Egil’s Saga Page 38

4 GUNNAR HLIFARSON. For more of him, see Hen-Th. passim.

  5 OLAF FEILAN. Grandson of Queen Aud, with whom he came to Iceland about 892 and from whom he inherited the family seat of Hvamm. See note on Thord the Yeller, p. 269.

  6 THORD THE YELLER. See note, p. 269.

  7 ODD-A-TONGUE. A famous lord in the west country, dwelt at Broadlairstead in Reekdale of Burgfirth. He plays a large part in Hen-Th., which says (ch. 1) that “he was not held for a man of fair dealings”. For more of him, see ch. LXXXI ff.

  8 DIED ASGERD. The power of the saga style is nowhere more surprisingly shown than in the little passages like this. The pathos and beauty of the plain, measured statement (‘A little after… that were then alive’) touch one as gentians do, seen suddenly on the naked mountain-side; yet there is no rhetoric or appeal to sentiment, simply the succession of relevant facts.

  9 TARGE-DRAPA (Berudrápa). The rest of the poem is lost.

  10 STAVE. ‘King’s thane’ (þegn konungs), Thorstein Thorason. ‘The altar’s falling-tresséd Friend’ (fallhadds vinr stalla)—Odin; His ‘force or waterfall’—poesy. ‘Hordland’ (trǫþ Hǫrþa), lit. ‘that which is trod by Hords’—Hordaland. ‘Crop of eagle’s chaps or beak’ (arnar kjapta ǫrþ)—poesy: from the story (Ed. p. 117) of Odin’s stealing of Suttung’s mead and flying off with it to Asgard in eagle’s-shape, and “spitting it out” into the casks of the Gods, “but Suttung’s mead gave Odin to the Aesir and to those men who have wit to use it”. The last two lines are corrupt: the ‘Raven’ is no doubt a ship, and her ‘steerer’ Thorstein Thorason.

  11 HELGA THE FAIR. The heroine of Gunnl.

  CHAPTER LXXX

  1 SNAEFELLSTRAND. The south coast of the Snaefellsness peninsula. (Cf. the curious New Zealand place-name ‘Snufflenose’, which is obviously ‘Snæfellsnes’ corrupted by foreigners who did not understand its meaning.)

  2 KORMAK. See his Saga, one of the oldest; Collingwood’s translation (the only one in English) has very great merits: the more the pity that it should be unwarrantably free and padded out, so as to give a reader no inkling, with its mask of lady-like smoothness, of the rough old features of its original. Kormak probably had Irish blood in his veins; his life-story hangs mainly on his love for Steingerd and his holmgangs with her successive husbands; of his poems addressed to her C.P.B. says, “were they perfect, they would probably be the finest of all Northern classic love-poetry Steinar plays some part in Kormak’s saga.

  3 THE CATTLE WOULD GO WHERE IT LIKED. A pretty quarrel: “Cursed be he that removeth his neighbour’s landmark”.

  4 INGS (engjar). The same word, commonly used of meadows to-day in the north country, e.g. in Yorkshire.

  5 WALL OF THE HOME-MEAD (túngarðr). Tún is used in Iceland to-day, as it was in the saga-time, of the green cultivated field surrounding the home buildings.

  6 LITTLE AT STAKE WHERE I AM (lítlu til verja, þar sem ek em). Meaning, it will not be any great loss to Steinar if Thrand should unluckily be slain.

  CHAPTER LXXXI

  1 HAVE NIGHT-QUARTERS UNDER MINE AXE (eiga náttból undir öxi minni). Cf. Reykdœla 12, where Vemund Kogur had set on a foolish fellow; on promise of free winter-quarters, to put a public shame upon Steingrim of Kropp by smiting him with a boiled sheep’s head, and Steingrim avenged it by slaying his assailant, ‘and gave him winterquarters there and then, and saved Vemund the trouble’.

  2 GOOD LUCK (hamingja). See note, p. 257.

  3 A magnificent conversation between Steinar and Thorstein.

  4 EINAR OF STAFFHOLT. Also mentioned in Landn.

  5 REEKDALE. See note.

  6 THRALL-GILD. This law is also quoted in Eb. 43: see that and the following chapter for the famous bringing home of the thrall-gild by Steinthor of Ere, which led to the battle of Swanfirth between the men of Ere on the one side and Snorri the Priest and his turbulent fosterbrethren on the other.

