by Mark Coakley
Viking Saga
Mark Coakley
Published: 2009
Tag(s): Viking vikings saga sagas Halfdan Lindisfarne Norse Norway action thriller sex blood glacier battle military love tactics novel fiction nun monk charlemagne love sex violence poetry snow ice fantasy
VIKING SAGA
Translated By Mark Coakley
70,000 words
Copyright 2009: "Free, non-commercial use only."
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Translator's Note
Written in Old Norse by an unknown Icelandic author in the 14th century, Viking Saga describes events that supposedly occurred many centuries earlier, starting in the year 792.
Although many of the events described in Viking Saga are mentioned in other Norse sagas (i.e. Snorri Sturulson's Lives of the Kings of Norway) or have been confirmed by archaeology, there persists an academic debate as to how much, if any, of Viking Saga is historical fact. The debate began in 1837, when Professor Bethel of Oxford first translated Viking Saga into English, making it accessible to a world-wide audience for the first time. In the opinion of this translator, Viking Saga accurately reflects Norway's earliest history, though certain elements (i.e. scenes dealing with magic and the supernatural) are probably fictional. Regardless, most readers are less interested in its historical precision than its old-fashioned literary value.
In that respect, there is simply no debate. Viking Saga is an astonishing and great work of art, crammed with exciting scenes and descriptions of lyrical beauty, along with flashes of authentic folk-wisdom and exquisite comedy. Although not as famous as the so-called "classic" sagas (such as Njal's Saga, Egil's Saga and The Saga of the Volsungs), Viking Saga is an outstanding example of medieval story-telling. It is my personal favourite, and deserves a much wider audience.
I am honoured to translate this work for contemporary readers; the last English translation was made back in 1933, by Professor Winsome of the University of Los Angeles. Now it is time to introduce Halfdan the Black and his world to a new generation. I would like to thank the publishers, and my secretary, and of course my family, for their patience during the lengthy process of translation.
Mark H. Coakley
University of Toronto, 2010
Chapter 1
PARENTAGE
There was a man called Halfdan the Black, who lived and died long ago, when the folk of Norway were still ruled by many small kingdoms, and folk still followed the old customs, believing in Odin, Tor, Freya and other old gods. Halfdan grew up in the small farming-town of Os, in the kingdom of Fjordane. He was fathered by Gødrød the Toothy and mothered by an outlander woman called Aasa.
As a young man, Gødrød had killed a few other local young men, for no reason other than boredom; as punishment for these wrongs, the Fjordane Assembly had sentenced Gødrød to three years as an outlaw. Forced into exile, Gødrød rode east across the mountains. After twelve years in the east — when nobody in Os knew if he was still alive, and few even thought about him much anymore — Gødrød had returned home with a surprising woman.
Aasa had very dark skin. Nobody in Os could remember ever seeing a person like her before. Aasa's hair was completely black, tightly curled, and formed a soft ball around her head. She said that she was from Nubia, a place far to the south that nobody here had ever heard of. All of the gossip-loving folk in Os wanted to know their story. How had they met? Briefly, this is what happened. Aasa's first husband had travelled with Aasa from Nubia to Constantinople, where he was a diplomat to the Roman Empress. Gødrød had also lived in Constantinople then. He had learned to speak Greek and to pretend to worship Christ; these qualities, and his skill with spear and ax, had earned him a job in Constantinople as a bodyguard for the Empress Irene. Gødrød and Aasa were often at the palace at the same time. Aasa's odd-looking and darkly beautiful face — so different from Roman women, and from the pale and pointy-nosed girls he remembered from Os — appealed to him. He spied on her, learning that Aasa was lonely and that her husband preferred boys. When Gødrød approached her, Aasa agreed.
They kept their love secret from everybody in Constantinople.
