One character who I found especially fascinating was Sam from the Saga of Hrafnkel Frey's Godi. First, Sam is a unique name among Vikings, so he's easy to remember. I thought his reaction when Thorstein told him of his cousin's death was almost funny in its understatement: "It's no news that Hrafnkel kills people." I admired the way he took over what he thought was a hopeless case from his uncle. I was entertained by the creative methods they employed in getting support from influential people at the Althing. Even more interesting were the choices Sam made once he obtained power by temporarily throwing Hrafnkel out of power--his show of mercy was definitely not rewarded in the end and he ended up getting revenge taken on him, including the death of his brother. It's implied that he had bad luck because he didn't listen to advice. Since I've been looking at various ideas of fate and why different things happened to different people according to the sagas, the fact that his misfortunes were his own fault was interesting.

Ref the Sly

The introduction to this saga states that this is a fictionalized story in saga form, and there are several instances in the text to back this up. First, the plotting is actually pretty tight. In the sagas that also serve to impart history, there are always lots of side plots, not all of which get resolved. In this saga, there is an uncharacteristic economy of characters, and in addition, only one generation is really dealt with. The saga begins and ends with Ref's life.

Another thing that would have made me doubt the truth of this saga even without being told that it was fictional was: How could he have had enough timber to build a huge fort in Greenland? We saw in the video last week in class that there was not much timber in Greenland, which was part of the reason to explore Markland and Vinland. Also, the saga does not explain at all the process he used to build the fort, where most sagas go into great detail about things like that.

I found myself drawing comparisons between Ref and Egil. Ref, like Egil, fights his way out of several impossible situations, and both are really good at coming up with clever retorts to enemies. Both characters went to many different places, making enemies along the way, but Ref is perpetually lucky even where Egil is not; for instance, none of Ref's children die. In fact, no one in Ref's family dies violently. Also, there was not a whole lot of character development on Ref's part, aside from his abrupt transition from a couch potato to a scary guy who will kill you, although granted it is on the short side for sagas.

I thought this saga was entertaining in its own right, and my experience of it was certainly richer for having studied other more factually-based sagas. Some of the things in it seem to almost be parody of saga conventions and hyperbole.

The Vinland Sagas

First off, I thought it was cool that there are two separate sagas that overlap so much in terms of characters and events covered. It was like watching two different movies about World War II or something; there are some things that appear in each but the main focus of each is slightly different.

I also thought it was really interesting that so much emphasis was placed on Gudrid. It seems that her life is full of these supernatural types of events, most of which are recorded in both sagas. I could imagine how strange it must have been for her to be taking part in the magic rite with the wise woman in spite of her qualms about participating. When her husband woke up, after dying, to tell her fortune, it reminded me of the tale of Thorstein Shiver where he is talking to the demon in the outhouse--very matter of fact, not seeming to deny that such an interaction is really possible.

I think that the motivations stated for the exploration of Vinland speak to the nature of the Iceland-Greenland culture of the time. The people who went were in search of good natural resources and possible farm locations. If they were only a warmongering people, they would not have been so quick to give up hope of settlement because of conflict with the pre-existing residents.

Egil's Saga, Part 2

The things that stood out most to me about Egil's life were the more sentimental moments. In the midst of all the various adventures, legal wranglings, and battles, it was nice to see the incidents that showed he was also a person with real emotions too, rather than just a caricature of a bloodthirsty Viking. After his son Bodvar dies and his wife sends for their daughter Thorgerd, their interaction was very interesting. It seems that she knew her father just that well that she was able to come up with a way to pull him out of his gloom. I also was struck by Egil's ongoing friendship with Arinbjorn. Not many people these days seem to have lifelong friends, especially across such great distances. I was impressed by the way that they continued to give and give to each other.