  7 THE NESSES (Nes). I.e. the countryside bordering on the S. and S.E. of Faxa Flow.

  8 Egil’s hard common-sense and Onund’s sentimentality are finely contrasted.

  9 IN SADNESS (af alvöru). In the Shakespearean sense: alvara, ‘earnestness, seriousness’.

  10 FIGHTING HORSES (kapalhestar). Horse-fighting was a recognized sport which, even more than the ball-play, was apt to lead to bloodshed. Cf. Nj. 57–8. “Then the horses ran at one another, and bit each other long, so that there was no need for anyone to touch them, and that was the greatest sport” (ibid. 58). The good little Iceland horses of to-day are spared such hateful treatment.

  11 FROM UNDER THE TONGUE-ROOTS OF ODD (undir tungurótu Odds). Meaning he will not take orders from Odd as to what he (Onund) proposes to say on the subject.

  12 IN THY TEETH (í fangi pér). Lit. ‘in thy catch (sc. of fish)’, or ‘in thine arms (i.e. that with which one clasps or embraces)’; D. s.v.

  13 FARED THE COURTS OUT (fóru dómar út). I.e. the courts opened. The judges went out in a body in procession and took their seats (D. p. 101).

  CHAPTER LXXXII

  1 EGIL’S AWARD. This is one of the key passages for Egil’s character. It repays, and will bear, study.

  2 SOMETHING ASKEW. Icel. ‘heldr skökk’.

  3 THE HONOUR THEY DESERVED (skapnaðar-virðing). Said, of course, in irony.

  CHAPTER LXXXIII

  1 AN OUTLANDER (útlendr). From his name, Irish.

  2 WINTER-ROAD (vetrgata). A road through marshes, passable only in winter, when the ground is frozen.

  3 WHY MUST HE BE SO SET ON MEETING ME? ‘He’ is, of course, Olvald, mentioned in the next sentence. Thorstein’s purpose is to put his men off the scent, so that he can avoid a meeting with Steinar without appearing to be afraid of him.

  CHAPTER LXXXIV

  1 THORGEIR. Probably the grandson of Thorgeir Lambi and of Thordis, Yngvar’s daughter, from Alptaness.

  2 HIS EASTMAN (austmaðr hans). I.e. his Norse guest. Norse chapmen trading to Iceland were commonly called ‘eastmen’. Powerful men generally took them in as guests; cf. Eb. 18, Nj. 28, 148.

  3 THORSTEIN THE WHITE (Þorsteinn hvíti). Thorstein was ‘of all men the fairest to look on, white of hair’ (p. 202). But in Steinar’s mouth the word carries the alternative meaning of white-livered, milksop, white with fear: ‘Thorstein pap-face’, I can find no English counterpart for it.

  4 SKRYMIR. Steinar used this sword in his fight with Holmgang-Bersi: it “was never fouled, and no mishap followed it” (Korm. 12); afterwards he gave it to his nephew Kormak, who seems to have wielded it in his last battle (ibid. 27).

  5 LAMBI. A charming episode, and most unexpectedly bloodless.

  6 WIND-SHEATH (vindskeið). From vinda, ‘to wind’. There was a gabled porch over the door, and the two boards forming the edges were fitted together crosswise at the top and carved into the likeness of serpents’ tails intertwined, the heads being at the eaves.

  7 STAVE. Last couplet, lit. ‘Blund may not (has not the power to) bind himself from bale (i.e. abstain from misbehaving himself); I wonder at such things’.

  8 A MAN OF NO FOXISH TRICKS (maðr órefjusamr). ‘Refjur’, f. pl., ‘cheats, tricks’; from refr, ‘a fox’.

  CHAPTER LXXXV

  1 STAVE. Lit. ‘The tottering have I of a hobbled horse: in woeful peril of a fall am I on my bald pate: soft is for me leg-berg’s borer: and hearing is at an end’. þorrin, ‘drained, ebbed out, waned, ceased’. F.J. thinks bergifótar borr means the ‘tongue’; D. (s.v. borr) interprets it ad loc. as “metaphorically the pipe of a marrow-bone”. The real meaning is, no doubt, that given by Sveinbjörn Egilsson (Lex. Poet.) and by C.P.B. vol. 11, p. 573 (which quotes a parallel from Piers Plowman, Pass, xx, on his old age): an interpretation which is borne out by the context.