Until, long later, she became pregnant. Gødrød and Aasa knew that it would be impossible to hide her unfaithfulness when her belly started to bulge, as Aasa's first husband had not touched her in a long time. So Gødrød and Aasa stole as many treasures from the Empress and from Aasa's first husband as they could quickly get their hands on, fleeing Constantinople on horseback by night, to the west. Gødrød had spent the early years of his exile in Russia, and was able arrange a wedding in a Russian Christian church. The fugitives continued west on horseback, her belly growing bigger and bigger. After many adventures, including losing their horses and treasure to bandits in Lithuania, Gødrød guided his huge-bellied wife over Norway's eastern mountains and into the kingdom of Fjordane and to his home-town of Os.
There was born the hero of this saga.
Aasa became very sick in the long, dark winter of Halfdan's second year. She coughed and coughed. When her coughing finally ended, she was placed in the communal grave near Os.
Gødrød, able to bear his sadness only with strong mead, drank and drank. When his drinking finally ended, he was held in chains for manslaughter, and could not remember why he had axed two of his friends to shreds during a drinking-fest in a mountainside shepherd's hut. As Gødrød was too poor to afford to pay compensation to the families of the victims, the Fjordane Assembly outlawed him again, this time for seven years.
Before his second exile, Gødrød placed his son in the foster-care of Gødrød's sister and brother-in-law.
Gødrød rode again to the east, across the mountains, never to return. He plays no more part in this saga. Nobody knows what happened to him.
Chapter 2
HALFDAN INTRODUCED
Halfdan was a difficult child to raise. He spoke little, and his few words were usually rude. He delighted in disobeying rules and fighting.
His odd looks always attracted attention. Nobody in Fjordane had ever seen folk with Aasa's and Halfdan's curly hair and skin much darker than theirs. (In Os, visiting Swedes were rare, Danes and Finns were seen as wildly exotic, and only a few had heard of King Charlemagne.)
Often, folk would think that Halfdan had been covered with paint as a prank. More than once, when Halfdan was a young child, an adult grabbed him to rub snow or water on Halfdan's skin, trying to wipe off the brown paint.
He was soon nicknamed "Halfdan the Black," for the obvious reason, and also because the word "black" in Old Norse also meant "wicked". Folk in Os said, "He is going to grow up to be a blood-stained criminal like his father."
But as Halfdan grew into a young man, his Uncle Harald taught him to use his anger and violence for good ends. Halfdan grew a passion for listening to and composing spontaneous poetry. He would often laze away long winter nights by the fire, making up poems in his head. Even when very young, he would use that oldest of arts to express the feelings swirling inside his orphaned heart. When Halfdan chanted one of his rhyming and alliterating poems, to a family-member or one of his few friends, Halfdan's heart would sometimes empty of its fury and pain, for a while.
Uncle Harald told him to forget about becoming a farmer or shepherd or fisherman. Halfdan was told to try to become a professional fighter for the King of Fjordane, "so that instead of pointlessly killing folk around here and being exiled for it like your father, you can kill folk for the government and be a famous hero."
Chapter 3
A FULL BLADDER
Halfdan the Black stepped out of King Lambi's hall. It was night. He had to
piss. On the flat-stone path in front of him, a few guard-dogs were lying together. One dog was now sniffing at the early-fall wind. The dogs knew Halfdan's smell and ignored him. Halfdan turned and walked towards a row of out-houses on the east side of the big building. The hall was a hulking rectangle of oak boards nailed to thick oak beams holding up a high roof. The hall was the biggest building in the town of Eid, which was the biggest town in the kingdom of Fjordane. It stood aloof from Eid's other buildings. Its sloping roof was covered with tall clumps of grass and dying, droopy summer-flowers. It was surrounded by rich soil farmed by King Lambi.
Halfdan was now twenty-seven years old, and had lived in the hall as one of the King's fighters for eleven years. His face and body were covered with scars. His black hair hung in tangled curls from the top of his head; it was cut short, almost to the skin, on the back and sides of his head. In his hair and thick beard, there were a few thin strands of grey. He had one chipped front tooth. As was then customary in Norway on festive or formal occasions, for both men and women, Halfdan had smeared blue paint around both of his eyes.
