﬂeir níu hú›keipa13
ok var veift trjánum af skipunum ok lét ﬂví líkast í sem í hálmﬂústum
ok ferr sólarsinnis.14 ﬁá mælti Karlsefni:
99‘Hvat mun ﬂetta tákna?’
Snorri svarar honum: ‘Vera kann a‹t› ﬂetta sé fri›artákn ok tƒkum
skjƒld hvítan ok berum í mót.’15
102
Ok svá gjƒr›u ﬂeir. ﬁá reru hinir í mót ok undru›usk ﬂá, ok gengu
ﬂeir á land. ﬁeir váru smáir menn ok illiligir ok illt hƒf›u ﬂeir hár áhƒf›i. Eyg›ir váru ﬂeir mjƒk ok brei›ir í kinnunum ok dvƒl›usk ﬂar
105 um stund ok undru›usk. Reru sí›an í brott ok su›r fyrir nesit.
ﬁeir hƒf›u gjƒrt bú›ir sínar upp frá vatninu ok váru sumir skálarnir
nær meginlandinu en sumir nær vatninu. Nú váru ﬂeir ﬂar ﬂann vetr.
108 ﬁar kom alls eng‹i› snjár ok allr féna›r gekk ﬂar úti sjálfala.
96

Chapter 11‹E›n er vára tók, geta ﬂeir at líta einn morgin snemma at fjƒl›i hú›keipa
111 reri sunnan fyrir nesit, svá margir sem kolum væri sá‹i›t ok var ﬂáveift á hverju skipi trjánum. ﬁeir brug›u ﬂá skjƒldum upp ok tóku
kaupstefnu sín á millum ok vildi ﬂat fólk helzt kaupa rautt klæ›i. ﬁeir
114 vildu ok kaupa sver› ok spjót en ﬂat bƒnnu›u ﬂeir Karlsefni ok Snorri.
ﬁeir hƒf›u ófƒlvan belg fyrir klæ›it ok tóku spannarlangt klæ›i fyrir
belg ok bundu um hƒfu› sér, ok fór svá um stund. En er minnka tók
117 klæ›it, ﬂá skáru ﬂeir í sundr svá at eigi var brei›ara en ﬂvers fingrar
breitt. Gáfu ﬂeir Skrælingar jafnmikit fyrir e›a meira.
ﬁat bar til at gri›ungr hljóp ór skógi, en16 ﬂeir Karlsefni áttu, ok gall
120 hátt vi›. ﬁeir fælask vi›, Skrælingar, ok hlaupa út á keipana ok reru
su›r fyrir land. Var› ﬂá ekki vart vi› ﬂá ﬂrjár vikur í samt. En er sjá
stund var li›in, sjá ﬂeir sunnan fara mikinn fjƒl›a skipa Skrælinga,
123 svá sem straumr stœ›i. Var ﬂá veift trjánum ƒllum rangsœlis ok ‡laallir Skrælingar hátt upp. ﬁá tóku ﬂeir17 rau›a skjƒldu ok báru í mót.
Gengu ﬂeir ﬂá saman ok bƒr›usk. Var› ﬂar skothrí› hƒr›. ﬁeir hƒf›u
126 ok valslƒngur, Skrælingar. ﬁat sjá ﬂeir Karlsefni ok Snorri at ﬂeir fœr›u
upp á stƒngum, Skrælingarnir, knƒtt mikinn ok blán at lit ok fló upp áland yfir li›it ok lét illiliga vi› ﬂar er ni›r kom. Vi› ﬂetta sló ótta129 miklum yfir Karlsefni ok á li› hans, svá at ﬂá f‡sti einskis annars en
97 veitt 557. 106 bú›ir] bygg›ir 557.
557. 111 ﬂó 557.

109 Chapter division, no heading

XXI: Eiríks saga rau›a299

halda undan ok upp me› ánni ok til hamra nƒkkurra. Veittu ﬂeir ﬂarvi›tƒku har›a.
Freydís kom út ok sá er ﬂeir heldu undan. Hon kalla›i:‘ﬁví renni ﬂér undan slíkum ‹a›uvir›ismƒnnum, svá gildir menn er
mér ﬂœtti líkligt at ﬂér mætti› drepa ﬂá svá sem búfé? Ok ef ek hef›avápn ﬂœtti mér sem ek munda betr berjask en einnhverr y›var.’ﬁeir gáfu øngvan gaum hvat sem hon sag›i. Freydís vildi fylgja
ﬂeim ok var› hon heldr sein, ﬂví at hon var eigi heil. Gekk hon ﬂá eptir
ﬂeim í skóginn er Skrælingar sœkja at henni. Hon fann fyrir sér manndau›an, ﬁorbrand Snorrason,18 ok stó› hellusteinn í hƒf›i honum.
Sver›it lá hjá honum, ok hon tók ﬂat upp ok b‡zk at verja sik me›. ﬁá
koma Skrælingar at henni. Hon tekr brjóstit upp ór serkinum ok slettir
á sver›it. ﬁeir fælask vi› ok hlaupa undan ok á skip sín ok heldu á brottu.19
ﬁeir Karlsefni finna hana ok lof‹a› happ hennar.
Tveir menn fellu af Karlsefni, en fjórir af Skrælingum, en ﬂó ur›uﬂeir20 ofrli›i bornir. Fara ﬂeir nú til bú›a sinna ok íhuga hvat fjƒlmenni
ﬂat var er at ﬂeim sótti á landinu. S‡nisk ﬂeim nú at ﬂat eina mun li›ithafa verit er á skipunum kom, en annat li›it mun hafa verit ﬂvers‡ningar.
ﬁeir Skrælingar fundu ok mann dau›an ok lá øx hjá honum. ‹Einn
ﬂeira tók upp øxina ok høggr me› tré, ok ﬂá hverr at ƒ›rum, ok ﬂótti
ﬂeim vera gersimi ok bíta vel.›21 Einn ﬂeira hjó í stein ok brotna›iøxin. ﬁótti honum ﬂá øngu n‡t, er eigi stó› vi› grjótinu, ok kasta›i ni›r.
ﬁeir ﬂóttusk nú sjá, ﬂótt ﬂar væri landskostir gó›ir, at ﬂar mundijafn‹an› ófri›r ok ótti á liggja af ﬂeim er fyrir bjuggu. Bjuggusk ﬂeir ábrott ok ætlu›u til síns lands. Sigldu ﬂeir nor›r fyrir ok fundu fimmSkrælinga í skinnhjúpum sofanda ok hƒf›u me› sér skrokka ok íd‡ramerg dreyra blandinn. Virtu ﬂeir svá at ﬂeir mundu gjƒrvir af
landinu. ﬁeir drápu ﬂá.
Sí›an fundu ﬂeir nes eitt ok ‹á› fjƒl›a d‡ra. Ok ﬂann veg var nesit atsjá sem mykiskán væri, af ﬂví at d‡rin lágu ﬂar um vetrna.
Nú koma ﬂeir í Straumsfjƒr› ok er ﬂar alls gnóttir. Er ﬂat sumra
manna sƒgn at ﬂau Bjarni ok Freydís22 hafi ﬂar eptir verit ok tíu tigir
manna me› ﬂeim ok hafi eigi farit lengra, en ﬂeir Karlsefni ok Snorrihƒf›u su›r farit ok fjórir tigir manna ok hafi eigi lengr verit í Hópi envart tvá mánu›u ok hafi hit sama sumar aptr komit.
154 en ﬂeir 557. 159 fjƒl›i 557. written vag 557. 161 gnóttir] konar 557.
164, 165 hafi] haf›ir 557.

132

135

138

141

144

147

150

153

156

159

162

165

300

XXI: Eiríks saga rau›aKarlsefni fór á einu skipi at leita ﬁórhalls,23 en li›it var eptir, ok fóru
ﬂeir nor›r fyrir Kjalarnes, ok berr ﬂá fyrir vestan fram ok var landit á
168 bakbor›a ﬂeim. ﬁar váru ey›imerkr einar. Ok er ﬂeir hƒf›u lengi farit
fellr ‹á› af landi ofan ór austri ok í vestr. ﬁeir lƒg‹››u inn í árósinn oklágu vi› hinn sy›ra bakkann.
171‹Chapter 12›

ﬁat var einn morgin. Sjá ﬂeir Karlsefni fyrir ofan rjó›rit flekk nƒkkurnsvá sem glita›i vi› ﬂeim ok œptu ﬂeir á. ﬁat hrœr›isk ok var ﬂat
174 einfœtingr ok sk‡zk ofan ﬂangat sem ﬂeir lágu. ﬁorvaldr, son Eiríks
hins rau›a, sat vi› st‡ri ok skaut einfœtingr ƒr í smáﬂarma honum.
ﬁorvaldr dró út ƒrina ok mælti:177‘Feitt er um ístruna. Gott land hƒfum vér fengit kostum en ﬂó megum
vér varla njóta.’ﬁorvaldr dó af sári ﬂessu litlu sí›ar. ﬁá hleypr einfœtingr á braut ok
180 nor›r aptr. ﬁeir hljópu eptir einfœtingi ok sáu hann stundum. Ok ﬂvínæst sem hann leita›i undan, hljóp hann út á vág einn. ﬁá hurfu ﬂeir aptr.
ﬁá kva› einn ma›r kvi›ling ﬂenna:
183

186

189

Eltu seggir,
allsatt var ﬂat,
einn einfœting
ofan til strandar.
En kynligr ma›r
kosta›i rásar
hart of stopi‹r›.
Heyr›u, Karlsefni.

ﬁeir fóru ﬂá í brott ok nor›r aptr ok ﬂóttusk sjá Einfœtingaland.24 Vildu
192 ﬂeir ﬂá eigi lengr hætta li›i sínu. ﬁeir ætlu›u ƒll ‹ein› fjƒll, ﬂau er í
Hópi váru ok ‹ﬂessi› er ‹nú› fundu ﬂeir. Fóru ﬂeir aptr ok váru í
Straumsfir›i hinn ﬂri›ja vetr.
169 lágu inn í árósinum 557. 171 No chapter division or heading in 557.
175–80 sat . . . aptr] ﬁá mælti ﬁorvaldr: ‘Gott land hƒfum vér fengit.’ ﬁáhleypr einfœtingrinn á brott ok nor›r aptr ok skaut á›r í smáﬂarma á ﬁorvaldi.
Hann dró út ƒrina. ﬁá mælti ﬁorvaldr: ‘Feitt er um ístruna.’ 577. 180–81 ﬂvínæst] editorial conjecture; ﬂótti 557. 192 557 adds at kanna after ætlu›u.
193 ﬂeir before fundu 557. 194 vetr] written vintr 557. Cf. p. 275, no. 6 above.

XXI: Eiríks saga rau›a301

Gengu menn ﬂá mjƒk sleitum. Sóttu ‹ﬂeir› er kvánlausir váru í hendr
ﬂeim er kvánga›ir váru. ﬁar kom til hit fyrsta haust Snorri, son
Karlsefnis, ok var hann ‹ﬂá ﬂrívetr› er ﬂeir fóru á brott.25
Hƒf›u ﬂeir sunnanve›r ok hittu Markland ok fundu Skrælinga fimm;
var einn skeggja›r ok tvær konur, bƒrn tvau. Tóku ﬂeir Karlsefni til
sveinanna26 en hitt komsk undan ok sukku í jƒr› ni›r. En sveinanahƒf›u ﬂeir me› sér ok kenndu ﬂeim mál ok váru skír›ir. ﬁeir nefndu
mó›ur sína Vætildi ok ‹fƒ›ur› Óvægi. ﬁeir sƒg›u at konungar stjórnu›uSkrælingalandi. Hét annarr Avaldamon, en annarr hét Valdidida.27 ﬁeir
kvá›u ﬂar engi hús ok lágu menn í hellum e›a holum. ﬁeir sƒg›u landﬂar ƒ›ru megin gagnvart sínu landi ok gengu menn ﬂar í hvítum klæ›umok œptu hátt ok báru stangir ok fóru me› flíkr. ﬁat ætla menn Hvítramannaland.28
Nú kvámu ﬂeir til Grœnlands ok eru me› Eiríki rau›a um vetrinn.29

197 hann] ﬂar ﬂann 557.

205 línu 557.

195

198

201

204

207

302

XXI: Eiríks saga rau›aNotes

1 This is the first mention of Vínland in Eiríks saga rau›a. The

subsequent account of ﬁorfinnr karlsefni’s voyage contains various
place-names, as follows: (a) (referring to Greenland and in addition to
the term Grœnland itself): Vestribygg› (line 20; cf. notes 27 and 29 to
Text VIII above), Bjarneyjar (lines 20, 21); (b) (referring apparently
to lands in the west beyond Greenland): Vínland (lines 2, 4), Helluland(line 25), Bjarney (line 28), Markland (lines 29, 198) , Kjalarnes (lines
33, 167), Fur›ustrandir (lines 34, 42), Straumsey (line 54), Straumsfjƒr›r (lines 56, 83, 161, 194), Hóp (lines 90, 193), Einfœtingaland(line 191), Skrælingaland (line 203), Hvítramannaland (lines 206–07).
544 also refers to Írland it mikla (cf. note 28 below). In connection
with the names listed under (b), two issues arise: (i) how far they were
genuine place-names used for localities on the North American
continent or islands off it, and (ii) how far any of those that are genuine
can be identified with actual places or areas in North America. As to(i), we can be relatively certain that e.g. Markland was a genuine placename and that e.g. Einfœtingaland was not (cf. note 24 below). Cf.
also note 4 below. In connection with (ii), it should be noted that it isextremely difficult or impossible to locate any of the place-names which
may be genuine with any degree of certainty. This applies, for example,
to Kjalarnes, found both in Eiríks saga rau›a and in Grœnlendinga
saga ch. 4. On the other hand, it is quite likely that the place-nameMarkland was used for Labrador. And for some conjecture as to where
Hóp could have been, see note 12 below. Cf. Perkins (2004, 55–57).
2 ﬁórhallr vei›ima›r is obviously a fictional character. He conforms to

the stereotype of the recalcitrant and often mischievous heathen who
sometimes appears in the sagas and comes to bad end. One of his
main roles in the narrative of Eiríks saga rau›a is to act as a vehicle
for two verses in ch. 9, which in turn have their own special function(cf. note 11 below). The word vei›ima›r could be used of bothfishermen and hunters but was particularly used of whalers. Cf. Perkins(1976, 65–66, 70).
3 Lack of concord between verb and subject is found also in lines 32

and 161; this is not all that uncommon in Old Norse when the subject

XXI: Eiríks saga rau›a303

follows the verb, cf. Text XXIV, lines 4, 14–17, 28–29, 51–52 andnote 2 below and NION I, 3.9.8.2.
4 It seems unlikely that the word Fur›ustrandir was ever used by the

Norsemen as a place-name for any locality or geographical feature in
North America. The reason the author of Eiríks saga rau›a had for
placing these beaches of such length between Greenland and Vínland
may have been to represent Vínland as much further south and thus
much closer to Africa than it really was. This may have been in linewith current geographical theory which regarded Vínland as an extension of Africa (cf. the geographical treatise (landal‡sing) mentioned
in the introduction, p. 287 above). This may also explain why the sagaplaced a uniped in Vínland; cf. lines 173–81 and note 24 below. But
any certainty on a matter like this is impossible. See further Perkins(1976, particularly pp. 82–85).
5 The account (in Eiríks saga rau›a ch. 5) of King Óláfr Tryggvason(on whom see note 33 to Text VIII above) bidding Leifr preach
Christianity in Greenland and of Leifr subsequently fulfilling thismission is in all probability entirely unhistorical. Cf. HOIC 100–01;Ólafur Halldórsson (1981).
6 The adjective skozkr is sometimes used in Icelandic sources in thesense ‘Irish’ and this meaning may be intended here. Skozkir mennseem to have had a reputation for being fleet-footed; cf. Eyrbyggjasaga, ch. 18 (ÍF IV 1985, 33) where we are told of a man called Nagli,
described as mikill ma›r ok fóthvatr and skozkr at kyni. Cf. Nansen(1911, I 339–43); Jones (1986, 283–85).
7 Andrew Breeze (1998, 5–6) argues that kjafal is a corruption of anearly Irish word cochall (itself from Latin cucullus) which has a senseof ‘cowl, hood, hooded cloak’. On 557’s reading bjafal, cf. ÍF IV (1985,
424, note 10), and its reading vínker (an error for vínber) in line 50 below.
8 Adam of Bremen (see Introduction above), Grœnlendinga saga andEiríks saga rau›a all imply that grapes grew in the place called Vínland(Adam of Bremen calls it Winland) and Adam and Grœnlendinga saga
(ÍF IV 1985, 253) more or less specifically connect the name given to304

XXI: Eiríks saga rau›athe country with the presence of grapes there. There has been muchdiscussion of the grapes of Vínland. A number of scholars have argued
that the Norsemen did not find wild grapes in North America and that
their appearance in the sources must have some other explanation. It
has, for example, been suggested that the accounts of grapes are purely
literary borrowings and go back to accounts of the Insulae Fortunatae(or similar legendary places) in Isidor of Seville’s Etymologiae andclassical sources (cf. Nansen 1911, I 345–84; II 1–65). But such arguments
are to some extent anticipated and countered by, for instance, Adam’s
own statement on this matter. Nor is there any good reason for believingthat berries of some sort (rather then grapes proper) are referred to.
And an interpretation of the first element of the name Vínland as
originally the word vin f. (with a short vowel; cf. C–V 707) meaning‘pasture’, may be confidently dismissed. Further, there is probably nogood reason for rejecting the sources’ statement on this matter. Wild
grapes (e.g. riverbank grapes, Vitis riparia) do grow in eastern North
America, at present as far north as the St Lawrence River and New
Brunswick. In the more favourable climatic conditions of the Middle
Ages they were perhaps to be found rather further north than they aretoday. They were remarked upon by some of the early post-Columbian
explorers of the area, for example Jacques Cartier, who explored the
St Lawrence in the 1530s (cf. Gathorne-Hardy 1921, 154–59; Jones
1986, 123–24). Thus the Norsemen could well have reached the areas
where grapes grew. The references to self-sown wheat (hveiti sjálfsáit
in line 50, sjálfsánir hveitiakrar in line 90; cf. Adam of Bremen’s‘unsown crops’) is more difficult to explain and there is no mention of
it in Grœnlendinga saga. It is true that Cartier reports fields of wild
cereals on the St Lawrence. But identification with any known North
American plant appears rather uncertain. The suggestion that the accountsof wheat in Vínland were indeed literary borrowings from legends ofthe Insulae Fortunatae (or similar places) to pair with its grapes, which
may have existed in reality, is not implausible. Cf. Perkins (2004, 59–60).
9 Both Eiríks saga rau›a and Grœnlendinga saga imply that theNorsemen took livestock with them on their expeditions to Vínland(cf. lines 95 and 119–20). There is, however, little or no archaeologicalevidence for this.

XXI: Eiríks saga rau›a305

10 The implication of the saga’s account here is clearly that bycomposing poetry in honour of his patron ﬁórr (cf. ﬁórr fulltrúinn,line 79), ﬁórhallr has persuaded the god to strand a whale as food forthe starving company. Certainly there is evidence elsewhere that praisepoetry was composed in honour of ﬁórr, that the god was thought of as
something of a hunter and killer of whales and that he had the control
over wind and wave necessary to beach a whale. But the Norsemen
had various other forms of magic for luring fish and other sea-animals(e.g. seals) to land as well. For example, Adam of Bremen tells how
the inhabitants of northernmost Norway employ ‘a powerful mumblingof words’ to draw whales to land. Nor was such magic the preserve of
the Norsemen: for example, in Coon (1974, 129–30) there is a description of how a whale ritualist of the Nootka tribe of Indians (Vancouver
Island) sought to get whales to drift ashore by a grisly process involving
a human corpse. This he did after four days of ritual fasting in a remoteshrine overlooking the sea from which whales could be seen. See further
on this passage in Eiríks saga rau›a, Perkins (2000, 223–30).
11 In ch. 9 of Eiríks saga rau›a (omitted in the present selection) weare told how ﬁórhallr vei›ima›r, apparently disappointed by theabsence of wine at Straumsfjƒr›r, breaks away from the main
expedition with nine others and heads north in search of Vínland. He
is storm-driven by a westerly wind across to Ireland and there is brutallybeaten and enslaved and dies. Before he sets sail, two stanzas indróttkvætt are quoted, which ﬁórhallr is said to have declaimed. In thefirst of these, which the prose tells us was uttered as ﬁórhallr wascarrying water on board his ship, he complains that despite being
promised the finest drink, no wine has touched his lips; he has rather
to wield a bucket. The second verse is an exhortation to put out to sea
and to leave others boiling whales on Fur›ustrandir, though in theprose of the saga, it is in Straumsfjƒr›r that meat from the stranded
whale is cooked. An older school of saga-criticism, which took thesagas far more seriously as history than is now customary, believedthat these two verses were composed more or less under the circumstances described in the saga. They have even been claimed to be among‘the first recorded American poetry’. But in fact it is very unlikely thatthe occasion for the original composition of the verses was that

306

XXI: Eiríks saga rau›adescribed in the prose of the saga and, as remarked in note 2 above,ﬁórhallr vei›ima›r is not to be regarded as a historical character. On
the other hand, they were probably not composed by the author of thesaga either and we can only guess at the circumstances of their origin.
It is possible that the first verse was composed while the bailing of aship was in progress. The second verse may have been used amongst
groups of men engaged in hunting whales and processing their blubber(cf. Perkins 1976, 69–82). At all events, although the author of thesaga probably formed his fictitious narrative partly to fit these verses,
he also cunningly intended his audience to take them as corroborationof such details of his narrative as ﬁórhallr’s disappointment at the lackof wine at Straumsfjƒr›r and the Fur›ustrandir of lines 34 and 42,
which had their own special function in his account (cf. note 4 above).
12 Place-names are often presented in this way in Old Norse writings(i.e. in the dative case preceded by the preposition normally used withthem); cf. Text XV:33–34 above and NION I, 3.1.8 (p. 54).
While attempting to locate the various places mentioned in the
Vínland Sagas is a hazardous business (cf. note 1 above), it is not
impossible that Hóp was a genuine place-name and also not impossiblethat it referred to a locality on the south-western side of the Gulf of St
Lawrence, more specifically around the mouth of the Miramichi Riverin New Brunswick. Here there are lagoons, sheltered from the sea byprotective sandbars, to which the Old Norse word hóp might beapplicable (see C–V 281; cf. Wallace 2003, 381 for an aerial
photograph). It is in this area that some scholars would locate Vínland(e.g. Ferguson 2001). Wild grapes are found there, and also the placename Baie du Vin apparently given by post-Columbian French settlers
referring to them (cf. Crozier 2003, 336). A large concentration ofMicmac Indians was also to be found there (cf. note 13 below).
Nevertheless, no certain identification of Hóp can be made on the basisof these facts.
13 With the arrival of these nine skin boats (hú›keipar) at Hóp, theSkrælingar are introduced into Eiríks saga rau›a and later in the saga(lines 153–54) we are told that it is fear of Skræling hostility thatcauses Karlsefni and his band to abandon their attempt to settle in
Vínland. The Skrælingar are mentioned in various other Old NorseXXI: Eiríks saga rau›a307

sources, including Ari’s Íslendingabók (see Text VIII, lines 69–71),Grœnlendinga saga and Historia Norwegiae (see History of Norway
2001, 3). The etymology of the word Skrælingar is uncertain but itvery probably had pejorative connotations. The Norsemen certainly
used it of the Inuit (Eskimo) peoples they came into contact with inGreenland. But they doubtless also had some contact with Native
American (American Indian) peoples as well as Inuit in the parts of
the North American mainland (with Newfoundland) they visited, andthey appear to have used the word also of them. The accounts ofSkrælingar in Eiríks saga rau›a and in Grœnlendinga saga may reflect
such encounters. There seem to have been Dorset Inuit at least in
Labrador at the time. And the Native American peoples the Norsemen
might have come across could have been (the ancestors of) the Innu
in Labrador, the Beothucks (now extinct) in Newfoundland or theMicmacs in Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island and New Brunswick.
Cf. Odess et al. (2000); McAleese (2003).
The Norsemen would have regarded the hú›keipr (‘skin boat’) as
the traditional vessel of Skrælingar. One might here here think first of
the umiaks of the Inuit rather than Indian canoes made of birch-bark.
But both the Beothucks and the Micmacs seem to have had canoes covered
with moose or deer skins and were also practised canoeists, and at
least the Micmacs were traders and evidently owned canoes in largish
numbers (cf. lines 110–11 and 122–23). See also note 30 to Text VIII.
Modern scholarship has expended much effort and ingenuity on
attempting to square Norse accounts of the Skrælingar in the two
Vínland sagas with what is otherwise known about the Inuit and Native
Americans who inhabited these parts (cf. e.g. Gathorne-Hardy 1921,
173–95 for a traditional approach; and for a more modern one, Sverrir
Jakobsson 2001). There is much that seems realistic in the saga’s
descriptions. For example, the account of trade between the Norsemen
and Skrælingar (lines 112–18) seems fairly true to life. The Skræling
interest in red cloth makes one think of the Beothuks of Newfoundlandwhose predilection for the colour red probably gave rise to theexpression ‘Red Indians’. The incident described in lines 149–52 gives
quite a realistic picture of a person unacquainted with iron weapons(as both the Native Americans and Inuit of the area would have been;
cf. lines 113–14). The d‡ramergr dreyra blandinn (‘marrow fromanimal bones mixed with blood’) which the five sleeping Skrælingar

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XXI: Eiríks saga rau›ahave with them in bark containers (lines 155–57) has been interpreted
as some form of pemmican used as iron rations by certain Native
American tribes while out hunting (cf. Gathorne-Hardy 1921, 179).
Much less convincingly, the large sphere used as a weapon by theSkrælingar (lines 126–28) has been compared with some sort of ballista
thought to have been used by an Algonquin people (cf. ION 219, note
to lines 378–81). Unfortunately, the physical description of theSkrælingar in lines 103–04 (where 544 has svartir for 557’s smáir) is
hardly illuminating. And there are certainly various suspect elementsin the accounts of the Skrælingar in Eiríks saga. For example, thenames given to four of them in lines 201–03 were clearly invented on
the basis of Norse name-elements or other European names (cf. note
27 below). The accounts of them in Eiríks saga could well be influenced
by stories of exotic peoples encountered by Norsemen on their journeys
east of Scandinavia (e.g. in Muslim countries). And when we find that
the Skræling arrow which kills ﬁorvaldr Eiríksson in ch. 4 of Grœnlendinga saga is shot by a uniped in ch. 12 of Eiríks saga rau›a, we
see that the inhabitants of Norse America were in danger of joining
the ranks of the fantastic peoples known to saga-authors from thelearned literature of medieval Europe.
14 As in other cultures, in the Old Norse world anticlockwise motion(cf. rangsœlis, line 123) had sinister or baleful associations. Conversely,
clockwise motion (sólarsinnis) would have been regarded as auspicious
and conducive to good fortune.
15 We hear elsewhere of the display of white shields and red shields(line 124) as tokens of peace and hostility respectively (cf. the terms
fri›skjƒldr, ‘peace-shield’ and herskjƒldr, ‘war-shield’); cf. also line
112 above and Text VI above, line 104 and note 11. But for red shields
as ‘peace-shields, see Shetelig and Falk (1937, 401).
16 en (er in 544) here looks as though it might be being used as arelative pronoun; cf. ÍF IV (1985, 429, note 4); C–V 128. But in thisinstance at any rate, it is better regarded as anacoluthon (‘— andKarlsefni and his people owned it —’).
17 This pronoun presumably refers to the Norsemen.