  2 STAVE. ‘Spear-care’s goddess’: that which takes care of the spear is the whet-stone: hence, a stone in general; the goddess of a hearthstone—a woman. ‘Words of the captain of Hamdir’s spear’, i.e. gold. Cf. Hamðismál (C.P.B. vol. 1, p. 53 ff.); Hamdir and Sorli
avenged their sister Swanhild’s murder on Jormunrek, King of the Goths, by hewing off his hands and feet, but the king’s men stoned them to death. The spear that slew Hamdir, therefore, is a stone; the ‘prince’ or ‘captain’ (gramr) of that—a giant; the ‘words’ of the giant—gold (see the story in Ed. pp. 112–13).

  3 OVER-DEAFLIKE (ofdaufligt). A tragic echo from his youth; for it can hardly be accidental that the same words are in his mouth here in his grievous old age that were used (p. 80) on the eve of the first violent clash, two generations ago, between his fierce and headstrong youth and the might of Eric and Gunnhild.

  4 STAVE. This exquisite little epigram, the last of Egil’s verses that survives, reads in the original as follows:

  Langt þykke mér,

  likk einn saman

  karl afgamall

  firr konungs vǫrnom;

  eigom ekkjor

  allkaldar tvær,

  en þær konor

  þurfo blossa.

  The pun in the last half rests on the double meaning of hœll, (1) heel, (2) widow. Lit. ‘I have two widows (ekkja, the ordinary word, suggesting to the hearer the synonym hœll which commonly means heel) all cold, and those women need warmth’.

  CHAPTER LXXXVI

  1 MASS-PRIEST (prestr). As distinct from priest (goði), which of course has no Christian signification or connexion.

  CHAPTER LXXXVII

  1 SKULI. Cf. O.T. 114, on the battle of Svold: “So saith Skuli Thorsteinson, who was with Earl Eric that day:

  The Frisian’s foe I followed,

  And Sigvaldi; young gat I

  Life-gain, where spears were singing

  (Old now do people find me).

  Where I bore reddened wound-leek

  To the mote against the meeter

  Of mail-Thing in the helm-din

  Off Svold-mouth in the south-land”.

  The first lines may mean that that Skuli followed Earl Sigvaldi and the Jomsburg vikings in their fatal battle against Earl Hakon in Hiorungwick. Earl Eric, the son of the great Earl Hakon (on whom see note, p. 250), avenged his father in the great sea-fight off Svold where he, with the help of the kings of Denmark (Svein Twi-beard) and Sweden, defeated and slew King Olaf Tryggvison: see the whole story in Hkr. (O.T. 106–22).

  The quiet ending, retrospective, dying away like falling embers, surveying the line of the Myresmen in their generations dead and gone, falls with the true saga cadence of ‘Tout passe’. Cf. the greatest of such endings: that of Njála, with the reconciliation of Flosi and Kari, Nj. 158.

  * Germania, ch. 3.

  * I.e. from Thistlefirth in the far N.E. to near Hekla in the S.S.W., about 150 miles across the howling wilderness of the interior.

  * R. Pitcairn, Criminal Trials, Edin. 1833, vol.III.

  * See also note, p. 305, on Egil’s stave lamenting the fall of Arinbiorn.

  * He is so called in Skallagrim’s ditty made on the slaying of Hallvard and Sigtrygg (p. 52).

  † See Kveldulf’s attitude, p. 4.

  * And many wives besides. The strife between his many sons broke up the realm after the great King’s death.

  * Hǫlgabrúðr, i.e. the bride (wife) of Hǫlgi, another form of Helgi.

  INDEX

  The page numbers in this index relate to the printed version of this book; they do not match the pages of your eBook. You can use the eBook reader’s search tool to find a specific word or passage.

  The Icelandic word, where it differs in spelling from the word used in the translation, is given immediately after it in brackets: e.g. ODIN (Óðinn).

