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Title: The Viking Age. Volume 1 (of 2)
       The early history, manners, and customs of the ancestors
              of the English-speaking nations

Author: Paul B. Du Chaillu

Release Date: December 13, 2017 [EBook #56167]

Language: English

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VIKING SHIP, USED FOR BURIAL (GOKSTAD, NORWAY).

(Length of keel, 60 feet; total length, 75 feet; broadest part, 15½ feet; depth from the upper part of bulwark to bottom of keel, 3½ feet.)

Judging from the number of holes seen, which were about 18 inches below the gunwale, it carried sixteen oars, and was consequently a sixteen-seater. Its preservation is due to the blue clay in which it was partly embedded, the upper part being eaten away owing to the clay being mixed with sand, thus allowing the rain and air to penetrate. It is entirely of oak, clinker built, calked with cows’ hair spun in a sort of cord.

To you, my dear Taylor, who, like myself, have travelled over many lands, and led the same adventurous life in days gone by, I dedicate “The Viking Age,” in remembrance of years of friendship, of the many pleasant days we have spent together, and especially of our wanderings in the Land of the Midnight Sun, in the home of the old Vikings, while I was engaged on the present work.

While studying the progress made in the colonisation of different parts of the world by European nations, I have often asked myself the following questions:—

How is it that over every region of the globe the spread of the English-speaking people and of their language far exceeds that of all the other European nations combined?

Why is it that, wherever the English-speaking people have settled, or are at this day found, even in small numbers, they are far more energetic, daring, adventurous, and prosperous, and understand the art of self-government and of ruling alien peoples far better than other colonising nations?

Whence do the English-speaking communities derive the remarkable energy they possess; for the people of Britain when invaded by the Romans did not show any such quality?

What are the causes which have made the English such a pre-eminently seafaring people? for without such a characteristic they could not have been the founders of so many states and colonies speaking the English tongue!

In studying the history of the world we find that all the nations which have risen to high power and widespread dominion have been founded by men endowed with great, I may say terrible, energy; extreme bravery and the love of conquest being the most prominent traits of their character. The mighty sword with all its evils has thus far always proved a great engine of civilisation.

To get a satisfactory answer to the above questions we must go far back, and study the history of the race who settled in Britain during and after the Roman occupation. We viiishall thus find why their descendants are to-day so brave, successful, energetic and prosperous in the lands which they have colonised; and why they are so pre-eminently skilled in the art of self-government.

We find that a long stretch of coast is not sufficient, though necessary, to make the population of a country a seafaring nation. When the Romans invaded Britain, the Brits had no fleet to oppose them. We do not until a later period meet with that love of the sea which is so characteristically English:—not before the gradual absorption of the earlier inhabitants by a blue-eyed and yellow-haired seafaring people who succeeded in planting themselves and their language in the country.

To the numerous warlike and ocean-loving tribes of the North, the ancestors of the English-speaking people, we must look for the transformation that took place in Britain. In their descendants we recognise to this day many of the very same traits of character which these old Northmen possessed, as will be seen on the perusal of this work.

Britain, after a continuous immigration which lasted several hundred years, became the most powerful colony of the Northern tribes, several of the chiefs of the latter claiming to own a great part of England in the seventh and eighth centuries. At last the time came when the land of the emigrants waxed more powerful, more populous than the mother-country, and asserted her independence; and to-day the people of England, as they look over the broad Atlantic, may discern a similar process which is taking place in the New World.

The impartial mind which rises above the prejudice of nationality must acknowledge that no country will leave a more glorious impress upon the history of the world than England. Her work cannot be undone; should she to-day sink beneath the seas which bathe her shores, her record will for ever stand brilliantly illuminated on the page of history. The great states which she has founded, which have inherited her tongue, and which are destined to play a most important part in the future of civilisation, will be witnesses of the mighty work she has accomplished. They will look back with pride to the progenitors of their race who lived in the glorious ixand never-to-be-forgotten countries of the North, the birthplace of a new epoch in the history of mankind.

As ages roll on, England, the mother of nations, cannot escape the fate that awaits all; for on the scroll of time this everlasting truth is written—birth, growth, maturity, decay;—and how difficult for us to realise the fact when in the fulness of power, strength, and pride! Where is or where has been the nation that can or could exclaim, “This saying does not apply to me; I was born great from the beginning; I am so now, and will continue to be powerful to the end of time.” The ruined and deserted cities; the scanty records of history, which tell us of dead civilisations, the fragmentary traditions of religious beliefs, the wrecks of empires, and the forgotten graves, are the pathetic and silent witnesses of the great past, and a sad suggestion of the inevitable fate in store for all.

The materials used in these volumes, in describing the cosmogony and mythology, the life, religion, laws and customs of the ancestors of the English-speaking nations of to-day, are mainly derived from records found in Iceland. These parchments, upon which the history of the North is written, and which are begrimed by the smoke of the Icelandic cabin, and worn by the centuries which have passed over them, recount to us the history and the glorious deeds of the race.

No land has bequeathed to us a literature, giving so minute and comprehensive an account of the life of a people. These Sagas (or “say”) record the leading events of a man’s life, or family history, and date from a period even anterior to the first settlement of Iceland (about 870 A.D.).

Some Sagas bear evident traces of having been derived, or even copied, from earlier documents now lost: in some cases definite quotations are given; others are evidently of a fabulous character, and have to be treated with great caution; but even these may be used as illustrating the customs of the times at which they were written. Occasionally great confusion is caused by the blending of the similar names of persons living at different periods.

My method of putting together the series of descriptions which will be found in the ‘Viking Age’ has been as follows:—

xBy reading carefully every Saga—and there are hundreds of them—dealing with the events of a man’s life from his birth to his death, I was able to select the passages bearing on the various customs. When in one Saga the bare fact of a birth, or a marriage, or a burial, or a feast, etc., etc., was mentioned, in others full details of the ceremonies connected with them were found. After thus collecting my material, which was of the most superabundant character, I went over it and selected what seemed to me to be the best accounts of the various customs with which I deal in these volumes. I have not been content with the translations of other persons, but have in every case gone to the original documents and adopted my own rendering of them.

Some extracts from the Frankish Chronicles are given in the Appendix, as showing the power of the Northmen, and bearing strong testimony to the truthfulness of the Sagas. If I had not been afraid of being tedious, I could also have given extracts from Arabic, Russian, and other annals to the same effect.

The testimony of archæology as corroborating the Sagas forms one of the most important links in the chain of my argument; parchments and written records form but a portion of the material from which I have derived my account of the ‘Viking Age.’ During the last fifty years the History of the Northmen has been unearthed as it were—like that of the Egyptians, Assyrians, and Romans—by the discovery of almost every kind of implement, weapon, and ornament produced by that accomplished race.

The Museums of Denmark, Sweden, Norway, England, France, Germany, Russia, are as richly stored with such objects as are the British Museum, the Louvre, the Museums of Naples and Boulak with the treasures of Egypt and Pompeii.

I have myself seen nearly all the objects or graves illustrated in this book, with the exception of a few Runic stones which have now disappeared, but are given in an old work of Jorgensen.

As my materials expanded themselves before me I felt like one of those mariners of old on a voyage of discovery. To them new lands were continuously coming into view; to me xinew materials, new fields of literary and archæological wealth unfolded themselves incessantly. Thus carried away by enthusiasm and the love of the task I had undertaken, I have been able to labour for eight years and a half on the present work, with some interruptions from exhaustion and impaired health. May I, then, ask the indulgence of a public, which has always been kind to me, for all the shortcomings of my work?

I have received valuable assistance from many friends, but I desire especially to express my thanks to Mr. Bruun, the Chief Librarian of the Royal Library of Denmark, for his great kindness in allowing me so many privileges during the years I have worked in Copenhagen; to Mr. Birket Smith, of the University Library of Copenhagen; and Mr. Kaalund, Keeper of the Arna Magnæan Collection of Manuscripts, for the uniform courtesy they have shown me; among antiquarians, to my friend Professor George Stephens, author of the magnificent work, ‘Northern Runic Monuments,’ for his readiness in giving me all the information and help I needed, which sometimes occupied much of his valuable time (several illustrations of the runic stones, etc., in these volumes are taken from his work); to Mr. Vedel, Vice-President of the Royal Society of Antiquarians; to Messrs. Herbst, Sophus Müller, and Petersen, of the Royal Museum of Northern Antiquities, for their great courtesy; I am also indebted to the works of the following distinguished antiquarians which have been invaluable to me in my researches and which have furnished me with many of the illustrations for my book: Ole Rygh, Bugge, Engelhart, Nicolaysen, Sehested, Steenstrup, Madsen, Säve, Montelius, Holmberg, Jorgensen, Baltzer, and Lorange; also to the works of the historians, Keyser, Geijer, Munch, Rafn, Vigfusson. My sincere thanks are also due to my young friend Jon Stefánsson, an Icelandic student, for his constant help in rendering the translations of the Sagas as accurate and literal as possible; and to my old friend Mr. Rasmus B. Anderson, late American Minister to Denmark, and translator of the ‘Later Edda,’ etc.; in England, to Messrs. A. S. Murray, Franks, and Read, of the British Museum; to Dr. Warre, the head master of Eton, and to General Pitt Rivers, author of a valuable work on the excavations in Cranborne Chase, xiiwhich contains objects strikingly similar to those of Scandinavia; also to my friends Mr. J. S. Keltie and Mr. Arthur L. Roberts; to my old friends Messrs. Clowes, who have taken great pains in carrying out what has proved to be a very difficult task for the printer, and who have had the work over two-and-a-half years in type.

I must thank, above all, my esteemed and venerable publisher, John Murray, for the great interest he has taken in the present work, which has tried his patience and liberality many a time, and also for the many years of uninterrupted friendship and the pleasant business relations (unhampered by any written agreement whatever), which have existed between us from the time when I came to him almost a lad, and he first undertook the publication of ‘Explorations in Equatorial Africa,’ in 1861, not forgetting my dear friends, his sons, John and Hallam, the former of whom has assisted me materially in seeing the work through the press, and my old companion Robert Cooke.

I cannot close this preface without thanking my old and ever true friend Robert Winthrop, of New York, descendant of the celebrated Colonial Governor of Massachusetts, to whom I dedicated “The Land of the Midnight Sun,” for his unfailing kindness and sympathy during the years I have been engaged in the present work.

KINGS OF DENMARK.

KINGS OF NORWAY.

KINGS OF SWEDEN.

Geography and Nomenclature of the Viking Age

Early antiquities of the North—Literature: English and Frankish chronicles—Early civilisation—Beauty of ornaments, weapons, &c.

A study of the ancient literature and abundant archæology of the North gives us a true picture of the character and life of the Norse ancestors of the English-speaking peoples.

We can form a satisfactory idea of their religious, social, political, and warlike life. We can follow them from their birth to their grave. We see the infant exposed to die, or water sprinkled,^[1] and a name bestowed upon it; follow the child in his education, in his sports; the young man in his practice of arms; the maiden in her domestic duties and embroidery; the adult in his warlike expeditions; hear the clash of swords and the songs of the Scald, looking on and inciting the warriors to greater deeds of daring, or it may be recounting afterwards the glorious death of the hero. We listen to the old man giving his advice at the Thing.^[2] We learn about their dress, ornaments, implements, weapons; their expressive names and complicated relationships; their dwellings and convivial halls, with their primitive or magnificent furniture; their temples, sacrifices, gods, and sacred ceremonies; their personal appearance, even to the hair, eyes, face and limbs. Their festivals, betrothal and marriage feasts are open to us. We are present at their athletic games preparatory to the stern realities of the life of that period, where honour and renown were won on the battle-field; at the revel and drunken bout; 2behold the dead warrior on his burning ship or on the pyre, and surrounded by his weapons, horses, slaves, or fallen companions who are to enter with him into Valhalla;^[3] look into the death chamber, see the mounding and the Arvel, or inheritance feast.

These Norsemen had carriages or chariots, as well as horses, and the numerous skeletons of this animal in graves or bogs prove it to have been in common use at a very early period. Their dress, and the splendour of their riding equipment for war, the richness of the ornamentation of their weapons of offence and defence are often carefully described. Everywhere we see that gold was in the greatest abundance. The descriptions of such wealth might seem to be very much exaggerated; but, as will be seen in the course of this work, the antiquities treasured in the museums of the North bear witness to the truthfulness of the records. The spade has developed the history of Scandinavia, as it has done that of Assyria and Etruria, but in addition the Northmen had the Saga and Edda literature to perpetuate their deeds.

We are the more astonished as we peruse the Eddas and Sagas giving the history of the North, and examine the antiquities found in the country, for we hear hardly anything about the customs of the people from the Roman writers, and our ideas regarding them have been thoroughly vitiated by the earlier Frankish and English chronicles and other monkish writings, or by the historians who have taken these records as a trustworthy authority.

Some writers, in order to give more weight to these chronicles, and to show the great difference that existed between the invaders and invaded, and how superior the latter were to the former, paint in a graphic manner, without a shadow of authority, the contrast between the two peoples. England is described as being at that time a most beautiful country, a panegyric which does not apply to fifteen or twenty centuries ago; while the country of the aggressor is depicted as one of swamp and forest inhabited by wild and savage men. It is forgotten that after a while the people of the country attacked were the same people as those of the North or their 3descendants, who in intelligence, civilisation, and manly virtues were far superior to the original and effete inhabitants of the shores they invaded.

The men of the North who settled and conquered part of Gaul and Britain, whose might the power of Rome could not destroy, and whose depredations it could not prevent, were not savages; the Romans did not dare attack these men at home with their fleet or with their armies. Nay, they even had allowed these Northmen to settle peacefully in their provinces of Gaul and Britain.

No, the people who were then spread over a great part of the present Russia, who overran Germania, who knew the art of writing, who led their conquering hosts to Spain, into the Mediterranean, to Italy, Sicily, Greece, the Black Sea, Palestine, Africa, and even crossed the broad Atlantic to America, who were undisputed masters of the sea for more than twelve centuries, were not barbarians. Let those who uphold the contrary view produce evidence from archæology of an indigenous British or Gallic civilisation which surpasses that of the North.

The antiquities of the North even without its literature would throw an indirect but valuable light on the history of the earlier Norse tribes, the so-called barbarians, fiends, devils, sons of Pluto, &c., of the Frankish and English chronicles. To the latter we can refer for stories of terrible acts of cruelty committed by the countrymen of the writers who recount them with complacency; maiming prisoners or antagonists and sending multitudes into slavery far away from their homes. But the greatest of all outrages in the eyes of these monkish scribes was that the Northmen burned a church or used it for sheltering their men or stabling their horses.

The writers of the English and Frankish chronicles were the worst enemies of the Northmen, ignorant and bigoted men when judged by the standard of our time; through their writings we hardly know anything of the customs of their own people. They could see nothing good in a man who had not a religion identical with their own.

Still allowance must be made for the chroniclers; they wrote the history of their own period with the bigotry, passions, and hatreds, of their times.

4The striking fact brought vividly before our mind is that the people of the North, even before the time when they carried their warfare into Gaul and Britain, possessed a degree of civilisation which would be difficult for us to realise were it not that the antiquities help us in a most remarkable manner, and in many essential points, to corroborate the truthfulness of the Eddas and Sagas.

The indisputable fact remains that both the Gauls and the Britons were conquered by the Romans and afterwards by the Northern tribes.

This Northern civilisation was peculiar to itself, having nothing in common with the Roman world. Rome knew nothing of these people till they began to frequent the coasts of her North Sea provinces, in the days of Tacitus, and after his time the Mediterranean. The North was separated from Rome by the swamps and forests of Germania—a vague term given to a country north and north-east of Italy, a land without boundaries, and inhabited by a great number of warlike, wild, uncivilised tribes. According to the accounts of Roman writers, these people were very unlike those of the North, and we must take the description given of them to be correct, as there is no archæological discovery to prove the contrary. They were distinct; one was comparatively civilised, the other was not.

The manly civilisation the Northmen possessed was their own; from their records, corroborated by finds in Southern Russia, it seems to have advanced north from about the shores of the Black Sea, and we shall be able to see in the perusal of these pages how many Northern customs were like those of the ancient Greeks.

A view of the past history of the world will show us that the growth of nations which have become powerful has been remarkably steady, and has depended upon the superior intelligence of the conquering people over their neighbours; just as to-day the nations who have taken possession of far-off lands and extended their domain, are superior to the conquered.

The museums of Copenhagen, Stockholm, Christiania, Bergen, Lünd, Göteborg, and many smaller ones in the provincial 5towns of the three Scandinavian kingdoms, show a most wonderful collection of antiquities which stand unrivalled in Central and Northern Europe for their wealth of weapons and costly objects of gold and silver, belonging to the bronze and iron age, and every year additions are made.

