Eventually, several of the sentries are ordered to show Þormóður to the king’s tent, which is located at the foot of a heather-grown hill topped by an ancient stone cairn standing out against the sky. Serried ranks of guards surround the king’s camp. The king’s men’s horses graze in gullies and hollows, while baggage and saddlery are piled on level ground. The majority of the troops have nothing to distinguish them apart from the weapons they had been issued that day, scarcely marking them off from the beggars who roam from house to house during bad years. Nowhere near are any knights on fiery, golden-bridled stallions, wielding famous old swords, or any of those champions who chomp the edges of their shields, roaring and making all sorts of other grand and manly shows to terrify folk, or yet those great and noble vassals who are bathed in the grace and goodwill of a mighty king.
The men now crowd round Þormóður to hear his business, most of them making fun of this poor wretch who has come straight from the enemy army the night before battle, completely unguarded, to request an audience with the king himself. They inform him that the king has more pressing issues at the moment than listening to the bosh of beggars from Iceland – he would be better off telling them how fat the pigs in Norway are, and whether the cattle are well-fed. “We have had enough of the Swedes’ barley gruel,” they say. Some have heard as well of the wealth of women to choose from in Norway – which meant that they could look forward to softer beds the following night than they had lain in for some time. They were far more for bawdy talk and lewd ribbing than for bringing such a miserable tramp before their king. “Why are you lame in both legs?” they ask.
“Because,” says he, “that is the only cure for being lame in only one leg.”
As they stand there gabbing with this beggarman, an officer passes by with a small escort. He addresses the men, asking if they have everything they need. Most say yes, though some are reluctant to answer. The officer says: “By tomorrow evening, you will have even more.” This man is not stately in appearance. He is, in fact, corpulent, and waddles more than walks, with chubby cheeks and a sparse red beard. He is wearing a blue cloak of fine cloth, very creased, clotted with horse hair and mud, a tall, Russian fur hat, and high, dirty boots. A sword hangs from his belt, the tip of its scabbard poking out from beneath the hem of his cloak. Old books state that even though King Olaf had not learned the art of swordplay, which made him resemble Ása-Þórr, he still always wore a sword, in the manner of lords and noblemen. The king has not had his hair or beard trimmed or groomed in a long time, and his face is grimy with dust and streaked with sweat.
When Þormóður realizes that this is King Olaf Haraldsson, he steps forward and addresses him, speaking loudly and clearly:
“I am the skald Þormóður Bessason from Iceland, your champion Þorgeir Hávarsson’s sworn brother. Pray listen, my lord, while I sing you a lay.”
The king asks what beggar this is, daring to open his mouth in his presence. “Trolls take you Icelandic skalds!” says he. “Few have done me worse than they. I have had more than enough of these Icelanders’ boasting. Where is that man tonight,” says the king, “who always boasted so highly of his loyalty and devotion to me when I needed them most – Sigvatur Þórðarson of Apavatn?”
“Of your friend Sigvatur, my king, I can inform you that he has gone to Rome to pass the time, out of pessimism about the outcome of the battle awaiting you. But I have traveled treacherous paths to stand before you.”
The king casts him a glance and asks curtly: “What paths have you traveled, then?”
Þormóður says: “In order to stand before you, sire, I have given these things of myself: I abandoned my farm in Iceland and left behind the treasures of mine that I could not, for love of them, take my eyes off at any hour of day or night, and placed them all in the hands of a foreign slave, in hope of the glory that skalds reap from such a noble lord as you are reputed to be, endowed with the might to rule the world. That being done, I went westward to Greenland, and then far north of the world of men for three-and-a-half years, intending to avenge Þorgeir Hávarsson, the greatest warrior you had in your kingdom.”
“I cannot comprehend what this man is prattling about,” says the king. “The impertinence of you Icelandic starvelings toward your lords is an unparalleled abomination. What warrior does he claim to have been best in our kingdom?”