  In references to the Introduction, to the Notes, to the Terminal Essay, etc., the printing of a page-number in italics indicates that that is the main reference to the matter in question.

  ACRES (Akrar): Icel. 57

  ADILS, KING, (Aðils): 274

  ADILS: a Welsh earl, brother of Earl Hring, pays scat to K. Athelstane 99; deserts to Olaf the Scots-King 100; proposes to him the plan by which K. Athelstane may be taken at unawares 104; rides forward with his b. to Winaheath but fails at the surprise 105; arrayed against E. Alfgeir whom he puts to flight; fares less happily against Egil and his men, and on Hring’s fall flees to the wood; is reported to K. Olaf as slain 106–7; ambushes Thorolf Skallagrimson; slain by Egil 109; no. 281

  AEGIR (Ægir): 190; 192. xxiii. 301

  AFFINITY: 261

  AGDIR (Agðir): a folkland in S. Norway 14

  AKI (Áki): a Dane rescued by Egil in Kurland 88–91; warns E. of Eyvind Braggart’s presence on Jutland-Side 97

  ALDI: an isle off the coast of Norway 126

  ALF ASHMAN (Álfr Askmaðr): brother of Q. Gunnhild, a very masterful man and not well loved 95; to please his sister, breaks up the courts with violence at the Gula-Thing 120. 278–9

  ALF THE WEALTHY (enn auðgi): a bonder of Vermland, befriends Egil 176, 178–9

  ALFGEIR (Álfgeirr): an earl in Northumberland 99; defeated by Olaf the Scots-King, flees and is ill thought of 100–1; at Winaheath flees again, and escapes to Valland 105–6

  ALFRED THE GREAT (Elfrátðr enn ríki): King of England 98, 99. xvii

  ALOF (Álof): second wife of Biorn the Franklin 71, 119

  ALOST (Álöst): mod. Alstenö, an island off Halogaland 11, 16, 22, 42

  ALPTANESS (Álptanes): Icel., the seat of Yngvar, and the S. point of the Myres district 55, 57, 59, 61, 132, 184, 213–4

  ALPTAWATER (Álptá): a river of Burgfirth 116

  ALREKSTEAD (Alreksstaðir): mod. Aarstad, near Bergen; a great house of K. Harald Hairfair’s 68, 125–6

