page_title: Starkad
section_title: Gautreks saga
hierarchical_section_title: Starkad / Gautreks saga
caption_attribution_description: Starkaðr holding two rune staffs. On the rune staffs are written in Latin "Starcaterus pugil Suctius". From Olaus Magnus' "Historia de gentibus septentrionalibus".
context_page_description: Starkad was either an eight-armed giant or the human grandson of the aforementioned giant in Norse mythology.
  Starkad appears in numerous accounts, and the stories of his adventures relate to different Scandinavian traditions. He is most fully treated in Gesta Danorum but he also appears in Icelandic sources. He is portrayed as a great warrior who performed many heroic deeds but also many crimes.
  A cognate of the Starkad legends can be found in the Anglo-Saxon poem Beowulf.
context_section_description: Gautreks saga continues the account found in Hervarar saga.  It is tells among other things the adventures of Starkad, the son of Stórvirkr who was the son of Starkad Ala-warrior, whom Thor had killed. 
  It tells that young Starkad was raised at the court of Harald, the king of Agder, together with Harald's son Vikar. One day, Herþjófr, the king of Hordaland, made a raid and killed king Harald. He also took Vikar hostage to ensure the loyalty of the people of Agder.  When Vikar had grown up, he assembled a warband, including Starkad and avenged his father by killing Herþjófr with thirty of his warriors. Vikar was then king of Agder, Hordaland, and Hardanger.
  Starkad took part in Víkar's many battles for the hegemony of the petty kingdoms of southern Norway, one of the battles where Battle at Lake Vænir and he was Víkar's greatest warrior.
  After all these victories, when sailing north from Agdir to Hördaland with a large army, Víkar was becalmed. Divination showed Odin required a sacrifice of one person chosen by lot and Víkar's lot came up each time. The decision was put off till the next day. Then Grani Horsehair, Starkad's foster father, took Starkad to a secret council of the gods and revealed himself to be Odin. Odin bestowed on Starkad the blessings of living three lifetimes, of possessing the most excellent of weapons, an abundance of riches, victory in battle, the gift of poetry and always to be held in the highest esteem among the rich and powerful. Thor, however, who hated Starkad because of his jotun origin, denied Starkad the blessing of having children and cursed him to commit a crime every lifetime he lived and never to possess real estate. Thor further cursed Starkad never to feel that he had enough property, always to receive dangerous wounds in battle, never to remember his skaldic poems and ever to be hated by commoners.  After blessings and curses laid on Starkad alternately by Odin and Thor, Odin asked Starkad to send him King Víkar in payment for Odin's blessings. Starkad agreed and Odin gave Starkad a spear which Odin promised would appear to be only a reed-stalk. So Vikar met his death.
  After Vikar's death, Starkad fled to Sweden and the kings Alrek and Eirík at Uppsala. Starkad served them first as a companion on their viking expeditions and then, after Alrek and Eirík had settled down, he went on further Viking expeditions alone.
caption: The hero Starkad, from Olaus Magnus' Historia de gentibus septentrionalibus (1555).
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