XXI: Eiríks saga rau›a309

18 It is not certain who is referred to here. It is possible that ﬁorbrandr

Snorrason is an error for Snorri ﬁorbrandsson, mentioned earlier asﬁorfinnr karlefni’s partner and one of the leaders of the expedition(e.g. lines 3, 86, 100, 114). Certainly we never hear what eventuallybecame of Snorri ﬁorbrandsson at the end of the saga (though cf. lines
161–65). Alternatively (but perhaps less probably), we must assume
that Snorri ﬁorbrandsson had with him a son called ﬁorbrandr on the
expedition and that it is he who is referred to here, although he has notbeen mentioned earlier (cf. Introduction, p. 291 above). See also ÍFIV (1985, 383–84 and 437); Perkins (2004, 50–51).
19 This episode, in which Freydís appears to put the Skrælingar pursuing

her to flight by slapping her naked breast with a sword, has mystified
commentators. For discussion, cf. Barnes (2001, 27–30 and references).
20 This pronoun refers to Karlsefni and his band; cf. Jansson (1945,

73, 163–64, 167).
21 The words in brackets are supplied here from 544. Sven B. F. Jansson(1944, 144; cf. 73) regarded them as an addition by the redactor of theversion in 544, but Ólafur Halldórsson (ÍF IV 1985, 430, note 11) is
probably right in thinking that they (or words of similar meaning)were omitted by the scribe of 557.
22 544 has Gu›rí›r, which is perhaps more logical. Gu›rí›r ﬁorbjarnar-

dóttir, wife of ﬁorfinnr karlsefni, plays a major part in both Eiríks
saga rau›a and Grœnlendinga saga and is in all probability a historicalfigure. She was mother of the Snorri who was born on this expedition(cf. lines 196–97).
23 Cf. note 11 above.
24 In chapter 4 of Grœnlendinga saga (ÍF IV 1985, 256), ﬁorvaldr, sonof Eiríkr rau›i, dies from an arrow-wound sustained in a skirmish with
the Skrælingar; this account may even have some basis in historicalfact (cf. Perkins 2004, 47 and 61). Here in ch. 12 of Eiríks saga rau›a,
it is a uniped who shoots the fatal arrow into ﬁorvaldr’s entrails. The
most plausible explanation for the introduction of this uniped is that

310

XXI: Eiríks saga rau›aaccording to medieval Icelandic notions of geography Vínland wasthought to be an extension of Africa and unipeds were believed to livein Africa (cf. Jones 1986, 285; Magnusson and Hermann Pálsson 1965,
15 and 39; Barnes 2001, 27–28; see p. 281 above). The verse about
the uniped (lines 183–90) has been the subject of an essay by Ian
McDougall (1997), who produces good reasons for believing that it isan adaptation of a riddle about a pen. The uniped (einfœtingr) represents
the pen itself and the men (seggir) who chase it are the fingers of thehand holding it; the ‘shore’ (strƒnd) down to which the men chase thepen would be the bottom margin of the page or the writing surface ingeneral. McDougall adduces parallels from other Icelandic and Old
English riddles. The verse might have been introduced by the authorof the saga to give support to the place-name Einfœtingaland, which
is probably fictitious and may even have been invented by the authorof the saga himself (cf. notes 1, 4 and 11 above). ﬁorvaldr’s words inlines 177–78 resemble those attributed to ﬁormó›r Kolbrúnarskáld
Bersason, mortally wounded by an arrow at the Battle of Stiklarsta›ir(Stiklestad) (see ÍF XXVII 393; VI 276; Hkr 520–21; cf. also ION
219, note to line 434; Perkins 1976, 87, note 46).
25 Snorri, like his father ﬁorfinnr karlsefni and mother Gu›rí›rﬁorbjarnardóttir, may have been a historical figure and was quitepossibly the first European known by name to have been born on the
North American mainland, or at any rate in Newfoundland (cf. note
22 above; Perkins 2004, 64).
26 This story, in which two Skræling boys are captured and taken backto Greenland, is perhaps not unrealistic. Jacques Cartier, the postColumbian explorer of the St Lawrence, returned to France with two
captured natives after his first voyage to these parts in 1534. For further
similar instances, see Baitsholts (2003, 366 and references there).
27 The names of the mother and father of the Skræling boys areinventions made up from Norse words or name-elements (cf. Barnes
2001, 30, note 81; Perkins 2004, 51–53). Vætildr: vættr f. means ‘spirit’;(h)ildr is common as the second element in a number of Norse women’snames (e.g. Bryn(h)ildr); Óvægir is related to the adjectives óvægr,‘unmerciful’ and óvæginn, ‘unyielding’ (cf. the attested personal name

XXI: Eiríks saga rau›a311

Óﬂyrmir related to óﬂyrmir, ‘merciless man’ and óﬂyrmiligr,‘unmerciful, harsh’). And the names of the two kings whom the boys
say rule Skrælingaland, Avaldamon and Valdidida (in 557; Avaldidida
in 544), are probably based on those of the king of Gar›aríki, Valdamarr
or Valdimarr, and his consort Allogía (mentioned, for example, inOddrÓT 23). It has been suggested that the boys’ report that Skrælingaland was ruled by two kings may reflect the situation in Norway
between 1261 and 1263: Hákon Hákonarson was king 1217–63, while
his son Magnús was crowned in 1261 and died in 1280 (see Helgi
Gu›mundsson 1997, 63, note 42).
28 544 adds e›a Írland it mikla ‘or Ireland the Great’ after Hvítramanna-land. Írland it mikla is also mentioned in Landnámabók (ÍF I, 162; cf.
BS 61). There we are told that it lay six days’ sailing (sex dœgra sigling)west of Ireland and near Vínland.
29 The account of ﬁorfinnr’s expedition to Vínland finishes here. The

two following chapters (13 and 14) into which the remainder of the saga
is conventionally divided tell how the ship captained by Bjarni Grímólfsson (cf. lines 5 and 162 above) sinks under dramatic circumstances(ch. 13), and of Karlsefni and Gu›rí›r’s return to Iceland and theirdescendants. 544 concludes with a genealogy down to Haukr Erlendsson written in in Haukr’s own hand.

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XXI: Eiríks saga rau›aXXII: ÓLÁFS RÍMA HARALDSSONAR
Óláfs ríma Haraldssonar was composed c.1350–70, and is preservedin the late fourteenth-century manuscript known as Flateyjarbók (GKS
1005 fol.). The poem is the earliest surviving example of what became
the most popular literary genre in Iceland between the fifteenth andnineteenth centuries. Rímur are narrative poems based, in almost every
case, on prose sources. They are sometimes referred to as ‘metricalromances’ in English; nearly eighty rímur survive from before 1600,
and about half of these are based on riddarasögur, with about anotherquarter of the corpus based on fornaldarsögur. Óláfs ríma is one of
only nine pre-1600 rímur based on Íslendingasögur or (as here)
konungasögur. It is also an unusually short example of the genre:
most rímur consist of several cantos or fits using different metricalforms, but Óláfs ríma consists of a single ríma of sixty-five stanzas.
Unlike many later examples of the genre, Óláfs ríma does not begin
with a mansƒngr (literally, ‘love song’), a non-narrative introductionin the tradition of courtly love poetry.
Óláfs ríma is composed in feyrskeytt, the most common ríma stanza
form. The first and third lines of each quatrain contain four stressedsyllables, any two of which (other than the first and second) alliteratewith one another. The second and fourth lines of the quatrain contain
three stressed syllables, of which the first in each line alliterates withthe two alliterating stresses of the preceding odd-numbered line. In
addition, the quatrain rhymes abab; the a rhymes are monosyllabic
and the b rhymes trochaic.
Foreign literary traditions influenced the development of the rímur(the name of the genre is related to French rime, and already in thisfirst example of the genre there is some emphasis on courtesy (st.
31), and warriors are in one place (st. 24) referred to as riddarar‘knights’), but the influence of skaldic and eddic poetry is readily
apparent, not least in the characteristically native poetic vocabulary
employed, though there are also the loan-words fánga, klókr and júngr(Low German), pín (Old Saxon, Old English), strí› in the sense ‘warfare’(Old Saxon). Heiti and kennings are more common in later rímur thanin Óláfs ríma, but poetic diction employed in the poem includes fifteen
heiti for ‘king’, and smaller numbers for ‘man/warrior’, ‘battle’, and‘sword’. The few kennings in Óláfs ríma are all two-element onlyand simple, conventional ones found frequently in skaldic battle-

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XXII: Óláfs ríma Haraldssonar

poetry; there are six for ‘battle’ (randa glam (st. 38), darra él (st. 41),
randa regn (st. 46), darra ﬂing (st. 54), and odda hrí› and málma
leikr (st. 55; maybe also hjƒrva gnau›, st. 56), one for ‘sword’ (undana›r, st. 40), one for ‘man/warrior’ (ƒrva mei›r, st. 2), and one for‘breast’ or ‘heart, mind’ (hyggju strendr, st. 19). As Vésteinn Ólason
notes (1985, 9), the kenning fálu hestr (‘horse of a giantess’ = wolf)in stanza 41 is the only one in the poem to employ a mythologicalallusion.
Óláfs ríma is about an important saint, but the poet makes little useof the Christian skaldic diction developed in medieval Icelandic
religious poetry; examples include dróttinn himna hallar (‘Lord of
the heavenly mansion’; st. 2), himna gramr (‘King of heavens’; st.
51); note also bragníngr allra ﬂjó›a (‘king of all peoples’; st. 65) andthe description of Óláfr as Kristz et bjarta blóm (‘the bright flower ofChrist’; st. 62). But although the vocabulary of Óláfs ríma is influenced
by that of skaldic poetry, the word order is much simpler, and according
to Vésteinn Ólason 1985, 9, often ‘comes close to that of the spoken
language’.
The poem celebrates St Óláfr, King of Norway (r. 1015–30). It begins
with general praise of his achievements, concentrates mainly on an
account of events just before and during the Battle of Stiklasta›ir, inwhich he was killed by rebellious subjects, and ends (after brief
references to his burial, translation and posthumous miracles) with arequest that the saint intercede for the poet. St Óláfr, protomartyr andpatron of Norway, was a figure of immense religious and ideologicalimportance in medieval Norway and Iceland. He was the subject of awide range of written texts, including Latin hagiography and historical
writing, skaldic battle-poetry, hagiographic skaldic verse, andprosimetric sagas (for a survey of early Norwegian and Icelandic texts
about St Óláfr see Kunin and Phelpstead 2001, xxvi–xli). The highpoint of this textual tradition is Snorri Sturluson’s Óláfs saga helga,
originally composed as an independent saga and later incorporated in
his Heimskringla. Snorri’s saga provided the source material for Óláfs
ríma and so it is the version of the saint’s life referred to in the notes
to the text below.
The continuing importance of St Óláfr in the later Middle Ages is
attested by his prominence in Flateyjarbók, in which Óláfs ríma
immediately follows Einarr Skúlason’s Geisli (1152–53), the skaldic

XXII: Óláfs ríma Haraldssonar

315

poem in praise of Óláfr composed to celebrate the establishment ofan archiepiscopal see at his shrine in Trondheim. Flateyjarbók also
includes a much-augmented version of Óláfs saga helga. The manuscript ascribes Óláfs ríma to Einarr Gilsson, who was briefly a lƒgma›r(law-man, one of the two highest government officials in Iceland) in
the north and west of Iceland in the late 1360s. It has been suggested
that Einarr was a friend of Jón Hákonarson, the man who commissioned
Flateyjarbók, and that Óláfs ríma might have been copied into
Flateyjarbók from the poet’s autograph manuscript (see Björn K.
ﬁórólfsson 1934, 298–99; Rowe 2005, 299). Óláfs ríma and Geisli
were added to the beginning of Flateyjarbók by its second scribe,
Magnús ﬁórhallsson, c.1390. Rowe argues that the inclusion of Óláfs
ríma in the manuscript ‘underscores the points made by the inclusionof Geisli: the reader’s focus should be on St Óláfr (and specificallyon Óláfr as a martyr and saint, rather than as a king), and the manuscript should contain as many kinds of poetry as possible’ (2005, 300).
This edition of Óláfs ríma has been normalised from Finnur Jónsson’s text (1905, 1–9); for a facsimile of Flateyjarbók see CCIMAXX. One notable linguistic feature commonly found in the rímur thathas been retained in this edition is the frequent apocope of the strong
masculine nominative inflectional ending -r; other features of fourteenthcentury Icelandic in general that are here retained are the diphthongisation or lengthening of short vowels before -ng and lowering of á to
ó after v (except where á is required by the rhyme).

BibliographyÁgrip af Nóregskonungasƒgum: A Twelfth-Century Synoptic History of theKings of Norway, ed. M. J. Driscoll (1995).
Björn K. ﬁórólfsson, Rímur fyrir 1600 (1934).
William A. Craigie, Specimens of Icelandic Rímur from the Fourteenth to
the Nineteenth Century/S‡nisbók íslenzkra rímna frá upphafi rímnakvedskapar til loka nítjándu aldar, 3 vols (1952).
Finnur Jónsson, ed., Rímnasafn: Samling af de ældste islandske rimer, 2 vols,
Samfund til udgivelse af gammel nordisk litteratur 35 (1905–22).
Peter A. Jorgensen, ‘Rímur’. In MS 536–37.
Devra Kunin, tr., and Carl Phelpstead, ed., A History of Norway and thePassion and Miracles of the Blessed Óláfr (2001).

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Elizabeth Ashman Rowe, The Development of Flateyjarbók: Iceland andthe Norwegian Dynastic Crisis of 1389 (2005).
Snorri Sturluson, Heimskringla, ed. Bjarni A›albjanarson. In ÍF XXVI–XXVIII; translated in Hkr.
Snorri Sturluson, Óláfs saga helga. In ÍF XXVII, II 3–415.
Vésteinn Ólason, ‘Kve›i› um Ólaf helga: Samanbur›ur ﬂriggja íslenskra
bókmenntagreina frá lokum mi›alda,’ Skirnir 157 (1983), 48–63.
Vésteinn Ólason, ‘Saint Olaf in Late Medieval Icelandic Poetry’. In Carol L.
Edwards and Kathleen E. B. Manley, eds, Narrative Folksong, New
Directions: Essays in Appreciation of W. Edson Richmond (1985), 2–17.

XXII: Óláfs ríma Haraldssonar
XXII: ÓLÁFS RÍMA HARALDSSONAR
Óláfs ríma Haraldzsonar er Einar Gilsson kva›
1.

Óláfr kóngr ƒrr ok frí›rátti Noregi at rá›a;gramr var æ vi› bragna blí›r,borinn til sigrs ok ná›a.

2.

Dƒglíng helt svó d‡ran hei›rdróttni himna hallar;
eingi sk‡‹r›ir ƒrva mei›rƒ›língs fræg›ir allar.

3.

Mildíng haf›i mentir ﬂær,er mestar vóru í heimi;
hvergi frægra hilmi fær
hvórki af gle›i né seimi.

4.

Fimm hefir kóngr kristnat lƒnd,kann ek ƒll at nefna;1gramr vill jafnan rjó›a rƒndok rángan úsi› hefna.

5.

Rán ok stuldi refsti hannok ræktar stjórn í landi;
hilmir lag›i á hei›ni bannok hefndi stórt me› brandi.

6.

Gramr nam lƒgmál setja svá
at seggir ﬂol‹d›u valla;
dáligan lét hann dau›a fá
dróttinssvikara alla.

7.

Rekkar ‡f›uz ræsi á mót
ok rétti har›la sƒnnum;
vóru kóngi heimsklig hót
hafin af sjálfs síns mƒnnum.

317

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XXII: Óláfs ríma Haraldssonar
8. Hárekr var fyrir brƒgnum bystr,
búinn at strí›a stilli;ﬁórir hundr er ﬂann veg lystr,
ﬂri›i var Kálfr enn illi.2
9. Kálfr var fyrr me› kóngi sákærr í ƒllum rá›um;
nú er hann horfinn hilmi frá,hei›ri sviptr ok dá›um.
10. ﬁrændir geingu ﬁóri á hƒnd,ﬂeim var ljúft at herja;
háleysk ﬂjó› vill rjó›a rƒndok ríkit kóngi verja.
11. Fylkir ríkr, frægr ok mildr
fréttir safna› ﬂenna;ﬂá vill hilmir hraustr ok gildr
hvergi undan renna.
12. Bragníng lætr byrja fer›
bónda3 múg í móti;hann vill jafnan hræra sver›
ok her›a skot me› spjóti.
13. Siklíng haf›i safnat ﬂá
sínum gƒrpum snjƒllum;
lof›úngs kann ek l‡›i at tjá,lángt bar gramr af ƒllum.
14. Hl‡ri kóngs var har›la júngr,hann vil ek fyrstan nefna,
víst nam Haraldr4 ﬂykkju ﬂúngrﬁrændum strí› at hefna.
15. ‘Get ek ei hrotta hƒggit rƒnd,’Haraldr talar vi› garpa,

XXII: Óláfs ríma Haraldssonar‘bindi menn vi› mína hƒndmæki ﬂann enn snarpa.’
16. Rƒgnvaldr5 var mildr ok merkrme› ﬂeim kóngi gó›a;
Brúsa son nam brig›a sterkr
brand í dreyra at rjó›a.
17. Finnr Árnason6 frækn ok hraustrfylgir jƒfri sterkum;Bjƒrn stallari7 tryggr ok traustr
trúr vel ræsi merkum.
18. Sá var annar Árna mƒgr,‡tar ﬁorberg kalla,hann lét stálin stinn ok fƒgrí sterkum hlífum gjalla.
19. ﬁormó›r var vi› Kolbrún kendr,8
kóngsins skáld it frí›a,sá berr hvassar hyggju strendr
hvar sem garpar strí›a.
20. Ná›uz menn í niflúngs flokknær sem risar at líta;
ﬂeir hafa bragnar brynjurokk
brandi skorit enn hvíta.
21. Geingu fram fyr kóngsins kné
ok kvƒddu stilli enn teita;bu›u ﬂeir bæ›i fylgd ok féfrægum sjóla at veita.
22. Gramr ré› spyrja garpa ﬂá:‘Geri› mér heiti at inna;
trú skulu greina seggir svá
at satt megi til ﬂess finna.’
19/2 frí›a] MS d‡ra.

319

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XXII: Óláfs ríma Haraldssonar
23. ‘Opt hafa ﬂegnar ﬂrjózku hefnt,
ﬂat mun eingi lasta;
Gauka-ﬁóri hafa gumnar nefnt
gla›an ok Hafra-Fasta.9
24. Treystum vér á mátt ok megn,
er margan riddara pr‡›ir;
aungva hafa af Ásum fregn
okkrir sterkir l‡›ir.’25. ‘Taki ﬂér heldr helga trú
himna kóngs me› blóma,
vir›ar, kasti› villu nú
ok veri› me› oss í sóma.’26. L‡›ir ger›u lykt á ﬂví
at leysa ﬂenna vanda;skírnarbrunn fara skatnar í
ok skynda Gu›i til handa.
27. ﬁrekstórr kom til ﬂeingils ma›r,
ﬂann frá ek Arnljót10 heita,tók hann skírn ok gekk ﬂó gla›r
grams í flokkinn teita.
28. Garpar fleiri at fylki renn11
en fyr›ar mega ﬂat telja;siklíngr nam sæmdarmenn
sér til li›s at velja.
29. Kálfr haf›i múga manns
merkta vƒllu ví›a;ní›íngligt var nærsta hansniflúng ﬂeim at strí›a.
30. Bjálfa klæddiz hƒr›um Hundr
ok hans sveitúngar margir;
ﬂat hafa geysigrimmligt undrgert Búfinnar12 argir.

XXII: Óláfs ríma Haraldssonar
31. Ræsir talar vi› ﬁorgils13 ﬂá,ﬂat var mest af pr‡›i:‘ﬁér vil ek silfr í sjó›i fá
ﬂú se› me› auma l‡›i.’
32. ﬁorgils hugsar ﬂeingils mál:‘ﬁér inni› framar hóti;
gef fyr ﬂeira garpa sál
er gánga oss í móti.’33. Herrinn drífr á hilmis fundat heyja ímƒn stránga;svó var ﬂrútin ﬂeira lund,at ﬂraut var› fram at gánga.
34. Múginn ﬂessi geysiz gegn
gram me› sárum vilja;lƒg›u á orku ok allt sitt megnjƒfur vi› land at skilja.
35. Á Stiklastƒ›um var róman remd14
ríkum kóngi í móti;
ﬂar vóru skƒpt me› hƒndum hremd
ok hƒr›u kasta› grjóti.
36. Hárekr eggjar herli› sitt,heitr mƒrgum sóma.
‘Lúki garpar geysistríttgram fyr har›a dóma.’37. Gó›a sver›it Hneitir hét,
haf›i gramr til víga;
ﬂar fyr margan ﬂeingill lét
ﬂegn at jƒr›u hníga.
38. Gumnar hlaupa geystir framgrams fyr merkit væna,

321

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XXII: Óláfs ríma Haraldssonar
reisa ﬂannig randa glamok rísta skjƒldu græna.
39. Gellini tók at geysaz hartok ger›i rómu stránga;sannliga lét hann seggja martsáran dau›a fánga.
40. Árna synir sinn unda na›reinart drógu af magni;
kendiz ei svó klókr ma›rkæmi hlíf at gagni.
41. ﬁormó›r nam brytja brá›bleikum fálu hesti,
var›i kóng me› dyg› ok dá›,darra él hann hvesti.
42. ﬁórir hundr ﬂrautar gildr
ﬂreif sitt spjót it snarpa;
laga var hann ok hƒggva mildrvi› har›a kóngsins garpa.
43. ﬁorsteinn hét sá er ﬁóri vi›r
ﬂar nam fram at gánga;sá var kendr knarrarsmi›r,15
kominn í villu stránga.
44. Kóngrinn hjó til ﬁóris ﬂá,ﬂat frá ek undrum sætti,ekki beit hans bjálfann á,brast sem grjóti mætti.16
45. Bjƒrn stallari bystr ok rei›rbar›i Hund í móti;
sí›an hné vi› sannan hei›r
seggr á ﬁóris spjóti.

XXII: Óláfs ríma Haraldssonar
46. ﬁorgeirr17 vó› í randa regn,ræsi ná›i at finna;
snarr ré› kóngr ﬂrjózkum ﬂegn
ﬂessi or› at inna.
47. ‘ﬁeygi gerir ﬂú, ﬁorgeir, réttat ﬂreyngir mƒnnum mínum;lypta ek ﬂér af lægri stétt,lokit mun sigri ﬂínum.’
48. Kóngrin hjó me› Hneiti ﬂá,
svó hrau› af eggjum bá›um;
ﬁorgeir dau›r á l‡ngi lá,lífi sviptr ok dá›um.
49. ﬁorsteinn ré› á ﬂeingils kné
ﬂunnri ƒxi at sní›a,sí›an lét hann fjƒr me› fé
ok fell í ánau› strí›a.
50. Bjƒrtum varp sér brandi frá
bu›lúngs hƒnd in mæta,sjóli ba› me› sƒnnu ﬂá
sjálfann Gu› sín gæta.
51. ﬁórir lag›i í kóngsins kvi›kƒldum snótar rá›um;18
hilmis sál tók hæstan fri›himna grams me› ná›um.
52. Kálfr hjó til bragníngs bystr
batt sér ﬂúngan vanda,
ramliga var hann á rei›i lystr
ræsi ﬂeim at granda.
53. Myrkri sló yfir menn ok hjƒr›vi› mildíngs d‡ran dau›a,49/3 hann] MS adds líf.

323

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XXII: Óláfs ríma Haraldssonar
litu ﬂá hvórki lƒg né jƒr›,l‡› aflar ﬂat nau›a.
54. ﬁá kom Dagr19 me› dreingi sín
darra ﬂíng at heyja;
margr hlaut vi› mikla pín
ma›r af sút at deyja.
55. Æsilig var odda hrí›,undrum frá ek ﬂat gegna,mátti ekki meira strí›af málma leiki fregna.
56. Hræ›ilig var hjƒrva gnau›,
har›ar brynjur sprúngu,dreingir feingu dapra nau›,dƒrr á hlífum súngu.20
57. Stórt var ﬂetta manna mót,
mest kom hjálp til bragna,
daufir feingu ok blindir bót,
bjúgir heilsu fagna.21
58. ﬁorgils geymdi ﬂeingils lík,
ﬂat fór heldr af hljó›i;ma›r tók s‡n fyr merkin slík
af mætu kóngsins bló›i.
59. Fróni er huldr fylkir mætrfir›r nau› ok grandi;líkami kóngs var mildr ok mætrmánu›r tólf í sandi.22
60. ﬁeim kom vir›um vóndzlig ﬂraut
at vísis feingu rei›i;
geislar skinu um grund á brautgrams af d‡ru lei›i.23

XXII: Óláfs ríma Haraldssonar
61. L‡›ir tóku upp líkama hans,24
lutu ﬂá kóngi snjƒllum,
hár ok negl var heilags mannshátt at vexti ƒllum.25
62. Hildíngs taka ﬂá helgan dóm
halir í skrín at leggja;
nú er Kristz et bjarta blóm
ok blí›uz miskunn seggja.
63. Dróttni fær›i ƒ›língr ƒnd,‡tum líkam seldi;
nú er hann Gu›s á hægri hƒndhimins í æzta veldi.
64. Bu›lúngs hei›r er bjartr ok ríkrbæ›i um lƒnd ok geima,fæddiz eingi fylkir slíkr
fyrri nor›r í heima.
65. Rei›zt ﬂú ei ﬂó, ﬂeingill, ﬂér
ﬂyr›a ek vísu at bjó›a;bi›r ek Óláf bjarga mérvi› bragníng allra ﬂjó›a.26

325

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XXII: Óláfs ríma Haraldssonar
Notes

1 The conversion of five (or six) countries is attributed to St Óláfr’s
predecessor and namesake, Óláfr Tryggvason, rather than to St Óláfr
in several Icelandic and Norwegian sources; the list (and number) ofcountries varies slightly: see, for example, Historia Norwegiae (Kunin
and Phelpstead 2001, 21); Ágrip (1995), ch. 19; OddrÓT, ch. 52; andcf. Snorri’s account of Óláfr Tryggvason’s missionary endeavours inhis Óláfs saga Tryggvasonar in ÍF XXVI, chs 47, 53, 73, 95–96.
2 Hárekr ór ﬁjóttu, son of Eyvindr skáldaspillir, ﬁórir hundr (‘the dog’),

and Kálfr Árnason were prominent chieftains who led the rebellion
against King Óláfr. ﬁórir hundr was, however, one of the first people
to recognise Óláfr’s sanctity after his death.
3 Óláfr’s opponents are usually characterised as bœndr, but the leadersof their army were of higher social status.
4 Haraldr Sigur›arson, later known as har›rá›i (‘hard ruler’), wasking of Norway 1046–66. He was Óláfr’s half-brother. On st. 15/3–4
cf. ÍF XXVII 364.
5 Rƒgnvaldr Brúsason was the son of Earl Brúsi of Orkney. WhenKing Óláfr settled a dispute between rival earls he required Rƒgnvaldr
to remain at the Norwegian court in order to ensure that Brúsi kept tothe agreement. Rƒgnvaldr remained there for many years; see Óláfs
saga helga ch. 102; in Haralds saga Sigur›arsonar in ÍF XXVIII,
ch. 1 Snorri tells how Earl Rƒgnvaldr helped Haraldr Sigur›arson toescape from the battle at Stiklasta›ir.
6 Two brothers of Óláfr’s opponent Kálfr mentioned here supported

the king, Finnr and ﬁorbergr (cf. stt. 18 and 40).
7 Earlier in Óláfr’s reign Bjƒrn stallari (‘the marshal’) had undertaken

a diplomatic mission to try to make peace with the the king of Sweden.
He had later visited the king in exile in Russia and reported on thestate of affairs in Norway.
8 The court poet ﬁormó›r Kolbrúnarskáld figures prominently in thelast part of Snorri’s Óláfs saga helga and is also a central character in
Fóstbrœ›ra saga. Snorri records how he recited Bjarkamál in fornu

XXII: Óláfs ríma Haraldssonar

327

before the battle at Stiklasta›ir and later died as a result of wounds
received in the battle (Óláfs saga helga chs 208, 233–34). ﬁormó›racquired his nickname after dedicating a poem to a woman calledﬁorbjƒrg kolbrún (‘coal brow’).
9 Gauka-ﬁórir and Hafrafasti (Afrafasti in Heimskringla and mostmanuscripts of Snorri’s separate Óláfs saga helga; Hafrafasti in
Flateyjarbók) were brothers and robbers who decided to join Óláfr’sarmy before the battle, but Óláfr would accept their help only if theyfirst submitted to Christian baptism (Óláfs saga helga chs 203,
205).
10 Arnljótr gellini (cf. stanza 39) was also required to convert toChristianity before Óláfr would accept his help in the battle: see Óláfs
saga helga chs 141, 215.
11 renn is presumably for renna, with the -a elided with the vowel atthe beginning of the next line so as to preserve the rhyme.
12 The Lappish inhabitants of Finnmark. Lapps were traditionallyassociated with sorcery. ﬁórir’s protective magic cloaks are describedin Óláfs saga helga ch. 193 (cf. ch. 228).
13 ﬁorgils Hálmuson, a farmer at Stiklasta›ir, fulfilled his promise tobury the king’s body after the battle; cf. st. 58 below and see Snorri’sÓláfs saga helga chs 210 and 236–38.
14 The Battle of Stiklasta›ir (or Stiklarsta›ir) took place on 29 July1030. Cf. note 18 to Text VIII above.
15 In Óláfs saga helga ch. 222 Snorri tells how ﬁorsteinn knarrarsmi›r(‘ship-builder’) fell out with King Óláfr and was punished for his
violent crimes by having a large ship he had built confiscated;ﬁorsteinn vowed to repay the king by being the first to strike him if
he could get close enough in the battle against him. Snorri’s accountof the fatal blows inflicted on Óláfr by ﬁorsteinn, ﬁórir hundr and
Kálfr Árnason is in Óláfs saga helga ch. 228.
16 I.e. presumably the king’s sword broke. But he is still using Hneitir

at 48/1, and his sword is not said to be broken in ÍF XXVII 383–84.