The weapons found with their peculiar northern ornamentation, and the superb ring coats-of-mail, show the skill of the people in working iron. A great number of their early swords and other weapons are damascened even so far back as the beginning of the Christian era, and show either that this art was practised in the North long before its introduction into the rest of Europe from Damascus by the Crusaders, or that the Norsemen were so far advanced as to be able to appreciate the artistic manufactures of Southern nations.

The remnants of articles of clothing with graceful patterns, interwoven with threads of gold and silver, which have fortunately escaped entire destruction, show the existence of great skill in weaving. Entire suits of wearing apparel remain to tell us how some of the people dressed in the beginning of our era.

Beautiful vessels of silver and gold also testify to the taste and luxury of those early times. The knowledge of the art of writing and of gilding is clearly demonstrated. In some cases, nearly twenty centuries have not been able to tarnish or obliterate the splendour of the gilt jewels of the Northmen. We find among their remains—either of their own manufacture or imported, perhaps as spoils of war—repoussé work of gold or silver, bronze, silver, and wood work covered with the thinnest sheets of gold; the filigree work displays great skill, and some of it could not be surpassed now. Many objects are ornamented with niello, and of so thorough a northern pattern, that they are incontestably of home manufacture. The art of enamelling seems also to have been known to the artificers of the period.

Objects, many of which show much refined taste, such as superb specimens of glass vessels with exquisite painted subjects—unrivalled for their beauty of pattern, even in the museums of Italy and Russia—objects of bronze, &c., make us pause with astonishment, and musingly ask ourselves from 6what country these came. The names of Etruria, of ancient Greece, and of Rome, naturally occur to our minds.

Other objects of unquestionable Roman and Greek manufacture, and hundreds and thousands of coins, of the first, second, third and fourth centuries of the Christian era, show the early intercourse the people of the North had with the western and eastern Roman empire, and with Frisia, Gaul, and Britain.

A careful perusal of the Eddas and Sagas will enable us, with the help of the ancient Greek and Latin writers, and without any serious break in the chain of events, to make out a fairly continuous history which throws considerable light on the progenitors of the English-speaking people, their migrations northward from their old home on the shores of the Black Sea, their religion, and the settlement of Scandinavia, of England, and other countries.

The three maritime tribes of the North—The fleets of the Sueones—Expeditions of Saxons and Franks—Home of these tribes—The tribes of Germania not seafaring—Probable origin of the names Saxons and Franks.

Roman writers give us the names of three maritime tribes of the North, which were called by them Sueones, Saxones, and Franci. The first of these, which is the earliest mentioned, is thus described by Tacitus (circ. 57–117 A.D.):—

“Hence the States of the Sueones, situated in the ocean itself, are not only powerful on land, but also have mighty fleets. The shape of their ships is different, in that, having a prow at each end, they are always ready for running on to the beach. They are not worked by sails, nor are the oars fastened to the sides in regular order, but left loose as in some rivers, so that they can be shifted here or there as circumstances may require.”^[4]

The word Sviar, which is constantly met with in the Sagas to denote the inhabitants of Svithjod (Sweden), or the country of which Upsala was the capital, corresponds somewhat to the name Sueones, and it is highly probable that in Sueones we have the root of Sviar and of Svithjod. The ships described by Tacitus are exactly like those which are described in this work as having been found in the North.

It stands to reason that the maritime power of the Sueones must have been the growth of centuries before the time of Tacitus, and from analogy of historical records we know that the fleets of powerful nations do not remain idle. Hence we must come to the conclusion that the Sueones navigated the sea long 8before the time of Tacitus, an hypothesis which is implied by the Eddas and Sagas as well as by the antiquities discovered.

That the Sueones, with such fleets, did not navigate westward further than Frisia is not credible, the more so that it was only necessary for them to follow the coast in order to come to the shores of Gaul, from which they could see Britain, and such maritime people must have had intercourse with the inhabitants of that island at that period; indeed, the objects of the earlier iron age discovered in Britain, which were until lately classed as Anglo-Roman, are identical with those of the country from which these people came, i.e., Scandinavia.

The Veneti, a tribe who inhabited Brittany, and whose power on the sea is described by Cæsar, were in all probability the advance-guard of the tribes of the North; their ships were built of oak, with iron nails, just as those of the Northmen; and the people of the country in which they settled were not seafaring.^[5] Moreover, the similarity of the name to that of the Venedi, who are conjecturally placed by Tacitus on the shores of the Baltic, and to the Vends, so frequently mentioned in the Sagas, can scarcely be regarded as a mere accident.

“The Veneti have a very great number of ships, with which they have been accustomed to sail to Britain, and excel the rest of the people in their knowledge and experience of nautical affairs; and as only a few ports lie scattered along 9that stormy and open sea, of which they are in possession, they hold as tributaries almost all those who have been accustomed to traffic in that sea....”

“For their own ships were built and equipped in the following manner: Their ships were more flat-bottomed than our vessels, in order that they might be able more easily to guard against shallows and the ebbing of the tide; the prows were very much elevated, as also the sterns, so as to encounter heavy waves and storms. The vessels were built wholly of oak, so as to bear any violence or shock; the cross-benches, a foot in breadth, were fastened by iron spikes of the thickness of the thumb; the anchors were secured to iron chains, instead of to ropes; raw hides and thinly-dressed skins were used for sails, either on account of their want of canvas and ignorance of its use, or for this reason, which is the more likely, that they considered that such violent ocean storms and such strong winds could not be resisted, and such heavy vessels could not be conveniently managed by sails. The attack of our fleet on these vessels was of such a nature that the only advantage was in its swiftness and the power of its oars; in everything else, considering the situation and the fury of the storm, they had the advantage. For neither could our ships damage them by ramming (so strongly were they built), nor was a weapon easily made to reach them, owing to their height, and for the same reason they were not so easily held by grappling-irons. To this was added, that when the wind had begun to get strong, and they had driven before the gale, they could better weather the storm, and also more safely anchor among shallows, and, when left by the tide, need in no respect fear rocks and reefs, the dangers from all which things were greatly to be dreaded by our vessels.”

Roman writers after the time of Tacitus mention warlike and maritime expeditions by the Saxons and Franks. Their names do not occur in Tacitus, but it is not altogether improbable that these people, whom later writers mention as ravaging every country which they could enter by sea or land, are the people whom Tacitus knew as the Sueones.

The maritime power of the Sueones could not have totally disappeared in a century, a hypothesis which is borne out by the fact that after a lapse of seven centuries they are again mentioned in the time of Charlemagne; nor could the supremacy of the so-called Saxons and Franks on the sea have 10arisen in a day; it must have been the growth of even generations before the time of Tacitus.

Ptolemy (circ. A.D. 140) is the first writer who mentions the Saxons as inhabiting a territory north of the Elbe, on the neck of the Cimbric Chersonesus.^[6] They occupied but a small space, for between them and the Cimbri, at the northern extremity of the peninsula, he places ten other tribes, among them the Angli.

About a century after the time of Ptolemy, Franks and Saxons had already widely extended their expeditions at sea. Some of the former made an expedition from the Euxine, through the Mediterranean, plundered Syracuse, and returned without mishap across the great sea (A.D. circ. 280).^[7]

“He (Probus) permitted the Bastarnæ, a Scythian race, who had submitted themselves to him, to settle in certain districts of Thrace which he allotted to them, and from thenceforth these people always lived under the laws and institutions of Rome. And there were certain Franks who had come to the Emperor, and had asked for land on which to settle. A part of them, however, revolted, and having obtained a large number of ships, caused disturbances throughout the whole of Greece, and having landed in Sicily and made an assault on Syracuse, they caused much slaughter there. They also landed in Libya, but were repulsed at the approach of the Carthaginian forces. Nevertheless, they managed to get back to their home unscathed.”

“Why should I tell again of the most remote nations of the Franks (of Francia), which were carried away not from those regions which the Romans had on a former occasion invaded, but from their own native territory, and the farthest shores of the land of the barbarians, and transported to the deserted parts of Gaul that they might promote the peace of the Roman Empire by their cultivation and its armies by their recruits?”^[8]

11“There came to mind the incredible daring and undeserved success of a handful of the captive Franks under the Emperor Probus. For they, having seized some ships, so far away as Pontus, having laid waste Greece and Asia, having landed and done some damage on several parts of the coast of Africa, actually took Syracuse, which was at one time so renowned for her naval ascendancy. Thereupon they accomplished a very long voyage and entered the Ocean at the point where it breaks through the land (the Straits of Gibraltar), and so by the result of their daring exploit showed that wherever ships can sail, nothing is closed to pirates in desperation.”^[9]

In the time of Diocletian and Maximian these maritime tribes so harassed the coasts of Gaul and Britain that Maximian, in 286, was obliged to make Gesoriacum or Bononia (the present Boulogne) into a port for the Roman fleet, in order as far as possible to prevent their incursions.

“About this time (A.D. 287) Carausius, who, though of very humble origin, had, in the exercise of vigorous warfare, obtained a distinguished reputation, was appointed at Bononia to reduce to quiet the coast regions of Belgica and Armorica, which were overrun by the Franks and Saxons. But though many of the barbarians were captured, the whole of the booty was not handed over to the inhabitants of the province, nor sent to the commander-in-chief, and the barbarians were, moreover, deliberately allowed by him to come in, that he might capture them with their spoils as they passed through, and by this means enrich himself. On being condemned to death by Maximian, he seized on the sovereign command, and took possession of Britain.”^[10]

Eutropius also records that the Saxons and others dwelt on the coasts of and among the marshes of the great sea, which 12no one could traverse, but the Emperor Valentinian (320–375) nevertheless conquered them.

The Emperor Julian calls the

“Franks and Saxons the most warlike of the tribes above the Rhine and the Western Sea.”^[11]

Ammianus Marcellinus (d. circ. 400 A.D.) writes:—

“At this time (middle of the 4th century), just as though the trumpets were sounding a challenge throughout all the Roman world, fierce nations were stirred up and began to burst forth from their territories. The Alamanni began to devastate Gallia and Rhætia; the Sarmatæ and Quadi Pannonia, the Picts and Saxons, Scots, and Attacotti constantly harassed the Britons.”^[12]

“The Franks and the Saxons, who are coterminous with them, were ravaging the districts of Gallia wherever they could effect an entrance by sea or land, plundering and burning, and murdering all the prisoners they could take.”^[13]

Claudianus asserts that the Saxons appeared even in the Orkneys:—

“The Orcades were moist from the slain Saxon.”^[14]

These are but a few of many allusions to the same effect which might be quoted.

That the swarms of Sueones and so-called Saxons and Franks, seen on every sea of Europe, could have poured forth from a small country is not possible. Such fleets as they possessed could only have come from a country densely covered with oak forests. We must come to the conclusion that Sueones, Franks, and Saxons were seafaring tribes belonging to one people. The Roman writers did not seem to know the precise locality inhabited by these people.

13It would appear that these tribes must have come from a country further eastward than the Roman provinces, and that as they came with ships, their home must have been on the shores of the Baltic, the Cattegat, and Norway; in fact, precisely the country which the numerous antiquities point to as inhabited by an extremely warlike and maritime race, which had great intercourse with the Greek and Roman world.

The dates given by the Greek and Roman writers of the maritime expeditions, invasions, and settlements of the so-called Saxons and Franks agree perfectly with the date of the objects found in the North, among which are numerous Roman coins, and remarkable objects of Roman and Greek art, which must have been procured either by the peaceful intercourse of trade or by war. To this very day thousands upon thousands of graves have been preserved in the North, belonging to the time of the invasions of these Northmen, and to an earlier period. From them no other inference can be drawn than that the country and islands of the Baltic were far more densely populated than any part of central and western Europe and Great Britain, since the number of these earlier graves in those countries is much smaller.

Every tumulus described by antiquaries as a Saxon or Frankish grave is the counterpart of a Northern grave, thus showing conclusively the common origin of the people.

Wherever graves of the same type are found in other countries we have the invariable testimony, either of the Roman or Greek writers of the Frankish and English Chronicles or of the Sagas, to show that the people of the North had been in the country at one time or another.

The conclusion is forced upon us that in time the North became over-populated, and an outlet was necessary for the spread of its people.

The story of the North is that of all countries whose inhabitants have spread and conquered, in order to find new fields for their energy and over-population; in fact, the very course the progenitors of the English-speaking peoples adopted in those days is precisely the one which has been followed by their descendants in England and other countries for the last three hundred years.

14It is certain that the Franks could not have lived on the coast of Frisia, as they did later on, for we know that the country of the Rhine was held by the Romans, and, besides, as we have already seen, Julian refers to the Franks and Saxons as dwelling above the Rhine. Moreover, till they had to give up their conquests, no mention is made by the Romans of native seafaring tribes inhabiting the shores of their northern province, except the Veneti, and they would have certainly tried to subjugate the roving seamen that caused them so much trouble in their newly-acquired provinces if they had been within their reach.

From the Roman writers, who have been partially confirmed by archæology, we know that the tribes which inhabited the country to which they give the vague name of Germania were not seafaring people nor possessed of any civilisation. The invaders of Britain, of the Gallic and of the Mediterranean coasts could therefore not have been the German tribes referred to by the Roman writers, who, as we see from Julius Cæsar and other Roman historians, were very far from possessing the civilisation which we know, from the antiquities, to have existed in the North.

“Their whole life is devoted to hunting and warlike pursuits. From childhood they pay great attention to toil and hardiness; they bathe all together in the rivers, and wear skins or small reindeer garments, leaving the greater part of their bodies naked.”^[15]

Tacitus, in recording the speech of Germanicus to his troops before the battle at Idistavisus, bears witness to the uncivilised character of the inhabitants of the country.

“The huge targets, the enormous spears of the barbarians could never be wielded against trunks of trees and thickets of underwood shooting up from the ground, like Roman swords and javelins, and armour fitting the body ... the Germans had neither helmet nor coat of mail; their bucklers were not even strengthened with leather, but mere contextures of twigs 15and boards of no substance daubed over with paint. Their first rank was to a certain extent armed with pikes, the rest had only stakes burnt at the ends or short darts.”^[16]

Now compare these descriptions with the magnificent archæology of the North of that period—as seen in these volumes—from which we learn that the tribes who inhabited the shores of the Baltic and the present Scandinavia had at the time the above was written reached a high degree of civilisation. We find in their graves and hoards, coins of the early Roman Empire not in isolated instances, but constantly and in large numbers, and deposited side by side with such objects as coats of mail, damascened swords and other examples of articles of highly artistic workmanship.

Three kinds of swords are often mentioned by the Northmen—the mœkir, the sverd, and the sax, while among the spears there is one called frakki, or frakka.

The double-edged sword was the one that was in use among the Romans, and they, seeing bodies of men carrying a weapon unlike theirs—single-edged, and called Sax—may have named them after it, and the Franks, in like manner, may have been called after their favourite weapon, the Frakki; but we see that neither the sax nor the frakki was confined to one tribe in the North. There is a Saxland in the Sagas—a small country situated east of the peninsula of Jutland, about the present Holstein—a land tributary to the Danish or Swedish Kings from the earliest times, but far from possessing the warlike archæology of the North, it appears to have held an insignificant place among the neighbouring tribes.

In the Bayeux tapestry the followers of William the Conqueror were called Franci, and they always have been recognised as coming from the North.

The very early finds prove that the Sax was not rare, for it occurs in different parts of the North and islands of the Baltic. The different swords and spears used were so common and so 16well known to everybody, that we have no special description of them in the Sagas, except of their ornamentation; but in the Saga of Grettir there is a passage which shows that the Sax was single-edged.

Gretti went to a farm in Iceland to slay the Bondi Thorbjorn and his son Arnor. We read—

“When Gretti saw that the young man was within reach he lifted his sax high into the air, and struck Arnor’s head with its back, so that his head was broken and he died. Thereupon he killed the father with his sax.”

Whatever may be the origin of local names employed by the Roman writers we must look to the North for the maritime tribes described by them; there we shall find the home of the earlier English people, to whose numerous warlike and ocean-loving instincts we owe the transformation which took place in Britain, and the glorious inheritance which they have left to their descendants, scattered over many parts of the world, in whom we recognise to this day many of the very same traits of character which their ancestors possessed.

The Notitia—Probable origin of the name England—Jutland—The language of the North and of England—Early Northern kings in England—Danes and Sueones—Mythical accounts of the settlements of England.

Britain being an island could only be settled or conquered by seafaring tribes, just in the same way as to-day distant lands can only be conquered by nations possessing ships. From the Roman writers we have the only knowledge we possess in regard to the tribes inhabiting the country to which they gave the vague name of Germania. From the Roman records we find that these tribes were not civilised and that they were not a seafaring people.

