Icelandic histories & romances

196 Pages·2002·38.202 MB·English

by  Ralph O'Connor

lce1andic HistoRies Romances
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~Romances
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l'UllLISI IF.O IN THE UNITED l\INGDl>M UY:
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Copyright © Ralph o·connor, 2002
The right of Ralph O'Connor· to be identified as the Author
of this work has been by him in accordance with the
a~serted
Copyrights, Desib'llS and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this b-Ook 1nay be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any
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electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying ind
recording. or in any information storage or retrieval systern, without the permission in writing from the
Puhli~hcrs.
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Uritish Library Cataloguing in Publication Data.
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A catall1guc record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISllN 0 7524 1952 8
TyJ""'l•tuni:: and uri!!inatiun hy T1:t11pu' 1'11hhshi11g.
Jc.-J.111J ic finHS dl·~it;111:d hy c:arl EJlund AnJcr~un.
l'l(INTl:O AND ll<>UNO IN GllEAT lllUTAIN
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Cont ena -i
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PRCfa c.c
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V iking Age· c;cploRCRS and lcclandic hiscoRians
lcclandic sagas: hisroRics OR Romances? II
20
The aRr of rhe saga-aurhoR
SraR-Oddis DReam 27
29
The Saga of 1-ljalmrhcR and OlviR
32
C;crRacr fRom rhc Book of Flarey
The Saga of BaRd rhc Snowfcll (jod 36
40
ffiiRmanns Saga
47
Not:c on t:hc nanaladona
1 DRcam 51
s~a-Oddt'a
2 The Saga of HjaJmt:hat and Olm 65
3 e;aROcc fRom t:hc Book of F1arcy 103
CJod
JI. The Saga of 'Bcmd t:hc SnowfcTI 109
5 <Dhanann'a Saga 139
175
G1088CIRY of and
chaRattCRB ~CRlllS
189
lcc1andlc place nwncs
190
FURChca Reading
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face
lleadl'rs are \Varnt•d th,u tht• Introduction \Viii spoil th<' story if rt•;ul first. This applies in particular
s
to tht· first-r.He plot of .\lir111<11111 Sc!!!"· \\'ith its unexpected t\vists and turns.
Th<' printing of this book \\'as n1,1de possible by a gifi to the University of Can1bridgc in
n1t·n1ory of l)orothea C:oke, Skjat'rer. 1951.
My translations n1uch to the \vork done by the sagas' previous editors and translators. Sonic
0\\'t'
arc no longer with us, but I \vish to n.:cord n1y debt to the work of Sarah M. Anderson, Bjarni
Villtj,\lrnsson, Terry c;unnell, Richard Harris.Jon Skaptason, Gwyn Jones, Anthony Ma.xwell, Phillip
Pulsiano, Desrnond Slay, Marvin Taylor and l>6rhallur Vilrnundarson. I also a particular debt to
O\Ve
on Icelandic 'rornance' by Geraldine Barnes, MatthC\v Driscoll, Jiirg Gbuser, Hern1an11
\Vritin~
P;ilsson, Marianne E. Kalinke, Torli Tulinius and Gerd Wollgang Weber.
1 have received niuch help and kindness during the preparation of this book, and tried the
patienre of rnany. First of all, I arn gratt·ful to those long-suffering individuals, fan1ily and
friends, \vho listened to sagas being read out and posed as trolls for the illustrations.
For giving up their tirne and advice, and for help in various capacities, I would like to thank
Al\,1lht·iour Guo111undsd6ttir, Michael Chesnutt, Santanu Das, C:lare Do,vnha111, Gucfujorn
Sigunnuri.lsson, Alaric Hall, Richard Kirby, Ja111es E. Knirk, Christopher Moule, Subha
Mukherji. Anne O'Connor. Andy Orchard.Judy Quinn, Ragnhei<'lur M6sesd6ttir. Ian Robinson,
i
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Chris Sandt•rs, Svanhildur Oskarsd6ttir, Peggy Truscott and Alistair Vining. as well as Anne l
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Phipps. Tirn Clarke and Katherine Savage of Te111pus Publishing. I arn grateful to the staff of tht·
Arn:1111;1gn:1:an Institute and Dictionary in Copenhagen for alJo\ving 111e co spend an extren1ely
s1i111ulating thrt•c \Vet· ks there in Septe111bcr 200 I, a trip 111.1de possible in part by a grant front
( :arnbridge Univt•rsiry\ Sc.1ndinavia11 Studies Fund.