328

XXII: Óláfs ríma Haraldssonar

17 According to Snorri’s account, ﬁorgeirr of Kvistssta›ir supported

the rebels against Óláfr despite having earlier been elevated in social
status by the king; see st. 47/3–4 and Óláfs saga helga chs 225, 227.
18 Cf. the proverb kƒld eru kvenna rá› ‘cold are the counsels of

women’ in e.g. Njáls saga (ÍF XII 292); and the episode in Óláfs
saga helga ch. 123 (ÍF XXVII 213) where Sigrí›r, ﬁórir hundr’s sisterin-law, urges ﬁórir to stab the king with the spear that had killed herson Ásbjƒrn.
19 Óláfr had exiled Dagr’s father King Hringr of Hei›mƒrk from

Norway, but on Óláfr’s own return journey to Norway from exile inRussia he sent word to Dagr that if he were to regain Norway with
Dagr’s help he would grant him dominions as great as his ancestors
had held there (Óláfs saga helga ch. 199). Dagr’s renewal of the battle
following Óláfr’s death is recounted in Óláfs saga helga ch. 229.
20 Craigie (1952, I 285) suggests that some verses may be missing

between stanzas 56 and 57, where the story jumps to the evening
after the battle when the first of the miracles took place (Óláfs saga
helga ch. 236).
21 Cf. Matthew 11: 5.
22 Óláfr’s body was secretly buried in a sandbank by the River Ni›

near Trondheim (Óláfs saga helga ch. 238).
23 On the light from St Óláfr’s grave see Óláfs saga helga ch. 238.
24 The translation of Óláfr’s body took place on 3 August 1031. His

remains were enshrined in Trondheim, later the location of theNorwegian archiepiscopal see.
25 The miraculous growth of the dead saint’s hair and nails is recorded

in many texts, including Snorri’s Óláfs saga helga chs 244–45.
26 The final prayer is presumably for the poet to be saved from thejudgment of Christ on doomsday, which is a normal request, rather
than from Christ himself.

XXIII: ENCYCLOPEDIC LITERATURE
PHYSIOGNOMY
The passage below is offered as an example of the kind of learned
literature collected and edited by Kr. Kålund under the title Alfræ›iíslenzk. In line with Kålund’s title, material of this type is often known
as encyclopedic literature, specimens of which are to be found in
Icelandic manuscripts from as early as c.1200, though the majority ofthe encyclopedic manuscripts that survive are from the fourteenth
and fifteenth centuries. It must be stressed that the compilations inwhich such writing is found, in the Old Norse context, are not encyclopedias in the modern sense. The Middle Ages did indeed produce
some influential Latin works of a truly encyclopedic nature in that
their authors aimed at giving systematic and comprehensive accountsof lore concerning the whole world and its inhabitants; notable among
these are the Etymologiae of St Isidore of Seville and the Imago mundiof Honorius Augustodunensis, the former being a work from the earlyseventh century that gained lasting currency throughout Europe, andthe latter belonging to the first half of the twelfth century. The Imago
mundi appears to have been especially popular in medieval Iceland:
it is likely that there was a twelfth-century Icelandic translation of it,which has not survived; the fifteenth-century manuscript AM 685 a
4to contains a vernacular adaptation of the first part of the work; andAM 435 12mo, from which the passage below is drawn, refers to thework by name in the paragraph immediately before the one with which
the present excerpt begins (Alfræ›i III 98). It can be said in general,
however, that the Old Icelandic manuscripts which are compilationsof encyclopedic literature function not as full descriptions of the world
but as ‘micro-libraries’ (Clunies Ross and Simek 1993) consisting ofunsystematised collections of works, or pieces of works, commonly
dealing with such subjects as geography, the peoples of the world,
the properties of stones, liturgical matters and computus (i.e. calculation,
but in particular the art of calculating the correct dates of moveable
feasts in the ecclesiastical year). AM 435 12mo, for example, includes
sections on computus, the Icelandic calendar and the ceremonial of
the Mass, but in addition its first fifteen folios are devoted to thesubject of physiognomy.

330

XXIII: Physiognomy

As expressed pithily by the Peripatetic author of Physiognomica,
long thought to be Aristotle himself, the basic proposition of theancient and medieval science of physiognomy was that ‘dispositions
follow bodily characteristics’ (Aristotle, Minor Works 1936, 85); inother words, the personality of a human individual can be perceived
by observing the person’s physical appearance. This idea had beenendorsed by the real Aristotle in the Prior Analytics (70b 7–38), which
was available to the Middle Ages in a Latin translation by Boethius(Aristoteles latinus 1962, 5–139). The basis of physiognomy asunderstood by Aristotle was not simply the observation of humanbeings and their personalities but rather the drawing of analogies
between humans and animals; as Ross’s commentary on Aristotle’s
work (1949, 501) puts it, the methodology depends on ‘the inferringof mental characteristics in men from the presence in them of physicalcharacteristics which in some other kind or kinds of animal goconstantly with those mental characteristics’. Remnants of this wayof thinking can be seen in the references to bears, horses, sea-monsters,
snakes, birds, goats and spiders in the passage below (lines 6, 60, 63,
66, 69 and 95–96). For the Middle Ages, perhaps the most influential
writer on physiognomy was Marcus Antonius Polemon (c.88–144),
whose work on the subject is lost in its original Greek form but survives
in Latin and Arabic translations and in a later Greek paraphrase. It is
Polemon who is the ultimate source for the material included in the
Old Norse passage reproduced here. Contrary to the impression givenby Kålund (Alfræ›i III xv), however, the more direct source for thepassage is a later Latin work based on Polemon, the Anonymi dephysiognomonia liber, or something quite like it; this fact is shownby the sequence of the topics discussed, which is radically different
from that of Polemon, and by the close correspondence of many
sentences. Details of the correlation between the Icelandic text andthe Latin works are given in the notes below.
In other types of Old Norse literature, such as sagas of Icelanders
and eddic poems, it is quite common for physical characteristics tobe mentioned in ways that may imply some kind of significance forthe personality or social status of the people who bear them. An
interesting topic for further study would be that of the differences
and similarities between the beliefs implicit in such references andthe system of physiognomic lore outlined here. This is not the place

XXIII: Physiognomy

331

to enter into such a study, but some pointers have been given in theaccompanying notes.
The text is a normalised version of AM 435 12mo, folios 8r–13r,
based on Kålund’s transcription (Alfræ›i III 98–103). The manuscript,
which has been dated to c.1500, shares its physiognomic material
with another encyclopedic manuscript from Iceland, the Codex
Lindesianus (John Rylands University Library, Manchester, Icel I; =L), c.1473, which has been described by Eiríkur Magnússon (1896–
97). The passage includes a high proportion of unusual vocabulary,noted by Eiríkur (pp. 11–14) and Kålund (Alfræ›i III xvi–xvii),
including blauthær›r (line 3), fávitugr (line 80), fjórhyrndr (line 32),
hugsanarmikill (line 2), ónæmi (line 46), rálítill (line 38; here emended
to rólítill), stundanarmikill (line 19), útrau›r (line 37), ﬂunnhær›r(line 3) and ﬂykkhær›r (line 4). The word trítli (line 39; MS trillti),
which does not occur in L, is especially problematical; the reading
given here is based on a suggestion made by Kålund (Alfræ›i III xvii).

Bibliography
Kr. Kålund with N. Beckman (vol. 2), eds, Alfræ›i íslenzk. 3 vols (1908–18).
Anonymi de physiognomonia liber latinus. In R. Foerster, ed., Scriptores
physiognomonici graeci et latini. 2 vols (1893), II 1–145.
Marcus Antonius Polemon, Polemonis de physiognomonia liber arabice etlatine, ed. G. Hoffmann. In R. Foerster, ed., Scriptores physiognomonici
graeci et latini. 2 vols (1893), I 93–294.
Aristotle, Minor Works, ed. and tr. W. S. Hett (1936).
Aristoteles latinus III 1–4. Analytica priora, ed. L. Minio-Paluello (1962).
M. Clunies Ross and R. Simek, ‘Encyclopedic Literature’. In MS 164–66.
E. C. Evans, Physiognomics in the Ancient World (1969).
Anne Holtsmark, ‘Encyklopedisk litteratur’. In Kulturhistoriskt Lexicon för
nordisk medeltid. 22 vols. (1956–78).
Eiríkur Magnússon, ‘Codex Lindesianus’, Arkiv för nordisk filologi 13 (1896–97), 1–14.
‘Polemon’. In S. Hornblower and A. Spawforth, eds, The Oxford Classical
Dictionary, 3rd ed (2003).
W. D. Ross, ed., Aristotle’s Prior and Posterior Analytics (1949).

XXIII: Physiognomy

332

XXIII: ENCYCLOPEDIC LITERATURE
PHYSIOGNOMY‹S›vá segja fornir frœ›imenn, at eptir náttúrligu e›li sé karlmanna
hugr skjótr ok ákafr í sinni f‡st, i›jufullr ok hugsanarmikill, en kvenna
3 hugr miskunnsamr ok óttagjarn.1 Blauthær›ir menn ok ﬂunnhær›ir s‡na
skjótt hugvit; ﬂykkhær›ir menn síngjarnir ok óhræddir. ﬁat hár er
ﬂrøngir mjƒk saman ok hrøkkr nƒkkut yfir enninu, s‡nir grimman hug,
6 ok ﬂví samﬂykkir hárfer› á skógbjarnar hƒf›i. Gulir lokkar, ﬂykkvir
ok nƒkkut ljósir, s‡na mann ónæman. Døkkjarpir lokkar, ef ﬂeir eru
mátuliga ﬂunnir, s‡na gó›si›uga menn ok hœgt skaplyndi.2
9Hƒfu› mjƒk mikit s‡nir heimskan mann, en bƒllótt hƒfu› ok skammtóvitran ok óminnigan. Lítit hƒfu› ok yfir ofan svá sem slétt s‡nir
lausungar mark ok óvenju. Aflangt hƒfu› ok vaxit nƒkkut svá sem
12 hamarr segir mann vera forsjálan ok athugasaman.3
Enni ﬂat er mjƒk er mjótt, segir mann vera ónæman ok grá›gan; en
ﬂat er mjƒk er langt, segir litla skynsem›argrein. Kringlótt enni s‡nir
15 rei›an mátt. Lítit enni ok ni›rlútt s‡nir óframan hug ok l‡talausan.
Ferhyrnt enni me›r mátuligum mikilleik s‡nir mann mikilhuga›anme› mikilli vizku.4
18
Ef br‡nn eru ﬂar til bjúgar sem ﬂær koma saman vi›r nefit, merkja
gløggvan mann ok stundanarmikinn í ƒllum sínum ger›um; en ef ﬂarver›r nƒkkut mjótt me›al, ﬂat s‡nir hryggan mann ok óvitran. En ef
21 bjúgleikr brúnanna hne‹i›gisk ni›r til augna ok beri ni›r af mjƒkﬂykkvar kinnr, merkir vanrœktar hug. En ef brúna hár eru mjƒk lƒngok mƒrg, ﬂat merkir grimman mann ok mikilhuga›an.5
24
Augu ﬂau sem bjar‹t›liga skína, segja til fagrfer›ugra si›a; en ef ﬂau
eru ósta›fƒst, svá at ﬂau renna stundum skjótt, en stundum sé ﬂau kyr,merkja illa hluti válkask í huginum ok vera eigi fram komna.6 Gul
27 augu me› skínandi birti merkja djarfan mann ok til illger›a vakran.
Mikil augu skjálfandi ok svƒrt merkja drykkjumann ok kvennamann.7
Augu hreinliga svƒrt merkja óstyrkan hug ok krap‹t›lausan. Svƒrt augu
30 me› rau›um dropum merkja réttlátan hug, dyggan ok hugvitran.8 ﬁarsem í svƒrtum augum s‡nask smádropar ákafliga rau›ir ok nƒkkurir
fjórhyrndir ok nƒkkurir bleikir, en a›rir gulir, ok hringar ﬂeir, er liggja
33 útan um sjáldrin, hafi á sér bló›slit, ok sé augun mikil ok birti sú sem
fylgir sjáldrunum hrœrisk svá sem hrœrask sjáldrin, ﬂvílík augu merkja
12 athugan saman

XXIII: Physiognomy

333

ﬂann hug er um fram er allan hræd‡ra hátt, ﬂví at hvat er af óhœfunni
má hugsat vera ór ﬂvílíkum augum máttuligt at fremja, ok eigi munu 36
varna vi› heimamannligu bló›i. ﬁau augu sem eru mjƒk útrau› ok ﬂó
rólítil,9 birta stillingarlausan ok ‹ó›stƒ›ugan líkam. Snƒrp augu ok snƒrí trítli,10 ef ﬂau eru vát, s‡na sannsƒglan mann, skjótan ok forsjálan í 39
sínum ger›um. ﬁau augu sem optliga lúkask upp ok aptr, s‡na óttafullan
hug ok vanmegnan.11 Augu mjƒk opin merkja heimsku ok óframa, en
ﬂau sem mjƒk eru lukt, merkja hrœriligan hug ok í ƒllum gjƒr›um 42
sínum ósta›fastan.
Eyru ﬂau sem hátt standa ok eru mjƒk mikil, merkja athugaleysi,
heimsku ok óvizku; en mjƒk lítil eyru hafa illgjƒr›a mark. Mjƒk 45
kringlótt eyru merkja ónæmi, en aflƒng ok ﬂrƒng merkja ƒfundar mark;ﬂau sem liggja nær hƒf›inu s‡na leti.12
Feitar kinnr ok mjƒk ﬂykkvar merkja leti ok ofdrykkju, en ﬂær er mjƒk 48
eru ﬂunnar merkja illgirni. Kringlóttar kinnr s‡na ƒfund.13
Opnar nasir gefa af sér gle›imark ok styrktar, en ﬂunnar ok langarósta›festi ok léttleika. ﬁat nef er ni›r af enni ok fram er hvárki mjƒk 51
hátt né lágt, heldr jafnt vi›r sik ok rétt, s‡nir af sér karlmannligt markme› sta›festi ok vizku. Nasir minni en hœfiligt er, er ﬂjófa mark.14
Allt saman andlit, ef ﬂat er kjƒtsfullt, ﬂykkt ok feitt, merkir óﬂrifna›ar 54
mark ok munhug›ar. Bjúgleitt andlit vísar til undirferli ok vælar me›rslœg›.15
ﬁunnar varrir, ef hin efri er nƒkkuru meiri en hin ne›ri, s‡nir mikil- 57
huga›an mann ok sterkan; en ﬂunnar varrir me›r litlum munni s‡naóstyrkan hug ok slœgan. Ef varrir hanga nƒkkut svá ni›r frá munninum,s‡na óﬂrifna›ar mark, ﬂví at ﬂat mark finnsk á ƒsnum ok hestum. Lítill 60
munnr hœfir kvenna áliti og ﬂeim hugum er kvennligir eru. Sá munnr
er um fram hátt er ví›r, s‡nir mann grá›gan, ómjúkan ok ómildan, ﬂví63
at svá mikit gin hœfir sjóskrímslum.16
Haka sú er nƒkkut svá er lƒng, s‡nir manninn mi›r rei›an ok mi›r
skelf›an. ﬁeir sem hafa litla hƒku eru ómjúkir ok ƒfundsjúkir; ﬂessa
sag›i meistari Plato hƒggormum líka. Nytsamligra manna haka er vel 66
mátuliga mikil ok nƒkkut svá ferhyrnd. Sú haka er mjƒk er lƒng, s‡nir
prettóttan hug.17
Sú rƒdd er lík er fugla rƒdd e›r geita s‡nir heimsku mark, en ﬂeir er 69
sína rƒdd hefja upp á fugla hátt, eru léttir ok au›veldir. Sú rƒdd sem eróstyrk ok nƒkkut grátlig, s‡nir hryggan ok grunsem›arfullan hug. ﬁeira
38 rálítil 39 ‘trillti’ 70 littir

334

XXIII: Physiognomy

72 manna rƒdd er rennr í nefit, svá at nefit samhljó›i rƒddinni, ﬂeir eru

lygnir ok illgjarnir ok fagna annarra illgjƒr›um.18
Langr háls ok ﬂunnr merkir ﬂann er illt hugsar. Kringlóttr háls s‡nir
75 hugar krapt ok líkams lítillæti. Skammr háls er mark ﬂess er djarfr er.
Sá háls er mjƒk berr sik réttan s‡nir óvenju ok ﬂrjótlyndi.19
Brjóst ﬂat sem lengra er en kvi›rinn, s‡nir vitran mann.20 Brjóst ﬂat
78 sem me› kvi›inum er hult miklu hári, merkir óstƒ›ugan mann útan si›læti ok mildi. Brjóst ﬂat er mjƒk er hult miklu kjƒti, segir ónæma mennok fávituga, en ef eitt saman brjóstit hefir hárit, s‡nir hugfullan mann.21
ﬁunnar her›ar ok uppréttar vísa til ﬂess manns er gjarna sitr um a›ra.22
81
Armleggir, ef ﬂeir eru svá langir at ﬂá er ma›rinn stendr me› réttum
líkama, taki lengstu fingr mjƒk til knjá, ﬂó at a›rir fingr taki eigi jafnlangt,
84 s‡nir lítilláta menn ok styrka; en ef fingr eru ‹eigi› lengri en á mjƒ›minae›a litlu lengra, s‡nir illgjarna menn ﬂá er fagna annarra illgjƒr›um.23
Mjƒk skammar hendr ok litlar s‡na styrka menn ok vituga. Feitar
87 hendr ok meir skammir fingr en hœfiligt er, birta mann ómerkan. Snúnar
hendr ok ﬂunnar s‡na málgan mann ok grá›gan. Hvítir negl ok blautir,
sléttir ok ﬂunnir ok líttat rjó›ir har›la vel skínandi, segja it hæsta hugvit;
90 bjúgir negl s‡na óvitra ok grá›ga. Mjƒk samfelldir fingr s‡na illgjarnanok ágjarnan, en litlir fingr ok feit‹i›r segja djarfan ok ƒfundsjúkan.
Litlir fingr ok ﬂunnir s‡na hei‹m›skan mann.24
ﬁunnar ok ﬂrƒngvar sí›ur s‡na hræddan mann, en kjƒtmiklar ok93har›ar s‡na mann ónæman; ﬂví eru ﬂær af spekingum kalla›ar kƒngurváfum líkar.25
Sá hlutr fótleggjar sem undir knénu er, kallask at bókmáli sura; ef
96
ﬂar er fullt mjƒk, svá at ﬂat ﬂyngi fótinn, merkir mann stillingarlausanok óhreinan. Blautar surae eru kvensligar.26
Feitir fœtr ok skammir s‡na mjƒk óstyrkan mann, en mjƒk langir99
prettóttan, mjƒk ﬂunnir ok skammir illgjarnan. ﬁeir er langa fœtr hafa
ok stíga hátt ok langt, eru vanir at vera mikilhuga›ir menn ok fljótvirkir.
102 Sá er fljótliga gengr ok haldi sér ﬂó svá aptr, l‡tr ni›r, sem hann beriallan líkamann bjúgan,27 merkir ƒfundsjúkan ok slœgan. Sá sem hefirskamma fœtr ok berr ﬂá skjótliga, er sag›r vera illgjarn ok óstyrkr.28
Svartr skinnslitr segir mann slœgan, en hvítr skinnslitr ok nƒkkut
105
rjó›r segir styrka menn ok hugfulla. Ákafliga hvítr skinnslitr me› bleikum
merkir ﬂrotnanda krapt ok óstyrkt af ofkaldri náttúru. Eldsligr skinnslitr
91 litlir] lit|litir over line breakfœtrXXIII: Physiognomy

335me› skínƒndum augum sn‡sk til œ›i. Me›alskinnslitr, hvítr ok svartr, ok
breg›i á nƒkkut brúnu, s‡nir mann me› gó›u hugviti ok gó›um si›um.29

Notes
1 For the probable source of this sentence see Anonymi de physiognomonia

liber 4 (hereafter Anon., all references being to section numbers).
2 For the material on hair see Anon. 14, which includes the reference

to the bear (ursus) whereas Polemon ch. XL specifies only a likenessto a wild animal (similitudo ferae agrestis). In connection with this
topic it should be noted that hair curling over the forehead seems tohave been regarded as an ugly feature in medieval Iceland, since inKormaks saga (ÍF VIII 210) Steinger›r ﬁorkelsdóttir refers to thischaracteristic as the one blemish in the otherwise handsome Kormakr.
An emphasis on particularly beautiful hair, however, is often taken to
indicate points at which Old Norse literature has been influenced by
European romance traditions, as in the case of the description of
Sigur›r in Vƒlsunga saga (ed. R. G. Finch 1965, 41), which is probably
based on a passage in ﬁi›reks saga (ed. Gu›ni Jónsson 1954, 255),
the latter work being a translation of some German romance. See
also the descriptions of various characters in Trójumanna saga (ed.
Jonna Louis-Jensen 1963, 64–70), an Icelandic work that dates fromthe first half of the thirteenth century and is based on a well-known
Latin text that the Middle Ages ascribed to Dares Phrygius; the passage
gives prominence to the hair colour of each person mentioned, though
it is not clear whether personality traits are to be inferred from thedescriptions. Colouring, however, is definitely associated with social
status, and hence character type, in the eddic poem Rígsﬂula, which
has been dated as early as the eleventh century or as late as the midthirteenth and which gives black hair to the prototypical ﬂræll, whereas
it declares the original jarl to have been blond. It is most likely thatnobility and beauty are the associations that the author of Njáls saga
(ÍF XII 53) has in mind when he says that Gunnarr Hámundarson had
thick golden hair, rather than the characteristic that could be inferredfrom the physiognomic text above.
3 Anon. 16. See also Polemon XXX.

108

336

XXIII: Physiognomy

4 Anon. 17. See also Polemon XXVII.
5 Anon. 18. See also Polemon XLVIII.
6 The material on eyes is a greatly abridged version of Anon. 21–44(see also Polemon I) generally conforming to the sequence of topics
in the Latin text but with interpolations. The sources of individualstatements, where it has been possible to identify them, are indicatedin the notes that follow. The two parts of the paragraph’s first sentence
are from Anon. 21 and 23 respectively.
7 Anon. 23.
8 This and the following sentence concerning black eyes are from

Anon. 27, which includes references to wild beasts and the slaying ofclose kindred, which may be reflected in the references to hræd‡raháttr and heimamannligt bló› in lines 35 and 37. In Old Norse
literature there is an association between black eyes and Icelandic poets:in Kormaks saga (ÍF VIII 211) the eponymous skald says Svƒrt augu
berk in a stanza replying to criticism of this feature made by ahandmaid of Steinger›r ﬁorkelsdóttir, the object of the poet’s love;and Heimskringla (ÍF XXVII 140) preserves a stanza by Sigvatr ﬁór›arson
referring to augun ﬂessi íslenzk . . . svƒrtu, apparently replying to acomment made by a woman in the court of Rƒgnvaldr jarl of Gautland,
to the effect that Sigvatr has come with his black eyes to gain thegold ring that the jarl gives him. The latter exchange seems to be
somewhat flirtatious, as is the comment in Kormaks saga; but it may
also imply an accusation of avarice on the part of the poet, which
would accord with the statement in Anon. 27, omitted in the Old Norsetext above, that black eyes lucri avidum indicant ‘indicate a person
greedy for gain’.
9 The MS reading rálítill, though it is explained by Eiríkur Magnússon

as an otherwise unrecorded term meaning something like ‘with rather
indistinct corners’ (rá f. corner), is more likely to be an error in thearchetype for rólítill, which fits the context much better.
10 The MS reading ‘trillti’ is not a known word in Icelandic, but Kålund

in the introduction to Alfræ›i III (p. xvii) suggests a link with
Norwegian trilla, trilta ‘toddle, run’, Modern Icelandic trítla ‘mince,XXIII: Physiognomy

337

trot’. Cf. also trítill ‘top’; ‘urchin’. It might then be dative of trítill m.,meaning ‘small movements’, and here it has accordingly been emended
to trítli. Alternatively the word might be *trilt n., with the same
meaning, and the text would then require no emendation.
11 Anon. 41.
12 Anon. 47. See also Polemon XXIX.
13 Anon. 49. See also Polemon XXVIII.
14 Anon. 51, but here the correspondence is closer to Polemon XXVI,

which includes a reference to the mark of thieves. Note that in Njáls
saga (ÍF XII 7) it is the eyes rather than the nose that can carry physicalsigns of a propensity to commit theft, since Hrútr Herjólfsson, on
seeing Hallger›r Hƒskuldsdóttir for the first time, asks hva›an
ﬂjófsaugu eru komin í ættir várar ‘whence thief’s eyes are come into
our family’.
15 Anon. 50. See also Polemon XXVIII.
16 Anon. 48, but the passage is closer to Polemon XXV, which includes

a reference to crocodiles, corresponding to sjóskrimsl.
17 Anon. 52 refers to snakes but not to Plato; Polemon XXIV does not

mention either.
18 The material on the voice corresponds to Anon. 78, though theLatin text refers to sheep rather than geitr. Polemon LII mentions
neither sheep nor goats.
19 Anon. 53–55, Polemon XXIII. There appears to be some confusion

or corruption here as both Latin texts declare a short neck to be a signof timidity.
20 Anon. 63. See also Polemon XV.
21 Anon. 73. See also Polemon XLIV.
22 Anon. 58. This statement is not present in the corresponding passage

of Polemon, XX.