Unfortunately the Roman accounts we have of their conquest and occupation of Britain, of its population and inhabitants, are very meagre and unsatisfactory, and do not help us much to ascertain how the settlement in Britain by the people of the North began. Our lack of information is most probably due to the simple reason that the settlement, like all settlements of a new country, was a very gradual one, a few men coming over in the first instance for the purpose of trade either with Britons or Romans, or coming from the over-populated North to settle in a country which the paucity of archæological remains shows to have been thinly occupied. The Romans made no objection to these new settlers, who did not prove dangerous to their power on the island, but brought them commodities, such as furs, &c., from the North.

We find from the Roman records that the so-called Saxons had founded colonies or had settlements in Belgium and Gaul.

Another important fact we know from the records relating 18to Britain is that during the Roman occupation of the island the Saxons had settlements in the country; but how they came hither we are not told.

In the Notitia Dignitatum utriusque imperii, a sort of catalogue or “Army List,” compiled towards the latter end of the fourth century, occurs the expression, “Comes litoris Saxonici per Britannias”—Count of the Saxon Shore in Britain. Within this litus Saxonicum the following places are mentioned:—Othona, said to be “close by Hastings”; Dubris, said to be Dover; Rutupiæ, Richborough; Branodunum, Brancaster; Regulbium, Reculvers; Lemannis, West Hythe; Garianno, Yarmouth; Anderida, Pevensey; Portus Adurni, Shoreham or Brighton.

This shows that the so-called Saxons were settled in Britain before the Notitia was drawn up, and at a date very much earlier than has been assigned by some modern historians.

The hypothesis that the expression “litus Saxonicum” is derived from the enemy to whose ravages it was exposed seems improbable. Is it not much more probable that the “litus Saxonicum per Britannias” must mean the shore of the country settled, not attacked, by Saxons? The mere fact of their attacking the shore would not have given rise to the name applied to it had they not settled there, for I maintain that there is no instance in the whole of Roman literature of a country being named after the people who attacked it. If, on the other hand, the Saxons had landed and formed settlements on the British coasts, the origin of the name “Litus Saxonicum” is easily understood.

Some time after the Romans relinquished Britain we find that part of the island becomes known as England; and, to make the subject still more confusing, the people composing its chief population are called Saxons by the chroniclers and later historians, the name given to them by the Romans.

That the history of the people called Saxons was by no means certain is seen in the fact that Witikind, a monk of the tenth century, gives the following account of what was then considered to be their origin^[17]:—

19“On this there are various opinions, some thinking that the Saxons had their origin from the Danes and Northmen; others, as I heard some one maintain when a young man, that they are derived from the Greeks, because they themselves used to say the Saxons were the remnant of the Macedonian army, which, having followed Alexander the Great, were by his premature death dispersed all over the world.”

As to how Britain came to be called England the different legends given by the monkish writers are contradictory.

The Skjöldunga Saga, which is often mentioned in other Sagas, and which contains a record down to the early kings of Denmark, is unfortunately lost: it would, no doubt, have thrown great light on the lives of early chiefs who settled in Britain; but from some fragments which are given in this work, and which are supposed to belong to it, we see that several Danish and Swedish kings claimed to have possessions in England long before the supposed coming of the Danes.

Some writers assert that the new settlers gave to their new home in Britain the name of the country which they had left, called Angeln, and which they claim to be situated in the southern part of Jutland; but besides the Angeln in Jutland there is in the Cattegat an Engelholm, which is geographically far more important, situated in the land known as the Vikin of the Sagas, a great Viking and warlike land, from which the name Viking may have been derived, filled with graves and antiquities of the iron age. There are also other Engeln in the present Sweden.

In the whole literature of the North such a name as Engeln is unknown; it may have been, perhaps, a local name.

In the Sagas the term England was applied to a portion only of Britain, the inhabitants of which were called Englar, Enskirmenn. Britain itself is called Bretland, and the people Bretar.

“Öngulsey (Angelsey) is one third of Bretland (Wales)” (Magnus Barefoot’s Saga, c. 11).

20Another part of the country was called Nordimbraland.

It is an important fact that throughout the Saga literature describing the expeditions of the Northmen to England not a single instance is mentioned of their coming in contact with a people called Saxons, which shows that such a name in Britain was unknown to the people of the North. Nor is any part of England called Saxland.

To make the confusion greater than it is, some modern historians make the so-called Saxons, who were supposed to have come over with the mythical Hengist and others, a distinct race from the Northmen, who afterwards continued to land in the country.

In the Sagas we constantly find that the people of England are not only included among the Northern lands, but that the warriors of one country are helping the other. In several places we find, and from others we infer, that the language in both countries was very similar.

“All sayings in the Northern (norræn) tongue in which there is truth begin when the Tyrkir and the Asia-men settled in the North. For it is truly told that the tongue which we call Norræn came with them to the North, and it went through Saxland, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, and part of England” (Rimbegla, iii. c. i.).

“We are of one tongue, though one of the two, or in some respects both, are now much changed” (Prose Edda, ii.)

“Then ruled over England King Ethelred, son of Edgar (979). He was a good chief; he sat this winter in London. The tongue in England, as well as in Norway and Denmark, was then one, but it changed in England when William the Bastard won England. Thenceforth the tongue of Valland (France) was used in England, for he (William) was born there” (Gunnlaug Ormstunga’s Saga, c. 7).

That the language of the North should have taken a footing in a great part of England is due, no doubt, to the continuous flow of immigration, from the northern mother country, which entirely swamped the former native or British element.

The story given in the English or Irish chronicles of the appearance of the Danes, in A.D. 785, when their name is first mentioned, is as little trustworthy as that of the settlement of 21England, and bears the appearance of contradiction and confusion in regard to names of people and facts.

We must remember that the Sueones are not mentioned from the time of Tacitus to that of Charlemagne (772–814), and certainly they had not disappeared in the meantime.

What were the Danes doing with their mighty fleets before this? Had their ships been lying in port for centuries? Had they been built for simple recreation and the pleasure of looking at them, or did their maritime power arise at once as if by magic? Such an hypothesis cannot stand the test of reasoning. The turning of a population into a seafaring nation is the work of time. Where in the history of the world can we find a parallel to this story of a people suddenly appearing with immense navies? Let us compare by analogy the statement of the chronicles with what might happen to the history of England in the course of time.

Suppose that for some reason the previous history of England were lost, with the exception of a fragment which spoke of her enormous fleet of to-day. Could it be reasonably supposed that this great maritime power was the creation of a few years?

A few years after the time fixed as that of their first supposed appearance we find these very Danes swarming everywhere with their fleets and warriors, not only in England, but in Gaul, in Brittany, up the Seine, the Garonne, the Rhine, the Elbe, on the coasts of Spain, and further eastward in the Mediterranean.

The Sueones, or Swedes, reappear at the close of the eighth and commencement of the ninth centuries by the side of the Danes, and both called themselves Northmen. Surely the maritime power of the Sueones, described by Tacitus, could not have been destroyed immediately after his death, only to reappear in the time of Charlemagne, when it again becomes prominent in the Frankish annals.

A remarkable fact not to be overlooked is that, in the time of Charlemagne, the Franks and Saxons were not a seafaring people, though their countries had an extensive coast with deep rivers. The Frankish annals never mention a Frank or Saxon fleet attacking the fleets of the Northmen, or preventing them from ascending their streams, though Charlemagne ordered ships to be built in order to resist their incursions.

22While the country of the Saxons was being conquered by this Emperor, we find that the Saxons themselves had no vessels on the Elbe or Weser in which, if defeated, they could retire in safety, or by help of which they could prevent the army of their enemies from crossing their streams. Such tactics were constantly used by the Northmen in their invasions of ancient Gaul, Britain, Germania, Spain, &c.

Thus we see that, though hardly more than three hundred years had elapsed since the time when, according to the Roman writers, the fleets of the Franks and Saxons swarmed over every sea of Europe, not a vestige of their former maritime power remained in the time of Charlemagne, and the Saxons were still occupying the same country as in the days of Ptolemy.

Pondering over the above important facts, the question arises: Were not the Romans mistaken in giving the names of Saxons and Franks to the maritime tribes of whose origin, country, and homes they knew nothing, but who came to attack their shores? Were not these so-called Saxons and Franks in reality tribes of Sueones, Swedes, Danes, Norwegians? The Romans knew none of the countries of these people. It seems strange, if not incredible, to find two peoples, whose country had a vast sea-coast and deep rivers, totally abandoning the seafaring habits possessed by their forefathers.

It cannot be doubted that Ivar Vidfadmi, after him Harald Hilditönn, then Sigurd Hring and Ragnar Lodbrok and his sons, and probably some of the Danish and Swedish kings before them, made expeditions to England, and gained and held possessions there. Several distinct records, having no connection with each other, being parts of different Sagas and histories, with the archæology, form the evidence.

“Ivar Vidfadmi (wide-fathomer) subdued the whole of Sviaveldi (the Swedish realm); he also got Danaveldi (Danish realm) and a large part of Saxland, and the whole of Austrriki (Eastern realm, including Russia, &c.) and the fifth part of England. From his kin have come the kings of Denmark and the kings of Sweden who have had sole power in these lands” (Ynglinga Saga, c. 45).

23The above is corroborated by another quite independent source.

“Ivar Vidfadmi ruled England till his death-day. As he lay on his death-bed he said he wanted to be carried to where the land was exposed to attacks, and that he hoped those who landed there would not be victorious. When he died it happened as he said, and he was mound-laid. It is said by many men that when King Harald Sigurdsson came to England he landed where Ivar’s mound was, and he was slain there. When Vilhjálm Bastard came to the land he broke open the mound of Ivar and saw that the corpse was not rotten; he made a large pyre, and had Ivar burned on it; then he went up on land and got the victory” (Ragnar Lodbrók’s Saga, c. 19).

We find that not only did the Norwegians call themselves Northmen, but that both Danes and Sueones were called Northmen in the Frankish Chronicles.^[18]

“The Danes and Sueones, whom we call Northmen, occupy both the northern shore and all its islands.”

So also Nigellus (in the reign of Louis Le Debonnaire).^[19]

“The Danes also after the manner of the Franks are called by the name of Manni.”

The time came when the people of the North, continuing their expeditions to Britain, attacked their own kinsmen. After the departure of the Romans the power of the new comers increased, and as they became more numerous, they became more and more domineering: the subsequent struggles were between a sturdy race that had settled in the country and people of their own kin, and not with Britons, who had been so easily conquered by the Romans, had appealed to them afterwards for protection, and had for a long period been a subject race. It is not easy to believe that the inhabitants of a servile Roman province could suddenly become stubborn and fierce warriors, nor are there any antiquities belonging to the Britain of yore which bear 24witness to a fierce and warlike character displayed by the aboriginal inhabitants.

From the preceding pages we see that Franks and Saxons are continually mentioned together, and it is only in the North we can find antiquities of a most warlike and seafaring people, who must have formed the great and preponderating bulk of the invading host who conquered Britain.

Britain after a continuous immigration from the North, which lasted several hundred years, became the most powerful colony of the Northern tribes, several of whose chiefs claimed a great part of England even in the seventh century. Afterwards she asserted her independence, though she did not get it until after a long and tedious struggle with the North, the inhabitants and kings of which continued to try to assert the ancient rights their forefathers once possessed. Then the time came when the land upon which the people of these numerous tribes had settled became more powerful and more populous than the mother country; a case which has found several parallels in the history of the world. To-day the people of England as they look over the broad Atlantic may perhaps discern the same process gradually taking place. In the people of the United States of North America, the grandest and most colossal state founded by England or any other country of which we have any historical record, we may recognise the indomitable courage, the energy and spirit which was one of the characteristics of the Northern race to whom a great part of the people belong. The first settlement of the country, territory by territory, State by State—the frontier life with its bold adventures, innumerable dangers, fights, struggles, privations and heroism—is the grandest drama that has ever been enacted in the history of the world. The time is not far distant, if the population of the United States and Canada increases in the same ratio as it has done for more than a hundred years, when over three or four hundred millions of its people will speak the English tongue; and I think it is no exaggeration to say that in the course of time one hundred millions more will be added, from Australia, New Zealand and other colonies which to-day form part of the British Empire, but which are destined to become independent nations. 25In fact we hesitate to look still further into the future of the English race, for fear of being accused of exaggeration.

There is a mythical version of the settlement of Britain contradictory of the Roman records. This version is that of Gildas whose ‘De Excidio Britanniæ’ is supposed to have been composed in the sixth century (560 A.D.), and whose statements have unfortunately been taken by one historian after the other as a true history of Britain. His narrative, which gives an account of the first arrival of the Saxons in Britain and the numerous wars which followed their invasion, has been more or less copied by Nennius, Bede and subsequent chroniclers, whose writings are a mass of glaring contradictions, diffuse and intricate, for they contain names which appear to have been invented by the writers and which cannot be traced in the language of those times, while the dates assigned for the landing of the so-called Saxons do not agree with one another.

The historians who use Gildas as an authority and try to believe his account of the settlement of Britain by Hengist and Horsa (the stallion and the mare) are obliged, in order to explain away the Roman records, to give a most extraordinary interpretation to the Notitia.

We are all aware that the people of every country like to trace their origin or history as far back as possible, and that legends often form part of the fabric of those histories. The early chroniclers, who were credulous and profoundly ignorant of the world, took these fables for facts, or they may have possibly been incorporated in the text of their supposed works after their time. The description of the settlement of a country must be founded on facts which can bear the test of searching criticism if they are to be believed and adopted; Gildas and his copyists cannot stand that test, and the Roman records, as corroborated by the archæology and literature of the North and the archæology of England, must be taken as the correct ones.

The mythological literature of the North bears evidence of a belief prevalent among the people, that their ancestors migrated at a remote period from the shores of the Black Sea, through south-western Russia, to the shores of the Baltic. 26This belief seems to be supported by a variety of evidence. Herodotus describes a people on the Tanais, the Budini, as being blue-eyed and yellow-haired, with houses built of wood, his description of the walls reminding one of the characteristics of the Danavirki (Herodotus, IV. 21, 108, 109). One of his tribes, the Thysagetæ, may possibly be indicated in the Thursar of the Voluspa, &c.

When we appeal to Archæology, we find in the neighbourhood of the Black Sea, near to the old Greek settlement, graves similar to those of the North, containing ornaments and other relics also remarkably like those found in the ancient graves of Scandinavia. The Runes of the North remind us strikingly of the characters of Archaic Greek. If we follow the river Dnieper upwards from its mouth in the Black Sea, we see in the museums of Kief and Smolensk many objects of types exactly similar to those found in the graves of the North. When we reach the Baltic we find on its eastern shores the Gardariki of the Sagas, where, we are told, the Odin of the North placed one of his sons, and on the southern shores many specimens have been discovered similar to those obtained in Scandinavia.

In the following chapters the reader will be struck by the similarity of the customs of the Norsemen with those of the ancient Greeks as recorded by Homer and Herodotus; for example, the horse was very much sacrificed in the North, and Herodotus, describing the Massagetæ, says:

“They (the Massagetæ) worship the sun only of all the gods, and sacrifice horses to him” (I. 216).

In regard to the Jutes, Jutland = Jöts, Jötnar; Jötland, Jötunheim, we find them from the Sagas to be a very ancient land and people, and meet several countries bearing kindred names—even to this day we have Göteborg, in which the G is pronounced as English Y.

From the Roman, Greek, Frankish, Russian, English, and Arabic records, we must come to the conclusion that the “Viking Age” lasted from about the second century of our era to about the middle of the twelfth without interruption, hence the title given to the work which deals with the history and customs of our English forefathers during that period.

The three poems giving the mythology and cosmogony of the North—The Völuspa, Vafthrudnismal, Grimnismal, the Asar, Jötnar, and Thursar—Odin and Vafthrudnir—The nine worlds—Before the creation—The origin of the Hrim Thursar—Birth of Ymir—Birth of Odin—Vili and Ve—The ash Yggdrasil—The well of wisdom—Hel, one of the nine worlds—The bridge Bifröst—Heimdall—Bergelmir born before the creation—The Jötun—Ymir slain by Odin—The deluge of blood—Creation of the world—Divisions of time—End of the world—A new world.

In the three poems called Völuspa, Vafthrudnismal, and Grimnismal, we have the earliest accounts of the cosmogony and of the mythology of the people of the North. The grand central figure in the mythology is Odin. He and his kin formed the people known as Asar in the lore and literature of the North, and were treated as gods. These poems are too long to be given here in full, but in the following pages we have endeavoured, by means of extracts, to give a more or less consecutive account of the subjects with which they deal.

The Völuspa was an inspired poem of a Völva or Sibyl,^[20] and embodies the records of the creation of the present world, and of the time prior to it; of the various races, their origin and history, and of the chaos and destruction which finally will overtake mankind.