A "T"-shaped Tor-idol of clay hung from a string around his muscle-thick neck. He wore a long-sleeved grey linen shirt that hung almost to his knees, tied at his waist by a belt of reindeer-leather. The belt-buckle was made of silver, twisted into the shape of a bug-eyed, cat-like beast with hands that gripped itself. A sword dangled from the belt, its oiled iron blade hiding in a sheath of cloth-wrapped oak-wood.
The well-used weapon swung forward and back beside the wool cloth of his right pant-leg as he walked.
A bit drunk, from a long night of feasting and boozing with visitors from the neighbouring kingdoms of Sogn and Førde, Halfdan looked up at the brooding snow-topped mountain-range overhead, and at the clear sky filled with sharp silver stars and a honey-yellow moon. Halfdan stopped walking, staring up. He lifted a hand as if to reach up and pull down some of the glittering stars.
"Beautiful," he whispered.
Halfdan walked past a row of carved and painted masks of the gods hanging on the outside hall-wall, the grimacing faces of Odin, Tor, Freyir, Baldur, Loki and others; some of whose names are now forgotten. Halfdan went to the corner of the hall and turned left again and went fast towards a row of woven-wicker huts down-wind of the hall. To his right and across a grassy space was the high wooden wall that surrounded Eid. On the other side of the town-wall was a ragged line of shadowy trees that stretched up the dark mountain-face.
Halfdan went in an out-house. A smell of beery piss and puke rose from the hole in the ground by his cow-leather shoes. He yawned and aimed himself and soon felt better.
As he was walking back towards the hall's front door, Halfdan again noticed the guard-dogs on the path of flat stones that led towards the rest of the town.
The dogs were now eating something. Halfdan was surprised. Before his piss, the dogs had been resting on the ground and one had been sniffing the night-wind.
Where had the food come from?
Halfdan, suspicious, stopped walking.
He was staring at the dogs and about to go over to them to see what they were eating when something hit him in the lower part of his belly. It hit him hard and punched his breath out.
Halfdan gasped and looked down. A wood arrow-shaft with grey guide-feathers was now sticking straight out of his belly.
He gasped, "Tor!"
His legs went weak and he fell backwards. He landed on his back on the cold lumpy ground. Arrow-shot in the gut. He knew he was dying. A bad way to end. It would be painful and slow.
Chapter 4
THE HALL
As Halfdan lay stunned on the bumpy, grassy ground — preparing himself to die for a reason he did not know, the pain of the arrow reaching deeper and deeper into his guts — he turned his head sideways to look at the shadowy outer wall of King Lambi's hall.
This place had been the center of his life, ever since leaving the small, dull town of Os at sixteen. The first time Halfdan had seen the building from the outside, its size and solid construction had greatly impressed him. And the first day he had seen it from the inside, escorted there (when it was empty) by his nervous-looking Uncle Harald, Halfdan's mouth had dropped open in amazement. "Tor!" Halfdan had never seen a place like it before.
It had seemed to be a single large room (though he learned later that the King and his Queens had a separate sleeping-room at the back). The room was so big! Halfdan had known entire families in Os who had fed themselves on farmland smaller than this! Some parts of the wood walls were undecorated, with bronze shield-hooks. Elsewhere, brightly-coloured wool tapestries hung on the walls, showing vivid scenes of men and gods feasting and in battle. Furs hung on the walls too: the grey skins of wolves, the larger brown skins of reindeer and moose and boar-pig, and the huge yellow-white pelts of the legendary northern bear. The bestial faces of these hunting-trophies snarled at the high ceiling.
Halfdan saw other faces too: there were small shelves on the thick oak beams holding up the roof, and on each shelf was resting the dried head of a man. Some looked like they had sat there for a long time. Messy, brittle-looking hair and beards dangled from the wrinkled, shrivelled grey skin of the lifeless and grimacing heads. Swollen blackish eyes bulged out of some heads; the eye-lids of others squinted or were completely shut. The top of each head was gone, and Halfdan could see the unlit tips of candles sticking up from the inside of each skull.