338

XXIII: Physiognomy

23 Anon. 59. See also Polemon XXI.
24 Anon. 59–60. See also Polemon III–IV. Concerning the words

samfelldir fingr, Kålund (Alfræ›i III xvii) declares that they answer
to the phrase digitos cum unguibus cohaerantes ‘joined fingers withnails’ in Polemon IV; in fact, however, the sentence in which theyoccur is a rendering of digiti cum coniuncti sunt et cohaerent, immundum
hominem significant ‘when fingers are conjoined and cohere, theysignify an impure man’ (Anon. 60). The phrase litlir fingr ok feitir, inthe emended text above, corresponds to digiti . . . parvi et crassi ‘small
and thick fingers’ in Anon. 60 and provides a clear antithesis withlitlir fingr ok ﬂunnir, which correspond to digiti . . . parvi et tenues‘small and slender fingers’.
25 Anon. 65. The Latin word corresponding to kƒngurváfa is rana‘frog’. This is not in Polemon, and it is possible that the Latin text
used by the Norse compiler had a spelling for rana that he took for
the Greek ajravcnh ‘spider’, and he perhaps understood the simile torefer to thinness of limbs. At this point the Old Norse text omitsmaterial relating to the back, lower spine, pelvis, thigh and knee foundin Anon. 66–70.
26 Anon. 71 mentions sfura ‘ankles’ rather than sura ‘calf’. The final

sentence, to the effect that soft calves are womanish, corresponds to
one in Anon. 72, which actually refers to feet. See also Polemon VII.
27 ‘. . . and yet holds himself backwards, bowing down, so that he

carries his whole body curved.’ This rather confusing description
appears to mean that the person bends himself in the middle withhead and knees forward, putting his body in the shape of a C.
28 The first sentence of this paragraph corresponds to one in Anon.

72; the rest relates to Anon. 75. See also Polemon V and L.
29 Anon. 79. See also Polemon XXXVI. The phrase me› bleikum (line106) does not have a correlative in the corresponding sentences of either
Latin text.

XXIV: KONUNGS SKUGGSJÁ
Konungs skuggsjá, or Speculum regale, was written in Norway, mostprobably in the 1250s, in the form of a dialogue between a father andhis son, the former answering the latter’s questions. It is in three parts,
the first dealing with matters of interest to a merchant, the second
with life at court and how a king’s retainer should behave, and thethird with the duties of the king, especially his duties as a judge. The
work is anonymous, but it may safely be assumed that the author wasa cleric closely associated with the royal circle, who probably wrote
his ‘king’s mirror’ for the enlightenment of King Hákon Hákonarson’ssons, Hákon the Young (1232–57) and Magnús (1238–80), the latterof whom, Magnús the Lawmender, succeeded his father in 1263.
Konungs skuggsjá is preserved in some sixty manuscripts, both
Norwegian and Icelandic; their interrelationship is discussed in HolmOlsen 1952, 116–79 and Holm-Olsen 1987, 12–17. The text of theextract below reflects that of the so-called main manuscript, AM
243 b a fol., as edited in Holm-Olsen 1983, 48–49; it has also beencollated with the relevant folios (62–64) of that manuscript as edited
in facsimile by Flom (1915). The manuscript was written in Norway,
most probably in Bergen, in c.1275 (Holm-Olsen 1983, xii). In theextract as edited here, Norwegian spellings and word-forms have beenretained, as in the extract from Fagrskinna (cf. p. 65 above), thoughwith the main differences that short, open e is represented by ∂(corresponding to the long sound æ), and the Norwegian i-mutationof au by øy (often written œy).
The extract, from the second part of Konungs skuggsjá, is of great
historical sociolinguistic interest for the light it throws on the uses ofthe singular, dual and plural forms of the first and second person
pronouns (cf. Gr 3.2, 3.2.1) in the spoken language(s) of Norway and
Iceland in the thirteenth century (cf. Gr 1.2). As Helgi Gu›mundsson(1972, 39) notes: ‘Of course the usage in question may not have been
precisely the same in Iceland as in Norway, but in view of the close
connections between the two countries at that time it cannot havebeen widely divergent.’ The father is here advising the son on theappropriate uses of the pronominal forms. The plural is to be used inaddressing the king (lines 3–4) or an influential person (57–58) orsomeone who deserves respectful treatment (61), such as a chieftain(72–75); this has become established as the custom among wise and340

XXIV: Konungs skuggsjá

courteous men (59–60). One should however guard against using theplural with reference to oneself when speaking to the king (4–6), or(it is implied) to anyone of higher rank than oneself, lest it be thoughtthat one considers oneself the equal of such a person (82–84). Even
when talking to an equal or to an inferior one should not seek toelevate oneself by speaking of oneself in the plural (84–86). Only afool would refer to himself in the plural and to the king in the singularwhen addressing the king (4–6).
In other words, the first and second person plural forms, used
respectively with reference to oneself and to the one addressed, areboth felt to be honorific. Although in Konungs skuggsjá as a whole
the father and son do not always follow in their own dialogue thefather’s recommendations as given here, as Helgi Gu›mundsson (1972,41) has noted, they do so in the extract itself: the son uses the pluralin addressing the father (lines 22–23, 54), while referring to himself
in the singular (22, 24, 50, 54), and the father addresses the son in the
singular (1–10, 12–13, 25–26, 30, 47–49, 82–85), while also referring
to himself in the singular (25–26, 29–32). It is true that the father
uses first person plural forms at lines 28, 34, 40 and 42, but it seems
clear that in doing so here he is speaking neither of himself as anindividual, nor of just himself and his son, but of mankind (or at least
Christendom) in general. When he is speaking of just himself and hisson, on the other hand, he uses dual forms, as at lines 47 and 49. In
this last respect, i.e. in using the dual to refer to just themselves, father
and son are not entirely consistent, either, in Konungs skuggsjá as awhole, as Helgi Gu›mundsson (1972, 46) has also noted, thoughHelgi’s examples give the impression that the father is more consistentin this respect than the son. In the brief speech within the father’s
speech with which the extract opens, where the father is indicating to
the son how the king should be addressed (lines 10–12), the father
naturally follows his own rules in presenting the son as addressing
the king in the plural and as referring to himself in the singular.
There is however one exception to the father’s rule that a superior
should be addressed in the plural, as the son diffidently points out tohim (lines 15–24), i.e. that it is customary to address God in the second
person singular. At lines 18–19 and 20–21 the son gives examples ofwhat his experience has led him to regard as, respectively, the correctand incorrect uses of the personal pronoun in addressing the Almighty.

XXIV: Konungs skuggsjá

341

The father’s reply, which is also somewhat diffident, since he claims
that this is a matter more for theologians than for him (25–29), confirms
by implication the accuracy of the son’s observation in acknowledging
that the question here raised deserves an answer (29–31). The father
then explains this particular usage in terms of the singularity of theChristian God as opposed to other gods (32–39), an explanation whichaccords interestingly with one recently offered, in the context of thehistory of English but expressed in relatively general terms, by Smith(1991, 135). It may however be noted that Strang (1970, 139–40), also
writing in the context of English while expressing herself in generalterms, explains this usage by reference not to so much to the singularity
of God as to His specialness. Once the use of the plural pronoun forpolite address to a single person has been introduced into a language,
she argues, it is likely to snowball, since in cases of doubt one would
rather be polite than risk giving offence. The use of the plural to asingle human superior would thus acquire the status of what Strang callsa central function, from which the use of the singular in addressing
God, who is regarded as a special case, would become an exception.
In response to the question, asked by the son at lines 14–15 andagain at lines 54–56, of why influential people should be addressedin the plural, the father justifies this on the grounds, firstly, that it isan old-established practice (57–61), and secondly that the plural formof address appropriately reflects the plurality of the responsibilitiesof those addressed. Chieftains, for example, are responsible for many
more people than just themselves and their households (61–75), andthe king does not function alone, but is surrounded by a retinue ofcounsellors (77–81). This explanation of the use of the plural in
addressing a superior also accords interestingly with explanations bymodern writers on language as to how this practice may have arisen.
Pointing out that the polite use of the plural to refer to a single addressee‘seems to be very general in unrelated languages’ (including Hungarian,Quechua, Tamil and many African languages), Brown and Levinson(1987, 198–99, cf. 202) suggest two possible motives for it: first, it
provides the addressee with a ‘let-out’ in allowing him, theoreticallyat least, to interpret the address as not necessarily directed specificallyat him; and second, it enhances his sense of status in treating him as
the representative of a group rather than as a relatively powerless
individual. Comparable to this second motive would be the motivation

342

XXIV: Konungs skuggsjá

for the use of the high-status or ‘royal’ first person plural ‘we’, against
the use of which, in the extract (lines 4–6, 82–86), the father advises
the son, the implication being that it is appropriately used only bypeople of very high or responsible status.
Brown and Gilman (1960, 255–61) described the semantic evolution,
as they saw it, of second person singular and plural pronoun forms,
calling them respectively T and V (from Latin tu and vos ) in French,
English, Italian, Spanish and German, and maintaining that in theselanguages a set of norms crystallised in T and V usage at different
stages between the twelfth and fourteenth centuries. This set of norms,
which they called the power semantic, involved the downward andupward use of T and V, respectively, between people of unequal social
status, and the use of V and T respectively between equals of theupper and lower classes. (A later development, they argued, was thesolidarity semantic, whereby an intimate T came to be used between
people not necessarily of equal status but sharing the same views
and/or behaviour dispositions; they left unexplained, however, theuse of T for addressing God.) Helgi Gu›mundsson (1972, 60–61)
noted examples in Old Norse-Icelandic of a distinction between
ordinary (i.e. non-honorific) and honorific uses of the first and second
person pronouns from as early as the tenth century (in skaldic poetry),
attributing it to influence from Central and Southern Europe, while atthe same time recognising it as a widely attested feature; he also
showed (1972, 94–99) that, in Icelandic, an increased honorific useof the second person plural pronoun in the seventeenth century led to
the need for an unequivocally defined ‘ordinary’ plural. As a result,the second person dual pronouns gradually acquired plural meaning,as did also, mainly by analogy, the first person dual pronouns. Thus
the Icelandic dual pronouns lost their dual meanings and came to be
used as ordinary plurals, whereas the old plural forms vér, ﬂér etc.
were reserved exclusively for honorific use. The resulting situation isreflected in present-day Icelandic by the use of vi› (< vit) ‘we’ andﬂi› (< ﬂit) ‘you’ in plural meanings, and by the genitive forms okkar,
ykkar in the meanings ‘our’ and ‘your’ (pl.) respectively; honorific
vér and ﬂér, however, are now found for the most part only in thewritten language. Icelandic is unusual in using old dual forms in plural
meanings, but a parallel development has taken place in Faroese (Helgi
Gu›mundsson 1972, 122–24).

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343

Bibliography
Brown, Penelope and Stephen C. Levinson (1987), Politeness: some universals
in language usage.
Brown, Roger and Albert Gilman (1960), ‘The pronouns of power andsolidarity’, in Style in language, ed. by Thomas A. Sebeok, 253–76.
Finnur Jónsson, ed. (1920), Konungs skuggsjá = Speculum regale udgivet
efter håndskrifterne af Det kongelige nordiske oldskriftselskab.
Finnur Jónsson, tr. (1926), Kongespejlet: Konungs skuggsjá i dansk
oversættelse.
Flom, George T., ed. (1915), The Arnamagnean manuscript 243 B a, folio at
Det kongelige biblioteket, Copenhagen: the main manuscript of Konungsskuggsjá in phototypic reproduction with diplomatic text.
Graves, Robert (1958), The Greek myths.
Hagen, Friedrich Heinrich von der (1836), ‘Die deutschen Wochentagegötter’,Germania 1, 18–38, 344–77.
Helgi Gu›mundsson (1972), The pronominal dual in Icelandic.
Holm-Olsen, Ludvig (1952), Håndskrifterne av Konungs skuggsjá. En
undersøkelse av deres tekstkritiske verdi.
Holm-Olsen, Ludvig, ed. (1983), Konungs skuggsiá utgitt for Kjeldeskriftfondet. Second edition.
Holm-Olsen, Ludvig, ed. (1987), The king’s mirror: AM 243a fol.
Larson, Laurence Marcellus, tr. (1917), The king’s mirror (Speculum regale– Konungs skuggsjá).
Meissner, Rudolf, tr. (1944), Der Königspiegel: Konungsskuggsjá aus dem
Altnorwegischen übersetzt.
Smith, Jeremy J. (1999), Essentials of Early English.
Strang, Barbara M. H. (1970). A history of English.
Strutynski, Udo (1975), ‘Germanic divinities in weekday names’, Journalof Indo-European studies 3, 368–84.
Svanhildur Óskarsdóttir (2005), ‘Prose of Christian instruction’, in A companion
to Old Norse-Icelandic literature and culture, ed. by Rory McTurk, 338–53.

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XXIV: KONUNGS SKUGGSJÁ

3

6

9

12

15

18

21

24

27

30

33

Fa›ir: . . . Nú kann svá til at b∂ra at konungr mælir til ﬂín nƒkkur or›,1
ﬂá skalt ﬂú ﬂat varaz vandliga í andsvƒrum ﬂínum at ∂igi margfaldirﬂú ∂ngi ﬂau atkvæ›i er til ﬂín horfa, ﬂó at ﬂú margfaldir svá s∂m til
byrjar ƒll ﬂau atkvæ›i er til konungs horfir.2 En ∂nn h∂ldr skaltu ﬂatvaraz, s∂m fól kann stundum at h∂nda, at ∂igi margfaldir ﬂú ﬂau atkvæ›i
er til ﬂín horfa, en ﬂú ∂infaldir ﬂau er til konungsins horfa.
En ∂f svá kann til at v∂r›a at konungr mælir til ﬂín nƒkkur or›, ﬂau
er ﬂú n∂mir ∂igi ok ﬂarftu annat sinni ∂ptir at frétta, ﬂá skalt ﬂú hvárkis∂gja ‘há’ né ‘hvat’, h∂ldr skalt ﬂú ∂kki meira um hafa en kv∂›a svá ator›i: ‘H∂rra’. En ∂f ﬂú vilt h∂ldr spyrja m∂› fleirum or›um: ‘H∂rraminn, láti› y›r ∂igi firi ﬂykkja at ek spyrja hvat ﬂér mæltur til mín, ﬂvíat ‹ek› nam ∂i gƒrla.’ Ok lát ﬂek ﬂó s∂m fæstum sinnum ﬂat h∂nda at
konungr ﬂurfi optar en um sinn or› at h∂rma firi ﬂér á›r en ﬂú n∂mir.
Sunr: Hv∂r skyns∂m› er til ﬂ∂ss at ﬂá er b∂tr at ƒll atkvæ›i sé margfaldat, ﬂau er mæla skal til ríkismanna, h∂ldr en ∂infaldat? En ∂f ma›r
bi›r bœnar sinnar til Gu›s, er allum er fr∂mri ok hæri, ﬂá eru ∂infaldatí hv∂rri bœn ƒll ﬂau atkvæ›i er til hans horfa, ok kv∂›r svá at or›ihv∂rr er sína bœn flytr vi› Gu›: ‘ﬁú, Dróttinn minn, allsvaldandi Gu›,høyr›u bœn mína ok miskunna mek betr en ek sé v∂‹r››r’. En ∂nganmann høyri ek svá taka til or›s: ‘ﬁér, Dróttinn minn, høyri› bœn mínaok gøri› b∂tr vi› mik firi sakar miskunnar y›arrar en ek sé v∂r›r’.
Nú v∂it ‹ek› ∂i at allfró›lig sé spurning mín. En ﬂó, m∂› ﬂví at ﬂér
hafi› lofat mér at spyrja slíks sem mek forvitnar, ﬂá vænti ek ﬂó gó›rarórlausnar s∂m fyrr, ﬂó at ek spyri b∂rnskliga.
Fa›ir: Víst vil ek ﬂat gjarna allt firi ﬂér sk‡ra er ek em til fœrr, en ∂igi
v∂it ek hví ﬂú forvitnar ﬂ∂tta mál svá gjƒrsamlega vi› mek at firi ﬂatskal skyns∂m› v∂ita hv∂rsu atkvæ›um er skipat í h∂lgum bœnum, ﬂvíat lærif∂›r várir mundu ﬂar kunna b∂tr svara um ﬂá luti er til gu›dómsins
er en ek. En m∂› ﬂví at hv∂r spurning lítr jamnan til svara, ﬂá vil ek
sk‡ra ﬂ∂tta mál firi ﬂér m∂› skjótri rœ›u, svá s∂m mér s‡niz vænligast,ok vil ek ﬂví fyst svara er mér ﬂykki ágætast v∂ra.
Nú ætla ek firi ﬂví svá skipat atkvæ›um í h∂lgum bœnum at h∂ldr sé∂infaldat en margfaldat ákall gu›legs nafs, at allir ﬂeir er á Gu› trúa
skili ﬂat til fulls at vér trúum á ∂inn Gu› sannan, en ∂igi á marga
falsgu›a, s∂m hei›nir m∂nn trú›u for›um á sjau gu›a. Kalla›u svá at

XXIV: Konungs skuggsjá

345∂inn gu› st‡r›i himnaríki, en annarr himintunglum, hinn ﬂri›i ﬂ∂ssum 36
heimi ok áv∂xtum jar›ar, hinn fjór›i hƒfum ok vƒtnum, en hinn fimti
vindum ok lopti, hinn sétti mannviti ok málsp∂ki, en hinn sjaundi h∂lvíti
ok dau›a.3
39
Nú skulum vér firi ﬂví gƒfga ∂inn Gu›, ﬂann er allar skepnur ﬂjóna,
ok bi›ja til hans m∂› ∂infƒldu atkvæ›i, at ∂i ﬂ‡›iz flær›samir gu›ar til
várra ákalla firi ﬂat at vér margfaldim atkvæ›i at fleiri væri gu› en 42∂inn í ákalli gu›legs nafns.4 ﬁ∂ssir lutir ganga ok til at skamms‡nirm∂nn mætti ﬂat hyggja at fleiri væ‹r›i gu› en ∂inn ∂f m∂› margfalda›uatkvæ›i væri á hans nafn kallat, ok er ﬂat réttliga tilskipat ok vitrlega at 45∂infƒld trú ok heilƒg hafi ∂kki rúm e›a villustíg at ganga af réttri ﬂjó›gatu.
Nú ∂f ﬂér skilz ∂igi til fulls ﬂ∂ssi rœ›a, ﬂá m∂gum vit ∂nn fl∂ira til
finna. En ∂f ﬂ∂ssi rœ›a má ﬂek lei›a til fullrar skilningar, ﬂá m∂gum 48
vit v∂l víkja okkarri rœ›u til andsvara um ﬂá luti a›ra er ﬂú spur›ir.
Sunr: ﬁ∂ssir lutir skiljaz mér v∂l ok ﬂykki mér v∂ra bæ›i sannligir ok
ﬂó nau›synlegir at firi ﬂví skal5 h∂ldr ∂infaldaz en margfaldaz ƒll 51
atkvæ›i til Gu›s at hvárki m∂gi rétt trú spillaz firi margfalt atkvæ›i ok∂igi m∂gi slœgir úvinir undir ﬂ‡›az ﬂat ákall er ∂infƒld trú ok rétt vísar
ﬂeim ífrá. En ek vil nú at ﬂér sk‡ri› ﬂat firi mér er ek spur›a um 54
v∂raldar ríkism∂nn, hví ƒll atkvæ›i ﬂœtti b∂tr til ﬂeirra margfaldat en∂infaldat?
Fa›ir: ﬁar er ﬂó œrnu firi svarat, at firi ﬂá sƒk ﬂykki b∂tr v∂ra mælt til 57
ríkismanna m∂› margfaldu atkvæ›i h∂ldr en ∂infaldu, at hœv∂skir m∂nnhafa ﬂat funnit firi andv∂r›u, ok h∂fir ﬂat sí›an snúiz til si›v∂nju m∂›r
allum vitrum mƒnnum ok hœv∂skum ﬂeim til sœm›ar s∂m vi› er mælt, 60
ok til ﬂ∂ss er kominn at ﬂiggja sœm›aratkvæ›i. En ﬂ∂tta ∂fni funnu
ﬂeir til, er frá andv∂r›u skipa›u ﬂ∂ssum atkvæ›um, at ríkism∂nn eru∂igi s∂m ∂innhv∂rr annarra, sá er firi sér ∂inum b∂rr áhyggju ok sínu 63
h‡ski ok á firi fá m∂nn svƒr at v∂ita. En hƒf›ingjar b∂ra áhyggju firiƒllum ﬂeim er undir ﬂeim eru at ﬂjónustu e›a at v∂ldi, ok hafa ﬂeir ∂igi
∂ins manns svƒr í munni, h∂ldr ∂igu ﬂeir firi marga svƒr at v∂ita, ok ∂f 66
gó›r hƒf›ingi f∂llr ífrá, ﬂá er ∂igi s∂m ∂ins manns missi, h∂ldr er ﬂat
mikil missa allum ﬂeim er af honum tóku upphald e›a sœm›ir, ok ers∂m allir v∂r›i minni firi sér, sí›an er ﬂeir missa hƒf›ingja síns, en 69
ﬂeir váru m∂›an hann lif›i, nema ﬂví at ∂ins at sá komi annarr í sta› er
ﬂeim sé jamv∂l vilja›r s∂m hinn er frá fell.

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XXIV: Konungs skuggsjá

Nú m∂› ﬂví at hƒf›ingjar halda upp m∂› mƒrgum hvártv∂ggjasœm›um ok andsvƒrum ok margfaldri áhyggju, ﬂá er ﬂat v∂l til
l∂ggjandi ﬂeim til sœm›ar at kenna ﬂá m∂› margfƒldu atkvæ›i í allri
75 rœ›u frá ﬂví er til ﬂeirra ﬂarf at rœ›a er smæri eru ok minni firi sér.6
En ﬂ∂ssir lutir eru ﬂeir enn er ﬂá váru til funnir e›a hugleiddir, er ﬂ∂tta
var fyrsta sinni til si›ar t∂kit, at konungar e›a a›rir ríkism∂nn ﬂá eru
78 ∂igi ∂inir saman í rá›ager› sinni, h∂ldr hafa ﬂeir m∂› sér marga a›ravitra m∂nn ok gƒfga; ok man ﬂá svá s‡naz, ∂f til hƒf›ingja v∂r›r mæltm∂›r margfaldu atkvæ›i, at ﬂá sé ∂igi til konungs ∂ins mælt, h∂ldr til
81 allra ﬂeirra er í rá›ager› eru m∂› hánum ok hans eru rá›gjafar. Ek gat
ﬂ∂ss ok nƒkkut í hinu fyrra or›i at ﬂú skalt vi›r ﬂví sjá at ﬂú margfaldir
annur ﬂau atkvæ›i er til ﬂín horfa, at ∂igi vir›ir ﬂú ﬂek jamnan hinum
84 er ﬂú rœ›ir vi›r ok meiri er en ﬂú. En ﬂó at ﬂú rœ›ir vi›r jammaka
ﬂinn e›a minna mann en ﬂú sér, ﬂá b∂rr ﬂér ∂kki sjálfum at vir›a ﬂikm∂› margfalda›u atkvæ›i.
72

XXIV: Konungs skuggsjá

347

Notes
1 Nú followed by verb and subject in inverted word order, even whenthe verb is not subjunctive, makes the opening clause conditional(‘Now if it should come about that . . .’), and the main clause usuallythen opens with a correlative ﬂá or ok. There are three examples ofthis in the extract from Grágás, XXVII:12, 16, 45 below.
2 Lack of concord between subject and verb is not all that uncommon

in Old Norse prose, but it is normally found only when the subject
and verb are widely separated in the sentence and the verb precedes
the subject (as in lines 16–17, where the lack of concord is between
subject and participle, and 51–52), and especially when the subject
consists of a sequence of conjoined subjects (see NION I, 3.9.8.2).
There are examples in other texts in this book in I:26–27 (see commentary), XIX:23, XXI:18, 32 and 161. But it is remarkable that inthis extract there are several examples of lack of concord where theverb does not precede the subject, as here and in lines 14–15 (where
the lack of concord is again between subject and participle) and 28–29.
Even though another of the principal manuscripts of this text, AM
243 a 4to, has regular concord in all these cases except the one
corresponding to that of lines 28–29, where it has horfir instead of er,
it seems unlikely that they are all the result of scribal error. Nor doesit seem a possible solution to take the verbs in lines 4, 14–15 and 29
as impersonal, especially since horfa is clearly not impersonal in lines
3 and 17, and nor is eru ∂infaldat in line 16. What is further remarkablein this text is that the first three examples all concern the word atkvæ›i‘verbal expression’, ‘mode of address’. Since it is an abstract noun, theplural may not have been perceived to have any difference in meaningfrom the singular, and the grammatical plural may well have beentaken by the scribe on occasion as a ‘logical singular’.
3 According to Finnur Jónsson (‘Indledning’, 1920, 60), it is the godsof classical (as opposed to Old Norse) mythology that are meant here;
he tentatively suggests that the seven gods in question are, respectively,
Jupiter, Sol, Liber (or Saturn), Neptune, Mercury, Apollo and Pluto.
He also offers the alternative suggestion that the deities in question
may be those associated with the days of the week, without, however,making it clear whether he is thinking of classical or Germanic deities in348

XXIV: Konungs skuggsjá

this context. On the former, see Graves (1958, 15–17, 27–30, 258–60);
on the latter, see Hagen (1836) and Strutynski (1975).
4 The syntax of this rather tortuous sentence is not entirely clear. Whilefiri ﬂví . . . at in lines 40–41 can be taken to mean ‘for this reason . . .
that’, i.e. ‘so that’, ‘in order that’ and firi ﬂat at in line 42 to mean
‘because’, ‘as a result of the fact that’, the second at in line 42 perhaps
means ‘as if’, ‘on the assumption that’.
5 Cf. note 2.
6 It is difficult to see how the last clause links to the rest ot the sentence,and if the er is relative, what the antecedent is. The meaning may be‘. . . in every speech about what needs to be spoken to them (by thosewho) are lower in rank and of less importance’ or ‘. . . in every speech
about what needs to be spoken to them when they (the speakers) arelower in rank and of less importance’. On the other hand, Finnur
Jónsson (1926, 84) and Meissner (1944, 121; though not Larsson 1917,
190) understand frá to mean ‘as distinct from’ and take ﬂeirra as theantecedent of the particle er that occurs later in the line, giving ameaning something like ‘. . . in all speech, as distinct from (differently
from?) the speech needed for addressing those who are lower in rank
and of less importance’.