It is in some places so obscure, that if it had not been partly explained by the later Edda, and had light thrown upon it by the sagas and ancient laws, it would be impossible to understand its meaning; and even now it is most difficult, and in some places impossible to fully comprehend several of its mythical parts, some of which will always remain enigmatical.

Vafthrudnismal is especially interesting as compared with 28the Völuspa, with much of which it corresponds, and some part of which it amplifies.

The mythical and the real are so intermingled that it is often impossible to distinguish the one from the other.

In the beginning we are confronted by a chief named Odin, the son of Bör, who lived near the Tanais (the river Don) not far from the Palus Mæotis (the Sea of Azof), and there we find one Asgard, which in all probability had its original in some real locality.

Besides Asar and Jötnar, many other tribes are mentioned which can hardly be regarded as altogether mythical, some of which may have inhabited the far north of the ancient Sweden, or part of the present Russia and Scandinavia; the Thursar, who were also called Hrimthursar (hoar frost), and the Risar, also Bergrisar (mountain Risar), appear from these names to have lived in a cold mountainous country, possibly the region of the Ural Mountains.

Jötunheim, the chief burgh of which was Utgard, would appear to be a general, vague name given to a very wide extent of country not embraced in Asaheim (the home of the Asar). Jötunheim, as the name indicates, was the home or country of the Jötnar and Thursar, between whom and the Asar there was fierce enmity.

Some of the Jötnar were considered very wise, and Odin, as the chief of the Asar, determined to go in disguise to Jötunheim, the home of the Jötnar, in order to seek out the Jötun Vafthrudnir^[21] (the mighty or wise in riddles), who was renowned for his knowledge. The song begins by representing Odin as consulting his wife, Frigg, as to the advisability of undertaking the journey. The stanzas which follow represent Odin questioning Vafthrudnir in his search for knowledge:—

We are told in the Völuspa that Odin, in the quest of information, went to visit the Völva, or Sybil, Heid, who was possessed of supernatural powers of knowledge and foresight. She asks for a hearing from the sons of Heimdal, or mankind, and then proceeds to tell what she recollects:—

The nine worlds were—1, Muspel; 2, Asgard; 3, Vanaheim (home of the Vanir); 4, Midgard; 5, Alfheim (world of the Alfar); 6, Mannheim (home of men); 7, Jötunheim (the home of the Jötnar); 8, Hel; 9, Niflheim.

The first beginnings of all things were apparently as obscure to the Völva as to others; nothing existed before the Creation. The world was then a gaping void (Ginnungagap), and there the Jötun Ymir, or the Hrim Thursar, lived. On each side of 30Ginnungagap there were two worlds, Niflheim, the world of cold, and Muspelheim, the world of heat.

“First there was a home (a world) in the southern half of the world called Muspel; it is hot and bright, so that it is burning and in flames; it is also inaccessible for those who have no odals (or family estates); there the one that sits at the land’s end to defend it is called a Surt. He has a flaming sword, and at the end of the world he will go and make warfare and get victory over all the gods, and burn the whole world with fire” (Later Edda, c. 4).^[27]

The origin of the Hrim Thursar and the Birth of Ymir, who lived in Ginnungagap, and of Odin, Vili, and Ve, is as follows:

“Gangleri asked, ‘How was it before the kindreds existed and mankind increased?’ Hár answered, ‘When the rivers called Elivagar had run so far from their sources that the quick venom which flowed into them, like the dross which runs out of the fire, got hard, and changed into ice; when this ice stood still and flowed no longer, the exhalation of the poison came over it and froze into rime; the rime rose up all the way into the Ginnungagap.’ Jafnhár said, ‘The part of Ginnungagap turning to the north was filled with the heaviness and weight of ice and rime, and the opposite side with drizzle and gusts of wind; but the southern part of Ginnungagap became less heavy, from the sparks and glowing substances which came flying from Muspelheim.’ Thridi said, ‘Just as the cold and all things come from Niflheim, the things near Muspel were hot and shining; Ginnungagap was as warm as windless air. When the rime and the breath of the heat met so that the rime melted into drops, a human form came from these flowing drops with the power of the one who had sent the heat; he was called Ymir, but the Hrimthursar call him Örgelmir, and the kin of the Hrimthursar have sprung from him.’ Gangleri asked, ‘How did the kin grow from this, or how came it that there were more men; or dost thou believe in the god of whom thou didst tell now?’ Hár answered, ‘By no means do we think him a god; he was 31bad, and all his kinsmen; we call them Hrimthursar. It is told that when asleep he sweated, and then there grew a man and a woman from under his left arm, and one of his feet begot a son with the other; thence have sprung the kin of Hrimthursar. We call Ymir the Old Hrimthurs.’

“Gangleri asked, ‘Where did Ymir live, or by what?’ ‘It happened next when the hoar-frost fell in drops that the cow Audhumla grew out of it; four rivers of milk ran from her teats, and she fed Ymir.’

“Gangleri asked, ‘On what did the cow feed?’ Hár answered, ‘She licked the rime-stones covered with salt and rime, and the first day when she licked them a man’s hair came out of them in the evening; the second day a man’s head; the third day a whole man was there; he is called Buri; he was handsome in looks, large, and mighty; he had Bör for son, who got Besla, daughter of Bölthorn jötun, for wife, and she had three sons, Odin, Vili,^[28] Ve; and it is my belief that this Odin and his brothers are the rulers of heaven and earth. We think he is called so. Thus the man whom we know to be the greatest and most famous is called, and they may well give him this name’” (‘Gylfaginning,’ c. 5).

The ash tree Yggdrasil is one of the strangest conceptions found in any mythology.

Under it stands the well of wisdom for a drink from which Odin pledges his one eye.

“Gangleri said: ‘Where is the head-place or holy place of the Asar?’ Hár answered: ‘At the ash of Yggdrasil, where the gods give their judgments every day.’ Gangleri asked: ‘What can be told of that place?’ Jafnhár said: ‘The ash is the largest and best of trees; its branches spread all over the world and reach up over the heaven; three roots of the tree hold it up and spread very widely. One (of the roots) is with the Asar, another with the Hrimthursar where of yore 32Ginnungagap was; the third is over Niflheim, and beneath it is Hvergelmin, but Nidhög gnaws its lower part. Under the root turning towards the Hrimthursar is Mimir’s well, in which wisdom and intellect are hidden. Its owner is called Mimir; he is full of wisdom, for he drinks from the well of the horn Gjallar-horn. Odin came and asked for a drink of the well, and did not get it till he pawned his eye.”

“What more wonders,” asked Gangleri, “may be told of the ash?” Hár answered, “Many wonders. An eagle sits in the limbs of the ash and knows many things; between its eyes sits the hawk Vedrfölnir. The squirrel Ratatösk runs up and down the ash and carries words of envy between the eagle and Nidhög. Four harts run on the limbs of the ash and eat the buds; they are called Dain, Dvalin, Duneyr, and Durathror. So many serpents are in Hvergelmir with Nidhög that no tongue can number them” (Gylfaginning, c. 16).

Heid in the Voluspa tells about the holy tree, and that the horn of Heimdall is hidden under it till the last fight of the gods. Yggdrasil is watered from the water of the well.

Under the tree lived the three Nornir (Genii), who shape the destinies of men.

Hel was one of the nine worlds, and stood under the ash Yggdrasil, where the dead, who did not die on the battle-field, went. Hence, when a man had died, Hel-shoes were put on his feet for the journey.

Odin goes to the world of Hel, in which was the Gnipa cave, in order to inquire about the fate of his son Baldr who had died.

“Odin threw Hel (daughter of Loki) down into Niflheim, and gave her power over nine worlds; she was to lodge all those who were sent to her, namely, those who died of sickness and old age. She has a large homestead there, and her house-walls 33are wonderfully high, and her doors are large. Her hall is called Eljúdnir, her plate famine, her knife hunger; ganglati (lazy-goer, idler) her thrall; ganglöt (idler) her bondswoman; her threshhold is called stumbling-block; her bed the couch of one who is bed-ridden; her bed-hangings (ársal) the glittering evil. One half of her body is livid, and the other half skin-colour; therefore she is easily known, and her look is frowning and fierce” (Later Edda, c. 34, Gylfaginning).

“It is the beginning of this Saga that Baldr the Good dreamt great and dangerous dreams about his life. When he told them to the Asar they consulted and resolved to ask for safety for Baldr from every kind of danger; Frigg (Odin’s wife) took oaths from fire, water, iron, and every kind of metal, stones, earth, trees, sicknesses, beasts, birds, poison, serpents, that they would spare Baldr’s life. When this was done and known, Baldr and the Asar entertained themselves thus: he stood up at the Things and some gods shot at him, or others struck at him or threw stones at him. Whatever they did he was not hurt, and all thought this a great wonder. When Loki Laufey(jarson) saw this he was angry that Baldr was not hurt. He changed himself into a woman’s shape and went to Frigg in Fensalir. Frigg asked this woman if she knew what the Asar were doing at the Thing. She said that they all shot at Baldr, and that he was not hurt. Frigg said, ‘Weapons or trees will not hurt Baldr; I have taken oaths from them all.’ The woman asked, ‘Have all things taken oaths to spare Baldr’s life?’ Frigg answered, ‘A bush grows east of Valhöll called Mistiltein (mistletoe); I thought it was too young to take an oath.’ The woman went away; but Loki took the mistletoe and tore it up and went to the Thing. Höd (Baldr’s brother) stood in the outmost part of the ring of people. Loki said to him, ‘Why doest thou not shoot at Baldr?’ He answered, ‘Because I do not see where he is, and also I am weaponless.’ Loki said, ‘Do like other men and show honour to Baldr; I will show thee where he stands; shoot this stick at him.’ Höd took the mistletoe and shot at Baldr as Loki showed him; it pierced Baldr, who fell dead to the ground. This was the most unfortunate deed that has been done among the gods and men. When Baldr was fallen none of the Asar could say a word or touch him with their hands, and they looked at each other with the same mind towards the one who had done this deed, but no one could take revenge; it was such a place of peace. When they tried to speak the tears came first, so that no one could tell to the other his sorrow in words. Odin suffered most from this loss, 34because he knew best what a loss and damage to the Asar the death of Baldr was....” (Gylfaginning, c. 49).

“It is to be told of Hermód that he rode nine nights through dark and deep valleys and saw nothing before he came to the river Gjöll^[29] and rode on the Gjallar bridge,^[30] which is covered with shining gold.^[31] Modgud is the name of the maiden who guards the bridge; she asked him his name and kin, and said that the day before five arrays of dead men rode over the bridge, ‘but the bridge sounds not less under thee alone, and thou hast not the colour of dead men; why ridest thou here on the way of Hel?’ He answered, ‘I am riding to Hel to seek Baldr, or hast thou seen Baldr on the way of Hel?’ She answered that Baldr had ridden over the Gjallar bridge, ‘but the way of Hel lies downward and northward.’ Hermód rode till he came to the gates of Hel; then he alighted and girthed his horse strongly, mounted and pricked it with the spurs; the horse leaped so high over the gate that it touched nowhere. Then Hermód rode home to the hall, alighted, went in and saw his brother Baldr sitting in a high-seat; he stayed there the night. In the morning Hermód asked Hel to allow Baldr to ride home with him, and told how great weeping there was among the Asar. Hel said she would see if Baldr was as beloved as was told; if all things, living and dead, in the world weep over him, he shall go back to the Asar, but remain with Hel (me) if any refuse or will not weep. Then Hermód rose, and Baldr let him out of the hall and took the ring Draupnir and sent it to Odin as a remembrance, and Nanna^[32] sent to Frigg a linen veil and more gifts, and to Fulla a gold ring. Then Hermód rode back to Asgard and told all the tidings he had seen or heard. Thereupon the Asar sent messengers all over the world to ask that Baldr might be wept out of Hel, and all did it, men and beasts, earth and stones, trees, and all metals, as thou must have seen that these things weep when they come from frost into heat. When the messengers went home and had performed their errands well, they found a jötun woman sitting in a cave, called Thökk; they asked her to weep Baldr (out of) Hel; she answered—

35It is guessed that this was Loki Laufeyjarson, who had caused most evils among the Asar.”

“Then also the dog Garm, which is tied in front of Gnipa cave, got loose; he is the greatest terror, he fights Tyr and they kill each other” (Gylfaginning, c. 5).

The wicked seem to have died twice: first they die and get into Hel, then they die again and get into Niflhel = Foggy Hel. The following is one of the answers of Vafthrudnir to Odin:—

The sides of the rim of heaven communicate with each other by a bridge called Bifröst, or the bridge of the Asar, on which Heimdall, the watchman of the gods, stood.

“Heimdall is the watchman of the gods standing on Bifröst Bridge (the rainbow)” (Later Edda, 27).

“Heimdall is named the White As: he is great and holy; nine maidens bore him as son, and they were all sisters. He is also called Hallinskidi and Gullintanni (gold tooth). His teeth were of gold, his horse is called gold maned. He lived at a place called Himinbjörg (heaven mountains) by Bifröst. He is the warden of the gods, and sits there at the end of heaven to guard the bridge against the Berg Risar (mountain Jötnar); he needs less sleep than a bird, he can see equally by night and by day a hundred leagues away, and he hears when the grass grows, or the wool on the sheep, and all that is louder than these. He has the horn called Gjallarhorn, and his blowing is heard through all worlds. The sword of Heimdall is called Höfud” (Gylfaginning, 27).

We find that the Jötnar and Asar were separated from each other by a large river whose waters never freeze.

From Vafthrudnismal we learn of the origin of Bergelmir who was born before the Creation.

It is an important question which are the most ancient people—the Asar, or the ancient kinsmen of Ymir?

In due course Ymir was slain by Odin, Vili, and Ve, the three sons of Bör, who was himself a Jötun, and therefore of the same kin as Ymir. Having slain Ymir, the sons of Bör 37proceeded to make the earth out of his body, and to give the sun, moon, and stars their places in heaven. The flow of his blood was so great as to cause a deluge. Bergelmir was the only one of the Hrim-Thursar who escaped in a boat with his wife, and from him came a new race of Hrim-Thursar.

“The sons of Bör slew the Jötun Ymir, but when he fell there flowed so much blood from his wounds that it drowned the whole race of the Hrim-Thursar, except one who escaped with his household. Him the Jötnar called Bergelmir; he and his wife went on board his ark, and thus saved themselves; from them are descended a new race of Hrim-Thursar” (Later Edda).

After the destruction of the earlier Hrim-Thursar we hear how the sons of Bör created the world, and we are told how the earth and the heavens were made from Ymir.

We are also told of the creation of the planets and stars, of our world, of the sea, of the moon, and of day and night. The year was reckoned by winters (vetr), and the days by nights (nott).

The year was divided into months (mánud or mánad).

“Haustmánud (harvest-month) is the last before winter; Gormánud (gore-month, called thus from the slaughter of cattle then taking place) the first month of winter; Frermánud (frost-month); Hrútmánud (the ram’s month); Thorri (the month of waning or declining winter); Gói, Einmánud ... then Gaukmánud or Sádtid (cuckoo-month or sowing-tide); Eggtíd or Stekktíd (egg-tide or weaning-tide); Sólmánud or Selmánud (sun-month or sæter-month in which the cattle are removed to the sel or sæter); Heyjannir (haymaking-month); Kornskurdarmánud (grain-reaping month)” (Skaldskaparmal, c. 63).

The month was subdivided into six weeks; each week contained 38five days. The days were called—Týsdag = Tuesday; Ódinsdag = Wednesday; Thórsdag = Thursday; Frjádag = Friday; Laugardag (bath-day) or Thváttdag (washing-day) = Saturday.

The following is the origin of Midgard:—

Then we have the origin of the wind and of winter. Hræsvelg means the swallower of corpses.

Another amplification of the Creation is given in Gylfaginning.

Thridi said:

“They took Ymir’s skull, and made thereof the sky, and raised it over the earth with four sides. Under each corner they set four Dvergar, which were called Austri, East; Vestri, West; Nordri, North; Sudri, South. Then they took glowing sparks that were loose and had been cast out from Muspelheim, and placed them in the midst of the boundless heaven, both above and below, to light up heaven and earth; they gave resting-places to all fires, and set some in heaven; some were made free to go under heaven, but they gave them a place and shaped their course. In old songs it is said that from that time days and years were reckoned.”

The creation of the world, and of the heavens and planets, is followed by that of the Dvergar and of man and woman, who were helpless and fateless (their destinies not having been spun by the Nornir); from these two mankind are descended.

Finally the Völva describes the end of the world.

After the destruction of the world, a new one will arise.