A single long fireplace stretched from one end of the hall to the other. Two rows of long tables went along both sides of the fireplace; dozens of chairs were stacked by the long inner walls. At the far end of the room was a raised platform, which held up a table running perpendicular to the rest, with tall, fancily-painted chairs behind it. In front of this king-table stood a bronze idol of a boar-pig, the size of a real boar-pig, that glittered faintly in the sunlight beaming in through small, high windows.
Straw and wildflowers were strewn across the dirt floor, giving off a nice, fresh smell.
Uncle Harald said, "When Lambi is in town, there are lots of folk hanging around in the evening here. The King and his fighters, the Queens and their serving-girls, local nobles, clerks, poets and too many slaves to count."
Harald had known this because, long before this time, he had once enjoyed a victory-feast here, as a reward from the previous king for brave military service in the Third Great Swedish War.
"When will King Lambi come back to Eid?" Halfdan asked.
Harald said, "Whenever he finishes visiting his other properties around the kingdom. He owns more farms than anybody else, all along the fjord, and he likes to check each of them regularly, to get some dirt on his hands and keep his local managers honest. And the business of ruling also pulls him all over the kingdom: taking gifts of silver from some nobles to keep them from getting too rich, giving silver to other nobles to keep them from getting too ambitious, and hearing reports from his spies. When he is done all that, he will be back."
"And then he will accept me as one of his fighters?"
Harald said, "He should. It has been arranged. My bag of silver-bits will get you in. But as I told you, getting accepted is not the hard part. Once you are in the hall, you have to prove yourself, or you'll be sent away."
"I will prove myself. No matter what I have to do."
"I know you will," Harald said. "You're good with a weapon and even better with a poem, and that's what Lambi looks for in a man." Harald placed a hand on Halfdan's shoulder. "You were born with strong luck. We are proud of the man you have become. Fate has something special planned for you."
A few days later, the king-ship had returned to the Eid docks, and things had gone as Harald had predicted. A clerk had taken the bag of silver, in front of witnesses. Harald and Halfdan had been told to report to the hall that night.
When darkness finally came, and Halfdan (wearing new clothes, and with fresh blue paint smeared around his eyes) went inside the hall for the second time, it was full of many different
kinds of folk, as his uncle had described. Dozens of shields hung from the walls behind the tables. The candles sticking out of the man-heads on the shelves were burning and they, along with the cooking-fire in the middle of the room, filled the room with warm orange light. Many shaven-headed slaves were cleaning up after dinner or carrying beer buckets from table to table. The air smelled of male bodies and roasted meat. Men sat at tables in front of clay plates covered with bones and other dinner-waste. These men held silver-decorated drinking-horns and were talking and laughing until the two visitors from Os walked in. Then, all went quiet. Everybody stared at Halfdan. Usually he did not mind being stared at; he was used to it; most folk in Os had always viewed him as a freak. But now the staring eyes of this crowd of big-town folk made him more nervous.
On the raised platform at the far end of the hall, a man was sitting on the highest chair in the middle of the table. Unlike at the other tables, a few finely-dressed women were sitting up here. When the man in the middle of this table stood, Halfdan knew that this had to be King Lambi. The man was tall and thick-shouldered and fifty-seven years old.
Halfdan stopped and stared.
"Come," Harald said. "This is not a time to be timid."
As he walked with his uncle deeper into the hall, between the long tables towards the far end, Halfdan saw more of the man who many poets called the strongest and the wisest of all Norse kings.
Purple paint circled each of King Lambi's eyes. His beard and hair were thick and yellow, with some grey twisting through his long, braided beard. The king wore a full-length gown of shiny red silk — a magic kind of imported cloth that only a king or the richest of nobles could afford. King Lambi's belt, glittering with bits of honey-yellow amber, held a sword that was almost as long as his leg. The sword-handle was of plain, well-used leather; it had obviously been chosen less for display than for use.