XXV: HAM‹ISMÁL
Ham›ismál is the last poem in the Codex Regius of the Poetic Edda,
and its content forms the last episode in the legend cycle of Sigur›r
and the Burgundian royal family, of whom Gu›rún, Ham›ir and Sƒrli
are the last survivors.
It is probably one of the earliest surviving eddic poems, although
in an anonymous traditional poem it is always possible that different
stanzas may be of various dates and authorship. However, it has been
convincingly argued by Magnus Olsen (1936, 123–30) and Ursula
Dronke (1969, 214–17) that this poem is deliberately echoed several
times in some skaldic verses attributed to Torf-Einarr, Jarl of Orkney,
which probably date from around 890 (Skj B I 27–28). In celebrating
his own revenge for the killing of his father by Hálfdanr, son of King
Haraldr hárfagri of Norway, Einarr refers to himself as a fjƒr›ungr‘quarter’ of the force represented by himself and his brothers (TorfEinarr st. 2/4), just as Ham›ismál refers to the brothers decreasing
their force at ﬂri›jungi ‘by a third’ (line 55). This image of brothers
forming equal fractions of an overall unit is not found elsewhere in
ON verse. Immediately after this, Einarr tells his men to throw stoneson the body of his dead enemy (st. 2/5–8) and then declares how glad
he is that geirar . . . bitu ‘spears bit’ the ruler’s son (st. 3/1–4). This looks
like a deliberately ironic echo of Jƒrmunrekkr’s recognition that geirar
ne bíta ‘spears do not bite’ the brothers and they must be stoned (line92); again, the combination of geirar with the verb bíta is not foundanywhere else in ON verse. Finally, looking forward to further conflict,
Einarr says that his enemies do not know hverr ilﬂorna arnar / undirhl‡tr at standa ‘who will have to stand under the heel-thorns (i.e.
claws) of the eagle’ (st. 4/7–8); this is probably indebted to lines 106–07
of Ham›ismál, as we can see from the verb standa, which seems
surprising in Einarr’s verse but makes perfect sense in Ham›ismál’s imageof the heroes standing on the dead like eagles perching on the slain.
More tentatively, Dronke suggests (1969, 213–14) that some lines ofHam›ismál may already have been familiar to the earliest known skaldic
poet, Bragi Boddason (flourished c.850). Bragi’s Ragnarsdrápa is a poemof thanks to his patron for the gift of a ceremonial shield painted withmythological and legendary scenes, one of which was the brothers’ attackon Jƒrmunrekkr’s hall (Ragnarsdrápa 3–6, Skj B I 1–2). One phrase
in Ragnarsdrápa (3/5) resembles Ham›ismál 83 (rósta var› í ranni ‘there

350

XXV: Ham›ismál

was tumult in the hall’), and the image of the ƒlskálir ‘ale-cups’ (Ragnarsdrápa 4/5–6, Ham›ismál 83–84) rolling among the blood and severed
limbs is similar in the two poems. However, both of these may havebeen commonplace elements that could be expected in any poetic
description of this scene, and in other respects Bragi’s account seems
significantly different from the version in Ham›ismál. For example,
he seems to say that Jƒrmunrekkr was asleep when the brothers arrived
in his hall. It seems most likely that Ragnarsdrápa and Ham›ismál
are independent of each other, and therefore that Ham›ismál (or atleast major elements of it) should be dated to c.890 or a little earlier.
Like some other early eddic poems (e.g. Atlakvi›a), Ham›ismál,from the standpoint of the ‘classical’ Icelandic poetry of the late tenthcentury onwards, is rather irregular in metre, with stanzas and linesof varying lengths. Most of it is in the traditional fornyr›islag metre,‘the metre of ancient words (or deeds?)’, with two stressed syllables
in each half-line, usually with only one of those in the first half-line
bearing alliteration. One stanza is in the radically different ljó›aháttr‘metre of (magic) songs’, in which each pair of half-lines is followed
by a single heavy half-line that alliterates only within itself (lines
102–05; see note 35). Some individual half-lines, while not technicallyirregular, show heavy concentrations of unstressed syllables including
unstressed finite verbs (e.g. lines 21a, 62a). Line 66 has no alliteration
at all, but this may be due to a nom. pl. noun or adjective having
dropped out of the first half-line. Elsewhere, the alliteration does notalways conform to the conventions of later Icelandic verse, and hr- is
made to alliterate with r- in line 90, hv- with v- in line 100 (but withh- in lines 12 and 73) and sv- with s- in lines 9 and 32. The normal
rule is that it is the first stressed syllable in the second half-line (i.e.
the third in the whole line) that carries the alliteration, but in lines 77,
78 and 88 the alliteration is carried by the final stressed syllable ofthe line. This may be because the word order of these lines has been
subject to scribal alteration. Line 32 has double transverse alliteration(Hitt – hyggju, Sƒrli – svinna), but this is probably a deliberate ornamentrather than an irregularity. The poem is in a bad state of preservation,and many of these ‘irregularities’ may be the result of scribal
corruption; others may be due to the early date of composition, when
the rules may not have developed the strictness that became customary
in later Icelandic poetry. Since the poem shows great brilliance inXXV: Ham›ismál351

other respects, it is unlikely that they reflect the incompetence or
carelessness of the poet.
The legend of the death of Jƒrmunrekkr grew out of the fall of thehistorical Ostrogothic king Ermanaric in 375 AD. According to his
contemporary, the historian Ammianus Marcellinus (1935–39, Book
XXXI, ch. 3; Hamilton 1986, 415), Ermanaric wasa warlike king whose many heroic exploits had made him a terror to hisneighbours. Ermanaric was hard hit by the violence of this unexpected storm(i.e. an invasion by the Huns). For some time he endeavoured to standhis ground, but exaggerated reports circulated of the dreadful fate which
awaited him, and he found release from his fears by taking his own life.

Ammianus clearly does not tell the whole story of the historical events,
and perhaps did not know the details, but the king’s terrified suicide
seems surprising, for his successors did not immediately collapse
before the Hunnish onslaught, but organised an orderly retreat to theline of the River Dniester. This suggests that the historical Ermanaric
may have been decrepit with age or physically disabled, though wehave no contemporary evidence for or against this.
The next source on Ermanaric is the Ostrogothic historian Jordanes,
who wrote his Getica c.550, basing his work on that of Cassiodorus(who was also of Gothic origin and wrote c.520, i.e. about 150 years
after the events). Jordanes’s account runs as follows (1882, 91–92,§§ 315–19; my translation):
Hermanaricus King of the Goths had, as we related above, become theconqueror of many peoples, but while he was thinking what to do about
the arrival of the Huns, the perfidious nation of the Rosomoni, whom hehad then enslaved along with others, took this opportunity of betraying
him. And so the King, stirred up with rage, ordered that a certain womanof that nation who is remembered by the name Sunilda should be tied towild horses because of her husband’s treacherous desertion of him, andthat she should be torn to pieces by having them driven in different
directions. In vengeance for their sister, her brothers Sarus and Ammius
attacked Hermanaricus in the side with iron; wounded in this way, hedragged out his wretched life with a disabled body. Hearing of his
miserable state, Balamber King of the Huns moved his forces into theterritory of the Ostrogoths; certain Visigoths had also planned among
themselves to separate themselves from alliance with the Ostrogoths.
Meanwhile Hermanaricus, unable to bear either the pain of his wound or
the incursions of the Huns, died at a great age and full of days in the one

352

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hundred and tenth year of his life. His death gave the Huns the opportunity
to gain victory over those Goths who, as we have said, occupied theeastern region and were known as Ostrogoths.

This account introduces the prototypes of Svanhildr, Ham›ir and Sƒrli
and the sibling relationship between them, although it makes Svanhildr
the wife of a rebellious tribal leader rather than of the Jƒrmunrekkr
figure himself. It also gives her a manner of death similar to that in
the poem, though not identical with it. Dronke (1969, 193–96) argues
persuasively that there is no essential contradiction between theaccounts of Ammianus and Jordanes, and that the latter could be substantially historical, but we have no real evidence either for or against
this view. Despite his ferocious treatment of Sunilda, Jordanes seems,
unlike the poet of Ham›ismál, to admire Hermanaricus and to sympathisewith him against both the Huns and the treacherous Rosomoni. This
may explain why he says nothing of the suicide, which might haveseemed dishonourable, and instead stresses the king’s achievements
and his great age. There is no reason to doubt that Sunilda may havebeen a historical woman, and the name Sarus was also known among
the Goths (it was also the name of a commander of the Ostrogothic
military forces in Ravenna c.500, see Randers-Pehrson 1983, 108),but it is a little suspicious that both Ammius and Sarus can beinterpreted as functionally meaningful names. Ammius corresponds
to OE hama ‘skin’ and ON ham›ir may mean ‘the one provided witha hamr (skin or form of another creature)’ or ‘the mail-coated one’,and Sarus seems to be related to OE searu ‘craftiness’, ‘skill’, ‘armour’and OHG saro ‘mailcoat’. In Ham›ismál the brothers seem to be
immune to weapons, and in Skáldskaparmál, Vƒlsunga saga and Saxo
Grammaticus, Gu›rún provides them with armour or an enchantmentthat makes them invulnerable to weapons. If the names of the brothers
mean ‘the one with a skin’ and ‘the armoured one’, they may havebeen invented to describe their role, in which case the names of theactual historical revengers, if they existed, have been forgotten, as
the tribal name Rosomoni was soon to be.
It is clear that Svanhildr’s affair with Randvér and the treacherous
role of Bikki were not part of the story known to Jordanes, and there isno evidence either for the tragic killing of Erpr in his time. But Randvér,
Erpr and Jónakr are all mentioned in Ragnarsdrápa, and by the timeof the poet of Atlakvi›a (possibly c.900), Bikki must have become aXXV: Ham›ismál353

byword for treachery, since Atli’s treacherous warriors (in anotherstory altogether) can simply be called Bikka greppar ‘Bikki’s men’(Atlakvi›a 14/3). At some time between c.550 and c.850, therefore:
1) Svanhildr became the wife of Jƒrmunrekkr himself;
2) Randvér (possibly ‘shield-warrior’) was invented to supply theyoung wife with sexual temptation along the lines of the Phaedra story;3) Bikki (who as Becca King of the Baningas receives what looks likea blameless mention between Eormanric (Jƒrmunrekkr) and Gifica (Gjúki)in the OE Widsi› 19) became the traitor who caused the lovers’ deaths;
4) Erpr (‘swarthy’) was invented as the bastard brother who offers to
help as hand helps hand or foot helps foot, but is murdered for his pains.
It is worth noticing that the poet of Ham›ismál feels no necessity
to tell the whole of this story. His focus is on the compulsion to heroic
revenge and the mistakes of his two protagonists, and for this purpose
Bikki could be completely ignored and the affair between Svanhildr
and Randvér reduced to the mere fact of their violent deaths. So far
as either he or Bragi tells the tale, they might have been falsely accused(as they are in Saxo’s version of the story).
Later versions of the Scandinavian strand of the legend can be foundin SnE, Skáldskaparmál ch. 42 (1998, 49–51), Vƒlsunga saga chs
40–42 (1943, 87–91; 1990, 106–09) and (in a more complicated form)in Saxo Grammaticus VIII, ch. x, 7–14 (1931–35, I 233–35; 1979–80, I 256–58). For the very different traditions of Ermanaric in Old
English and Middle High German, see Brady (1943).
Bibliography
Sophus Bugge, ed., Sæmundar Edda hins fró›a (1867).
Ursula Dronke, ed., The Poetic Edda I: Heroic Poems (1969).
Barent Sijmons and Hugo Gering, eds, Die Lieder der Edda I–III (1888–1931).
Ammianus Marcellinus, Rerum gestarum libri qui supersunt, ed. and trans.
J. C. Rolfe, 3 vols. (1935–39); trans. Walter Hamilton as The Later Roman
Empire, A.D. 354–378 (1986).
Jordanes, Getica, ed. Theodor Mommsen (1882). In Monumenta Germaniae
historica, Auctores antiquissimi 5, 1.
Vƒlsunga saga, ed. Gu›ni Jónsson in Fornaldarsögur Nor›urlanda I (1943);
trans. Jesse Byock as The Saga of the Volsungs (1990).
Morkinskinna, ed. Finnur Jónsson (1932); tr. T. M. Andersson and Kari Ellen
Gade (2000). Islandica 51.

354

XXV: Ham›ismál

Saxo Grammaticus = Saxonis Gesta Danorum, ed. J. Olrik and H. Ræder, 2vols (1931–57); Books I–IX trans. Peter Fisher and Hilda Ellis Davidson
as Saxo Grammaticus, The History of the Danes, 2 vols (1979–80).
Beowulf, ed. F. Klaeber (1941).
Beowulf, tr. Seamus Heaney (1999).
Richard Hamer, A Choice of Anglo-Saxon Verse (1970).
Lex Burgundionum, in Monumenta Germaniae historica, Legum Sectio I, Vol.
II.i (1892).
Theodore M. Andersson, ‘Cassiodorus and the Gothic Legend of Ermanaric’,Euphorion 57 (1963), 28–43.
Caroline Brady, The Legends of Ermanaric (1943).
Caroline Brady, ‘The Date and Metre of the Ham›ismál’, Journal of English
and Germanic Philology 38 (1939), 201–16.
Caroline Brady, ‘Ó›inn and the Norse Jörmunrekkr Legend’, PMLA (1940),
910–30.
David Clark, ‘Undermining and en-gendering vengeance. Distancing andanti-feminism in the Poetic Edda’, Scandinavian Studies 77 (2005), 173–200.
George T. Gillespie, A Catalogue of Persons Named in German Heroic
Literature (700–1600) (1973).
S. Gutenbrunner, ‘Über den Schluss des Hamdirliedes’, Zeitschrift fürdeutsches Altertum 83 (1951–52), 6–12.
Joseph Harris, ‘Eddic Poetry’. In Old Norse-Icelandic Literature: A Critical
Guide, ed. Carol J. Clover and J. Lindow (1985), 68–156. Islandica 45.
Ursula Hennig, ‘Gab es ein “Jüngeres” Hamdirlied?’, Beiträge zur Geschichte
der deutsche Sprache und Literatur [Tübingen] 82 (1960), 44–69.
John Hines, ‘Famous Last Words: Monologue and Dialogue in Ham›ismál
and the Realisation of Heroic Tale’. In Learning and Understanding in the
Old Norse World. Essays in Honour of Margaret Clunies Ross, ed. Judy
Quinn, Kate Heslop and Tarrin Wills (2007), 177–200.
L. M. Hollander, ‘The Legendary Form of Ham›ismál’, Arkiv för nordisk
Filologi 77 (1962), 56–62.
John McKinnell, Meeting the Other in Norse Myth and Legend (2005).
Magnús Olsen, ‘Torv-Einar og Ham›ismál’, Bidrag til Nordisk Filologi
tillägnade Emil Olson (1936), 123–30.
Justine D. Randers-Pehrson, Barbarians and Romans. The Birth Struggle ofEurope, A.D. 400–700 (1983).
Franz R. Schröder, ‘Die Eingangsszene von Gu›rúnarhvƒt und Ham›ismál’,Beiträge zur Geschichte der deutsche Sprache und Literatur [Tübingen]
98 (1976), 430–36.
Klaus von See, ‘Gu›rúnarhvöt und Ham›ismál’, Beiträge zur Geschichte
der deutsche Sprache und Literatur [Tübingen] 99 (1977), 241–49.
Tom A. Shippey, ‘Speech and the Unspoken in Ham›ismál’. In Prosody and Poetics
in the Early Middle Ages. Essays in Honour of C. B. Hieatt (1995), 180–96.
E. O. Gabriel Turville-Petre, Myth and Religion of the North (1964).

XXV: Ham›ismál355

XXV: HAM‹ISMÁL
Spruttu á tái1 tregnar í›irgrœti álfa2 in gl‡stƒmu.
Ár um morgin3 manna bƒlva
sútir hverjar sorg um kveykva.
Vara ﬂat nú né í gær,ﬂat hefir langt li›it sí›an;er fátt fornara, fremr var ﬂat hálfu,er hvatti Gu›rún, Gjúka borin,4sonu sína unga at hefna Svanhildar.5‘Systir var ykkur Svanhildr um heitin,sú er Jƒrmunrekkr jóm um traddi
hvítum ok svƒrtum á hervegi,6grám, gangtƒmum Gotna hrossum.
Eptir er ykr ﬂrungit ﬂjó›konunga,lifi› einir ér ﬂátta ættar minnar.
Einstœ› em ek or›in sem ƒsp í holti,
fallin at frændum sem fura at kvisti,va›in at vilja sem vi›r at laufi,ﬂá er in kvistskœ›a kømr um dag varman.’7
*

*

3

6

9

12

15

18

8

*

Hitt kva› ﬂá Ham›ir inn hugumstóri:‘Lítt myndir ﬂú ﬂá, Gu›rún, leyfa dá› Hƒgna,er ﬂeir Sigur› svefni ór vƒk›u.
Saztu á be›, en banar hlógu.
Bœkr9 váru ﬂínar inar bláhvítu
ofnar vƒlundum10 — flutu í vers dreyra.
Svalt ﬂá Sigur›r, saztu yfir dau›um,
gl‡ja ﬂú ne gá›ir; Gunnarr ﬂér svá vildi.11
20 written ‘hugom stri’, i.e. hugumstœrri?

21

24

27

356

30

33

XXV: Ham›ismál
Atla ﬂóttiz ﬂú strí›a at Erps mor›iok at Eitils aldrlagi — ﬂat var ﬂér enn verra.
Svá skyldi hverr ƒ›rum verja til aldrlaga
sver›i sárbeitu at sér ne stríddit.’12
Hitt kva› ﬂá Sƒrli — svinna haf›i hann hyggju —‘Vilkat ek vi› mó›ur málum skipta.
Or›z ﬂikkir enn vant ykru hváru.
Hvers bi›r ﬂú nú, Gu›rún, er ﬂú at gráti ne færat?

39Brœ›r grát ﬂú ﬂína ok buri svása,13ni›ja náborna leidda nær rógi.
Okr skaltu ok, Gu›rún, gráta bá›a,er hér sitjum feigir á mƒrum; fjarri munum deyja.’

42

Gengu ór gar›i gƒrvir at eiskra.
Li›u ﬂá yfir, ungir, úrig fjƒll,mƒrum húnlenzkum mor›z at hefna.

36

Fundu á stræti stórbrƒg›óttan.
‘Hvé mun jarpskammr okr fultingja?’
45

48

51

54

Svara›i inn sundrmœ›ri; svá kvaz veita mundu
fulting frændum sem fótr ƒ›rum.
‘Hvat megi fótr fœti veita,
né holdgróin hƒnd annarri?’ﬁá kva› ﬂat Erpr einu sinni— mærr um lék á mars baki:‘Illt er blau›um hal brautir kenna.’Kó›u har›an mjƒk hornung vera.14
Drógu ﬂeir ór skí›i skí›ijárn,mækis eggjar at mun flag›i.15
ﬁver›u ﬂeir ﬂrótt sinn at ﬂri›jungi —létu mƒg ungan til moldar hníga.
36 lei›a.

49–52 between 42 and 43.

XXV: Ham›ismál

357

Skóku lo›a, skálmir festu,
ok go›bornir smugu í gu›vefi.

57

Fram lágu brautir; fundu vástígu
ok systur son16 sáran á mei›i,vargtré vindkƒld vestan bœjar.
Tr‡tti æ trƒnu hvƒt,17 títt varat bí›a.18

60

Glaumr var í hƒllu, halir ƒlreifir,
ok til gota19 ekki ger›ut heyraá›r halr hugfullr í horn um ﬂaut.

63

Segja fóru Jƒrmunrekkiat sénir váru seggir und hjálmum:‘Rœ›i› ér um rá›, ríkir eru komnir!
Fyr mátkum hafi› ér mƒnnum mey um tradda.’

66

Hló ﬂá Jƒrmunrekkr, hendi drap á kampa,
beiddiz at brƒngu, bƒ›va›iz at víni;20
skók hann skƒr jarpa, sá á skjƒld hvítan,lét hann sér í hendi hvarfa ker gullit.
‘Sæll ek ﬂá ﬂœttumk ef ek sjá knætta
Ham›i ok Sƒrla í hƒllu minni.
Buri mynda ek ﬂá binda me› boga strengjum,go›bƒrn21 Gjúka festa á gálga.’
Hitt kva› ﬂá hró›rglƒ›,22 stó› of hle›um,23mæfingr mælti vi› mƒg ﬂenna:24
*

*

72

75

78

*

‘. . . ﬂví at ﬂat heita at hl‡›igi myni.25
Mega tveir menn einir tíu hundru› Gotna
binda e›a berja26 í borg inni há?’Styrr var› í ranni, stukku ƒlskálir,í bló›i bragnar lágu, komit ór brjósti Gotna.
62 bi›ja.

69

81 hundru›um.

81

84

358

XXV: Ham›ismál

87

Hitt kva› ﬂá Ham›ir inn hugumstóri:‘Æstir, Jƒrmunrekkr, okkarrar kvámu,brœ›ra sammœ›ra,27 innan borgar ﬂinnar.
Fœtr sér ﬂú ﬂína, hƒndum sér ﬂú ﬂínum,28Jƒrmunrekkr, orpit í eld heitan.’

90

93

96

99

102

105

108

111

ﬁá hraut vi› inn reginkunngi,29baldr í brynju, sem bjƒrn hryti:‘Gr‡ti› ér á gumna, allz geirar ne bíta,
eggjar né járn Jónakrs sonu.’‘Bƒl vanntu, bró›ir, er ﬂú ﬂann belg leystir:
opt ór ﬂeim belg30 bƒll rá› koma.
Hug hef›ir ﬂú, Ham›ir, ef ﬂú hef›ir hyggjandi;
mikils er á mann hvern vant er manvits er.
Af væri nú haufu›
ef Erpr lif›i,31
bró›ir okkarr inn bƒ›frœkni er vit á braut vágum,verr inn vígfrœkni32 — hvƒttumk at dísir —,gumi inn gunnhelgi — gƒr›umz at vígi.’33‘Ekki hygg ek okr vera úlfa dœmi,at vit mynim sjálfir um sakask
sem grey norna,34 ﬂau er grá›ug eru
í au›n um alin.35
Vel hƒfum vit vegit, stƒndum á val Gotna
ofan, eggmó›um, sem ernir á kvisti.
Gó›s hƒfum tírar fengit, ﬂótt skylim nú e›a í gær36 deyja.
Kveld lifir ma›r ekki eptir kvi› norna.’ﬁar fell Sƒrli at salar gafli,
en Ham›ir hné at húsbaki.37
ﬁetta eru kƒllu› Ham›ismál in fornu.

94 before this speech Hitt kva› ﬂá Ham›ir inn hugumstóri: (but the speaker
here must be Sƒrli, since the ﬂú in line 94 is certainly Ham›ir). 100 varr
inn vi›frœkni. 102 ykr.

XXV: Ham›ismál

359

Notes
1 The tá was a strip of beaten earth outside the main door and along

the front of Norse houses. It was a traditional place for private
conversations and could be used figuratively to refer to them, cf.
Morkinskinna (1932, 89; 2000, 151): ok heimtask nú á tá inir vitrustu
menn, ok hafa tal milli sín ‘Some of the wisest men were assembled
and took counsel’. Here it probably refers to the secrecy of the
discussion between Gu›rún and her sons.
2 Sijmons and Gering (1883–1931, III.ii 428) take grœti álfa as akenning for morning (because dwarves, who may be identical with‘dark elves’, are turned to stone if the daylight touches them, as at theend of Alvíssmál), but no comparable kennings have been found. It is
more probably a reference to the female family spirits (dísir or fylgjur,
perhaps originally the spirits of dead ancestors; see Turville-Petre
1964, 221–31, and McKinnell 2005, 198–200) who were believed topreside over the fortunes of a household. Here they may be said toweep because of the coming extinction of the family. This statement
contrasts with the more negative view taken by Ham›ir and Sƒrli,who blame the dísir for having provoked their own killing of Erpr(see line 100). See also note 15 below.
3 Early morning is a traditional time for brooding grief in Germanic

literature; cf. Beowulf lines 2450–62 (1941, 92; 1999, 77–78); The
Wife’s Lament lines 35–36; The Wanderer lines 8–9 (Hamer 1970,
74–75; 174–75).
4 According to the Lex Burgundionum (1892, 43) ‘Law of the Burgun-

dians’ (c.500), Gibica (= ON Gjúki) was the founder of the Burgundian
royal dynasty. In legend, Gjúki is the father of Gunnarr, Hƒgni andGu›rún, but only the first of these is clearly based on a historicalperson (King Gundaharius, killed by the Huns in 437; for sources,
see Dronke 1969, 34–36). The figure of Gu›rún may be indirectly
derived from Ildico (= Hild), who according to Jordanes (1882, 123;§§ 617–19) was the wife whom Attila the Hun had just married on
the night he died in bed of a nosebleed in 453. As Dronke demonstrates,
a rumour soon grew up that Attila had been murdered by his newwife, and if her motive was assumed to be a Burgundian desire forrevenge on the Hunnish king, it would be natural to give her name a

360

XXV: Ham›ismál

first element that began with G, like other Burgundian royal names.
This explains why the heroine in German versions of the story is called
Kriemhilt. But in ON sources, Grímhildr (literally ‘mask-battle’)
becomes the name of the heroine’s mother, and the almost synonymousGu›rún (literally ‘war-secret’, or perhaps ‘god-secret’) has been invented
for the heroine herself, possibly because the extra character of themother was needed to explain the magic potion that causes Sigur›r tofall in love with Gu›rún and forget his previous love for Brynhildr.
5 According to the cycle of legend related in the Poetic Edda and inVƒlsunga saga, Gu›rún was married three times, first to the hero anddragon-slayer Sigur›r, whom she loved and by whom she had Svanhildr;
next to Atli (= Attila the Hun), whom she murdered, along with their
two sons Erpr and Eitill; and finally to King Jónakr, the father of hersons Ham›ir and Sƒrli. On the death of Svanhildr, see Introduction above.
6 There were no paved military roads in Scandinavia. The important

motif of roads and paths may have survived from earlier German or
Old English versions of the story because of the idea that the stones
finally ‘take vengeance’ for the blood of Erpr having been shed onthem; see lines 43, 59 and 92.
7 It was a traditional summer task of women on Norwegian farms tostrip small branches from the trees during warm weather; twigs andpine needles were then dried and used for kindling and bedding, while
deciduous leaves were fed to the farm animals (see Dronke 1969, 227).
8 A stanza must be missing here, since line 21 implies that Gu›rún
has just compared her sons’ courage unfavourably with that of her
dead brothers Gunnarr and Hƒgni (for whose heroic death see Atlakvi›a). This lost stanza may have been used by the poet of st. 3 of thelater poem Gu›rúnarhvƒt (Dronke 1969, 146) which immediately
precedes Ham›ismál in the Codex Regius:‘Ur›ua it glíkir

ﬂeim Gunnari,‘You have not become like Gunnarr andhis brother,né in heldr hug›ir sem var Hƒgni. nor equipped with courage as Hƒgni was.
Hennar mundu› it
hefna leita, You would have tried to avenge her
ef it mó› ætti› minna brœ›ra, if you had the heart of my brothers,e›a har›an hug Húnkonunga.’ or the firm mind of the Hunnish kings.’