Þormóður replies: “Your glorious champion, Þorgeir Hávarsson. No man has ever been born in the North with such an unwavering heart.”
“This wretch must be mad,” says the king. “We certainly do not recall having ever heard that name – though some Icelandic imbecile by that name may have stumbled his way into our band back in our Viking days.”
These things being said, the king departs to attend to more pressing concerns.
After stopping here and there to inspect his forces, and speaking some encouraging words to most of the men he encounters, the king has horns blown in the night to muster his army to assembly. He summons his interpreters, announcing that he wishes to address all the men before they sleep. Those who are not already asleep gather together at the forest’s edge to hear the king speak. These are the words of Olaf Haraldsson:
“Good fellows,” says he. “It is known to you all that the land to which we have marched is named Norway, and some of you have doubtless heard tales of that land, though very few of you have ever set eyes on it. Now we are going to set it ablaze with fire.
“That land, Norway, lying just beyond the border, was my, Olaf Haraldsson’s, inheritance, by virtue of my noble birth. When miscreants managed to usurp the kingdom, some of them petty extortionists who titled themselves kings, others foreign thugs such as Cnut Sweynsson, who designated himself supreme monarch, I wrested the country from their hands, partly by prowess and gallantry, partly by trickery and guile. My supporter in all things was the Emperor Christ, the son of the Virgin, who rules over the Kingdom of Heaven. I know that you have little knowledge of him, but when opportunity allows, I will make it plain to you that he has a far finer weapon than the god Jumala, who carries naught but his simple staff, completely lacking a crossbeam. Though none of Christ’s features are as comely as those of Jumala, what he has above and beyond Jumala is that he was not begotten by a man in his mother’s womb, as Jumala was begotten by Kumala, but was born of an immaculate maiden by the intervention of the dove that learned men name Holy Wisdom. Moreover, to the Swedish men in our army who are friends of Þórr, I wish to make it known that White Christ, who was my benefactor in Norway, is so mighty an emperor that when his stake, which learned men call a cross, was measured against Þórr’s hammer in Saxony in the days of Charlemagne, men with sharp eyes and measured tongues testified that Christ’s was nine times higher than Þórr’s and twelve times heavier. Monks taught me these things from Latin books. After I brought the Norwegians this most outstanding stake and bought them peace and happiness, their livestock yielded little milk, whereupon I led an army to Denmark to salt down cows, and I had houses of God built all the way north to Rogaland, so that chanting and bell-ringing and the paternoster might be heard throughout all the land, while giants and ogres fled for their lives. Who then should rise from the hair of the earth but churls and fishermen, pitting themselves with insolent rage against their lord, and at the behest of our enemies?
“My good men, now the rulers in Sweden, my wife’s kin, have granted me, in you, a doughty and valiant army for the reclamation of this land, and we have brought fifty horseloads of steel, whereas the Norwegians have only their clubs. I now designate you the defenders of the kingdom of Norway, and the time has come for us to burn the Norwegian peasants’ dwellings to charcoal. It is my command that you spare no creature that draws breath in Norway, and show no man mercy until I have once again gained complete control of the land. Wherever you see a churl with his brood in field or meadow, on the highroad, or in his punt, cut off his head. If you see a cow, slaughter it. Set each and every house ablaze, and send barns up in flames.
Millhouses – topple them; bridges – break them. Wells – piss in them. You are the liberators and defenders of Norway, and whatever you come across, rightly or wrongly, dead or alive, milk and meat or money, is to be your spoils of war – all except for gold, which the king alone claims. Let nothing withstand you until you have laid Norway at my feet.