More gener.11 thank' are due to the Dt·partn1ent of Anglo-Saxon, Nor'e and Ct·ltic at
C:a111brid~e fiir the infectious enthusias111 and excellence of its te.1d1ing. and t()r sustaining a
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frit·n,lly. supportive and invigorating acadernic cnvironn1t•nt. Special thanks. for help and
support bt·yond the rail of duty. 11n1st go to Matthe\V [)riscoll. l)es111011d Slay and (above all)
l'.Hrit'i:1 Boulhosa and P;nrl Bibi re. Any t'rr(lr' in this book art'. of rour,e. 111y responsibility.
O\Vll
No on,• has gi\·en n1orc· over chest' chrt•c ye.1rs than l-l:1rrit·t Truscou. \\'ithout \vhose critical
eye. p.1ticnce and int•xh.111stibk gt·nt·roo;ity this book \\'otild not exi't. In this, as in cvt•rything.
niv \\-.1rr11est th.inks .irc• for her.
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lnt:R<>duct:ion
V1lmlg Age.' c;cploRCRS and lcc1and1c htst:oldans
Ne111 U'(>rlds to the Ll'est
One of the n1ost engrossing sub-plots in the history of 111edieval Europe n1ust be the n1ariti1ne
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explorations of the Norsemen in the late Iron Age, the so-called 'Viking Age' . Fron1 the late
eighth century onwards, new craft plied the western seas. Slender dragon-headed longships and
sturdy cargo-carrying k11arrar cruised the coasts and rivers, wreaking havoc but also bringing
trade, settlers and rulers to areas as far-flung as Norn1andy, Dublin, Seville, Morocco. Kiev and
Dyzantiun1. The period takes its popular nan1e fron1 the notorious bands of Norse \varriors who
\vent { viking (raiding), extorting money fron1 individuals and realms alike; but these represent
only one aspect of an age characterized by large-scale migration - the last wave of the great
Ger1nanic niigrations which had been changing the face of Europe since the fourth century
AD. One of the most enduring achievements of this age of exploration and exploitation was the
sctden1ent of Iceland at the end of the ninth century, and the birth of that paradoxical creature,
a nation without a ruler. Elsewhere in Europe, the arrival of Christianity strengthened and con
solidated royal power, paving the way for feudalis1n; in Iceland such changes did not take place
until nearly three centuries after the con1ing of the new faith. The old Gern1anic forn1s of gov
ernment lived on and were adapted to a highly literate Christian culture. As Adan1 of Bren1e11
put it in the eleventh century, 'They have no king, but only la\v.'2
No doubt the delay \Vas partly due to Iceland's n1arginal position on the politicaJ rnap of
Western Europe. Apart fro111 a few Irish clerics (who had con1e seeking isolation in their O\Vn
ren1arkably seaworthy craft), Iceland had been uninhabited when the first Norse settlers arrived,
n1ainly fron1 Norway, Ireland and the H ebrides: according to a n1uch later account in Egil's
8<1,(!11,
'you could shoot anything you wanted, for none of the anin1als \vere used to n1an and they just
stood about quietly'.3 Iceland had enjoyed a rnarginal existence long before n1an arrived.
Geologically, it is the product of tensions bet\veen t\VO 111argins, straddling the Mid-Atlantic
Ridge where the North An1erican and Eurasian tectonic plates constantly strive to pull apart
from each other. The resulting volcanic activity created the ne\V island of Surtsey in 1963: 1nas
sive quantities of lava erupted fron1 the ridge on the sea bed, solidifying and lurching out of the
surf. Similar forces brought Iceland itself into being long after the last dinos;1ur had disappeared
frorn the face of the earth. AJong \Vith the arctic cli1natc, the violence of this young and unsta
ble land has forced society to cling to the fertile n1argi11s: the interior is a \vasteland uflava fit•lds,
glaciers and volcanic sand, fit only for outl:l\vs, trolls and backpackers. 1·he origin.ii scttk:rs \Ven:,
by dint of necessity, explorers: they had to 1nap out this virgin territory, ro st.tke out a hu111;1n
presence in the wilderness.
Son1e pushed further. That n1ost anci<:ut of isles, ( ;rt·cnland. a 111ild enough rlin1at1:·
e1~oyed
for Icelanders to settle there late in the tenth century. though the voyagt· ''"ts extrcrnt'ly h.1zardous.