XXV: Ham›ismál

361

Most of this may in fact come verbatim from Ham›ismál, as thefollowing stanza of Gu›rúnarhvƒt certainly does (cf. lines 20–24 ofthis edition of Ham›ismál), but this cannot be regarded as certain.
The only element in it which is probably not indebted to the lost stanza
of Ham›ismál is its reference to ‘Hunnish kings’ (probably an allusion
to Sigur›r, who is of Hunnish origin only in later German and Norse
tradition). But the lost stanza may have included the same implicationthat because they are not sons of her beloved Sigur›r, Gu›rún places
a lower value on the lives of Ham›ir and Sƒrli than on that of Svanhildr.
This would help to motivate their sense of rage at the way she taunts
them into undertaking their suicidal venture, and the adjective hugumstóri ‘mighty in courage’ which is applied to Ham›ir immediately
afterwards suggests her unfairness in accusing them of cowardice(though it may also be a fixed epithet that was commonly attached tohim; cf. line 85).
9 Before the arrival of Latin literacy in the Germanic world there

were no ‘books’ in the modern sense of the word. This is one of anumber of instances in Old Norse where bók seems to refer to piecesof embroidered cloth (in this case bed-covers); cf. also Sigur›arkvi›ain skamma 49/7–8, where the dying Brynhildr offers bók ok blæju,bjartir vá›ir ‘an embroidered cloth and coverlet, bright clothes’ toany one of her maids who is prepared to die with her, and cf. the verb
gullbóka ‘to embroider in gold’ in Gu›rúnarkvi›a II 14/6. For theargument that the modern use of the word may be derived from a comparison of manuscript illumination with embroidery, see Dronke(1969, 228).
10 Vƒlundr is familiar as the legendary master-craftsman of the Germanic

world and the protagonist of Vƒlundarkvi›a, but the word occasionallyappears, as here, as a common noun meaning ‘craftsman’ (cf. also
Merlínusspá II, 7/2 and Snorri Sturluson, lausavísa 4/8; Skj B II 25,
89). It is not clear whether or not these instances are derived from theproper name, whose etymology is obscure (largely because it isdifficult to derive ON Vƒlundr, OF Galans from the same root as OE
Welund/Weland, MHG Wielant). It is possible that they may indeed
have different origins, with the common noun vƒlundr being related
to ON val, vƒl, OHG wala ‘choice’ (cf. ON velja ‘to choose’), hence‘one who makes choice things’, while forms of the name with a long

362

XXV: Ham›ismál

front vowel could have come about by association with the noun vél‘device, trick’. In that case, the proper name Vƒlundr may be derived
from the common noun rather than vice versa.
11 In lines 21–27 Ham›ir reminds Gu›rún that the brothers she has

praised were also the murderers of Sigur›r. As the compiler of theprose links in the Codex Regius points out at the end of Brot af
Sigur›arkvi›u (PE 201), there were various versions of how Sigur›rdied. In Brot itself and in Gu›rúnarkvi›a I the brothers kill him outof doors and report his death to Gu›rún, but the poet of Ham›ismál
prefers the tradition shared by Sigur›arkvi›a in skamma, in which
they kill him when he is asleep in bed with her. In Sigur›arkvi›a inskamma and Vƒlsunga saga the murder is actually carried out by
Gothormr, the younger brother of Gunnarr and Hƒgni, who has not
sworn an oath of foster-brotherhood with Sigur›r as they have. Thismay be an elaboration from a time later than that of Ham›ismál, or
this poet may simply have omitted it for the sake of brevity; whether
they did the killing themselves or not, Gunnarr and Hƒgni were
responsible for Sigur›r’s death.
12 In lines 28–31 Ham›ir points out that Gu›rún ought to realise thatsome revenges are too costly to the revenger to be worthwhile, as
when she herself slaughtered Erpr and Eitill, her sons by Atli, as partof her annulment of their marriage following his murder of Gunnarrand Hƒgni. Ironically, Ham›ir and Sƒrli will soon murder another Erpr,
Jónakr’s son by another woman, and one instance of the name may
have been borrowed from the other. However, since its meaning(‘swarthy’, cf. OE eorp ‘dark’, ON jarpr ‘brown’) is appropriate toboth of them (with Erpr in Ham›ismál even being called jarpskammr‘the short brown man’), it is not possible to tell which if either is theoriginal. The fact that the name lacks the vowel-breaking that was
normal in this word suggests either that it fossilised at an early stage
or that it has been borrowed from Old High German or Old Saxon,
where this change did not take place (cf. OE eor›e, ON jƒr›, but
OHG, OS erda ‘earth’).
13 This phrase is curiously echoed in Atlakvi›a st. 39, which claims
that Gu›rún never wept for either her brothers or her sons. The tradition
that Gu›rún could not weep later became fixed (see Brot, closing

XXV: Ham›ismál363

prose, and most of Gu›rúnarkvi›a I), but it is not possible to say
whether or not it already existed when Ham›ismál was composed.
14 In the Codex Regius, lines 48–51 are placed at the beginning of theencounter between Erpr and his brothers (before line 43 in this text),
but this seems an obvious mistake, even though Hines (2007, 184–88)
puts forward an argument in favour of the manuscript ordering of thelines. Line 43 clearly introduces the scene, which Ham›ir and Sƒrli
begin by decrying Erpr’s offer of help (presumably because they regard
him as an outsider and beneath them). His reply that he would help
them as one foot or hand helps the other recalls versions of the story
in which they later stumble on the way to carry out their revenge andrealise the truth of his words (see SnE Skáldskaparmál ch. 42,
Vƒlsunga saga ch. 44 and cf. Dronke 1969, 199–202). The poet may
have omitted the latter half of this motif for the sake of brevity, and/or
because it was so well known that it could be assumed from Erpr’s
words here. However, their killing of him is well motivated by hissuggestion that they are cowardly (using what is probably a proverb).
They have had to endure this damaging insult from their mother, butwill not tolerate it from their bastard brother.
15 The flag› ‘ogress, giantess, hag’ here may be either Hel, the female

figure who presides over the world of the dead, or a malicious dís
who wants to see the destruction of the family. If the first interpretation
is right, the idea may be akin to that in Ynglingatal 7 (Skj B I 8),
where Hel is said to enjoy (sexual) pleasure from the body of King
Dyggvi. The second would suggest that the poet agrees with the viewexpressed by one of the brothers that the dísir provoked them to kill
Erpr (line 100; but see line 2 above for a very different view, also in themouth of the narrator).
16 Strictly, Jƒrmunrekkr’s son Randvér (see Bragi, Ragnarsdrápa 3,

c.850; Skj B I 1) is their half-sister’s stepson, but the emotional shockis reinforced by citing the sister’s son relationship, which was particularly sacred in Germanic society. According to Skáldskaparmál ch.
42 and Vƒlsunga saga ch. 42, Svanhildr and Randvér were tempted
into planning to marry each other by Jƒrmunrekkr’s evil counsellor
Bikki, who then informed on them, with the result that both were
executed. In Ham›ismál Randvér has evidently been wounded as well364

XXV: Ham›ismál

as hanged, which may suggest an Odinic sacrifice; cf. Hávamál st.
138, Gautreks saga ch. 7 and Turville-Petre (1964), 47.
17 Hanged and slain men are often indicated by reference to the carrion

birds that feasted on them, but this is a strange example, because thecrane is not a carrion bird. It should probably be understood as anabbreviation of some such kenning as bló›trani ‘blood-crane’ (i.e.
raven), cf. Óttarr svarti, Knútsdrápa 8/3 (Skj B I 274).
18 The Codex Regius reading bi›ja ‘to ask (for something)’ makes nosense here, and is probably a scribal error for bí›a ‘to wait, linger’.
19 gota is a poetic word, but may refer either to (Gothic) horses (asense also found in a runic verse on the Rök stone, c.900) or to warriors(originally ‘Goths’); in this latter sense it is used of the Burgundiansin Grípisspá 35/6, Brot 9/4, Atlakvi›a 20/3, and Gu›rún’s mother
Grímhildr is called gotnesk kona ‘Gothic woman’ in Gu›rúnarkvi›a
II 17/2. But in Ham›ismál it seems unlikely that it refers to Ham›ir
and Sƒrli, since this would introduce an unnecessary confusion withJƒrmunrekkr and his men, who actually are Goths and are referred toas such (though always with the alternative gen. pl. form Gotna) inlines 81, 84 and 105. The reference is probably to the sound made by
the brothers’ approaching horses.
20 The vocabulary of this line is unusual and probably deliberately

exotic, as part of the portrait of an arrogant foreign ruler. In ON bei›ausually means ‘to demand’, but the context of beiddisk here seems
rather to demand the sense ‘stirred himself up’, which is common in
the corresponding words in OHG, OS and OE; the word here could
either be a survival from an older version of the story in one of theselanguages or a deliberate exoticism introduced by this poet. The wordbrƒngu is found nowhere else in ON verse, but may be related to
MLG prank ‘battle, quarrel’, and could be another foreign borrowing.
The verb bƒ›va is also found nowhere else, though it is obviously
derived from the feminine noun bƒ› ‘battle’, of which there are about
fifteen examples in skaldic verse.
21 The MS reading here could be interpreted either as gó› bƒrn Gjúka‘good children of Gjúki’ (Sijmons and Gering, Kuhn in PE, among

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365

others) or as go›bƒrn Gjúka ‘divinely descended children of Gjúki’.
As Dronke points out (1969, 234) the latter is metrically moresatisfactory, and is formally paralleled in ﬁór›r Særeksson’s descriptionof Ska›i as go›brú›r (lausavísa 3/6, Skj B I 304). Most Germanic
royal families claimed divine ancestry, though in this context Jƒrmunrekkr may be mocking this claim.
22 The word hró›rglƒ› ‘(woman) pleased by glorious behaviour’ is

not found elsewhere, but for such similar compounds as hró›rau›igr‘rich in glory’, hró›rfinginn ‘devoted to glory’, hró›rfúss ‘eager forglory’, see LP 286–67, and for flugglƒ› ‘rejoicing in flight’ (a namefor an arrow), see LP 143. -glƒ› is also found as the second element
in some female personal names (e.g. Menglƒ›, the half-giantess who
befriends the hero in Orms ﬂáttr Stórólfssonar; and there is anotherMenglƒ› in the late eddic poems Grógaldr and Fjƒlsvinnsmál), but there
is no evidence that hró›rglƒ› is a proper name here, though some editors
have regarded her as the mother or mistress of Jƒrmunrekkr. Nor is it
likely that it refers to Gu›rún, as argued by Sijmons and Gering(1888–1931, III.ii 440), since this scene is taking place at Jƒrmunrekkr’s
court, far from the home of Gu›rún (see line 39). The speaker seems
to be simply an anonymous woman (or possibly one of the dísir ofline 100) whose function is to admire the two young heroes.
23 A hle›i was a wooden shutter or sliding door to a lokrekkja ‘closing

bed, sleeping cubicle’ in the hall; it was sometimes used by womenas a way of peeping into the hall without being seen themselves (e.g.
Kormaks saga ch. 3), and in this case it may explain how a woman inJƒrmunrekkr’s court can express a viewpoint that she would hardly
dare to state openly.
24 Several different emendations have been suggested here, to vi› mƒgusína ‘to her sons’ (assuming that the speaker is Gu›rún, see above),vi› mƒg svinnan ‘to the wise young man’ or vi› mƒgﬂegna ‘to the young
knights’), but the MS reading makes sense (‘to that young man’), andshould not be emended merely because it is surprising to find a singularhere. It probably refers to Ham›ir, the leader of the brothers.
25 This line seems disjointed, with no explanation of its opening ﬂvíat ‘because’; a line has probably been lost before it. Both halves of366

XXV: Ham›ismál

the line are metrically deficient. Some re-writings have been suggested: ﬂví er ﬂar hætta ‘one ought to desist from that (which) . . .’;ﬂví átt at heita ‘you ought to promise that (which) . . .’, ﬂví áttat heita‘you ought not to promise that (which) . . .’ — all excellent suggestions,and improvements metrically, but for the fact that they are not what the
MS appears to say.
hl‡›igi: -gi is an originally emphatic particle used after a negativethat came to be used as a negative particle when the ne was lost (e.g.
manngi ‘no one’). Apart from emendations, the only possibility forhl‡›i is that it is an otherwise unknown feminine noun meaning‘silence’ (cf. hljó›r adj. ‘silent’). The line might then be translated‘. . . because they are vowing what would be no silence (i.e. not kept
quiet) — sc. a famous deed’, except that in this sense heita requires anobject in the dative, not accusative case, and the line is probably corrupted beyond help other than emendation.
26 The brothers are not literally trying to bind the Goths, but to kill

them; binda ok berja seems to have been a generalised phrase meaning‘to gain complete victory over (someone)’.
27 This word is tragically ironic in the middle of Ham›ir’s ill-advised

speech of exultation over his enemy, since it contrasts with sundrmœ›ri(line 45) and thus reminds us of the crucial absence of Erpr from therevenge.
28 For the motif of hands and feet, see lines 46–48 and note 14 above.

Erpr’s absence and Ham›ir’s vaunting delay the decapitation ofJƒrmunrekkr long enough to give him time to tell the Goths how to kill
the brothers. They are invulnerable to weapons (see Introduction), sothey can only be killed by stoning.
29 reginkunngi is usually taken to refer to Jƒrmunrekkr’s divine ancestry(cf. reginkunnum, referring to runes in Hávamál 80/3; áskungar,
referring to the norns in Fáfnismál 13/4), and this must be part of thesense, but Dronke convincingly suggests that reginkunnigr here also
has the sense ‘knowledgeable about divine powers’ and refers to thecommon belief that dying men could acquire supernatural perception(and the ability to curse their enemies effectively; cf. also Fáfnismál).

XXV: Ham›ismál367

30 ﬂann belg leystir may refer to Ham›ir opening his own mouth inlines 86–89, which offered the delay that enabled Jƒrmunrekkr togive the orders that led to the death of the brothers. But belg is only
otherwise used in this sense in a proverbial metaphor for an old man
as a bag from which words pour out, cf. Hávamál st. 134, and in line
95 the reference is certainly to Jƒrmunrekkr speaking in lines 92–93.
Some editors have emended the first half of line 95 (Sijmons–Gering
to opt ór belg or›gum ‘often from a talkative bag’; Dronke to opt órrau›om belg ‘often from a red (i.e. bleeding) bag’), but neither seems
necessary, even though Dronke cites a prose parallel in Njáls sagach. 91. What Sƒrli means is that this particular ‘bag’ (i.e. Jƒrmunrekkr)
often speaks words that have evil consequences. If belg in line 94
also means Jƒrmunrekkr, er ﬂú ﬂann belg leystir would have to mean
‘when you left that bag free to speak’.
31 It is not clear which brother is speaking here. Lines 94–97 are clearly

spoken by Sƒrli; it makes sense for Ham›ir to have the last word (i.e.
lines 106–09); and lines 102–05 look like a rejoinder to the previouslines. One might see lines 98–101 as a continuation of the speech inwhich Sƒrli blames Ham›ir and 102–05 as Ham›ir’s rather selfexcusing reply (as I have done here). Alternatively, lines 98–101 may
be Ham›ir’s belated realisation of his mistakes (as Dronke assumes),
in which case lines 102–05 look like a conciliatory reply by Sƒrli.
Unfortunately, one’s view of the end of the poem seems likely todepend on which interpretation is adopted, and I can see no reliable
way of choosing between them. Hines (2007, 183–84) suggests thatthe question is unimportant because the two brothers are finally merged
into a single heroic personality.
32 Codex Regius varr inn vi› frœkni makes no sense; vígfrœkni ‘boldin killing’ (Neckel–Kuhn and Dronke) would be parallel in form andmeaning to bƒ›frœkni in the preceding line, and thus seems preferable
to ví›frægi ‘widely famous’ (Bugge and Sijmons–Gering).
33 Sijmons–Gering and Dronke emend to gƒr›umk ‘they made me’,to produce a grammatical parallel to hvƒttumk in the previous line,
but ‘we forced ourselves to the killing’ is quite possible for gƒr›umz.
‘We prepared ourselves for a killing’ also makes reasonable sense

368

XXV: Ham›ismál(more or less the equivalent of ‘we did do the killing’), and would
acknowledge that even if the brothers were provoked by the dísir,they know that they must ultimately take the responsibility for Erpr’s
death themselves.
34 ‘Norns’ bitches’ are obviously she-wolves, though no exact parallel

has been found. Dronke points out that the poet avoids suggestingthat wolves are the Norns’ ‘steeds’ because that would associate theNorns with giantesses and troll-women (such as Hyndla, who rides awolf in Hyndluljó› st. 5).
35 Unlike the rest of the poem, lines 102–05 are in ljó›aháttr ‘themetre of (magic) songs’ (see Introduction) which is also used in
didactic or proverbial poems such as Hávamál. The different metre
here has led to speculation that these lines may have been added byanother poet, but the change of metre could be due merely to thecontent, which resembles proverbial advice (cf. Fáfnismál). On othermetrical irregularities in the poem, see Introduction.
36 í gær usually means ‘yesterday’, but Dronke suggests on the basisof one case in Gothic that it may here have an archaic sense ‘tomorrow’,or more generally ‘some other day’.
37 Dronke (1969, 190–92) sees a dichotomy between the attack in thehall and the fact that the brothers ultimately die outside the building,and concludes that lines 110–11 may be the work of another poet.
But their deaths outside the hall can be explained in several otherways (e.g. they tried to fight their way out; they were rushed outside
because it was easier to stone them there; they had to get outside sothat the stones could complete their ‘revenge’; see note 6 above), andher supposition seems unnecessary. Hines (2007, 193–96) suggeststhat at salar gafli and at húsbaki may refer to locations inside thehall, at its inner end, and so could imply that the brothers were killed
inside.

XXVI: Njáls saga

369

XXVI: NJÁLS SAGA
Njáls saga (referred to in the manuscripts as Brennu-Njáls saga ‘Sagaof Njáll of the Burning’) was probably written 1275–90. It is thelongest and in many ways the greatest of the Sagas of Icelanders,combining several originally separate narratives and involving a large
number of characters from all over Iceland, although the main eventsare located in the south-west of the country.
The two extracts reproduced here represent the climaxes of the firsttwo parts of the saga: the extraordinary fight to the death of the great
warrior Gunnarr, and the burning in his house of Gunnarr’s friend
Njáll and his sons. The feuds leading up to these events are largely
disparate, but the two parts (which some have thought derive fromtwo separate sagas) are linked both by the friendship and common
desire for peace of the contrasting heroes, and thematically. This isclear from the overt comparison made, in the preamble to the burning
at Bergﬂórshváll, between the burners and the more honourable
attackers who had scorned to resort to the use of fire against Gunnarr(B, lines 60–66). The two parts of the saga are separated by the socalled Kristni ﬂáttr, recounting the conversion of Iceland to Christianity,in which Njáll is given a leading (but no doubt fictitious) role; thissection forms a pivot between the perspectives of the two parts,
contrasting the noble pagan Gunnarr with his Christian, indeed almost
saintly friend — whose killers are also Christian. The last part of thesaga relates the lengthy quest of Njáll’s son-in-law Kári, who survives
the burning, to track down and kill the burners one by one, before heis finally reconciled with their leader Flosi.
This reconciliation is symptomatic of the fact that violence in thesaga is more often a response to the demands of honour, in particular
the duty of revenge, than the result of personal animosity. The leadersof both attacks are represented as upstanding men forced by theseimperatives to take an action they regret. Flosi is a sincere Christian;Gizurr inn hvíti Teitsson, who leads the attack on Gunnarr, figureslater in the saga as one of the first to bring Christianity to Iceland (ahistorical reality confirmed by Íslendingabók; his son Ísleifr was tobe Iceland’s first bishop). Gizurr is drawn into the feud by the need toavenge those reluctantly killed by Gunnarr. This theme is introduced
to the saga by the sequence of incidents in which Gunnarr and Njáll
struggle to maintain their friendship in the face of the attempts of

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XXVI: Njáls saga

their wives to draw them into a feud. Although they share a militant
determination to protect their husbands’ honour literally to the death,these women are contrasted by their attitudes to their marital situation:
Bergﬂóra famously declares her determination not to be separated indeath from the man she was married to when young (B, lines 163–64), whereas Hallger›r proudly sacrifices each of her three husbands
after a slight on her honour. Mƒr›r Valgar›sson too, described morethan once as slœgr ok illgjarn ‘cunning and ill-disposed’ (ÍF XII 70,
119), plays an unequivocally villainous role in both the first and thesecond parts of the saga, fomenting quarrels and acting as a ringleader
in the attack on Gunnarr. He is said to be envious of Gunnarr, towhom he is related (their mothers were first cousins according to thesaga’s genealogy). Once again Christianity forms the fault-line
between the morally upright and the disreputable, since Mƒr›r andhis father, Valgar›r inn grái, are prominent among the opponents to theConversion (ch. 102). Christianity changes the saga’s perspective, butdoes not simplify it. The Christian burners are seen as more unscrupulous
than their pagan predecessors who had attacked Gunnarr; and Njáll
himself, though his death is infused with hagiographical overtones,
remains bound by the ethic of revenge, choosing to die because he is
too old to avenge his sons and will not live with shame. The overwhelming
desire for harmony, shared by Gunnarr and Njáll even before thecoming of the new faith, is set against the demands of the traditional
code of honour, but this simple equation is complicated by conflictsof family loyalty, sexual desire and the ambiguous role of the law.
Njáls saga survives in nineteen medieval manuscripts (dating frombetween 1300 and 1550) as well as numerous later copies, demonstrating
its popularity throughout its history (Einar Ól. Sveinsson 1953). None ofthese early manuscripts is complete and some are no more than fragments.
The text used in these extracts is that of Reykjabók (R), the earliest
extant manuscript, written around 1300. This and the manuscripts
related to it cite more skaldic verse than the other manuscript groups,
both in the body of the text and written later in the margins. The saga
is also included in the fourteenth-century Mö›ruvallabók (M) (seepp. 42 and 198 above and Text XVIII), which has supplied somereadings in the text. The chapter headings are those of R, written in adifferent but contemporary hand to that of the text, but the chapter
numbers are those conventional in editions and translations.

XXVI: Njáls saga

371

Bibliography
Njála, udgivet efter gamle Håndskrifter. Ed. Konrá› Gíslason et al. (1879–96).
Brennu-Njálssaga (Njála) Ed. Finnur Jónsson (1908). Altnordische SagaBibliothek.
Brennu-Njáls saga, ed. Einar Ól. Sveinsson (1954). ÍF XII. [Based on
Mö›ruvallabók.]
Njáls saga: The Arnamagnæan Manuscript 468, 4to (1962). Manuscripta
Islandica. [Facsimile of Reykjabók.]
Brennu-Njálssaga. Texti Reykjabókar. Ed. Sveinn Yngvi Egilsson (2004).
Njal’s saga, tr. Robert Cook. In CSI III 1–220. Also published by Penguin,
2001.
Scriptores historiae Augustae, trans. D. Magie et al. (1922–23, reprinted1991). Loeb Classical Library.
Jesse Byock, Viking Age Iceland (2001).
Ursula Dronke, The Role of Sexual Themes in Njáls saga (1981). Dorothea
Coke Memorial Lecture.
Einar Ól. Sveinsson, Studies in the Manuscript Tradition of Njáls saga (1953).
Studia Islandica 13.
Hjalmar Falk, Altnordische Waffenkunde (1914).
Lars Lönnroth, Njáls saga: A Critical Introduction (1976).
Ian Maxwell, ‘Pattern in Njáls saga’. Saga-Book 15 (1957–61), 17–47.
Gu›rún Nordal, ‘Attraction of Opposites: Skaldic Verse in Njáls saga’. In
Literacy in Medieval and Early Modern Scandinavian Culture, ed. Pernille
Hermann (2005).
Evert Salberger, ‘Elfaraskáld – ett tilnamn i Njáls saga’. Scripta Islandica
24 (1973), 15–24.

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XXVI A: THE DEATH OF GUNNARR
Chapter 76: Atrei› til Hlí›arenda
Um haustit sendi Mƒr›r Valgar›sson or› at Gunnarr mundi vera einn
3 heima, en li› allt mundi vera ni›ri í Eyjum at lúka heyverkum. Ri›uﬂeir Gizurr hvíti ok Geirr go›i austr yfir ár ﬂegar ﬂeir spur›u ﬂat, ok
austr yfir sanda til Hofs. ﬁá sendu ﬂeir or› Starka›i undir ﬁríhyrningi,
6 ok fundusk ﬂeir ﬂar allir er at Gunnari skyldu fara, ok ré›u hversu atskyldi fara. Mƒr›r sag›i at ﬂeir mundu eigi koma á óvart Gunnari
nema ﬂeir tœki bónda af næsta bœ, er ﬁorkell hét, ok léti hann fara
9 nau›gan me› sér at taka hundinn Sám ok fœri hann heim einn á bœinn.1
Fóru ﬂeir sí›an austr til Hlí›arenda, en sendu eptir ﬁorkatli. ﬁeir
tóku hann hƒndum ok ger›u honum tvá kosti, at ﬂeir mundu drepa
12 hann, ella skyldi hann taka hundinn, en hann køri heldr at leysa líf sittok fór me› ﬂeim. Tra›ir váru fyrir nor›an gar›ana at Hlí›arenda, ok
námu ﬂeir ﬂar sta›ar me› flokkinn. Bóndi ﬁorkell gekk heim á bœinn,15 ok lá rakkinn á húsum uppi, ok teygir hann rakkan á braut me› sér ígeilar nƒkkurar. Í ﬂví sér hundrinn at ﬂar eru menn fyrir, ok leypr áhann ﬁorkel upp ok greip nárann. ¯nundr ór Trƒllaskógi hjó me› øxi
18 í hƒfu› hundinum svá at allt kom í heilann. Hundrinn kva› vi› háttsvá at ﬂat ﬂótti ﬂeim me› ódœmum miklum vera, ‹ok fell hann dau›rni›r›.
21

Chapter 77: Víg Gunnars frá Hlí›arenda

Gunnarr vakna›i í skálanum ok mælti, ‘Sárt ertu leikinn, Sámr fóstri,ok bút svá sé til ætlat at skammt skyli okkar í me›al.’
Skáli Gunnars var gerr af vi›i einum ok sú›ﬂaktr útan ok gluggar
24
hjá brúnásunum ok snúin ﬂar fyrir speld.2 Gunnarr svaf í lopti einu ískálanum ok Hallger›r ok mó›ir hans. ﬁá er ﬂeir kómu at, vissu ﬂeir
27 eigi hvárt Gunnarr mundi heima vera, ok bá›u at einnhverr mundifara heim fyrir ok vita hvers víss yr›i. En ﬂeir settusk ni›r á vƒllinn.
ﬁorgrímr Austma›r gekk upp á skálann. Gunnarr sér at rau›an kyrtil
30 bar vi› glugginn, ok leggr út me› atgeir á hann mi›jan.3 ﬁorgrími
skruppu fœtrnir ok var› lauss skjƒldrinn, ok hrata›i hann ofan af
ﬂekjunni. Gengr hann sí›an at ﬂeim Gizuri er ﬂeir sátu á vellinu‹m›.
33 Gizurr leit vi› honum ok mælti:11 ger›u M, ger›i R.

18 at M, er R.

19–20 words supplied from M.