Egil's Saga, Part 1

Already in this saga I notice a few repeated themes, or recurring situations. First, the situation where a woman gets "carried off", in other words kidnapped away from her family and then married to the guy who does this. In the first case, the children from that marriage weren't considered legitimate and therefore had no rights to their father's estate, even though it ended up getting passed out of their family entirely. On page 20, Thorolf says, "I don't even consider that you have any birthright, because I am told that your mother was taken by force and carried off to your father's house." In the next generation, the same sort of thing happens between Bjorn and Thora, but in their case, eventually a settlement was made and so far it seems that everyone is happy. Probably because Bjorn did not have any pre-existing children who would want to discredit the marriage.

There were also two main gifts given so far in the story. The first notable one was the ship given to Eirik, while he was young, by Thorolf Skallagrimsson. This "gift" was clearly a thinly veiled attempt to get on his good side, but it works for at least a while. Thorolf seems interested in patching up some of the hard feelings between the Norwegian royals and his family, but his father is skeptical, just as his grandfather was skeptical of his uncle Thorolf's efforts before he died.

The second gift that I took note of was the axe given to Skallagrim by King Eirik. I was confused as to why exactly it broke and what parts of it were broken. Did it break because Skallagrim was too strong and the axe went straight through to the stone? We already saw that he was supposed to have some super-strength abilities when he dove for a stone that "would take four men to move today" so that would be plausible. Or is the point that the axe was shiny and looked nice, but not the kind that would actually stand up to hard use? Either way, I think it provides a symbolic contrast between the type of person Skallagrim is versus Eirik. Was it really given with malicious intent? It's hard to say, but Thorolf secretly gets rid of the damaged axe instead of spitefully returning it the way his father asked him to, which further reinforces his role as the would-be peacekeeper.

Partway through I noticed some references to children being sprinkled with water, including Egil and Thorolf, which I looked up in the glossary and found out that sprinkling was part of the naming ceremony and initiation into society, so it doesn't necessarily have the Christian connotations that my mind jumped to at first. There's also the occasional reference to a person who practices witchcraft or a feast to go along with a sacrifice being made. Both of these show that at the time of this saga, beliefs in the ancient mythology and traditions were a part of most people's lives.

I thought it was sort of humorous the way Egil was portrayed as a kid, partying with the adults and spouting poetry, then bashing in other kids' heads over a game! I took these passages as tall tales, much like the American folk tales of Paul Bunyan and Davy Crockett ("killed 'im a b'ar when he was only three!"). The narrative seems to suggest that his intensity is at least partly inherited from his father and grandfather. I suppose Egil might be a good poster child for the nature-versus-nurture argument: Did he get his disruptive traits through genetics, or were they encouraged by his family, which seems to have endorsed the philosophy of "stab first and ask questions later (see pgs. 44-45)"?

Prologue to the Prose Edda

To me, this prologue is basically an explanation from an early medieval standpoint of how the Norse mythology came to be. The author starts by explaining why their ancestors were not part of the Judeo-Christian tradition. One phrase that stuck out to me was, "Who then could tell their sons of God's mighty wonders?" He understands that before recent (to him) times, people, at least in that part of the world, were reliant on oral recitation to pass down information and beliefs.

The idea that the earth is alive stands in huge contrast to the idea that became popular during the Enlightenment, that the earth is a machine working according to the "laws of nature." We don't usually think of the earth itself as being a living thing; but at the same time, it is becoming more apparent all the time how interdependent all forms of life are. Certainly the metaphor of the earth as a nourisher still has appeal today.

Snorri gives justification for his theory of the origins of the Norse myths by describing the qualities that should be ascribed to deity: power, strength, benevolence, eternality. Then he shows how the human people who came to be known as Thor, Odin, and others rose to such high regard by their feats of strength, bringing prosperity their region, coming from a foreign place, and ushering in a new era in the history of the people.

Introduction to Norse Mythology

One of the things that struck me the most about the introduction was the idea that mythology is one important way in which we can learn about ancient Scandinavian culture, and by extension, Germanic and Indo-European culture. The methods of interpretation have evolved, from Snorri in the thirteenth century, who only had access to the Icelandic source material and the viewpoint he adopted that the gods were originally humans who became deified over time in the myths, through more recent scholars who looked for explanations in natural phenomena, to the current prevailing view, which seems to be a combination of the two. As time goes on, our understanding has become more sophisticated and more source material has been unearthed, translated, and analyzed, but still there is a kind of vanishing point beyond which the reconstruction of history depends mostly on educated guesses and linguistics.