“Good men, let us go now and set Norway awash with flames. And when we have burned, scorched, and decimated the land, I will name my right-hand men and grant estates and titles to those who make the greatest achievements in the work that we shall commence in the red light of dawn. Some of you shall then be titled jarl or hersir, others count or baron, some alderman or lord, and some, finally, knyaz or bogatyri. You shall have equal share with me in the revenue and bounty of the land in Norway, besides other wealth, and we shall all sit at one and the same table when we feast. Yet first I would ask of you, though you are heathens, not to take it amiss if I maintain something of my loyalty to the emperor who tumbled the Romans and other evildoers into Hell at the hour when he was hanged on the gallows. In return, I will allow you to keep your idols. Those who put their faith in Jumala’s staff shall serve him, and Þórr’s men shall exalt his hammer as they wish. The same goes for each and every man, whatever stump or stone he believes in. Yet I beseech you not to hold Christ in lower regard than Jumala, for it is of vital importance that this army earns the rightful blessing of the Lord Pope in Rome and the venerable Father Patriarch in Constantinople, as well as the good graces of the emperors, kings, and dukes who rule in the South, yet particularly the mercy of Christ himself, who has made all of these authorities his foot pages.
“After we have subdued Norway and put to death the rabble that has risen there against its king, we shall rebuild the country, erecting forts and castles with tall towers, and build ships and conduct Viking raids throughout the world. We shall sow fields more spacious than have ever been seen in Norway, and tend fatter herds, and for our labor we shall purchase slaves who will submit to us body and soul until we free them and declare their children equal to our own. We shall lay stone roads over the length and breadth of Norway and drive wagons like King Óðinn. We shall raise towns and cities with splendid houses and monasteries, horse markets, butchers’ stalls, and extraordinary brothels, and buy Saracen fabrics and ornate swords, pepper from India, gold and ivory from Africa, and silk from the Orient. We shall erect a cathedral of Holy Wisdom in Nidaros, as glorious as the Hagia Sophia in Constantinople, and on its altars display golden shrines holding the skulls of saints, bigger and better than elsewhere in Christendom.”
52
IN THIS BOOK, we shall not gather everything else that has been told of the sworn brothers Þorgeir Hávarsson and Þormóður Bessason, who were among the greatest and most renowned heroes in the Vestfirðir. Our account of their king, Olaf the Stout, is likewise drawing to its close. Other scholars, more sagacious than we, have done the task of extolling the glory of Skald Þormóður and King Olaf from the moment when they both fell lifeless at Stiklestad, the morning after the conclusion of this our narrative. The tale of King Olaf’s glorious sainthood began when his devoted friend, Bishop Grímkell the Englishman, returned from Rome, and, going over the heads of the bishops of Bremen and the Christians of Norway, disinterred the king’s corpse, which the peasants had dragged off and buried beneath a pile of stones, and declared its sanctity in the name of the Lord Pope. With an abundance of melodious requiems, the Church, for its part, celebrated the papal decree declaring this man to be the true King of Norway throughout the ages, in the light of this world as in Heaven, in nomine Jesu Christi domini nostri.
At the same time, news spread that Bishop Grímkell had been reconciled with the archiepiscopal see of Bremen through the intercession of the Pope, and made suffragan bishop over God’s Christians in Norway. Now it went as it so often does, that those who bestow posthumous glory on kings also rewrite the stories of their lives, and thereby create saints for generations present and future.
The death of Þormóður Kolbrúnarskáld at Stiklestad has been exalted by Icelandic historians in immortal books, ensuring that the skald’s renown survives as long as that of the king whom he sought and found.
On this the final night of our narrative, when the army has gone to rest, and the men have laid themselves down beneath their shields throughout the forest, having plucked moss and leaves to cover their feet and keep them warm, the king finds himself unable to sleep. It is commonly held that the speech he made that evening heartened him less than his followers. Many a foreigner in the army has fallen asleep hoping that he will, with the help of Christ, Þórr, and Jumala, and the steel that cowards esteem higher than the gods, subjugate all of Norway and kill all the Norwegians apart from those who wish to become their docile slaves. Not all, however, who await these great events can sleep. Here and there a man can be seen sitting upright in the grass, scratching himself and yawning, while others lie around him dozing, or nibbling on morsels from their satchels to while away the night before death.