  ALTHING (Alþingi): xx–xxi, xxv. 269

  AMPHIPOLIS: 282

  ANATOMY OF MELANCHOLY: 238. 246, 262, 297

  ANDAKIL (Andakíll): on Burgfirth, near Hvanneyri 55, 78. 268

  ANDAKILSWATER (Andakílsá): 55

  ANI (Áni): a follower of Skallagrim 46, 56, 160, 213

  ANISBRENT (Ánabrekka): a farmstead W. of Burg 56, 160, 204, 213, 214, 218

  ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA: xxxi

  ARABIA DESERTA: 240

  ARABIAN NIGHTS: xxx. 240

  ARCHAISM: 239–41

  ARINBIORN THE HERSIR (Arinbjörn hersir): s. of Thorir the Hersir; a little older than Egil, who makes great friends with him in their youth 79; 80; anxious for E.’s safety after Bard’s slaying, urges his f. to make peace for E. with K. Eric 85–6; insists on E.’s being allowed to guest at Thorir’s for the winter in spite of the K.’s objection 93; 94; by Thorir’s counsel keeps E. from going to the blood-offering at Gaular 95; takes inheritance after his father: E. guests with him 115; helps E. in his wooing of Asgerd; counsels E. not to settle in Norway while Q. Gunnhild’s power is so great 114–5; entertains E. and Asgerd; is unhopeful of E.’s getting his rights against Bergonund 117; his wrath at B.’s calling his father’s sister a bondwoman; tries, without success, to obtain the K.’s good will in E.’s favour; at the Gula-Thing has the duty of choosing twelve judges from the Firth-folk; has many ships and men 118; puts forward witnesses in E.’s behalf 120; after the Thing has broken up in tumult, counsels E. to go away quietly and avoid K. Eric’s wrath 121; the K. pursues him, thinking he is hiding E. 122–3; gives E. a ship to fare to Iceland 124; fares with K. Eric on his war-gathering against his brethren 126; is fosterbrother of K. Eric and fosterer of his child; follows him to England when Eric has to flee from Norway 134; 135; Egil comes to him in York 136; he takes E. to the K. and pleads his cause 137; his bandying of words with the Q.; obtains a night’s respite for E. and counsels him to employ it in making a praise-song on K. Eric; keeps away the swallow that disturbed the composition 138–9; next morning, by showing that he is ready to go to all lengths for E.’s sake if need be, obtains a hearing for the song 140–1, and E.’s release 145; rides with E. to K. Athelstane; gives E. the sword Dragvandil; goes back to K. Eric in York 146; upholds his nephew and foster-son’s, Thorstein Thorason’s, cause with K. Athelstane 147; 151; for his sake Egil supports Fridgeir against Ljot 152; after K. Eric’s
fall comes back to Norway and resumes his lordship in the Firths and has K. Hakon’s friendship; entertains Egil; his munificence at Yule 159–61; unable to dissuade Egil from pressing his claim against K. Hakon, undertakes to plead it himself and so incurs the K.’s wrath; pays E. himself rather than let him go empty 161–3; with E. harries in Saxland and Frisland 164–5; parts for the last time with E. at the Neck in the Limfirth and joins his fosterson K. Harald Ericson in Denmark 166; K. Hakon deals harshly with A.’s friends and kinsmen in Norway 167; 168; after the battle of Fitiar in Stord comes back to Norway with K. Harald and is held in great honour; E.’s drapa upon him (Arinbiorn’s Lay) 194; falls with K. Harald at the Neck; E.’s stave upon this 200. xxx, xxxiii. 251, 253, 274, 286, 295, 302

  ARINBIORN’S LAY: see Arinbjarnarkυiða

  ARINBJARNARKVIDA: 194–9. 302–4

  ARMOD BEARD (Ármóðr Skegg): a bonder in Vermland 169; his inhospitable entertainment of Egil rudely rewarded 170–2; punished by Egil 173; sets an ambush for Egil in Eidwood 174, 175–6; but not again on Egil’s journey home 182. 296

  ARNALD (Arnaldr): a (? imaginary) bonder in Vermland 169

  ARNFID (Arnfiðr): an Earl in Halland, entertains Thorolf and Egil 91–3

  ARNFINN (Arnfinnr): Earl of the Orkneys, weds a daughter of K. Eric Bloodaxe 134

  ARNGEIR OF HOLM (Arngeirr): son of Bersi the Godless 116

  ARNKEL THE PRIEST (Arnkell goði): 256, 268, 276, 287

  ARNVID (Arnviðr): king in Southmere; falls at Solskel 5

  ARNVID: Earl of Vermland; reputed to have slain King’s messengers who came for the scat 167; 176; pays the scat to Egil, and sends thirty men to sit for and slay him in Eidwood 177; his anger at their miscarriage 181; his treason discovered, he flees the land 183

  ASBIORN (Ásbjörn): Earl, falls at Solskel 5

  ASBIORN SEAL’S-BANE: 264

  ASGAUT (Ásgautr): Earl, falls at Solskel 5

  ASGEIR KNATTARSON (Ásgeirr Knattarson, i.e. son of Knöttr): a bonder of Iceland 186

  ASGERD (Ásgerðr): d. of Biorn the Franklin and Thora Jewel-hand and grand-d. of Earl Hroald; born at (or near) Burg and fostered by Bera and Skallagrim 67; Thorolf takes her to her f. in Norway 73, 78; 79; weds Thorolf 80; after Thorolf’s death Egil goes to Norway to look after her 113; E. woos and weds her 114–5; after some years returns to Norway with E. and guests with Arinbiorn while E. pursues her claim against Bergonund 116–7; B. claims that she should be adjudged the K.’s bondwoman 119–20; 124; 133; stays at home at Burg when E. sails on his third voyage abroad 135; her claims laid by E. before K. Hakon 149; and before Atli the Short 156; and finally met 158; her children by E. 159; after Bodvar’s drowning, sends to Herdholt for Thorgerd 187; E. recites to her his Sonatorrek 188; her love for her son Thorstein; lends him E.’s silk cloak, Arinbiorn’s gift 202; after her death E. leaves Burg 203. 307