It makes perfect sense to me that the reason we want to study the myths and sagas is the same reason the Icelanders kept the ancient myths and poetry alive: "It is possible that the continued transmission of poetry about early kings and battles as historical sources required a continuing knowledge of heroic legend and of myth, not as the object of belief or as something associated with cult but simply as stories that people interested in the history of their own culture had to know (p. 17)."

I thought it was strange that the gods can be killed, specifically, Thor and Frey. I think it makes the gods seem a lot more human than I how I am used to thinking about them. But I wonder, why would people continue to worship a god who, according to myth, had died? Looking at the section on time cleared this up a bit. The major gods all die in the "near mythic future". So people who revered Thor maybe thought of themselves as participating in the mythic present, not that they had that exact terminology in mind.

I read about Loki. Apparently Loki makes quite a few appearances, and his role changes depending on what time frame the action is taking place in. He is not completely good or completely bad, and the book showed many instances that demonstrated Loki's inherent ambiguity.

The Saga of the Confederates

Reading this saga I was a bit confused at first about what Einar was doing but I thought that he was very clever to come up with the "fine" that he did and the way that he used it to tell off the confederates who wanted chunks of Odd's wealth. A few things stood out to me as being indicators of this saga taking place in a different time than some of the others. One was that "At that time it was very common to set up new godords or to purchase them, and Odd new did so (page 467)." I do not remember reading about that being a common thing before. Another difference is that Ospak and Svala arranged their own marriage, which is a departure from the formalized negotiations between the fathers of the couple. I also noticed that Christmas and Easter are referred to as such, so obviously this happened after all the Icelanders started following Christian traditions. Finally, almost all of the action takes place at meetings and courts, whereas in previous sagas people seemed to be a lot faster to enact their own justice.

Hrafankel Frey's Godi

In this saga, the emphasis seemed to be on keeping one's word. At the beginning, Hrafankel says, "He who gives warning is not at fault." When Sam and Thorbjorn are having trouble getting support for their case, Sam convinces Thorbjorn to stick with it by using convincing words to remind him of why he wanted to take the case before the Althing to begin with. Thorkel uses an ingenious method to gain his brother's backing for Thorbjorn, saying, "Either you accept what I propose, or you won't come to me asking for advice." At the end, when Sam has had Hrafankel's farm taken back from him, he goes to Thorbjorn, who tells him pretty much the same thing. The second time, though, Sam does not take his advice, but goes back home and has a peaceful rest of his life.

I also enjoyed the contrast made by several characters between stoically living with one's bad fortune and courageously fighting for change. Many people remembered that Hrafankel had been an unfair ruler, but none of them had ever done anything about him because everyone believed that a dispute with him was more trouble than it was worth. Even Sam initially said, "It's no great news that Hrafankel kills people." It took a man like Thorbjorn, who felt he had nothing left to lose, to stand up to him.

So, indeed, Thorbjorn and Sam proved true the words of Thorkel, that "Who dares wins." Their gain did not last forever, though. The reappearance of Sam's brother Eyvind sparks Hrafankel to avenge his own humiliation and take back what he lost. I noticed that both Eyvind and Thorkel had spent time traveling around Europe, even specifically to Constantinople. I think that Hrafankel must have transferred some of his resentment towards Thorkel onto Eyvind when he decided to kill him.

Havamol

I actually like the beginning part of Havamal the best, because of the varied topics in short snippets, some of which are really striking. My two favorites both have to do with friendship and I think that they are great sentiments and are just as wise today as they were when they were written.

34. Crooked and far | is the road to a foe,
Though his house on the highway be;
But wide and straight | is the way to a friend,
Though far away he fare.

47. Young was I once, | and wandered alone,
And nought of the road I knew;
Rich did I feel | when a comrade I found,
For man is man's delight.

Speaking of wisdom, I notice that a lot of the short stanzas had to do with wisdom: things a wise person does and does not do, the benefits of wisdom, and so on. I seems that interpersonal relationships are considered to be a sound basis for determining a person's character.