XXVI: Njáls saga

373

‘Hvárt er Gunnarr heima?’
ﬁorgrímr segir, ‘Viti› ﬂér ﬂat, en hitt vissa ek, at atgeirr hans er heima.’
Sí›an fell hann ni›r dau›r.
36
ﬁeir sóttu ﬂá at húsunum. Gunnarr skaut út ƒrum at ﬂeim ok var›iskvel, ok gátu ﬂeir ekki at gert.4 ﬁá hljópu sumir á húsin ok ætlu›u ﬂa›an
at at sœkja. Gunnarr kom ﬂangat at ﬂeim ƒrunum, ok gátu ﬂeir ekki at 39
gert, ok fór svá fram um hrí›. ﬁeir tóku hvíld ok sóttu at í annat sinn.
Gunnarr skaut enn út, ok gátu ﬂeir ekki at gert ok hrukku frá í annat sinn.
ﬁá mælti Gizurr hvíti, ‘Sœkjum at betr, ekki ver›r af oss.’42
Ger›u ﬂá hrí› ina ﬂri›ju ok váru vi› lengi. Eptir ﬂat hrukku ﬂeir frá.
Gunnarr mælti, ‘¯r liggr ﬂar úti á vegginum, ok er sú af ﬂeira ƒrum,ok skal ek ﬂeiri skjóta til ﬂeira, ok er ﬂeim ﬂat skƒmm ef ﬂeir fá g‹e›ig 45
af vápnum sínum.’Mó›ir hans mælti, ‘Ger ﬂú eigi ﬂat, at ﬂú vekir ﬂá, er ﬂeir hafa á›r
frá horfit.’
48
Gunnarr ﬂreif ƒrina ok skaut til ﬂeira, ok kom á Eilíf ¯nundarson,ok fekk hann af sár mikit. Hann haf›i sta›it einn saman, ok vissu ﬂeir
eigi at hann var sær›r.
51‘Hƒnd kom ﬂar út,’ segir Gizurr, ‘ok var á gullhringr, ok tók ƒr er láá ﬂekjunni, ok mundi eigi út leita› vi›fanga ef gnógt væri inni, okskulu vér nú sœkja at.’554Mƒr›r mælti, ‘Brennu vér hann inni.’‘ﬁat skal ver›a aldri,’ segir Gizurr, ‘ﬂótt ek vita at líf mitt liggi vi›. Erﬂér sjálfrátt at leggja til rá› ﬂau er dugi, svá slœgr ma›r sem ﬂú ert kalla›r.’ 57
Strengir lágu á vellinum ok váru haf›ir til at festa me› hús jafnan.
Mƒr›r mælti, ‘Tƒku vér strengina ok berum um ássendana, en
festum a›ra endana um steina, ok snúum í vindása ok vindum af ræfrit 60
af skálanum.’ﬁeir tóku strengina ok veittu ﬂessa umbú› alla, ok fann Gunnarr
eigi fyrr en ﬂeir hƒf›u undit allt ﬂakit af skálanum. Gunnarr sk‡tr ﬂá 63
af boganum svá at ﬂeir komask aldri at honum. ﬁá mælti Mƒr›r íannat sinn at ﬂeir mundi brenna ‹Gunnar inni›.
Gizurr mælti, ‘Eigi veit ek hví ﬂú vill ﬂat mæla er engi vill annarr, 66
ok skal ﬂat aldri ver›a.’

38 í R. 41 ﬂrukku R? 45 skumm R. 53 út M, vítt R. 54 skulu vér M,
skalt ﬂú incompletely corrected to skulu ﬂér ?R. 65 Gunnar inni Gráskinna,Bæjarbók, Oddabók.

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Í ﬂessu bili hleypr upp á ﬂekjuna ﬁorbrandr ﬁorleiksson ok høgg‹r›
69 í sundr bogastrenginn Gunnars. Gunnarr ﬂrífr atgeirinn bá›um hƒndum

ok sn‡sk at honum skjótt ok rekr í gegnum hann ok kastar honum ávƒllinn. ﬁá ljóp upp Ásbrandr, bró›ir hans. Gunnarr leggr til hans
72 atgeirinum ok kom hann skildi fyrir sik. Atgeirr renndi í gegnumskjƒldinn ‹ok í me›al handleggjana. Snara›i Gunnarr ﬂá atgeirinn
svá at klofna›i skjƒldrinn›, en brotnu›u bá›ir handleggirnir, ok fell
75 hann út af vegginum. Á›r haf›i Gunnarr sært átta menn, en vegit ﬂá
tvá. ﬁá fekk Gunnarr sár tvau, ok sƒg‹››u ﬂat allir menn at hann bryg›isér hvárki vi› sár né vi› bana.
Hann mælti til Hallger›ar, ‘Fá mér leppa tvá ór hári ﬂínu, ok snúi›78
ﬂit mó›ir mín saman til bogastrengs mér.’6‘Liggr ﬂér nƒkkut vi›?’ segir hon.
‘Líf mitt liggr vi›,’ segir hann, ‘ﬂví at ﬂeir munu mik aldri fá sótt81
me›an ek kem boganum vi›.’‘ﬁá skal ek nú,’ segir hon, ‘muna ﬂér kinnhestinn,7 ok hir›i ek aldri
84 hvárt ﬂú verr ﬂik lengr e›a skemr.’8‘Hefir hverr til síns ágætis nƒkkut,’ segir Gunnarr, ‘ok skal ﬂik ﬂessa
eigi lengi bi›ja.’
Rannveig mælti, ‘Illa ferr ﬂér, ok mun ﬂín skƒmm lengi uppi.’
87
Gunnarr var›i sik vel ok frœknliga ok særir nú a›ra átta menn svá
stórum sárum at mƒrgum lá vi› bana. Gunnarr verr sik ﬂar til er hann
90 fell af mœ›i. ﬁeir sær›u hann mƒrgum stórum sárum, en ﬂó komsk
hann ór hƒndum ﬂeim ok var›i sik ﬂá lengi, en ﬂó kom ﬂar at ﬂeir
drápu hann. Um vƒrn hans orti ﬁorkell Elfaraskáld í vísu ﬂessi:9
93

96

99

Spur›u vér hvé var›isk
vígmó›r kjalar sló›aGla›st‡randi geiri,
Gunnarr, fyrir Kjƒl sunnan.
Sóknr‡rir vann sára
sextán vi›ar mána
hrí›ar her›imei›ahau›rmens, en tvá dau›a.
Gizurr mælti, ‘Mikinn ƒldung hƒfum vér nú at velli lagit, ok hefir oss

102 erfitt veitt, ok mun hans vƒrn uppi me›an landit er byggt.’

68 ﬁorleiksson M, ﬁorkelsson R. 73–74 words supplied from M.
gla›st‡randa M; gn‡stœrandi (written -adni) R. 98 vi›ur R.

95

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375

Sí›an gekk hann til fundar vi› Rannveigu ok mælti, ‘Villtu veitamƒnnum várum tveimr jƒr›, er dau›ir eru, ok sé hér heyg›ir?’
105‘At heldr tveimr, at ek munda veita y›r ƒllum,’ segir hon.
‘Várkunn er ﬂat,’ segir hann, ‘er ﬂú mælir ﬂat, ﬂví at ﬂú hefir mikils
misst,’ ok kva› á at ﬂar skyldi øngu ræna ok øngu spilla. Fóru á braut108
sí›an.
ﬁá mælti ﬁórgeirr Starka›arson, ‘Eigi megum vera heima í búum
várum fyrir Sigfússonum, nema ﬂú, Gizurr, e›a Geirr sér su›r hér
111nƒkkura hrí›.’‘ﬁetta mun svá vera,’ segir Gizurr, ok hlutu›u ﬂeir, ok hlaut Geirr
eptir at vera. Sí›an fór hann í Odda ok settisk ﬂar. Hann átti sér son er
Hróaldr hét. Hann var laungetinn, ok hét Bjartey mó›ir hans ok var 114
systir ﬁorvalds hins veila, er veginn var vi› Hestlœk í Grímsnesi.
Hann hrósa›i ﬂví at hann hef›i veitt Gunnari banasár. Hróaldr varme› fƒ›ur sínum. ﬁorgeirr Starka›arson hrósa›i ƒ›ru sári at hann 117
hef›i Gunnari veitt. Gizurr sat heima at Mosfelli. Víg Gunnars spur›isk
ok mæltisk illa fyrir um allar sveitir, ok var hann mƒrgum mƒnnum
120
harmdau›i.

107 ræna M; rá›a R.

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Notes

1 The dog Sámr (the name means ‘dark-coloured’) was a gift to

Gunnarr from Óláfr pái (a major figure in Laxdœla saga), who claimed
to have been given it on his journey to Ireland (ch. 70). It has been
pointed out that, if this story were true, the dog would have been
more than thirty years old when Gunnarr received it (Finnur Jónsson
1908, 156). Óláfr credits the dog with great intelligence in discerning
between friend and enemy and a readiness to lay down its life for its
master, effectively anticipating its role in warning Gunnarr of the attack.
2 For the construction of the typical Icelandic farmhouse at this period,

see Byock 2001, 358–68 (though the buildings discussed there areconstructed of turf, as was usual, rather than the overlapping boardsof Hlí›arendi). The brúnásar (referred to by Byock as ‘rafter-bracing
roof beams’) were two beams running along the tops of the rows ofinterior pillars; these beams supported the rafters at the point where
the pitch of the roof changed from steep to shallow, supporting theweight of the roof (especially heavy if made of turf) and allowing theuse of shorter timbers for rafters. The gluggar were probably unglazed
skylights in each side of the sloping roof just below the brúnásar.
3 The atgeirr is an unusual weapon, apparently a large and heavy

spear with a cutting edge on its head, like a halberd, used mostly forthrusting and hewing, but occasionally also thrown; Gunnarr’s ability
to do this demonstrates his unusual strength and skill as a warrior(Falk 1914, 62–83). Gunnarr wins the weapon in a battle against a
Viking on his travels in the Baltic, and is said to carry it ever afterwards; it has special powers, making a resounding noise as an omenof its impending use in a killing (ch. 30).
4 The saga’s hyperbolic account of Gunnarr’s fighting prowess

includes special mention of his skill in archery: ‘Hann skaut manna
bezt af boga ok hœf›i allt ﬂat, er hann skaut til’ (ch. 19); it is also
referred to in ch. 17 of Hœnsa-ﬁóris saga (ÍF XII, 53 note 1).
5 Eyrbyggja saga (ch. 47) refers to this incident, attributing thisobservation to Geirr go›i. The mismatch between Gunnarr’s intention
to shame his opponents by injuring them with their own weapon, andhis attackers’ assumption that he has simply run out of ammunition,
recognises his heroic status.

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6 Stories of bowstrings made of women’s hair (and the use of thesestories as illustrations of loyalty) can be found in classical sources,
such as Historia Augusta from c.400 AD:
Nor can we fail to mention the extraordinary loyalty displayed by the
Aquileans in defending the Senate against Maximinus. For, lacking bowstrings with which to shoot their arrows, they made cords of the women’shair. It was said that this once happened at Rome as well, whence it wasthat the Senate, in honour of the matrons, dedicated the temple of Venus
Calva (i.e. the Bald). (Scriptores Historiae Augustae III 377–78)
7 See note 4 to the extract from Laxdœla saga, p. 205 above. Each ofHallger›r’s three husbands slaps her face, and in each case thehumiliation leads to his death.
8 Here a verse is added in the margin of R, introduced with ‘Gunnarrkva› ﬂá vísu’. This verse is included in an appendix in ÍF XII 477.
For the marginal verses in R, thought to have been added to themanuscript by its earliest readers, see Nordal 2005.
9 ﬁorkell Elfaraskáld is not known from elsewhere, and this is the

only verse attributed to him. It has been suggested (Salberger 1973)
that his nickname means ‘poet of the traveller (fari) to the Elfr (theRiver Elbe, known as Göta älv in modern Sweden)’, alluding to
Gunnarr’s exploits in Sweden as related in chs 29–30, where heacquires the atgeirr.

Verse in prose word orderLines 93–100: Vér spur›u hvé Gunnarr, vígmó›r Gla›st‡randi kjalar sló›a,var›isk geiri fyrir sunnan Kjƒl. Sóknr‡rir vann sextán her›imei›a hrí›armána vi›ar hau›rmens sára, en tvá dau›a.

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XXVI: Njáls saga
XXVI B: THE BURNING OF NJÁLL
‹Chapter 127›

Nú er ﬂar til máls at taka at Bergﬂórshváli, at ﬂeir Grímr ok Helgi
3 fóru til Hóla — ﬂar váru ﬂeim fóstru› bƒrn — ok sƒg›u mó›ur sinni

at ﬂeir mundu ekki heim um kveldit. ﬁeir váru í Hólum allan daginn.
ﬁar kómu fátœkar konur ok kvá›usk komnar at langt. ﬁeir brœ›r
6 spur›u ﬂær tí›inda. ﬁær kvá›usk engi tí›indi segja.
‘En segja kunnu vér n‡lundu nƒkkura.’ﬁeir spur›u hver sú væri ok bá›u ﬂær eigi leyna. ﬁær sƒg›u svá
9 vera skyldu.
‘Vér kómum at ofan ór Fljótshlí›, ok sá vér Sigfússonu alla rí›ame› alvæpni. ﬁeir stefndu upp á ﬁríhyrningshálsa, ok váru fimmtán í
12 flokki. Vér sá‹m› ok Grana Gunnarsson ok Gunnar Lambason, ok
váru ﬂeir fimm saman. ﬁeir stefndu ina sƒmu lei›, ok kalla má at nú
sé allt á fƒr ok flaugun um hera›it.’
Helgi Njálsson mælti, ‘ﬁá mun Flosi kominn austan, ok munu
15
ﬂeir allir koma til móts vi› hann, ok skulu vit Grímr vera ﬂar Skarphe›inn er.’
18
Grímr kva› svá vera skyldu, ok fóru ﬂeir heim.
ﬁenna aptan inn sama mælti Bergﬂóra til hjóna sinna, ‘Nú skulu
ﬂér kjósa y›r mat í kveld, at hverr hafi ﬂat er mest f‡sir til, ﬂví at
21 ﬂenna aptan mun ek bera sí›ast mat fyrir hjón mín.’‘ﬁat skyldi eigi vera,’ segja ﬂau.
‘ﬁat mun ﬂó vera,’ segir hon, ‘ok má ek miklu fleira af segja ef ek
24 vil, ok mun ﬂat til merkja at ﬂeir Grímr ok Helgi munu heim komaá›r menn eru mettir í kveld. Ok ef ﬂetta gengr eptir, ﬂá mun svá farafleira sem ek segi.’27
Sí›an bar hon mat á bor›. Njáll mælti:‘Undarliga s‡nisk mér nú. Ek ﬂikjumsk sjá um alla stofuna, ok ﬂiki
mér sem undan sé gaflveggrinn, en bló› eitt allt bor›it ok matrinn.’
30
ﬁá fannsk ƒllum mikit um ﬂetta nema Skarphe›ni. Hann ba› mennekki syrgja né láta ƒ›rum herfiligum látum svá at menn mætti or› á
ﬂví gera.
33‘Ok mun oss vandara gert en ƒ›rum at vér berim oss vel, ok er ﬂatat vánum.’
1 No chapter division in R. The preceding chapter heading is Frá Flosa ok
brennumƒnnum.

XXVI: Njáls saga

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ﬁeir Grímr ok Helgi kómu heim á›r bor›in váru ofan tekin, ok brámƒnnum mjƒk vi› ﬂat. Njáll spur›i hví ﬂeir fœri svá hverft, en ﬂeir 36sƒg›u slíkt sem ﬂeir hƒf›u frétt. Njáll ba› øngvan mann til svefns
fara ok vera vara um sik.
Chapter 128: Vi›rtal Njáls ok Skarphe›ins

39

Nú talar Flosi vi› sína menn: ‘Nú munu vér rí›a til Bergﬂórshváls ok
koma ﬂar fyrir matmál.’ﬁeir gera nú svá. Dalr var í hválnum,10 ok ri›u ﬂeir ﬂangat ok bundu 42
ﬂar hesta sína ok dvƒl›usk ﬂar til ﬂess er mjƒk lei› á kveldit.
Flosi mælti, ‘Nú skulu vér ganga heim at bœnum ok ganga ﬂrƒngt
ok fara seint ok sjá hvat ﬂeir taki til rá›s.’
45
Njáll stó› úti ok synir hans ok Kári ok allir heimamenn ok skipu›usk
fyrir á hla›inu, ok váru ﬂeir nær ﬂremr tigum. Flosi nam sta› ok mælti:‘Nú skulu vér at hyggja hvat ﬂeir taka rá›s, ﬂví at mér lízk svá, ef 48
ﬂeir standa úti fyrir, sem vér munim ﬂá aldri sótta geta.’‘ﬁá er vár fƒr ill,’ segir Grani Gunnarsson, ‘ef skulum eigi ﬂora at
at sœkja.’
51‘ﬁat skal ok eigi vera,’ segir Flosi, ‘ok munu vér at sœkja ﬂótt ﬂeir
standi úti. En ﬂat afro› munu vér gjalda, at margir munu eigi kunna
frá at segja hvárir sigrask.’
54
Njáll mælti til sinna manna, ‘Hvat sjái ﬂér til, hversu mikit li› ﬂeir
hafa?’‘ﬁeir hafa bæ›i mikit li› ok har›snúit,’ segir Skarphe›inn, ‘en ﬂví 57
nema ﬂeir ﬂó nú sta› at ﬂeir ætla at ﬂeim muni illa sœkjask at vinna oss.’‘ﬁat mun ekki vera,’ segir Njáll, ‘ok vil ek at menn gangi inn, ﬂví atilla sóttisk ﬂeim Gunnarr at Hlí›arenda, ok var hann einn fyrir. En 60
hér eru hús rammlig, sem ﬂar váru, ok munu ﬂeir eigi skjótt sœkja.’‘ﬁetta er ekki ﬂann veg at skilja,’ segir Skarphe›inn, ‘ﬂví at Gunnarsóttu heim ﬂeir hƒf›ingjar er svá váru vel at sér at heldr vildu frá 63
hverfa en brenna hann inni. En ﬂessir munu ﬂegar sœkja oss me› eldi
ef ﬂeir megu eigi annan veg, ﬂví at ﬂeir munu allt til vinna at yfir takivi› oss. Munu ﬂeir ﬂat ætla, sem eigi er ólíkligt, at ﬂat sé ﬂeira bani ef 66
oss dregr undan. Ek em ok ﬂess ófúss at láta svæla mik inni sem melrakka í greni.’

57 bæ›i] be›it R.

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XXVI: Njáls saga

Njáll mælti, ‘Nú mun sem optar, at ﬂér munu‹›› bera mik rá›um,
synir mínir, ok vir›a mik engis. En ﬂá er ﬂér váru› yngri ﬂá gjƒr›u›ﬂér ﬂat eigi, ok fór y›art rá› ﬂá betr fram.’
72
Helgi mælti, ‘Gerum vér sem fa›ir várr vill. ﬁat mun oss bezt gegna.’‘Eigi veit ek ﬂat víst,’ segir Skarphe›inn, ‘ﬂví at hann er nú feigr.
En vel má ek gera ﬂat til skaps fƒ›ur míns at brenna inni me› honum,
75 ﬂví at ek hræ›umsk ekki dau›a minn.’
Hann mælti ﬂá vi› Kára, ‘Fylgjumsk vel, mágr, svá at engi skiliskvi› annan.’
78‘ﬁat hefi ek ætlat,’ segir Kári, ‘en ef annars ver›r au›it ﬂá mun ﬂatver›a fram at koma, ok mun ek ekki mega vi› ﬂví gera.’‘Hefndu vár en vér ﬂín,’ segir Skarphe›inn, ‘ef vér lifum eptir.’
81
Kári kva› svá vera skyldu. Gengu ﬂeir ﬂá inn allir ok skipu›usk ídyrrin.
Flosi mælti, ‘Nú eru ﬂeir feigir, er ﬂeir hafa inn gengit, ok skulu vér
84 heim ganga sem skjótast ok skipask sem ﬂykkvast fyrir dyrrin ok
geyma ﬂess at engi komisk í braut, hvárki Kári né Njálssynir, ﬂví at
ﬂat er várr bani.’87
ﬁeir Flosi kómu nú heim ok skipu›usk umhverfis húsin, ef nƒkkurarværi laundyrr á. Flosi gekk framan at húsunum ok hans menn. Hróaldr¯zurarson hljóp ﬂar at sem Skarphe›inn var fyrir, ok lag›i til hans.
90 Skarphe›inn hjó spjótit af skapti fyrir honum ok hjó til hans, ok komøxin ofan í skjƒldinn, ok bar at Hróaldi ﬂegar allan skjƒldinn, en hyrnan
sú in fremri tók andlitit, ok fell hann á bak aptr ok ﬂegar dau›r. Kári
93 mælti:‘Lítt dró enn undan vi› ﬂik, Skarphe›inn, ok ertu vár frœknastr.’‘Eigi veit ek ﬂat víst,’ segir Skarphe›inn, ok brá vi› grƒnum ok
96 glotti at.11 Kári ok Grímr ok Helgi lƒg›u út mƒrgum spjótum ok sær›umarga menn. En Flosi ok hans menn fengu ekki at gert.
Flosi mælti, ‘Vér hƒfum fengi‹t› mikinn mannska›a á mƒnnum
99 várum. Eru margir sárir, en sá veginn er vér mundum sízt til kjósa. Er
nú ﬂat sét at vér getum ﬂá eigi me› vápnum sótta. Er sá nú margr ereigi gengr jafnskƒruliga at sem létu. En ﬂó munu vér nú ver›a at gera
102 annat rá› fyrir oss. Eru nú tve‹i›r kostir til, ok er hvárgi gó›r: sáannarr at hverfa frá, ok er ﬂat várr bani; hinn annarr at bera at eld ok
brenna ﬂá inni, ok er ﬂat stórr ábyrg›arlutr fyrir Gu›i, er vér erum
105 menn kristnir sjálfir.12 En ﬂó munu vér ﬂat brag›s taka.’69

99 it added after sárir R.

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Chapter 129: Bœjarbruni at Bergﬂórshváliﬁeir tóku nú eld ok ger›u bál mikit fyrir dyrunum. ﬁá mælti Skarp108
he›inn:‘Eld kveykvi› ﬂér nú, sveinar, e›a hvárt skal nú búa til sey›is?’
Grani Gunnarsson svarar, ‘Svá skal ﬂat vera, ok skaltu eigi ﬂurfa
111
heitara at baka.’
Skarphe›inn mælti, ‘ﬁví launar ﬂú mér, sem ﬂú ert ma›r til, er ek
hefnda fƒ›ur ﬂíns, ok vir›ir ﬂat meira er ﬂér er óskyldara.’13
ﬁá báru konur s‡ru í eldinn ok sløkktu ni›r fyrir ﬂeim. Kolr ﬁorsteins- 114
son mælti til Flosa:‘Rá› kemr mér í hug. Ek hefi sét lopt í skálanum á ﬂvertrjám, okskulu vér ﬂar inn bera eldinn ok kveykva vi› arfasátu ﬂá er hér stendr 117
fyrir ofan húsin.’14
Sí›an tóku ﬂeir arfasátuna ok báru í eld. Fundu ﬂeir eigi fyrr, er
inni váru, en loga›i ofan allr skálinn. Ger›u ﬂeir Flosi ﬂá stór bál 120
fyrir ƒllum dyrum. Tók ﬂá kvennafólkit illa at ﬂola, ﬂat sem inni var.
Njáll mælti til ﬂeira:‘Ver›i› vel vi› ok mæli› eigi æ›ru, ﬂví at él eitt mun vera, ok skyldi 123
langt til annars slíks. Trúi› ﬂér ok ﬂví, at Gu› er svá miskunnsamr at
hann mun oss eigi bæ›i brenna láta ﬂessa heims ok annars.’
Slíkar fortƒlur haf›i hann fyrir ﬂeim ok a›rar hraustligri. Nú taka 126
ƒll húsin at loga. ﬁá gekk Njáll til dyra ok mælti:‘Hvárt er Flosi svá nær at hann megi heyra mál mitt?’
129
Flosi kvazk heyra mega. Njáll mælti:‘Villt ﬂú nƒkkut taka sættum vi› sonu mína e›a lofa nƒkkurummƒnnum útgƒngu?’
Flosi svarar, ‘Eigi vil ek vi› sonu ﬂína sættum taka, ok skal nú yfir 132
lúka me› oss ok eigi fyrr frá ganga en ﬂeir eru allir dau›ir, en lofa vil
ek útgƒngu konum ok bƒrnum ok húskƒrlum.’
Njáll gekk ﬂá inn ok mælti vi› fólkit, ‘Nú er ﬂeim út at ganga ƒllum 135
er leyft er. Ok gakk ﬂú út, ﬁórhalla Ásgrímsdóttir, ok allr l‡›r me›
ﬂér, sá er lofat er.’ﬁórhalla mælti, ‘Annarr ver›r nú skilna›r okkarr Helga en ek ætla›a 138
um hrí›, en ﬂó skal ek eggja fƒ›ur minn ok brœ›r at ﬂeir hefni ﬂessa
mannska›a er hér er gerr.’15
117 ﬂar written ﬂr with superscript abbreviation for ar R. 133 fyrr written fwith superscript i (= firr or firir) R. 137 lofat er written twice R.

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Njáll mælti, ‘Vel mun ﬂér fara, ﬂví at ﬂú ert gó› kona.’
Sí›an gekk hon út ok mart li› me› henni.
Ástrí›r af Djúpárbakka mælti vi› Helga Njálsson, ‘Gakktu út me›
144 mér, ok mun ek kasta yfir ﬂik kvenskikkju ok falda ﬂik me› hƒfu›dúki.’Hann tal›isk undan fyrst, en ﬂó ger›i hann ﬂetta fyrir bœn ﬂeira.
Ástrí›r vaf›i hƒfu›dúk at hƒf›i Helga, en ﬁórhildr kona Skarphe›ins
147 lag›i yfir hann skikkjuna, ok gekk hann út á me›al ﬂeira, ok ﬂá gekk
út ﬁorger›r Njálsdóttir ok Helga, systir hennar, ok mart annat fólk.
En er Helgi kom út, mælti Flosi, ‘Sú er há kona ok mikil um her›ar
150 er ﬂar fór. Taki› ‹hana› ok haldi› henni.’
En er Helgi heyr›i ﬂetta, kasta›i hann skikkjunni. Hann haf›i haftsver› undir hendi sér ok hjó til manns, ok kom í skjƒldinn ok af spor›inn
153 ok fótinn af manninum. ﬁá kom Flosi at ok hjó á hálsinn Helga svá atﬂegar tók af hƒfu›it.
Flosi gekk ﬂá at dyrum ok kalla›i á Njál ok kvazk vildu tala vi›
156 hann ok Bergﬂóru. Njáll gerir nú svá. Flosi mælti:‘Útgƒngu vil ek bjó›a ﬂér, Njáll bóndi, ﬂví at ﬂú brennr ómakligr
inni.’
Njáll mælti, ‘Eigi vil ek út ganga, ﬂví at ek em ma›r gamall ok lítt159
til búinn at hefna sona minna, en ek vil eigi lifa vi› skƒmm.’Flosi mælti ﬂá til Bergﬂóru, ‘Gakktu út, húsfreyja, ﬂví at ek vil ﬂik
162 fyrir øngan mun inni brenna.’
Bergﬂóra mælti, ‘Ek var ung gefin Njáli. Hefi ek ﬂví heitit honumat eitt skyldi ganga yfir okkr bæ›i.’
Sí›an gengu ﬂau inn bæ›i. Bergﬂóra mælti:165‘Hvat skulu vit nú til rá›a taka?’‘Ganga munu vit til hvílu okkarrar,’ segir Njáll, ‘ok leggjask ni›r;
168 hefi ek lengi værugjarn verit.’
Hon mælti ﬂá vi› sveininn ﬁór› Kárason, ‘ﬁik skal út bera, ok skaltu
eigi inni brenna.’‘Hinu hefir ﬂú mér heitit, amma,’ segir sveinninn, ‘at vit skyldim
171
aldri skilja me›an ek vilda hjá ﬂér vera, en mér ﬂikkir miklu betra atdeyja me› ykkr Njáli en lifa eptir.’16
Hon bar ﬂá sveininn til hvílunnar. Njáll mælti vi› brytja sinn:
174‘Nú skaltu sjá hvar vit leggjumsk ni›r ok hversu ek b‡ um okkr, ﬂvíat ek ætla he›an hvergi at hrœrask, hvárt sem mér angrar reykr e›a
177 bruni. Máttu nú nær geta hvar beina okkarra er at leita.’
141

150 hana M.