Norse Cosmogony—Midgard, Asgard, and Mannheim—The Asar and Vanir—Thor and Tyr—The Goddesses—The Apples of Youth.

Where the mythical Odin ends in the Völuspa, if there is any ending to him, is impossible to tell; it appears that he came and built an earthly Midgard,^[70] according to the writer of the Later Edda who gives the tradition and belief of the people in his day.

Odin himself was originally a Jötun, and it would appear from the mythological literature of the North that, for some reason, he wished to found a new religion, and desired to proclaim himself chief and spiritual ruler over several, if not all the tribes before mentioned; this claim, from the account of the fights which took place, must have been hotly contested. In the history of the birth of every nation, something similar has taken place, and these struggles are always described with wonderful and often supernatural accompaniments. We are led to believe that a devoted band of followers attached themselves to Odin’s cause, and gradually others joined him; thus forming a community over which he was the leader. To protect themselves from their enemies, among whom, according to the Eddas, were included Jötnar and Thursar, &c., the Asar erected a wall round their country, and called the whole enclosed land Midgard.

In the centre of Midgard, Odin built for himself, his family, chiefs, and councillors, Asgard,^[71] called also Asaheim (home of the Asar), and Godheim (home of the gods). As, in the Northern language, afterwards denoted one of the gods, who in course of time were also deified, and to whom, as well as to Odin, sacrifices were offered.

45Within the walls of Midgard, which encircled Asgard, was Mannheim,^[72] where Odin’s adherents dwelt, and hence the name of their country.

“They gave them clothes and names; the men they called Ash, and the women Embla. From them all mankind is descended, and a dwelling-place was given them under Midgard. In the next place the sons of Bör made for themselves, in the middle of the world, a burgh which is called Asgard, and which we call Troja (there dwelt the gods of their race), and thence resulted many tidings and adventures, both on earth and in the sky. In Asgard is a place called Hlidskjalf, and when Odin seats himself there in the high seat he sees all over the whole world, and what every man is doing, and he knew all things that he saw. His wife was Frigg, and she was the daughter of Fjorgvin, and from their offspring are descended the race which we call Asar, who inhabited Asgard the ancient, the realm that surrounds it, and all that race are known to be gods, and for that reason Odin is called Allfather” (Later Edda).

After Midgard had been built for the sons of men, there is a golden age on the Ida-völl (plain of movement). Altars and hearths were raised by the Asar, showing that work is conducive to happiness.

Then followed a great battle between the Asar and their neighbours, the Vanir. The Asar seem to have been at first defeated, but afterwards made peace. This fight is the most obscure part of the whole of Völuspa.

A fight is also mentioned in the Ynglinga Saga which seems to be the same as the one referred to in Völuspa.

“Odin went with a host against the Vanir, but they withstood him well and defended their land. Asar and Vanir got the victory by turns; each waged war in the other’s land and plundered. When they became tired of this they appointed a meeting for agreement between themselves, and made peace and gave each other hostages. The Vanir gave their foremost men, Njörd the wealthy and his son Frey, and the Asar gave a man called Hœnir, and said he was well fitted to be a chief. He was a tall and very handsome man. The Asar sent with him a man called Mimir, who was very wise; in exchange for him the Vanir gave one, who was the wisest among them, called Kvasir. When Hœnir came to Vanaheim he was at once made chief; Mimir taught him everything. And when Hœnir was at the Things or meetings, and Mimir was not near, and some difficult cases were taken to him, he always gave the same answer, ‘Let others say what is to be done.’ Then the Vanir suspected that the Asar had deceived them in the exchange of men. They took Mimir and beheaded him, and sent his head to the Asar. Odin took the head and besmeared it with the juice of plants, so that it could not rot. He sang charms over it, and by spells made it so powerful that it spoke with him, and told him many unknown things” (Ynglinga, c. 4).

47Thór was one of the greatest of the Norse gods after Odin; indeed, these with Frey formed a sort of triad.

“Thór is the foremost of them (the gods); he is called Asa-Thór or Öku-Thór. He is the strongest of all gods and men. His realm is Thrúdvángar (= plains of strength), and his hall is called Bilskirnir; in it there are 540 rooms. It is the largest house built by men. (See Grimnismal.) Thór owns two he-goats, which are called Tanngnjóst (tooth-gnasher) and Tanngrísnir (tooth-gnasher), and a chariot (reid), on which he drives and the he-goats draw it. Therefore he is called Oku-Thór (= the driving Thór). He also owns three costly things. One of them is the hammer Mjolnir which the Hrim Thursar and Berg Risar know when it is aloft, and that is not strange, for he has broken many a head of their fathers or kinsmen. The next best of his costly things is the belt of strength. When he girds himself with it his Asa-strength doubles. He owns a third thing, which is worth much, iron-gloves, without which he cannot hold the handle of the hammer. No man is so wise that he may reckon up all his great feats, but I can tell thee so many tales of him that the hours will be whiled away before I have told all that I know.”

“Hár said: ‘Furthermore there is an As called Týr. He is the boldest and most daring and has much power over victory in battles. It is useful for valiant men to make vows to him. It is a saying that the one surpassing others in valour and fearing nothing is Tý-brave. He is so wise that the wisest man is called Tý-wise. One of the proofs of his daring is this. When the Asar persuaded the Fenriswolf to allow them to tie it with the chain Gleipnir, it did not believe that they would untie it till they laid Týr’s hand into its mouth as a pledge. When they would not untie it then it bit off his hand at the place now called Wolf-joint (wrist). He is therefore onehanded and said not to be the reconciler of men.’” (Later Edda, Gylfaginning, 21).

The Later Edda differs from the Grimnismal in giving the number of gods or Asar which it mentions. When Gylfi asks how many Asar there are he is told twelve, and the names of Odin, Höd, and Baldr are omitted from the list. Only a few of these gods seem to have been of sufficient prominence to have had sacrifices offered to them, as is seen in the chapter on Religion, and we cannot depend on the Later Edda for reliable information concerning them.

48“The Asar went to their feast, and the twelve Asar who were to be judges sat down in the high-seats: their names were—Thór, Njörd, Frey, Týr, Heimdall, Bragi, Vidar, Vali, Ull, Hœnir, Forseti, Loki” (Later Edda).

The following extract from the Later Edda gives us the names of the principal goddesses, with their leading characteristics.

“Gangleri said: ‘Who are the Asynjar?’ Har answered: ‘Frigg is the highest; she has a very splendid house called Fensalir. The second is Sága, who lives at Sökkvabekk, a large place. The third is Eir; she is the most skilled healer (= physician). The fourth is Gefjon, who is a maiden, and those who die as maidens wait upon her. The fifth is Fulla; she is also a maiden with loose hair, and wears a golden band round her head; she carries the ashen box of Frigg and takes care of her shoe-clothes (= shoes and stockings), and partakes in her secret counsels. Freyja is next in rank to Frigg; she is married to a man called Ód, their daughter is Hnoss; she is so beautiful that fine and costly things are called after her—hnoss. Ód went far off and left Freyja weeping, and her tears are red gold. She has many names; that is because she called herself by different names when she went among foreign nations in search of Ód; she is called Mardöll, Hörn, Gefn, and Sýr. She owns the Brisinga necklace. She is called Vanadis (dis (goddess) of the Vanir). The seventh is Sjöfn; she applies herself much to turning the minds of men to love, both males and females; from her name a loving mind is called sjafni. Lofn is so mild and good to invoke that she gets Allfödr (Odin) or Frigg to allow the marriages of men, male and female, though they have been forbidden or flatly refused; from her name is lof (leave), and that which is lofat (= praised) by men. Vár listens to the oaths of men and the private agreements which men and women make between themselves; these are called várar, and she punishes those who break them. Vör is wise and asks many questions, so that nothing can be hidden from her; when a woman knows a thing she is vör (= aware) of it. Syn guards the door of the hall (Valhalla) and shuts it to those who are not to enter; therefore when some one denies a thing he is said to put down syn (= negation, refuse). Hlin has to guard the men whom Frigg wishes to save from danger. Snotra is wise and of good manners; a wise man or woman is called snotr from her name. Gna, Frigg sends into various worlds on her errands; she has a horse which runs 49on air and water, called Hófhvarfnir (= hoof-turner)” (‘Later Edda,’ Gylfaginning, 35).

The gods, it would seem, had it in their power, if not to secure everlasting life, at least to retain perpetual youth, unlike poor Tithonus of the well-known Greek myth. It may not be inappropriate to continue here the legend relating to this. Idun, the wife of Bragi, who was celebrated for his wisdom and eloquence, kept in a box the apples which when the gods felt old age approaching they ate in order that they might keep their youth till Ragnarök.

“Odin, Loki and Hœnir went from home over mountains and uninhabited land, and it was not easy for them to get food. When they came down into a valley they saw a herd of oxen, took one of them and prepared it for the fire. When they thought it was cooked they took it off, but it was not cooked. A second time, after waiting a little, they took it off, and it was not cooked. They considered what might be the cause of this. Then they heard a voice in the tree above them which said that he who sat there caused this. They looked up, and a large eagle sat there. The eagle said: ‘If you will give me my fill of the ox, it shall be cooked.’ They assented, and the bird came slowly down from the tree, sat down on the hearth, and at once gobbled up the four shoulder-pieces of the ox. Loki got angry, took a large pole, raised it, and with all his strength struck the eagle. At the blow the eagle flew into the air. The pole adhered to its body, and the hands of Loki to one end of it. The eagle flew so that Loki’s feet touched the rocks, the stone-heaps and the trees. He thought his hands would be torn from his shoulders. He shouted, eagerly asking the eagle to spare him, but it answered that Loki would never get loose unless he swore to make Idun leave Asgard with her apples. Loki promised this, got loose and went to his companions, and no more tidings are told about their journey till they reached home. At the appointed time Loki enticed Idun to go to a wood out of Asgard by saying he had found apples which she would prefer to her own, and asked her to take her own apples with her to compare them. Thjassi Jötun then came in an eagle’s shape and took Idun and flew away to his abode in Thrymheim. The Asar were much grieved at the disappearance of Idun, and soon became grey-haired and old. They held a Thing and asked each other for news of Idun. The last seen of her was when she walked out of Asgard with Loki. He was brought to the Thing and threatened with death or 50torture. He got afraid and said he would fetch Idun from Jötunheim, if Freyja would lend him the hawk-skin which she owned. When he got it he flew north to Jötunheim, and one day came to Thjassi Jötun, who was sea-fishing. Idun was alone at home. Loki changed her into a nut, held her in his claws and flew as fast as he could. When the Asar saw the hawk flying with the nut and the eagle pursuing they went to the Asgard-wall and carried thither bundles of plane-shavings. When the hawk flew into the burgh it came down at the wall. The Asar set fire to the plane-shavings, but the eagle could not stop when it lost the hawk, and the fire caught its feathers and stopped it. The Asar were near, and slew Thjassi inside the Asgard-wall, which is a very famous deed. Skadi, his daughter, took helmet and brynja and a complete war-dress, and went to Asgard to avenge her father. The Asar offered her reconciliation and wergild,^[77] and first that she might choose a husband from among them, not seeing more than their feet. She saw a pair of very beautiful feet, and said: ‘This one I choose; few things can be ugly in Baldr.’ But it was Njörd of Nóatún.” (Later Edda, Bragarœdur, c. 56.)

The Odin of the North—The forefathers of the English—Their migration from the shores of the Black sea—The geographical knowledge of the Norsemen—Tyrkland the home of Odin—Sigrlami, one of the sons of Odin—Odin establishes his family in the North—Death of Odin in the North—Attributes of Odin—Poetical names of Odin—Sleipnir, the horse of Odin—Odin as a one-eyed man.

In the Norse literature we find Odin referred to not only as a god, but as a hero and leader of men. It is not necessary to believe that any real person of the name of Odin ever existed, but from the frequency with which a migration northwards is mentioned, and from the details with which it is described, it is legitimate to infer that the predecessor of the Norsemen came from the south or south-east of Europe—probably, to judge from literature and archæology combined, from the shores of the Black Sea.

At the time of Odin’s arrival in the North we find not only a country called Gardariki, which is often mentioned in the Sagas, and seems to have adjoined the south-eastern shores of the Baltic, but also the large Scandinavian peninsula and that of Jutland, and the islands and shores of the Baltic, populated by a seafaring people whose tribes had constant intercourse with each other, and, to judge by the finds, seem to have had an identical religion. These people intermarried with the Asar who came north with Odin, and hence arose tribes called half-Risar and half-Troll.

“It is written in old books that Alfheimar^[78] were north in Gandvik and Ymisland, between it and Hálogaland. And before the Tyrkjar and Asia-men came to the Northern lands, Risar and half-Risar lived there; then the nations (peoples) were much mixed together; the Risar got wives from Mannheimar, and some of them married their daughters there” (Hervarar Saga, ch. i.).

52The account given in the Hervarar Saga agrees with that in the Ynglinga Saga, which is important not only as giving an idea of the conception the people of the North had of our world, but as describing the names of the lands and countries mentioned in the earlier Eddas and Sagas.

“The round of the world on which men dwell is much cut by the sea; large seas stretch from the outer sea round the earth into the land. It is known that a sea runs from Njörvasund (Straits of Gibraltar) all the way up to Jorsalaland (the land of Jerusalem). From it a long bay runs north-east, called the Black Sea, which separates the three parts of the world; the part east of it is called Asia, but the one west of it is called Europa by some, and Enea by others. North of the Black Sea is the great or the cold Sweden; some say that Sweden is no smaller than Serkland (the land of Saracens) the great; some say she is as large as Blaland (the land of the blue (black) men) the great. The northern part of Sweden is uninhabited, on account of frost and cold, as the southern part of Blaland is on account of the sun’s burning heat. In Sweden there are many large herads (districts).

There are also many kinds of people and many tongues: there are Asar, Dvergar, and Blamenn (blue (black) men), and many kinds of strange people; there are beasts and dragons wonderfully large. From the north, in mountains which are beyond all settlements, a river springs that flows through Sweden; its right name is Tanais; it was in old times called Tanakvísl,^[79] or Vana-kvísl; it flows into the Black Sea. The land round Vanakvísl was then called Vanaland or Vanaheim (home or world of the Vanir). This river^[80] separates the two-thirds of the world; east of it is Asia, and West of it is Europa” (Ynglinga Saga, 1).

“A large mountain ridge runs from north-east to south-west; it separates Sweden the Great^[81] from other lands. South of the mountain, not far off, is Tyrkland; there Odin owned a great deal of land. At that time the chiefs 53of the Rómverjar (Romans) went widely about the world and underlaid (conquered) all nations; and many chiefs on that account left their lands. As Odin was foreknowing and skilled in witchcraft he knew that his descendants would live in the northern part of the world. Then he set his brothers Vili and Vé to rule Asgard; he left, and all the Díar with him, and many folk. First he went westwards to Gardaríki, then southwards to Saxland. He had many sons; he became owner of land at many places in Saxland, and left his sons to defend Saxland. Then he went northwards to the sea and settled on an island; that place is now called Odinsey (Odin’s island) in Fjón (Fýen). Then he sent Gefjon^[82] northwards across the Sound to discover lands; she came to Gylfi, and he gave her one plough-land. Then she went to Jötunheim and there got four sons by a Jötun; she changed them into oxen, and harnessed them to the plough, and drew the land out to sea, and westwards, opposite to Odinsey, and the land is called Selund (Zealand); she afterwards lived there. Skjöld, a son of Odin, married her; they lived at Hleidra (Leire). There is a lake or sea called Lög (Mälaren). The fjords in the Lög lie as the nesses in Selund. When Odin heard that Gylfi’s land was good he went there, and he and Gylfi made an agreement, for Gylfi thought he had not strength enough to withstand the Asar. Many devices and spells did Odin and Gylfi use against each other, and the Asar always got the better of them. Odin took up his abode at the Lög (Mälaren), which is now called the old Sigtúnir; there he made a great temple and sacrificed according to the custom of the Asar. He gave abodes to the temple-priests; Njörd lived at Nóatún, Frey at Uppsalir, Heimdall at Himinbjörg, Thor at Thrúdvang, Baldr at Breidablik; he gave good abodes to them all” (Ynglinga, c. 5).

While Odin, according to the sages, was in Sweden^[83] his son Sigrlami ruled over Gardaríki; during the life of his father or after his death he had to fight against the Jötnar, and, like Skjöld his brother, he married a daughter of King Gylfi, who ruled over the present Sweden, whose authority is made to extend to the principal islands which form part of the present Denmark.

“At this time the Asia-men and Tyrkjar came from the east and settled in the northern lands; their leader was 54called Odin; he had many sons, and they all became great and strong men. One of his sons was called Sigrlami; to him Odin gave the realm now called Gardaríki; he became a great chief over that land; he was handsomer than any man. He was married to Heid, the daughter of King Gylfi; they had a son called Svafrlami.” (Hervarar, c. 2).