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Int ~odurt ion
Still further to the \vest, in arctic and subarctic Canad1, lay the rocky wastes of Hcl/11la11d (Slabla11,i)
and the fort·sts of Markla11d (Forestland). which Greenlanders exploited for tin1ber. Settlernent~
\Vere n1ade further south in Vi1i/1111d (Wineland), rich in natural resources and already inhabited l-,)·
native An1ericans. The Vf11la111I settlen1cnt did not last long, and the An1erican lands soon passed
into the reahns of fantasy. The increasingly neglected Greenlanders lasted, their nun1bers steadil)·
d\vindling. until the fiftel'llth century, \vhen they fell victin1 to the encroachrnent of drift ice a11J
'A1nericans' (i.e. the lnuit).4
By the thirteenth century the 'Viking Age' itself had vanished: its distinctive linean1ents hali
dissolvt>d in the n1ore politically centralised Christian Europe of the ne\v n1illenniun1. Bands of
oath-bound thugs no longer crosst•d the North Atlantic in search of fan1e and fortune. T hl·
autono111ous tribal and regional confederations that characterized early Germanic society Wt'rc
coa1escing into larger and fewer adn1inistrative units, controlled by increasingly powerful indi
viduals: in the n1id-thirteenth century. even Iceland acknowledged a king. New lands \Vere no
longer sought out and t>xploited; the last \vave of the Ger111anic 1nigrations was over.
E."l:plorin,{! tlie past
Yet a different kind of exploration was already under way. For the educated Icelandic elite. the
past itself was a country - or rather, a continent - whose di1nensions. resources and curiosities
\\'ere worth exploring, exploiting and recreating in a new genre of narrative literature known as
the saga. This tern1 needs defining: it is son1etin1es nlisunderstood to n1ean epic poetry, or used
to 1nean a very long and often tedious series of events ('our gas bill saga'). In Icelandic, saga sitn
ply rneans 'story, narrative'; but in tt'rn1s of n1t>dieval litt'rary criticisn1, it is a for1n of vernacular
pseudo-historical narrativt' prose (often incorporating passages of poetry). In other words, a saga
seen1s to clairn - at least on one level - to record that actually took place in the past.
event~
This forn1 developed on the Atlantic seaboard of 1nedieval Europe, above all in Ireland (fro1n
c. 700) and Iceland (fro1n c. t t 5! 1). 5 On each island the saga was the result of the fusion of (and
tensions benvt'en) t\VO cultures: the native traditions of storytelling and history-recording, and
the foreign tools of Latin literacy that had con1e \Vi th Christianity in the fifth and eleventh cen
turies respectively. The native traditions in each case were substantially different, giving Irish and
Icelandic sagas their own distinct generic features; but both traditions were vigorous, since these
far-flung Atlantic societit's had never con1e under the ho1nogt>nising influence of Ron1an cul
ture. The tern1 'saga' carrit's no necessary in1plication of length: n1ost are about the lenbtth of a
short story, son1e are only a fe\v pages long. and even the n1an1n1oths an1ong thern cannot n1atch
up to Richardson's Clari.1sa. All the sagas in this book \Vere \Vritten at a tin1e \vhen the influ
t'nce of European ron1ance fiction had helped to niake niuch of this pseudo-historical prose
1nore 'pseudo· than 'historical'.
History-\vriting. ho\vever, did not begin \Vith the sagas. Tht' earliest surviving exa111ples of
lcel:indic st'cular scholarship datt' fro1n the t\vt'ltth century. and these \vritinsrs are exceptionally
n1arure and original. European 111odels evidently providL·d a springboard, rather than a te1nplate,
for a distinctively lcel.1ndic practice of hisrory-\vriting. Ari the Learned's Bciok Iccla11dcrs
<~f
,
(/.,/c1uli1~~''"<'k. r. t I"..,) is - if can trust its sevl·ntcenth-century copyist - till" oldt•st exarnple of
\Vt:
narrative prose in a Sc.1ndi11a\'ian l:111gu,1gt·. It is a concise constitutional history of I ct· land, and Ari
is .1lso said to have \\·ritten an early version of thct <!( Sc11/c111c111:; (L111d11,i111,1hc>k), a
l~c>ok ~eograph­
ir.1ll)·-org;111ist·d catalovue of of lrel.1ndic settlers. heavily annotated \Vith saga-likt'
!!;l'nt•;1logic:-~
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