XXVI: Njáls saga

383

Hann sag›i svá vera skyldu.
ﬁar haf›i slátrat verit uxa einum, ok lá ﬂar hú›in. Njáll mælti vi›
brytjann at hann skyldi brei›a yfir ﬂau hú›ina, ok hann hét ﬂví. ﬁau 180
leggjask nú ni›r bæ›i í rúmit ok leggja sveininn í millum sín. ﬁá
signdu ﬂau sik ok sveininn ok fálu Gu›i ƒnd sína á hendi ok mæltu
ﬂat sí›ast svá menn heyr›i. ﬁá tók brytinn hú›ina ok breiddi yfir ﬂau 183
ok gekk út sí›an.17 Ketill ór Mƒrk tók í móti honum ok kippti honumút.18 Hann spur›i vandliga at Njáli, mági sínum, en brytinn sag›i allt186
it sanna. Ketill mælti,‘Mikill harmr er at oss kve›inn, er vér skulum svá mikla ógæfu
saman eiga.’
Skarphe›inn sá er fa›ir hans lag›isk ni›r ok hversu hann bjó um 189
sik. Hann mælti ﬂá:‘Snemma ferr fa›ir várr at rekkju, ok er ﬂat sem ván er: hann er
192
ma›r gamall.’ﬁá tóku ﬂeir Skarphe›inn ok Kári ok Grímr brandana jafnskjótt sem
ofan duttu, ok skutu út á ﬂá, ok gekk ﬂví um hrí›. ﬁá skutu ﬂeir spjótum
inn at ﬂeim, en ﬂeir tóku ƒll á lopti ok sendu út aptr. Flosi ba› ﬂá 195
hætta at skjóta, ‘ﬂví at oss munu ƒll vápnaskipti ﬂungt ganga vi› ﬂá.
Megu ﬂér nú vel bí›a ﬂess er eldrinn vinnr ﬂá.’198
ﬁeir gera nú svá. ﬁá fellu ofan stórvi›inir ór ræfrinu.
Skarphe›inn mælti ﬂá, ‘Nú mun fa›ir minn dau›r vera, ok hefir
hvárki heyrt til hans styn né hósta.’ﬁeir gengu ﬂá í skálaendann. ﬁar var fallit ofan ﬂvertré ok brunnit 201
mjƒk í mi›ju. Kári mælti til Skarphe›ins:‘Hlau‹p›tu hér út, ok mun ek beina at me› ﬂér, en ek mun hlaupa
ﬂegar eptir, ok munu vit ﬂá bá›ir í brott komask ef vit breytum svá, 204
ﬂví at hingat leggr allan reykinn.’
Skarphe›inn mælti, ‘ﬁú skalt hlaupa fyrri, en ek mun ﬂegar á hæla
207
ﬂér.’
‘Ekki er ﬂat rá›,’ segir Kári, ‘ﬂví at ek komisk vel annars sta›ar útﬂótt hér gangi eigi.’‘Eigi vil ek ﬂat,’ segir Skarphe›inn. ‘Hlauptu út fyrri, en ek mun 210
ﬂegar eptir.’‘ﬁat er hverjum manni bo›it at leita sér lífs me›an kostr er,’ segir
Kári, ‘ok skal ek ok svá gera. En ﬂó mun nú sá skilna›r me› okkr 213
182 ƒnd M, hƒnd R.

213 nú M, ﬂó R.

384

XXVI: Njáls sagaver›a at vit munum aldri sjásk sí›an, ﬂví at ef ek hleyp ór eldinum, ﬂá
mun ‹ek› eigi hafa skap til at hlaupa inn aptr í eldinn til ﬂín, ok mun
216 ﬂá sína lei› fara hvárr okkar.’‘ﬁat hlœgir mik,’ segir Skarphe›inn, ‘ef ﬂú kemsk á brott, mágr,
attu mun hefna mín.’ﬁá tók Kári einn setstokk loganda í hƒnd sér ok hleypr út eptir ﬂver219
trénu. Kastar hann ﬂá stokkinum út af ﬂekjunni, ok fell hann at ﬂeim
er úti váru fyrir. ﬁeir hlupu ﬂá undan. ﬁá logu›u klæ›in ƒll á Kára ok
222 svá hárit. Hann steypir sér ﬂá út af ﬂekjunni ok stiklar svá me›reykinum.
ﬁá mælti einn ma›r er ﬂar var næstr, ‘Hvárt hljóp ﬂar ma›r út af
225 ﬂekjunni?’‘Fjarri fór ﬂat,’ segir annarr, ‘heldr kasta›i ﬂar Skarphe›inn eldistokki at oss.’Sí›an grunu›u ﬂeir ﬂat ekki. Kári hljóp til ﬂess er hann kom at lœk
228
einum. Hann kasta›i sér ﬂar í ofan ok sløkkti á sér eldinn. Sí›an hljóp
hann me› reykinum í gróf nƒkkura ok hvíldi sik, ok er ﬂat sí›an kƒllu›231 Káragróf.

214 sjásk M, ‘saaz’ R.

XXVI: Njáls saga

385

Notes
10 The dalr is a depression in the hill (hváll) on which the farmhousestood. It can still be seen, but is too small to have concealed the 100
men said (in ch. 124) to have taken part in the burning, together withthe two horses of each (ÍF XII 325, note 3).
11 Skarphe›inn is described as having an ugly mouth and protruding

teeth (ch. 25), and his grin emphasises his threatening appearance atmany points in the saga.
12 The Christianity of the burners is emphasised by their having

stopped at the church at Kirkjubœr to pray on their way to Bergﬂórshváll (ch. 126).
13 Grani is the son of Gunnarr of Hlí›arendi, but is said to resemble

his mother Hallger›r in temperament (ch. 75).
14 The use of the chickweed to kindle the fire that will burn Njáll andBergﬂóra was predicted by an old servant-woman, Sæunn, but Skarphe›inn refused to remove it, since fate cannot be avoided (ch. 124).
15 ﬁórhalla’s father, Ásgrímr Elli›a-Grímsson, and her brother ﬁór-hallr (fostered by Njáll, who taught him law) later conduct the lawsuit
against the burners.
16 ﬁór›r, son of Kári and of Helga Njálsdóttir, has been fostered by

Njáll (ch. 109).
17 The ox-hide covering Njáll and Bergﬂóra provides a rational

explanation for the undamaged state of their bodies when they arefound, but this state is also used to imply an almost saint-like quality
in Njáll (ch. 132).
18 Ketill of Mƒrk is one of the Sigfússynir, and therefore among Njáll’s

attackers; but he is also the husband of Njáll’s daughter ﬁorger›r,
who has left the house along with the other women of the household(line 148).

386

XXVI: Njáls saga

XXVII: Grágás

387

XXVII: GRÁGÁS
The name Grágás (literally ‘grey goose’) is a convenient if somewhat
arbitrary label of obscure origin used collectively for the laws of themedieval Icelandic Commonwealth as preserved in a number of manuscripts. The two most important manuscripts are GkS 1157 fol. (alsocalled Codex Regius or, as here, Konungsbók; = K) and AM 334 fol.
(also known as Sta›arhólsbók; = S). K is normally dated to c.1260,
Sta›arhólsbók to c.1280. Other manuscripts or fragments which
preserve parts of Grágás include AM 315 d fol. (two leaves), written
perhaps as early as c.1150–75 and one of the oldest Icelandic
manuscripts in existence.
Compared with other laws of medieval Scandinavia, Grágás is awork of enormous size and detail. In Vilhjálmur Finsen’s edition of
1852, the Konungsbók text of Grágás takes up some 460 pages;
printed in the same series (also in 1852) with identical format andtype, the next longest of the early Scandinavian laws, Erik’s law of
Zealand (cf. MS 384), covers only about 130 pages.
The contents of K may be roughly divided into fifteen sections, as
follows (the symbol § is used for the chapters into which the texts of
Grágás are divided in Finsen’s editions): (1) Kristinna laga ﬂáttr(‘Christian laws section’, §§ 1–19); (2) ﬁingskapaﬂáttr (‘Assembly
procedures section’, §§ 20–85); (3) Vígsló›i (‘Treatment of homicide’,§§ 86–112); (4) Baugatal (‘The wergild ring list’, § 113) (together
with Gri›amál, ‘Truce speech’, § 114, and Trygg›amál, ‘Peace guarantee
speech’, § 115); (5) Lƒgsƒgumannsﬂáttr (‘The lawspeaker’s section’,§ 116); (6) Lƒgréttuﬂáttr (‘The Law Council section’, § 117); (7) Arfaﬂáttr (‘Inheritance section’, §§ 118–27); (8) Ómagabálkr (‘Dependents
section’, §§ 128–43); (9) Festaﬂáttr (‘Betrothals section’, §§ 144–71);(10) Landbrig›aﬂáttr (‘Land-claims section’, §§ 172–20); (11) Um
fjárleigur (‘On hire of property’, §§ 221–26); (12) Rannsóknaﬂáttr(‘Searches section’, §§ 227–33); (13) Um hreppaskil (‘On commune
obligations’, §§ 234–36); (14) A section containing miscellaneousarticles relating to such diverse matters as verbal injury by poetry or
harm from tame bears, §§ 234–54; (15) Um tíundargjald (‘On tithe
payment’, together with further miscellaneous provisions, §§ 255–68).
The texts of K and S differ substantially. Sta›arhólsbók does not havesections corresponding to (2), (4), (5), (6), (12), (13), (14) and (15)and the sections it does have appear in the order (1), (7), (8), (9), (11),388

XXVII: Grágás(3), (10). But sometimes matter in K in the sections absent in S isparalleled by matter in other sections present in S. Where the matterof the two texts is essentially the same, S is very often more detailed,
better organised and has more ‘modern’ content than K. And both S
and other manuscripts contain much matter not found in K at all.
A long tradition lies behind the preserved texts of Grágás, stretchingback to oral recitations of what must have been essentially heathen
law by the first lawspeakers at the Alﬂingi in the fourth decade of thetenth century (cf. Text VIII (c) and notes 19 and 21 to that text). The
acceptance of Christianity in 999 must inevitably have led to profoundchanges in the law (cf. VIII:123–43). Further, in 1096 or 1097 a law oftithe was introduced (cf. VIII:150–68; HOIC 147–53). And in the
period 1122–33, Kristinna laga ﬂáttr was compiled and recorded in
written form (cf. HOIC 160–69). Meanwhile, in the winter of 1117–18,
at the home of Hafli›i Másson at Brei›abólsta›r (in present-day
Vestur-Húnavatnss‡sla), some, at least, of the oral secular laws had
also been committed to writing under the supervision of Bergﬂórr
Hrafnsson, lawspeaker at the time, and other legal experts (cf.
VIII:168–80; HOIC 89–93; Laws I 9–13). The result of these men’s
work was doubtless the book referred to in K § 117 (cf. Laws I 190–91)
as skrá sú er Hafli›i lét gera (‘the screed which Hafli›i had made’),called Hafli›askrá by modern scholars, and it is generally supposedthat the preserved manuscripts of Grágás (apart from Kristinna lagaﬂáttr) go back in part ultimately to Hafli›askrá. Law-making did notcease with the appearance of Hafli›askrá and Kristinna laga ﬂáttr,and texts of Grágás would have proliferated, developed and been
expanded in various ways over the period after 1130, not least as aresult of new legislation by the Law Council (lƒgrétta). After Iceland’s
submission to the Norwegian king in 1262–64, the main part of Grágás
was superseded by Járnsí›a in 1271 (itself replaced by Jónsbók inthe early 1280s). Kristinna laga ﬂáttr, however, remained in force inthe diocese of Skálholt until 1275 and in the diocese of Hólar until
1354, and other sections of Grágás continued to be invoked in cases
for which the much briefer Jónsbók provided insufficient guidance.
It is uncertain how Grágás acquired the distinctly literary quality it
has in contrast to that of the continental Scandinavian laws of the
Middle Ages which are far more oral and primitive in their style. It
could well have done so in connection with the first writing down of

XXVII: Grágás389

the laws in the second decade of the twelfth century (cf. Ólafur Lárusson
1958, 87–89; Laws I 14–15).
Grágás gives us a picture of numerous aspects of life, both everyday
and ceremonial, in the medieval Icelandic Commonwealth. In many
respects it presents a different and truer picture than many of ourother sources (such as the Sagas of Icelanders). The passage selected
here as a sample is the ‘Lawspeaker’s section’ (Lƒgsƒgumannsﬂáttr),
only preserved in K (pp. 83a17–84a14), where it is the shortest section(consisting of a single chapter, § 116). The lawspeaker would havebeen a central figure in public life in Iceland during the Commonwealth period and particularly prominent at the meetings of the General
Assembly (Alﬂingi) held every summer at ﬁingvellir and attended bypeople from all over the country. He was elected for a term of threesummers but could be re-elected. At the annual meetings of the Alﬂingi
he had the important function of presiding at the Law Council, theforemost legislative body in the country. He also had the duty ofreciting ﬁingskapaﬂáttr at Lƒgberg (‘the Law Rock’) every summer
and the rest of the laws over the three-year period of his office. For afuller account of the lawspeaker’s position within the framework of
the constitution of the Icelandic commonwealth, the student is referredto the chapter ‘Form of government’ in HOIC 35–93, supplemented
by a reading of ﬁingskapaﬂáttr and Lƒgréttuﬂáttr as well, of course,
as the passage edited here (see Laws I 53–38, 189–93, 187–88).
There were some 43 lawspeakers from the time of the institutionof the Alﬂingi until 1271 and it is possible to draw up a complete listof them (see p. xliv above and Jón Sigur›sson 1886, 1–4) based on
medieval sources such as Íslendingabók and lists in the manuscripts
DG 11, which also contains a version of Snorra Edda (see pp. 15–21
above), and AM 106 fol., which also contains a version of Landnámabók(see pp. 261–66 above). The list extends from the shadowy Úlfljótr(cf. VIII:39–41) to ﬁorleifr hreimr Ketilsson (cf. III:44 above). It
includes such notables as ﬁorgeirr ﬁorkelsson Ljósvetningago›i who,
according to Ari ﬁorgilsson (VIII:116–43), played an important rolein the conversion of Iceland to Christianity; Skapti ﬁóroddsson, who
held the position longest of all (1004–30) and who must have hadsome hand in changes to the law resulting from the Conversion andalso in the institution of the Fifth Court ( fimmtardómr; cf. HOIC 70–74;
Laws I 83–88, 244–45); the eleventh-century poet Markús Skeggjason

390

XXVII: Grágás(died 1107; cf. VIII:152 and note 51); and in the thirteenth century threeprominent political and literary figures, all members of the Sturlung family,
Snorri Sturluson and his nephews Sturla ﬁór›arson and Óláfr ﬁór›arson.
Apart from his official function as an authority on legal matters,
the lawspeaker would have been a repository for much otherinformation, not only current politics and gossip, but also history,
lore and tradition. Indeed, the annual meetings of the Alﬂingi attended
by people from all over the country and with the lawspeaker at thecentre of its proceedings must have been a strong force for the preservation of a language that was hardly marked by regional differences
and of a vigorous and dynamic oral tradition during the days of the
Icelandic Commonwealth. This oral tradition would would have concerned the past as well as the present and would have become a richsource for thirteenth-century Icelanders writing about bygone times.
Bibliography
Facsimile edition: Páll Eggert Ólason (ed.), The Codex Regius of Grágás,CCIMA III (1932).
Critical editions:Vilhjálmur Finsen (ed.), Grágás. Islændernes Lovbog i Fristatens Tid udgivet
efter det kongelige Bibliotheks Haandskrift (1852; reprints 1945, 1974).
[Text of K and various fragments, including AM 315 d fol.]
Vilhjálmur Finsen (ed.), Grágás efter det Arnamagnæanske Haandskrift Nr.
334 fol., Sta›arhólsbók (1879; reprint 1974). [Text of S]
Vilhjálmur Finsen (ed.), Grágás. Stykker, som findes i det Arnamagnæanske
Haandskrift Nr. 351 fol. Skálholtsbók og en Række andre Haandskrifter(1883; reprint 1974) [Texts of various minor manuscript sources; apparatus
includes a detailed ‘Ordregister’ (in Danish) of technical vocabulary on
pp. 579–714]
Popular edition: Gunnar Karlsson, Kristján Sveinsson, Mör›ur Árnason (eds),
Grágás. Lagasafn íslenska ﬂjó›veldisins (1992). [In modern Icelandic
spelling; includes the whole of the Sta›arhólsbók text (pp. 1–369) andparts of the text of K without parallel in S (pp. 371–480)]
English translation: Laws of early Iceland. Grágás. The Codex Regius of
Grágás with material from other manuscripts I–II, tr. Andrew Dennis,
Peter Foote, Richard Perkins (1980–2000). [= Laws. A complete translationof K, with ‘Additions’ from other sources (mainly S) which either amplify
the contents of K or supply matter not found in it. Apparatus includes ‘A
guide to technical vocabulary’.]XXVII: Grágás

391

Background reading:Björn ﬁorsteinsson, Thingvellir. Iceland’s national shrine, tr. Peter Foote(1987).
H.-P. Naumann, ‘Grágás’. In Reallexikon der germanischen Altertumskunde
von Johannes Hoops, zweite . . . Auflage, ed. Heinrich Beck et al.
(1973–2008), XII 569–73.

Jón Sigur›sson, ‘Lögsögumannatal og lögmanna á Íslandi’. In Safn
til sögu Íslands og íslenzkra bókmenta II (1886), 1–250.
HOIC 35–93.
MS under Alﬂingi; Go›i; Grágás; Iceland; Laws 2. Iceland.
Ólafur Lárusson, ‘On Grágás – the oldest Icelandic code of law’. In ﬁri›ji
Víkingafundur. Third Viking Congress, Reykjavík 1956 (Árbók Hins íslenzka
Fornleifafélags. Fylgirit, 1958), ed. Kristján Eldjárn (1958), 77–89.
Beck, Heinrich, Wortschatz der altisländischen Grágás (Konungsbók) (1993).
[A concordance of the Konungsbók text]
For maps of ﬁingvƒllr (with for instance the site of Lƒgberg marked), see
HOIC 42, Laws I 281, Björn ﬁorsteinsson (1987), 9–11.

392

XXVII: Grágás
XXVII: GRÁGÁS
LƒgsƒgumannsﬂáttrSvá er enn mælt at sá ma›r skal vera nokkurr ávalt á landi óru er
3 skyldr sé til ﬂess at segja lƒg mƒnnum, ok heitir sá lƒgsƒguma›r. En

ef lƒgsƒgumanns missir vi›, ﬂá skal ór ﬂeim fjór›ungi taka mann tilat segja ﬂingskƒp1 upp it næsta sumar er hann haf›i sí›arst heimili í.
6 Menn2 skulu ﬂá taka sér lƒgsƒgumann ok s‡sla ﬂat fƒstudag hverr veraskal á›r sakir sé l‡star.3 ﬁat er ok vel ef allir menn ver›a sáttir á einnmann. En ef lƒgréttuma›r nokkurr stendr vi› ﬂví er flestir vilja, ok4
9 skal ﬂá hluta í hvern fjór›ung lƒgsaga skal hverfa. En ﬂeir fjór›ungsmenn er ﬂá hefr hlutr í hag borit skulu taka lƒgsƒgumann ﬂann sem
ﬂeir ver›a sáttir á, hvárt sem sá er ór ﬂeirra fjór›ungi e›a ór ƒ›rum
12 fjór›ungi nokkurum, ﬂeirra manna er ﬂeir megu ﬂat geta at. Nú ver›afjór›ungsmenn eigi á sáttir, ok skal ﬂá afl rá›a me› ﬂeim. En ef ﬂeir
eru jafnmargir er lƒgréttusetu eigu er sinn lƒgsƒgumann vilja hvárir,15 ﬂá skulu ﬂeir rá›a er biskup sá fellr í fullting me› er í ﬂeim fjór›ungi
er.5 Nú eru lƒgréttumenn nokkurir ﬂeir er níta ﬂví er a›rir vilja, fáiengan mann sjálfir til lƒgsƒgu, ok eigu enskis ﬂeirra or› at metask.
18Lƒgsƒgumann á í lƒgréttu at taka, ﬂá er menn hafa rá›it hverr veraskal, ok skal einn ma›r skilja fyrir en a›rir gjalda samkvæ›i á, okskal ﬂrjú sumur samfast inn sami hafa, nema menn vili eigi breytt
21 hafa.6 Ór ﬂeirri lƒgréttu er lƒgsƒguma›r er tekinn skulu menn ganga
til Lƒgbergs ok skal hann ganga til Lƒgbergs ok setjask í rúm sitt ok
skipa Lƒgberg ﬂeim mƒnnum sem hann vill. En menn skulu ﬂá mæla24 málum sínum.
ﬁat er ok mælt at lƒgsƒguma›r er skyldr til ﬂess at segja upp lƒgﬂáttualla á ﬂremr sumrum hverjum en ﬂingskƒp hvert sumar.7 Lƒgsƒguma›r
27 á upp at segja syknuleyfi ƒll at Lƒgbergi svá at meiri hlutr manna sé
ﬂar, ef ﬂví um náir, ok misseristal, ok svá ﬂat ef menn skulu koma
fyrr til Alﬂingis en tíu vikur eru af sumri,8 ok tína imbrudagahald 9 ok
30 fƒstuíganga, ok skal hann ﬂetta allt mæla at ﬂinglausnum.
ﬁat er ok10 at lƒgsƒguma›r skal svá gerla ﬂáttu alla upp segja at engi
viti einna miklugi gørr. En ef honum vinnsk eigi fró›leikr til ﬂess, ﬂá
33 skal hann eiga stefnu vi› fimm lƒgmenn in næstu dœgr á›r e›a fleiri,
9 En] The scribe first wrote Ef then altered it to En. 15 fellr] The scribe
first wrote er then altered it to fellr. 20 hafa] hafi K.

XXVII: Grágás

393

ﬂá er hann má helzt geta af, á›r hann segi hvern ﬂátt upp; ok ver›r
hverr ma›r útlagr ﬂremr mƒrkum er ólofat gengr á mál ﬂeirra, ok álƒgsƒguma›r sƒk ﬂá.
36Lƒgsƒguma›r skal hafa hvert sumar tvau hundru› álna va›mála aflƒgréttufjám fyrir starf sitt.11 Hann á ok útleg›ir allar hálfar, ﬂær er áAlﬂingi eru dœm›ar hér,12 ok skal dœma eindaga á ﬂeim ƒllum annat 39
sumar hér í búandakirkjugar›i,13 mi›vikudag í mitt ﬂing. Útlagr er
hverr ma›r ﬂremr mƒrkum er fé lætr dœma, ef hann segir eigi lƒgsƒgumanni til ok svá hverir dómsuppsƒguváttar hafa verit.
42ﬁat er ok, ﬂá er lƒgsƒguma›r hefr haft ﬂrjú sumur lƒgsƒgu, ok skalhann ﬂá segja upp ﬂingskƒp it fjór›a sumar fƒstudag inn fyrra í ﬂingi.
ﬁá er hann ok lauss frá lƒgsƒgu ef hann vill. Nú vill hann hafa lƒgsƒgu 45
lengr, ef a›rir unna honum, ﬂá skal inn meiri hlutr lƒgréttumannará›a.
ﬁat er ok at lƒgsƒguma›r er útlagr ﬂremr mƒrkum ef hann kemr 48
eigi til Alﬂingis fƒstudag inn fyrra, á›r menn gangi til Lƒgbergs, atnau›synjalausu, enda eigu menn ﬂá at taka annan lƒgsƒgumann ef
vilja.
51

Notes
1 I.e. some of the material from ﬁingskapaﬂáttr (Assembly Procedures

Section, Laws I 53–138), and probably some of Lƒgsƒgumannsﬂáttr
(The Lawspeaker’s Section, Laws I 187–88) and Lƒgréttuﬂáttr (TheLaw Council Section, Laws I 189–93) too.
2 I.e. lƒgréttumenn (members of the Law Council).
3 I.e. the first Friday of the Assembly, which would have been the one

between 19th and 25th June. Cf. Laws I 53–54.
4 Opening a main clause that stands after a subordinate clause (especi-

ally one beginning with ef or nú = ef ) with ok instead of ﬂá is especiallycommon in legal texts, but also occurs quite widely elsewhere (see lines
13, 17, 43 below and Texts II:21, XXI:38, and cf. Glossary under ok,
nú, ef, ﬂá1 and Gr 3.9.9).
38 fyrir] written twice in K at line-division.

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XXVII: Grágás

5 The Skálaholt bishop had authority over the East, South and West

Quarters, the Hólar bishop over the Northern Quarter. Cf. Text VIII,
notes 54–55; Laws I 35–36.
6 I.e. after the three years, a new lawspeaker will be appointed unlessmen do not wish to have him changed.
7 Cf. Laws I 193.
8 The misseristal would have been the calendar for the coming year.
Cf. Misseristal (Calendar), Laws I 51 and 111–12.
9 Ember Days (imbrudagar) are four groups each of three days at

various times of the year observed in the Middle Ages as days offasting and abstinence.
10 Sc. mælt ‘prescribed (that)’ (cf. lines 25 above and 43 and 48 below;

Laws I 12–13).
11 The only source of Law Council funds (lƒgréttufé) that is mentioned

in Grágás is payments for leave to marry within the remoter degrees
of kinship (Laws II 55, 60–61, 81), but it may be that all licences had
to be paid for. The lawspeaker was the only paid officer under thelaws of the Icelandic Commonwealth.
12 See Laws I 80 for an exception to this. It is also stated that heshares in fines imposed at the spring assembly he participates in, andthat if he himself is fined for failure to discharge all the duties requiredof him, half is due to the man who prosecutes him and half to thejudges of the case (Laws I 193). Cf. lines 48–51 below.
13 We hear of two churches at ﬁingvellir during the commonwealthperiod, one in public ownership which collapsed in a storm in 1118,
the other, known as búandakirkja, belonged to the local farmer andwould have been a burial church (cf. Laws I 29, footnote 17). It is thechurchyard of this latter which must be referred to here and which isoften mentioned as the legally prescribed place for payments (e.g.,
besides here, Laws I 172, 205; cf. Björn ﬁorsteinsson 1987, 49–54).