Sigrlami fell in a fight against Thjassi the Jötun. When Svafrlami heard of his father’s death he took for himself all his realm, and became a powerful man. It is said that on one occasion when riding in a forest he chased a stag for a long time, and did not kill it until sunset, when he had ridden so far into the forest that he lost his way. He saw a large stone and two Dvergar beside it, whom he was going to sacrifice to the gods, but on their begging to be allowed to give a ransom for their lives Svafrlami asked their names. One was called Dyrin, the other Dvalin. Svafrlami at once recognised them to be the most skilful of Dvergar, and insisted upon their making a sword for him, the hilt to be of gold, and the scabbard to be ornamented and inlaid with gold. The sword was never to fail, and never to rust; to cut iron and stone as well as cloth; and it was to bring victory in all battles and duels (einvigi) to every one who carried it.

On the appointed day Svafrlami came to the rock; the Dvergar gave him the sword; but Dvalin, standing in the door of the stone, said: “Thy sword, Svafrlami, shall be a man’s bane (death) every time it is drawn; and with it shall be performed the greatest nithing’s deed; it also will be thy death.” Svafrlami then struck at the Dvergar so that both edges of the sword entered into the rock, but the Dvergar ran into the rock. Svafrlami, we are told, called the sword Tyrfing, and carried it in battles and single fights; with it he killed in a duel Thjassi the Jötun, his father’s slayer, whose daughter Frid he married” (Hervarar Saga, c. 3).

We not only have accounts of how this Odin established his family in the North, but also how he died there. Feeling that his days were coming to an end, he prepared to die on a pyre, as was the custom of those times; and we find the belief existed that after his death he returned to the old Asgard.

“Odin fell sick and died in Sweden. When he was at death’s door he let himself be marked (wounded) with a spear-point, and said he was the owner of all the men slain by weapons, and would go into Godheim (the world of the gods), 55and there welcome his friends. Now the Swedes thought he had gone to the old Asgard, and would live there for ever. Then there again arose worship of Odin, and vows were made to him. The Swedes often thought he appeared to them in dreams on the eve of great battles; to some he gave victory, others he invited home; either of these alternatives was considered good. After death he was burnt with great splendour.^[84] It was their belief that the higher the smoke rose in the air the more glorious would the burnt man be in heaven,^[85] and the more property that was burnt with him the wealthier would he be” (Ynglinga Saga, c. 10).

Whether a hero and leader of the name of Odin ever lived or not we cannot tell, but that we know from the records the people believed that he and the Asar had existed, and the creed they had established was their religion; and this belief lasted with many to the end of the pagan era, which did not entirely disappear till the twelfth century. Odin and some of the Asar were deified and worshipped in all the countries of the North, and with the lapse of time their fame increased.

“Odin was a mighty warrior and travelled far and wide, and became owner of many realms (countries). He was so successful that in every battle he gained the victory, and at last his men believed that in every battle victory was in his power. It was his custom, when he sent his men into fight or on other errands, first to lay his hands on their heads and give them bjanak;^[86] they believed that luck would then be with them. Also it happened that whenever his men were in need on land or at sea they called on his name, and always felt relieved by it; for every kind of help they looked to him. He often went so far away that he was on a journey many seasons” (Ynglinga, c. 2).

“It is said with truth that when Asa-Odin, and with him the Díar,^[87] came into the northern lands, they began and taught those ídróttir^[88] which men afterwards long practised. Odin was the foremost of them all, and from him they learned the ídróttir, for he first knew them all, and more than any other. He was highly honoured on account of the following things. He looked so fair and noble when he sat with his friends that 56every mind was delighted; but when he was in a host, then he looked fierce to his foes. This was because he knew the ídróttir of changing looks and shapes in any way he liked. Another of his ídróttir was that he spoke with such skill and so glibly that all who listened thought it the only truth; he always spoke in poetry (hendingar) like that which now is called skáldskap (skaldship, poetry). He and his temple-priests are called Ljódasmidir (lay-smiths, song-smiths), for that ídrótt came from them into the northern lands. Odin had power to cause his foes to grow blind or deaf or full of fear, and to make their weapons bite no more than wands (sticks of wood). His own men fought without armour madly, like dogs or wolves, bit their shields, and had the strength of a bear or bull; they cut down the foe, and neither fire nor iron hurt them. That is called berserksgang (rage or fury of Berserks)” (Ynglinga, c. 6–7).

In the poetical language of the Sagas and Eddas a very great number of figurative names are given to Odin, which show how numerous his attributes were believed to be, and many of which recall the language of Homer; among them we may mention:—

“Then Thridi said: Odin is the highest and oldest of the Asar; he rules over everything, and, however mighty the 57other gods are, they all serve him as children a father. Frigg, his wife, knows the fates of men though she cannot prophesy. Odin is called Allfödr, because he is the father of all the gods; he is also called Valfödr, because all those who fall in battle (valr = the slain) are his chosen sons. These he places in Valhöll and Vingólf (a hall owned by the goddesses), and then they are called Einherjar. He is also called Hanga-gud (god of the hanged), Hapta-gud (god of the chained), and Farma-gud (god of cargoes), and he gave himself still more names when he was at King Geirröd’s. Gangleri said: ‘Wonderfully many names have you given to him, and surely it needs great wisdom to know the events which are the reasons of every one of these names.’ Hár answered: ‘Great wits are needed to explain this carefully, but, to tell it shortly, most of the names have been given because, as there are many different tongues in the world, every nation thinks it necessary to change his name according to their language, that they may invoke and pray to him for themselves. His journeys have given rise to some of these names, and they are told among people’” (Later Edda, c. 20).

“Two ravens^[91] sit on his shoulders and tell into his ears all the tidings, which they see or hear; these are Hugin and Munin. At the dawn of day he sends them out to fly all over the world, and they come back at day-meal time (the biggest meal of the day); hence he knows many tidings; therefore he is called Hrafnagud (Raven-god)” (Gylfaginning, c. 38).

Among the earlier myths connected with Odin may be mentioned the following account of the origin of his horse Sleipnir.

58

Fig. 1.—Earlier runic stone at Tjängvide, Götland, with the eight-footed horse of Odin.—Height about 5 feet; width, 4 feet 4 inches; thickness, 1 foot. Another similar stone with representation (in relief) of an eight-footed horse has been found also in Laivide in Götland.

“Gangleri asked: ‘Who owns Sleipnir the horse, or what hast thou to tell of him?’ Hár answered: ‘Thou knowest nothing about Sleipnir nor whence he sprang, but it will seem to thee worth a hearing. In early times when the gods had built up Midgard and made Valhalla there came a smith who offered to make a burgh for them in three seasons (half-years) so good that it would be strong and safe against Bergrisar (mountain-jötnar) and Hrimthursar, though they entered Midgard. In the place of wages he wanted to marry Freyja and get the sun and moon. The Asar came together to counsel among themselves, and it was agreed with the 59smith that he should get what he wanted if he could make the burgh in one winter, but if any part of it was unfinished on the first day of summer he was to lose his pay; he would not be allowed to use the help of any man in the work. When they told him these conditions he asked leave to make use of his horse Svadilföri; on the advice of Loki this was conceded to him. The first day of winter he began to build the burgh, and during night he carried stones on his horse to it; the Asar wondered much how the horse could drag such large rocks, and it did much more work than the smith. Strong witnesses were brought and many oaths were taken at their agreement, because the jötun thought it unsafe to stay with the Asar if Thor, who had gone to Austrveg (eastern countries) to kill Jötnar, should come home. As the winter passed the building of the burgh proceeded, and it was so high and strong that it could not be taken. When three days of the winter were left it was almost all finished except the gate. Then the gods sat down on their judgment-seats and tried to find an expedient; one asked the other on whose advice Freyja was to be married in Jötunheimar and air and heaven defiled by taking sun and moon away and giving them to the Jötnar; they all agreed that the causer of most evils, Loki Laufeyjarson, had caused this, and that he deserved an evil death if he did not find a way to cause the smith to lose his pay. They rushed at Loki, who got afraid, and took oaths that he would manage, whatever it might cost him, that the smith should lose his pay. The same evening when the smith drove out with his horse Svadilföri, to fetch stones, a mare ran out of the wood towards it and neighed to it. When the stallion saw what kind of horse this was he got wild, tore his ropes and ran towards it; the mare ran into the wood, and the smith followed and wanted to get hold of it, but the horses continued running all night, and no work was done that night; next day, as before, the work did not proceed. When the smith saw that the work could not be finished he got into Jötun-fury. When the Asar knew for certain that he was a Bergrisar (mountain jötun), they could not keep their oaths and called Thor; he came at once, and then the hammer Mjollnir went aloft; he paid him for the work, not by giving him the sun and moon, but by preventing him from living in Jötunheimar; at his first blow the jötun’s skull was broken into small bits, and he was sent down to Nifl-hel. But Loki had had such dealings with Svadilföri that he gave birth to a foal; it was grey, and with eight feet, and it is the best horse among gods and men” (Gylfaginning, 41–42).

60Odin was believed not only to give victory to his favourites, but other gifts, and is represented as coming to the aid of his followers, in the guise of an one-eyed old man—

“King Siggeir ruled Gautland; he was powerful and had many men; he went to King Völsung and asked him to give Signy to him in marriage. The king and his sons received this offer well; she herself was willing, but asked her father to have his way in this as in other things referring to herself. Her father made up his mind that she should be married, and she was betrothed to Siggeir. The wedding-feast was to be at King Völsung’s, and Siggeir was to come to him. The king prepared as good a feast as he could. When it was ready the guests and Siggeir’s men came on the appointed day; Siggeir had many men of rank with him. It is said that great fires were made along the hall,^[93] and the large tree before mentioned stood in the middle of the hall, and that when men were sitting before the fires in the evening a man walked into the hall whom they did not know. He wore a spotted hekla (frock); he was barefooted, and had linen breeches fastened to his legs; he had a sword in his hand, and wore a hood low down over his face; he was very grey-haired, and looked old, and was one-eyed.^[94] He went to the tree, and drew the sword, and stuck it into the trunk so that it sank up to the hilt. No man dared to speak to him. He said: ‘He who pulls this sword out of the trunk shall get it as a gift from me, and will find that he never had a better sword in his hand than this one.’ The old man then went out, and no one knew who he was, or where he went. Then all the foremost men tried to pull out the sword, and could not. Sigmund, the son of King Völsung, pulled it out as easily as if it had been quite loose. No man had seen so good a sword, and Siggeir offered three times its weight in gold for it. Sigmund answered that he should have pulled it out; now he should never get it, though he offered all the gold he owned” (Volsunga, c. 3).^[95]

Of Odin it is said:

“Odin changed shapes; then his body lay as if sleeping or dead, and he was in the shape of a bird or a beast, a fish or a serpent, and in the twinkling of an eye went into far-off lands on his own errands or on those of other men. Besides, he could, with words only, extinguish fire, calm the sea, and turn the winds into whatever direction he wished. He had a ship called Skídbladnir, on which he crossed large seas; it could be folded together like cloth.^[96] He had with him Mimir’s head, which told him many tidings (news) from other worlds. Sometimes he raised (awaked) dead men out of the earth (ground), or sat down beneath hanged men (hanging in gallows);^[97] therefore he was called the lord (dróttin) of the ghosts or of the hanged.^[97] He had two ravens, which he taught to speak, and they flew far and wide over lands (countries) and told him many tidings. Therefore he became very wise. So much lewdness followed this witchcraft when it was practised that it was thought a disgrace for men to practise it; and the priestesses (gydjur) were taught the idrótt. Odin knew where property was hidden in the ground, and he knew songs by which he unlocked (opened) the earth, the rocks, and the stones, and the mounds, and bound (held fast) with mere words those who dwelt in them, and went in and took what he wished. On account of these powers he became very famous; his foes feared him, but his friends trusted in him and believed in him and his power. He taught most of his idróttir to the sacrificing-priests; they were next to him in all wisdom and witchcraft. Many others, however, learned a great deal of them, and from them witchcraft has spread widely and been kept up long. But men worshipped Odin and the twelve chiefs (höfdingi) and called them their gods, and believed in them long afterwards” (Ynglinga Saga, ch. 7.)

Njörd the successor of Odin—Frey succeeds Njörd—A great temple built at Uppsalir by Frey—The ship of Frey—Death of Frey—Frey’s death kept secret from the people—Freyja, the priestess—Fjölnir, the son of Yngvi Frey—Svegdir—Genealogies of the Norse chiefs from Odin Skjöld, the founder of the Danish branch of chiefs.

According to the sagas, after the death of Odin, Njörd of Nóatún became the ruler of the Swedes.

“Thereupon Njörd of Nóatún became ruler over the Swedes, and continued the sacrifices; the Swedes called him their dróttin (lord); he gathered taxes from them. In his days there was very good peace, and seasons were so good in every respect that the Swedes believed that Njörd ruled over good seasons and the wealth and welfare of men. In his days most of the Díar died, and all of them were afterwards burnt and sacrificed to. Njörd fell sick and died; he also let himself be marked (with a spear) before he died, as a token that he belonged to Odin. The Swedes burnt him, and wept very much over his mound” (Ynglinga, c. 11).

“Njörd of Nóatún then begat two children. His son was Frey and his daughter Freyja. They were beautiful in looks and mighty. Frey is best of the Asar. He rules the rain and the sunshine, and also has power over the growth of the ground. It is good to make vows to him for good seasons and peace. He also rules over men’s fortune in property.” (Gylfaginning, c. 24.)

In Vafthrudnismal Odin asks Vafthrudnir the origin of Njörd.

63The Njörd who is related to have been punished by uncontrollable sadness for falling in love with Gerd and sitting on Odin’s high-seat is a mythical Njörd.

“A man was called Gýmir whose wife Orboda was of Berg (mountain) Risar kin. Their daughter Gerd was the most beautiful of all women. One day Frey had gone to Hlidskjalf^[98] and could see over all worlds. When he looked to the North he saw on a farm a large and fine house towards which a woman was walking. When she lifted her arms, opening the door, a light shone from them on the sea, and the air and all worlds were brightened from her. His great boldness in sitting down in the holy seat thus was revenged upon him, for he went away, full of sorrow. When he came home he did not speak or sleep or drink and no one dared question him. Then Njörd called to him Skirnir, the shoe-boy of Frey, and told him to go to Frey, address him and ask with whom he was so angry that he would not speak to men. Skirnir said he would go, though not willingly, as unfavourable answers might be expected from him. When he came to Frey he asked why he was so sad and did not speak to men. Frey answered that he had seen a beautiful woman and for her sake he was so full of grief that he would not live long if he should not get her. ‘Now thou shalt go and ask her in marriage for me and take her home hither whether her father is willing or not; I will reward it well.’ Skirnir answered that he would undertake this message if Frey gave him his sword. This sword was so good that it fought of itself. Frey did not fail to do this and gave it to him. Skirnir then went and asked the woman in marriage for him and got her promise that she would come after nine nights and keep her wedding with Frey. When Skirnir had told Frey of his journey Frey sang:

After the death of Njörd, Frey, one of his sons, succeeded him as high priest of the sacrifices, and, according to tradition, built the great temple at Upsala, which became of great repute as a most holy place among the people of the North, who came 64from all parts of the country to assist at the sacrifices. The Sagas say that great Things were held there, all important quarrels settled, friendship sealed, and peace concluded between chieftains and countries.

“Frey took the realm after Njörd; he was called the dróttin of the Swedes, and took taxes of them. He was as well liked as his father, and in his days also were good seasons. Frey raised a large temple at Uppsalir, and had his head burgh (höfud stad) there; all his taxes, lands, and loose property he gave thereto. That was the beginning of the Uppsalir wealth, which has been kept up ever since.

“In his days the peace of Fródi^[99] (King in Denmark) began; then there were good seasons in every land. The Swedes attributed that to Frey. He was worshipped more than other gods, because in his days the people of the land became wealthier than before, on account of the peace and the good seasons. His wife was called Gerd, daughter of Gýmir;^[100] their son was Fjölnir. Another name of Frey was Yngvi; this name was long afterwards used among his kin as a name of honour, and his kinsmen were afterwards called Ynglingar. Frey fell sick; when he was near death they took counsel and allowed few men to see him; they made a large mound ready for him with a door and three holes. When Frey was dead they carried him secretly into the mound and told the Swedes that he was alive, and kept him there for three winters. They poured all the taxes into the mound, the gold through one hole, the silver through another, and the brass pennings through the third. Then peace and good seasons continued” (Ynglinga, c. 12).