Gisli Stursson's Saga

I thought that one of the most interesting things about this saga was the complicated relationship between the brothers Gisli and Thorkel. It was confusing right from the beginning where Gisli killed the man Bard and how Thorkel was angry at Gisli about that until Gisli won the duel with Skeggi. It almost seemed like Thorkel was relieved that Gisli did not get killed in that duel, especially since Gisli had volunteered to fight in Kolbjorn's place and all. I wonder how the rest of the family must have felt about the repercussions of that duel--more people getting killed and their houses burned.

I thought the various mystical rites mentioned in the saga were interesting and how they had some unintended consequences, such as how the four men did not successfully complete their brotherhood-swearing ceremony and that was the point after which things started to get nasty. I think that part of the story shows how easily living situations could become awkward. You couldn't avoid ex-lovers or keep affairs covered up forever.

I thought it was interesting how pulling the weapon out of someone's death-wound made you responsible to avenge them.

My favorite line was on page 517 where Gisli is talking about his dreams that foreshadowed Vestein's death, that he did not want "to wake a third time from so dark a dream."

The ending of this saga was pretty sad. I noticed how several times it was repeated that Gisli was an accomplished man, but never had good luck or something to that effect. At least he made it for a long time (13 years?) as an outlaw. Even though the curse was supposed to be that no one could help him out, it seems like a lot of people did anyway. My other favorite part is on page 538: "However, it never occurred to him to say anything about the islands..." How often do movie bad guys get thwarted by some technicality? I guess this proves that such a plot twist is nothing new.

Gunnlaug Serpent-Tongue

In the Saga of Gunnlaug Serpent-toungue, I thought it was strange that Gunnlaug never got reprimanded for his trickery in the duel where he hid a second sword. Wouldn't that be a dishonorable thing to do?

I also wondered why it was still acceptable to go raiding in Scotland even after the Icelanders officially adopted Christianity.

When Gunnlaug cut off Hrafn's leg, I couldn't help but think of the part in the Monty Python movie with the Black Knight insisting that he's not defeated even after his arms and legs get cut off.

It seems to me that the author makes it sound like Helga died of a broken heart as much as of the sickness that was going around.

Audun from the West Fjords, The Story-wise Icelander

This week I'm presenting on these two tales. They are both pretty short, so if you haven't read them yet, you should definitely go ahead and do so.

In The Tale of Audun from the West Fjords, the first thing I noticed was the extent of Audun's travels. He goes to Greenland, the frontier of their society, and to Norway and Denmark, and even to Rome, the center of religious authority. I wondered about the significance of paying visits to the kings of Norway and Denmark, since Iceland had no king.

Audun's fortunes change multiple times during his tale. He runs out of money twice, and yet he ultimately returns home a much richer man than he was when he left. King Svein gives him a ship, money, and a ring. Why? More specifically, is there a reason why he receives those particular things?


In the Tale of the Story-wise Icelander, I had similar questions about the logic of the king's actions. Perhaps there are parallels between this one and some of the other tales in which the king keeps someone around for entertainment value, such as Sarcastic Halli. The unnamed youth, however, is concerned about offending the king, so he is probably a far less controversial personality around the court.

Why might the king not like to hear the story of his own travels? I have an idea, but I also want to hear what other people think.

It's not until the end of this tale that we find out about the connection to another of the tales. How does the ending of this tale compare to the ending of the tale of Halldor Snorrasson?

Thoughts from the first week's reading

I thought it was interesting that "Iceland was Iceland before France was France or England was England or Italy was Italy." It sounds like the Icelandic people who wrote the sagas had a strong sense of who they were, because "the inability of an individual to fit in is noticed, remarked upon, analysed and perhaps admired, but always dealt with in the end" (p. xii). Since "the saga heroes occupied a social place of the edges of society (p. xviii)," maybe other characters' reactions to the hero in a saga can tell us about what was acceptable or not in their society. I've been told that good stories happen when someone defies the rules of the day, so I'm looking forward to reading about all of these renegade types and finding out what happens to them.