That night, the king has no one with him but a Russian foot page who cannot speak the Norse tongue. Up until now, the king has trusted only this boy. Yet after the king has lain down, thinking that the boy is still awake, his mind turns to all the tales of kings being murdered in their sleep by their foot pages the night before significant events. Unable to fall asleep, the king crawls out of his sleeping bag and leaves his tent.
A waning moon hangs over the cairn behind the king’s tent, and the cairn’s topmost stones stand out against the sky. It appears to the king as if three men are sitting atop the cairn, brandishing their weapons: cross, hammer, and staff. The king stares at these men as he stands before his tent flap in the night, and says:
“I expect these must be the brothers Jumal, Christ, and Þórr, sitting there with their weapons.”
A sentry steps forward, marches over to the king, and asks:
“Did you say something, sire?”
“Nothing of any importance,” says the king. “I thought, however, that it might be amusing to augur the future from birds tonight, though I in fact had none when I conquered Norway the first time, with only two creaking tubs and a scurvy crew. Summer is beginning to wane, and I lie cold at night, with no companion whom I trust. Was it as I thought? Was there not an Icelandic skald limping about here earlier this evening, requesting an audience with us? Where might he be now?”
The sentry says that if no one has killed the man for amusement, he cannot be far away.
The king turns away from the sentry and takes a few steps up the slope behind his tent. The moon is now very close to touching the cairn’s topmost stones. The king lies face down on the ground, heavy-hearted. Finally, he raises his eyes to the cairn and addresses it:
“Cairn-dwellers,” says he, “whatever your names be! Take the hand of this inglorious arsonist, bereft of the backing of champions and the service of clerics, devoid of women’s love and skalds’ praise, a man friendless and alone. Your names are worthless to me, but your comfort is everything.”
After groveling in the grass beneath the cairn for a short time, he notices a man sitting several steps away in the shadow of a rock, watching him, having overheard his anguished plea. They stare at each other for several moments. Then the man says:
“None but foxes dwell in that heap of stones.”
The king asks: “Who are you?”
The man replies: “I am the Icelandic skald.”
“Welcome, skald,” says the king. “Did I hear correctly earlier this evening, that you composed a lay for me?”
“You did indeed, sire,” says this man. “I have composed a very precious lay for the greatest hero in the North, and for you, his king. This lay I paid for with my bliss and sun, and my daughters, Moon and Star, and with my own beauty and health, hands, legs, and feet, hair and teeth, and lastly with my lover herself, who dwells in the Abyss and has my life-egg in her keeping.”
“Ease your king’s mind awhile
now, skald,” says Olaf Haraldsson, “and deliver me your Lay of Heroes by this cairn tonight.”
After some hesitation, the skald replies: “I can no longer recall that lay,” says he, and he stands up slowly and hobbles away, leaning on his cudgel, and disappears behind the cairn.
By then the moon has gone down, and night shrouds valley and hill at Stiklestad, as well as the bird cherry, late to blossom.
ENDNOTES
1: Tense shifts between the past and present are common in the Old Icelandic sagas. Shifts to present tense often occur at particularly dramatic moments, as if to quicken the pace of the narrative according to the action, although this is not a hard-and-fast rule. Throughout Wayward Heroes, Laxness imitates this style, and it has been partially preserved in this translation.
1: “Brynhildur” refers to Brynhildur Buðladóttir, a renowned shield-maiden and Valkyrie who appears in many Old Norse and Germanic works. She was imprisoned by the god Óðinn within a ring of flames on Mount Hindarfjall. “Swans” spinning men’s fates refers to the Valkyries and their role determining the fates of warriors in a well-known Eddic poem.
2: Easterling (Icelandic: Austmaður) was a term used in medieval Iceland and the Orkneys for persons from Norway or the Scandinavian continent in general.
Wayward Heroes Page 33