“When all the Svíar knew that Frey was dead, and peace and good seasons continued, they believed it would last while Frey was in Svithjód, and would not burn him, and called him the god of the world (veraldar god), and sacrificed ever since chiefly to him for good seasons and peace” (Ynglinga, c. 13).

After the death of Frey, Freyja, the daughter of Njörd, became the priestess, and offered the sacrifices.

“Freyja upheld the sacrifices, for she alone of the godar was then living, and she became so renowned that all high-born 65women are called fruvor.^[101] Thus every woman is the freyja of her property, and she who has a household is hús-freyja^[102] (housewife). Freyja was rather many-minded (fickle); her husband was Ód; her daughters were Hnoss (costly thing) and Gersemi (precious thing); they were very beautiful, and the costliest things are called by their names” (Ynglinga, c. 13).

According to the Ynglinga, Yngvi Frey was the son of Njörd, and Fjölnir the son of Yngvi Frey. Fjölnir ruled over the Swedish and Upsala domain, and died in Zeeland. A strong friendship existed between him and Fródi the grandson of Skjöld, the son of Odin, and it was the custom of these two chiefs to visit each other.

“Fjölnir the son of Yngvi Frey then ruled over the Swedes and the Upsala-wealth; he was a powerful king, and peace-happy and season-happy. At that time Peace-Fródi was at Hleidra (Leire); they were friends and invited each other. When Fjölnir came to Fródi in Zeeland there was a great feast prepared for him, and people were invited to it from far and wide. Fródi had a large house; in it there had been a large vat, many feet high, held together by large timbers; it stood in the lower story, and there was a loft above in which there was an opening through which the drink could be poured in; the vat was full of mixed mead,^[103] a very strong drink. In the evening Fjölnir and his men were shown to their room on the next loft. In the night he went out on the svalir (a kind of balcony) to look for something; he was overcome with sleep and dead-drunk. When he returned to his room he walked along the balcony to the door leading into the next room, and there he missed his footing and fell into the mead-vat and perished” (Ynglinga, c. 14).

Svegdir succeeded his father, Fjölnir, and though several generations had passed away since the death of the last Odin, the veneration towards Asgard, the old home of the earlier Odin, was strong in the heart of the people.

“This Sweden they called Mannheimar (the world of men), but the large Sweden they called Godheimar (the world of gods); from Godheimar many tidings and wonders were told” (Ynglinga, c. 10).

“Svegdir took the realm after his father; he made a vow 66to search for Godheim and Odin the old. He went with twelve men far and wide about the world; he came to Tyrkland and to Sweden the great, and met there many of his friends and kinsmen, and was five winters on that journey.^[104] Then he came back to Sweden, and stayed at home for some time. He had married a woman called Vana in Vanaheim; their son was Vanlandi. Svegdir went again in search of Godheim. In the eastern part of Sweden there is a large bœr called Stein (stone); there stands a rock as large as a big house. One evening after sunset, when Svegdir ceased drinking and went to his sleeping-house, he saw a Dverg sitting outside the rock. Svegdir and his men were very drunk, and ran to the rock. The Dverg stood in the door and shouted to Svegdir to come in if he wanted to meet Odin. Svegdir rushed into the rock, which at once closed upon him, and he came not back” (Ynglinga, c. 15).

A description of the leading events in the life of each of the remaining mythical or semi-mythical rulers named in the genealogies is given in the Ynglinga, but we have only thought it necessary to place before the reader these few typical examples, as the scope of the work will not admit of a fuller treatment of the subject; though some extracts have been incorporated in the Chapter on Customs, &c.

The Northern chiefs traced their ancestry from this Odin of the North, whose influence had become so great with King Gylfi that two of his sons, as we have seen, married the latter’s daughters.

When reading the Saga literature we are particularly struck by the frequent references made to pedigrees in which the people of the North took great pride. There are three great genealogical branches through which the Northern chiefs traced their descent from Odin.

“All who are truly wise in events know that the Tyrkjar and Asia-men settled in the northern lands. Then began the tongue which has since spread over all lands. The leader of these people was called Odin, and to him men trace their families”^[105] (Sturlaug’s Saga (Fornaldarsögur, 111), c. 1).

These genealogical branches are:—1. The Ynglinga; or that of Hálfdán the black, the nephew of Rögnvald Jarl. 2. The 67Háleygja; or that of Hakon Jarl the great. 3. The Skjöldunga; or that of Harald Hilditönn or the Danish branch.

If we could admit that these genealogies are more or less correct, and if we struck an average by generations (of thirty years) the result would make Odin live about the beginning of the Christian era; if a longer average of life is allotted, he would have lived some centuries before that date. But of course the genealogies must be treated as in the main mythical.

The Ynglingatal,^[106] a genealogical poem,^[107] composed for Rögnvald Heidumhœri (the uncle of Harald Fairhair), traces the family of Rögnvald through thirty generations up to Odin, and being probably composed a little after 900, it would make Odin live about 100 before Christ.

Ari in ch. 12 of Islendingabók traces his family through thirty-seven degrees up to Yngvi Tyrkja King.

These are the names of the forefathers of the Ynglingar and Breidfirdingar (Men of Breidifjord):—

1.

Yngvi Tyrkjaking.

2.

Njörd Sviaking.

3.

Frey.

4.

Fjölnir, who died at Frid-Fródi’s.

5.

Svegdir.

6.

Vanlandi.

7.

Vísbur.

8.

Dómaldi.

9.

Dómar.

10.

Dyggvi.

11.

Dag.

12.

Alrek.

13.

Agni.

14.

Yngvi.

15.

Jörund.

16.

Aun the old.

17.

Egil Vendikráka.

18.

Ottar.

19.

Adils at Uppsalir.

20.

Eystein.

21.

Yngvar.

22.

Braut-önund.

23.

Ingjald the evil.

24.

Ólaf, wood-chopper (tretelgja).

25.

Hálfdán Whiteleg Upplendingaking.

26.

Godrod.

27.

Ólaf.

28.

Helgi.

29.

Ingjald, the son of the daughter of Sigurd, son of Ragnar Lodbrok.

30.

Oleif the white (king in Dublin).

31.

Thorstein the red.

32.

Glei Feilan, the first of them who settled in Iceland.

33.

Thórd gellir.

34.

Eyjólf, who was baptized in his old age when Christianity came to Iceland.

35.

Thorkel.

36.

Gellir, the father of Thorkel and Brand and Thorgils, Ari’s father.

As another example of these genealogies we give that of

68The Skjoldunga Branch.

^[108]

The following passage from the ‘Later Edda,’ which refers to this branch, may help the curious to fix the dates of these chiefs. According to it Odin the hero lived some years before the beginning of the Christian era.

“Skjöld (Shield) was the son of Odin, from whom the Skjöldungar are descended. He dwelt in and ruled over the lands now called Danmörk, which were then called Gotland. Skjöld had a son, Fridleif, who ruled the lands after him.

Fridleif’s son Fródi got the kingship after his father, about the time when the Emperor Augustus made peace all over the world; then Christ was born. As Fródi was the most powerful of all kings in the Northern lands, all who spoke the Danish (Dansk) tongue^[109] attributed the peace to him, and the Northmen called it the Peace of Fródi. No man did harm to another, even if he met the slayer of his father or his brother bound or loose; no thieves or robbers were then found, so that a gold ring lay for a long time in Jalangr-heath (i.e., was not taken by any one)” (‘Later Edda.’ Skáldskaparmal, c. 43).

Prehistoric ages of man—Use of metal unknown—First traces of man—Weapons of flint, bone, &c.—Graves of the Stone Age—Introduction of domestic animals—The cromlech or dolmen always near the sea—Gallery or passage graves—The passage grave of Karleby—Stone coffin graves—Sepulchral chambers—Objects of the Stone Age.

We have now given accounts of the literature which contains the earliest records of the people of the North. Let us pause and study for a while its archæology, which will throw considerable light also on its inhabitants and their customs.

It is now generally recognised by archæologists that all people who have advanced to a certain degree of civilisation have passed through three periods of development, which according to the material of which their implements, weapons, and utensils were made, have been named the stone, the bronze, and the iron age. We have very abundant evidence that the people of the North passed through these three stages, and indeed had reached the iron age before they came within the ken of history. Beginning with the stone age, let us see what we can learn of the civilisation of the North from the various articles which were in use during the three stages.

The finds in the North have been classified under the name “grave,” “bog,” and “earth” finds; that is, objects found in graves, bogs, or in the ground. In the latter case they are often hidden under stones, in obedience to the injunctions of Odin. Those of the iron age are found as far as 69° North latitude.

The custom of burying different objects with the dead, and also that of throwing objects and weapons into springs or bogs, or of hiding them in the ground, has helped in a most remarkable manner to give us an idea of the industries and daily life of the people there at a remote period.

70In the earliest age the use of metal was unknown, the weapons were made of stone, horn, and bone,^[110] and towards the close of this age pottery was made.

The first traces of man in some parts of the present Scandinavia are the kjökkenmöddinger (kitchen refuse heaps), consisting of oyster and mussel shells, bones of fish, birds, and mammals, such as the deer, bear, boar, beaver, seal, ure-ox, wolf, fox, &c., &c., with remains of clay vessels. Among and near these heaps of refuse are found a great number of rude implements and weapons made of flint, bone, horn, and broken flint chips, also fireplaces made of a few stones roughly put together, thus showing that the inhabitants lived in a very primitive state.

No graves of the earliest period of the stone age have thus far been found in the North. Towards the latter part of this age we see a great improvement in the making of weapons and tools; the latter were beautifully polished, and graceful in form. Domestic animals had also been introduced, as shown by the bones of cattle, horses, sheep, pigs, and dogs, that have been found in the graves. Beads of amber and bone were worn as ornaments. The graves of the stone age discovered in the present Scandinavia and on the islands and shores of the Baltic may be classified in four groups: the cromlech or dolmen; the passage or gallery graves; the free-standing stone coffins; and the stone coffins covered by a mound.^[111]

The cromlechs consist of from three to five large stones standing upright, and so placed as to form a ring, with a large block or boulder on the top. These were intended for a single body, buried in a sitting position, with flint implements and weapons. The walls of the chamber were made by large stones, smooth inside, and the floor consisted of sand or gravel. Certain marks on the tops of stones seem to indicate that 71sacrifices to the dead were prevalent; holes about 2 inches in width are found on the roofs of some cromlechs and passage graves. These cromlechs always occur near the sea, seldom more than seven miles from the coast. The other graves of the stone age are often found far inland, but they are almost always near a lake or river having connection with the sea.

Fig. 2.—Cromlech near Haga, Bohuslän.

Fig. 3.—Cromlech (stendös) with concave recesses on the roof-stone, near Fasmorup, in Skåne.

The cromlechs which appear to be the latest graves of this age have a much wider distribution than the other forms; they are found in nearly all the provinces where the older 72forms of graves occur. Most of them were in or on the top of a mound, which almost always had the roof, and in most cases part of the wall, uncovered. The mound, which is generally round, sometimes oblong, is surrounded at its base by stones often very large; when this was oblong, the grave was nearer the one end than the other.

Fig. 4.—One of three oblong cromlechs, distance between each about 120 feet, length 52 feet, and width 20 feet, position north and south, Lille Rorbœk, Zeeland. The central one had two stone-built chambers, both with the entrance from the east. The southern burial chamber is now destroyed, while the northern is completely preserved. It is 5½ feet long, and 3 feet wide, and has four walls of stone, three of which support a stone roof.

Fig. 5.—Sepulchral chamber covered with a mound, Kallundborg, Zeeland; height about 16 feet. In levelling the mound the earth was found to contain articles which tend to show the existence of a “kjókkenmödding.”

73

Fig. 6.—Passage grave on Axvalla heath, near Lake Venern, Vestergötland, Sweden, situated on a hill overlooking a flat country. Numerous graves belonging to that period are found in the neighbourhood.

The walls are made by large slabs, those in the passage being lower than the slabs of the quadrangle. The roof is of flat slabs of granite, 5 to 6 feet above the floor, a similar one serving as a door, closing the outer end of the passage, which is 20 feet long, and 2½ to 3 feet broad, and 3 feet high. The mortuary itself (the quadrangle) is 32 feet long by 9 feet broad.

The dead sit along the walls, young and old, men and women, the chin resting in both hands, with their legs drawn up. Thin slabs form the cells round each skeleton, and are about 3 feet high, consequently do not reach the roof. Arrow points, knives, etc., of flintstone, are found with the men, pieces of amber with the women.

Numbers of similar graves are found in Sweden and Denmark, a single grave sometimes containing nearly one hundred bodies.

Fig. 7.—Plan of above grave.

Gallery or passage graves consisted of a chamber and a 74narrow gallery leading into it, the whole being covered by a mound, the base of which was generally surrounded by a circle of larger or smaller stones.

Fig. 8.—Passage grave near Karleby—front view; length of the main gallery, covered by nine large stones, 52 feet; width, 7 feet; length of passage, 40 feet; height, 6 feet.

The chamber in a passage grave is either oblong, square, oval, or nearly round; the walls are formed by large upright blocks, not quite smooth, though even on the inside; the interstices are generally carefully filled up with gravel or fragments of stone, and birch bark is sometimes found between the blocks. The roof was formed by immense flat slabs or blocks, smooth on the under side, but rough on the top, the interstices being closed in the same manner as those in the walls. The floor is sometimes covered with small flat stones, but usually with earth. On the long side of the chamber there is an opening, from which a passage was built in the same manner as the chamber, only longer and narrower. This passage, or more precisely its inner part, was covered with blocks resembling the roof blocks of the chamber, but smaller; near the inner opening of the passage, and the outer end of its covered part a kind of door setting has been often found, consisting of a stone threshold and two narrow doorposts.

75

Fig. 9.—Side view of passage grave near Karleby.

Fig. 10.—Ground-plan of passage grave near Karleby.

The irregular lines show the position of the slabs covering the grave.

76The passage graves vary much in size. The length of the chamber is generally from 11½ to 23 feet, its width from 5 to 10 feet; height from 3½ to 4½ feet. The passage is often as long as the chamber, or even longer, and its width is from 2 to 4 feet, and height from 3 to 5 feet. But some are much larger, and are called giants’ graves. One of the largest of these graves is that of Karleby, near Falköping, Vestergötland, in Sweden, where a great number of the graves of the stone age have been found.

Fig. 11.—Stone coffin (hällkista) near Skattened, in Södra Ryrs parish, Vestergötland, 21¼ feet in length. Graves of this type are very numerous in Bohuslan also, and in Dal and south-western Vermland.

This grave^[112] was found under a large but not very deep mound, and is divided into a large chamber and two smaller ones, separated by stone slabs.

In it were remains of sixty skeletons, and by their side a large number of poniards, spear-points, arrow-heads, and other objects of flint and stone, showing that the grave belonged to the period when stone implements were still in use; but among the skeletons in the lower part of the grave a couple of bronze beads and a bronze spear-point were found.

77

Fig. 12.

Fig. 13.—Plan of above Mound.

Mound, Broholm. Sepulchral chamber made of boulders, with short passage leading to it. Stones from 4 feet 15 inches to 4 feet high, and 2½ to 4 feet wide; inside of the chamber 9 feet wide. Only four stones remain of the passage leading to the chamber, which is about 2 feet wide, and turns south-west. The space between the boulders is filled with small stones. In the chamber were charcoal and different things. To the left of the entrance lay remains of two skulls close to each other; and spread in every direction were daggers, blades, and points of spears, points of arrows, numerous amber beads, a necklace of amber, four clay vessels, and fragments of others, &c.

78

Fig. 14.—Entrance to passage grave at Uby, Holbæk amt, Denmark. Diameter 100 feet, height 14 feet. The length of the chamber is 13½ feet, width 7½ feet, height 7½ feet. Entrance towards the south passage is 18 feet long, 2½ feet wide, and 5½ feet high. There were found in the passage many human bones and several flint implements and three small clay urns.

The isolated stone coffins were formed of flat upright stones, and were four-sided, though the two longer sides were not parallel, thus making the coffin narrower at one end than at 79the other. Most of them were probably covered with one or more stones; and although these have in many places long ago been destroyed or removed, they are sometimes still found in their place. The direction of these coffins is almost always from north to south, and they are generally surrounded by a mound of stones of more or less stone-mixed earth. This form of grave was probably the outcome of the omission of the passage. Several intermediate forms have been found, showing how the passage was gradually lessened until it can only be traced in the opening which narrows at the south end of the coffin.

Fig. 15.—Interior of the passage grave at Uby. The spaces between the large stones filled with pebbles. The roof is formed by two large stones which have been cut from a large block.

The length of the stone coffin was generally from 8 to 13½ feet, width from 3 to 5 feet, height from 2½ to 5 feet. A few, especially in Vestergötland, are from 19½ to 31 feet in length, one of the longest graves of this kind in Sweden being 80one on Stora Lundskulla, in Vestergötland, with a length of 34 feet, and width of 8 feet. Nearly all other stone coffins found are, like the gallery graves, without a stone at the southern end. This cannot be accidental.

Besides the stone coffin above described, several have been found covered with a mound. The chambers are generally formed of upright flat stones, and roofed also with stones. They are generally smaller than the stone coffins, being from 6 to 10 feet long, and closed on all four sides; sometimes, however, there is found in the southern end an opening as previously mentioned.

Fig. 16.—Clay urn—Stone age—⅓ real size. In passage grave, Stege, island of Möen, Baltic, found with remains of some skeletons. Two stone axes, a flint saw, 2 arrow-points, 3 spear-heads, fragments of clay vessels with covers, pieces of a wooden tub, 2 awls of bone, a chisel of bone, 3 flint wedges, 2 flat scrapers of flint, and 17 amber beads for necklace were also found in the grave. The same mound was afterwards used for burials belonging to the bronze age, with cinerary urns with burned bones, on the top of which was a double-edged bronze knife, &c.

Fig. 17.—Amber-beads forming a necklace found in the grave with the clay urn.

The same mound was afterwards used for burial belonging to the bronze age; near the top, and entirely separate from the burial-chambers, there was discovered a very small stone coffin containing an urn with burnt bones, and on these lay a fine double-edged knife, a knife, and a pair of pincers, all of bronze.

Fig. 18.—Clay vessel found near Fredericia, Jutland. ⅓ real size.

Fig. 19.—Clay urn. Stone age grave, with flint weapons and amber-beads. ⅓ real size. Island of Möen.

Fig. 20.—Necklace of amber beads found with other amber beads and ornaments, altogether about 2,500, in a bog at the hamlet of Lœsten, Viborg amt, Jutland. ¼ real size.

Fig. 21.—Clay vessel which had a top, Stone age. ⅓ real size.—Möen.

Fig. 22.—Stone axes, of the form of some bronze axes. Several specimens in the Copenhagen Museum. ⅓ real size.—Fyen.

The two axes in this page are given on account of their peculiar form, similar
to that of the bronze age. Many other forms of weapons will be found
illustrated in ‘The Land of the Midnight Sun.’

83

Fig. 23.—Clay vessel found in a burial chamber with flint implements and other objects near Aalborg, Denmark. ⅓ real size.

Fig. 24.—Clay vessel found in a large passage grave, with flint, and other implements, near Haderslev, Slesvig. ⅓ real size.

Abundance of gold—Stone occasionally used for arrow-heads—Pottery—Graves—Commencement of cremation—Objects of this period—Proficiency in the art of casting—Weapons—Ornaments more varied than in the stone age—The Kivik grave—Oak coffins—Clothing of the bronze age—Sewing implements—Burnt and unburnt bodies sometimes found in the same grave—Gold vessels and ornaments—Bronze vessels—Battle-horns—Bronze knives.

While the three ages to some extent overlap, while we find stone articles running into the bronze age, and bronze and even stone into the iron age, still the distinction between the three periods is too clearly marked to be overlooked. Thus in the bronze age, characterised by the use of that metal and of gold, the weapons were almost entirely of bronze; amber still continued to be used for ornaments, and towards the close of this epoch glass, in the shape of beads, and iron appeared, but silver seems to have been unknown. Sometimes stone continued to be used for arrow-heads and spear-points.

The pottery shows a distinct improvement on that of the stone age.

The graves of the bronze age, as in the preceding stone age, are covered by a mound of earth, or a cairn, and contain several burial places. During the latter part of the bronze age the custom of burning the dead was introduced, but in the earlier part the bodies were unburnt. When the custom of cremation commenced and how long it lasted it is utterly impossible to tell, but from the numerous finds it is evident that it must have been in use long before iron became known. The graves of this period also generally lie on the top of some high hill, or the cairns are placed on the summit of some promontory having an unobstructed view of the sea or some large sheet of water. These graves 85prove that the shores of the Baltic and of the Cattegat were once thickly inhabited by a people having the same customs and religion; and from the situations of the graves, as well as from the objects, etc., in them, we learn that they were a seafaring people. North of the great lakes on the large Scandinavian peninsula these antiquities become more rare, thus showing that country not to have been so thickly settled.

Fig. 25.—Cake of a rosin-like substance made of a paste of birch bark, and containing fragments of amber, used as a kind of putty to fill up the hollows of objects of bronze, &c., found in bogs and urns belonging to the bronze age.

From the finds of beautiful and often costly antiquities belonging to the bronze age,^[113] and from their great numbers, the fact is brought vividly to our mind, that even before iron was discovered there existed in those regions a remarkable culture.

The people had attained very great proficiency in the art of casting, most of the objects are cast, and some of the weapons have still the mark of the clay upon them; the model was sometimes made of wax and clay put round it, the bronze was cast into the mould thus made, and the wax melted into the mould which afterwards was broken in order to take out the sword or object manufactured. Some of the small daggers especially are marvels of casting, which could not be surpassed to-day. The largest swords are cast in one piece. In the collection at Copenhagen nine of these are perfect, the size of the longest being from 35 to 38 inches. The swords, daggers, poniards often have their hilts ornamented or twisted with threads of gold.

The weapons of the bronze epoch are the same as those of 86the stone age; poniards, axes, spears, bows and arrows. The sword and the shield seem to have been in common use; one of these now in Copenhagen was found covered with thin gold.

The simple ornaments of the stone age are replaced by more varied and beautiful ones. Gold jewels and vases become common and testify to the wealth of the people. In this age as in the preceding age of stone, the people of the North attained a greater degree of proficiency, and seem to have possessed a higher degree of civilisation than the people of Central and Northern Europe belonging to the same period.

The graves containing unburnt bones which belong to the early period of the bronze age are very similar to those of the preceding period of the stone age, they contain several skeletons then finally decrease in size until they become about 7 feet long, or just large enough to contain one body.

The bodies were often not buried in stone chambers but in coffins made of the trunks of oak trees. It may be that at a later period the customs of burning bodies and burying bodies unburnt co-existed, as will be seen in the account of the iron age. The warrior was buried with his weapons just as in the stone age.

One of the most interesting graves which I have seen, belonging, probably, to the bronze age, is the Kivik cairn (see p. 88), near the sea on a beautiful bay near the town of Cimbrisham. This monument is the only one of its kind known in the North. It shows perfect resemblance to others of the bronze age, and differs only from the cairns found on the hilltops of Bohuslän in its larger size. We have looked with great care at the tracings, which are not so deep as those of the rock-tracings situated in the neighbourhood. The signs carved on the stones are evidently symbolical, and were so made as to look upon the great chief that had been buried there.

87

Fig. 26.—Skeleton in a grave, about 8 feet 5 inches long, lying south-west and north-east. The mound, which was about 4 feet high, with a diameter of 50 feet, contained in the centre another grave. Hesselagergaard, Broholm, Fyen. The original position of the head of the warrior was 19 inches from the line of stones. The warrior was buried with his weapons just as in the stone age. The following were some of the objects found in the grave: Fragments of a bronze fibula, a little above the head to the right. Two bronze rings, on each side of the head, 6 inches from it. A bronze necklet; 13 inches below the lower edge of the necklet was a large, flat, bronze titulus (sort of shield boss) ornamented with three rows of spirals. Above the edge of the large titulus was a bronze dagger, in a scabbard, 8½ inches long.

Fig. 27.—Man buried with ornaments. Grave, 9 feet 6 inches long, 2 feet 3 inches wide, in a mound, Hesselagergaard. Among the ornaments were some spiral bracelets and finger rings, amber beads and one light blue glass bead.

88

Fig. 28.

Fig. 29.

Fig. 30.

Fig. 31.

Fig. 32.

Fig. 33.

Fig. 34.

Fig. 35.

Slab, from the Kivik grave.^[114]

The Kivik grave, like many others belonging to the bronze age situated by the sea, is about 700 feet in circumference. The coffin, of flat upright slabs, was discovered in 1750; its length is fourteen feet; width, three feet. It is formed by 89four slabs on each side, and one at the north end. These were nearly four feet high, three feet wide, and eight to nine inches thick, and placed side by side. The inner surfaces were more or less smooth, though neither cut nor polished, and on these were the tracings. Two of these stones were lost about seventy years ago. The grave was covered with three slabs, and pointed north and south.

Fig. 36.—Oak coffin. Kongshöi find (Jutland).

Fig. 37.—Oak coffin, with skeleton body covered with a woollen cloak, Treenhöi, Jutland; one half serving as bed.

In a mound at Havdrup in Ribe amt, Jutland, there were found in 1861 three well-preserved oak coffins. The contents of two had been taken out before the discovery was notified to the authorities, but the third was found in the state shown in the illustration. Near this mound was that of Kongshöi, containing four well-preserved oaken coffins. The contents of these were however not as well preserved as those in the coffins of Treenhöi. At the top of this mound there were discovered clay urns with burnt bones.

90In some of these oaken coffins are found wooden bowls with handles, and ornamented with inserted pins of tin.

The articles of dress, found in a most extraordinary state of preservation in the oak coffin, kept from decay no doubt by the tannin in the oak, show how the people of the North dressed well before iron had come into use among them. These are the earliest perfect garments known, and even the latest period to which they belong cannot be far from three thousand years ago, and they may be of a much earlier date.

Fig. 38.—Oak coffin, Treenhöi, Jutland; one half serving as bed.

Among the most interesting graves which have given remarkable results in regard to dress are the mounds of Treenhöi by Vandrup, near Kolding, in Jutland.

In a man’s grave was a small cap covering the head of the body, which was wrapped in a deer-skin, composed of several sewn pieces of woven material, and ornamented outside with woollen threads, which had been inserted, and terminating with knots.

91

Fig. 39.—Cap.

Fig. 40.—Woollen shawl.

Fig. 41.—Cap.

Fig. 42.—Coarse woollen cloak.

Fig. 43.—Woollen skirt held by a striped band.

Articles of clothing, Treenhöi, Jutland.

On the left side under the cloak lay a bronze sword in a wooden sheath, of lath lined with deer-skin, the hair being inside. The hilt was ornamented by an oval bronze button at its top. There were no traces of leggings or other protection for the legs, but the feet seem to have been protected by strips of wool, and to have had leather shoes or sandals on.

92

Fig. 44.—Woman’s skirt and bodice of wool, found with bronze ornaments, and a bronze poniard with horn handle by the side of the body which had been wrapped in a deer-skin.—Aarhus, North Jutland.

The graves of women contain daggers, which may possibly imply that the women had been warriors; also large spiral rings, various ornaments, finger-rings, bracelets, glass beads, &c.

Women’s dress of the bronze age seems to have consisted of the skirt and bodice as at the present time, but the men’s clothes were quite different from those of the iron age; in the earlier time trousers were not worn, while we see them in use in the latter.

Many sewing implements of bronze have been found in the graves, the needles like those of the stone age are sometimes made of bone, but many are of bronze; awls were used to pierce the holes in garments that were made of skins, and some peculiar shaped knives have been found which were probably used in the making of skin clothing, or in cutting leather.

In a grave-mound near Aarhus, in North Jutland, a coffin made of two oak logs was found. The bottom of the coffin was covered with an untanned ox or deer-hide. On this lay a large cloak, made of coarse wool and cattle-hair. In the cloak, which was partly destroyed, was wrapped the skeleton of a 93woman dressed. The hair was long and dark, and a net covered the head, tied under the chin.

Fig. 45.—Profile of mound of the bronze age, with large coffin and unburnt body, and stone cist with cinerary urn containing burnt bones, also three smaller stone cists filled with burnt bones. Dömmerstorf, S. Halland.

Fig. 46.—Mound and sepulchral cist. The stones in this grave were of size of the fist, and formed a pavement of a diameter of about a yard. The urn contained burnt bones, among which were found a bronze awl, and fragments of a bronze saw.

Fig. 47.—Mound at Elsehoved, Fyen. At the bottom, in the centre of the mound, was found an irregular grave filled with earth, of about 4 feet 9 inches in length, 1 foot 9 inches in width, 1 foot 10 inches in depth (measured inside). Outside, on the natural soil, was spread a bed of earth, rich in charcoal, which contained remains of burnt bones and pieces of a clay urn, &c.

Burnt and unburnt bodies are sometimes found in the same mound; the latter generally at the bottom of the graves, the former at the top, this shows that the graves with unburnt bodies are considerably the older of the two. A mound with several graves may possibly have been the burial place of one family. The graves of the later bronze age are more 94numerous on the shores of the Baltic than in other parts of Europe. Sometimes the burnt remains have been found wrapped in clothing, and placed in an ordinary sized coffin, but more generally these burnt bones are preserved in urns of clay enclosed in a small stone cist.

Fig. 48.—Cairn covered with earth, bronze age, Kongstrup, Zealand. Diameter nearly 40 feet; height, 10 feet; covered with about 3 feet of clay, containing over thirty urns, one of which was fastened with a resin-like substance; with burnt bones and cinders, protected by little sepulchral cists made of slabs.

Fig. 49.—Mound of the bronze age, covering a double ring of stones; diameter of outside ring 86 feet; containing several burial-places, with urns and burnt bones.—Near Kallundborg, Zealand.

These stone cists of about the length of an average man are interesting as indicating the transition to the small ones containing burnt bones; some of these of a size large enough for an unburnt body have contained only a small heap of burnt bones, and evidently belonged to the period when the cremation of the dead began to prevail. Many of these little cists are only large enough to enclose a clay pot, in which the bones were collected; sometimes no coffins were found, but only clay pots containing ashes, a small bronze knife, a bit of bronze saw, or something of that kind. In some cases the bones were put simply into a hole in the mound and the whole covered with a stone slab.

95

Fig. 50.—Clay vase; ⅙ real size. Found in stone cist in the mound with an urn containing burnt bones, among which lay two bronze knives.—Mound at Gjöttrup, near Lögstör, Denmark.

Fig. 51.—Pot of burned clay; ¼ real size. Found in a mound with urns and bronze objects.—Vidstrup, Hjörring amt, Denmark.

Fig. 52.—Cinerary urn, ⅙ real size. Burnt bones.—Holstein.

Fig. 53.—Cinerary urn, ⅙ real size. With burnt bones.—Jutland.

Fig. 54.—Fragment of woollen cloth. Real size. Found at the bottom of a mound at Dömmestorp, in Halland; in a fold of it lay a well-preserved bronze poniard with its leather scabbard. The shawl was 5 feet long and 20 inches wide.

96

Fig. 55.—Maglehöj mound; height about 14 feet, diameter 40 to 50 feet; with sepulchral chamber, height, 5 feet; width, 5½ feet; length, 7 feet. Inside the chamber the ground was laid with cobble-stones; on top of these flint-stones, 2 to 3 inches in thickness; and then again a layer of cobble-stones, and among these were found: a diadem of bronze, two pieces of shields or breast-armour, the blade of a dagger, &c., &c.—Zeeland.

Fig. 56.—Floor of chamber.—Maglehöj.

Fig. 57.—Interior of chamber with cinerary urn.—Maglehöj.

97

Fig. 58.—Gold vessel, ½ real size, found with ten other similar ones. All of 20-carat gold. Placed with the handles downward in the bronze urn, Fyen (see p. 101).

Fig. 59.—Gold vessel, ⅓ real size, handle surrounded with gold threads. Found with a gold vessel in a mound, Zeeland.

Fig. 60.—Bottom of the vase.

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Fig. 61.—Gold vessel, about ½ real size, found under a slab, Halland. Weight, 2 oz. 5 dr.

Fig. 62.—Design forming the bottom part of the vase. ¼ real size.

Fig. 63.—Bracelet of solid gold, ¾ real size; weight, 6 oz.—Scania.

Fig. 64.—Diadem of gold, ⅔ real size, Balsby, Scania; deposited, together with four massive bronze axes, upon a slab below the surface of the ground.

99

Fig. 65.—Hollow bracelet of gold, real size, found with four spiral gold bracelets near a large stone.—Skärje, Bohuslan.

Fig. 66.—Spiral ring of double thread of gold.—Scania.

Fig. 67.—Pincers of gold. Real size.—Halland.

Fig. 68.—Bronze pincers. ¾ real size.—Fyen.

Fig. 69.—Bronze pincers. Real size.—Scania.

100

Fig. 70.—Bronze vessel, with representation of sun ship, with prow and stern alike, as in northern ships. ⅓ real size.—Bog near Aalborg, Denmark.

Vessels of bronze are uncommon in the graves; some by their form seem to be of Greek origin, while others appear to be of Northern make. Some beautifully cast, and of peculiar shape, seem to have been made to be suspended. Some are ornamented with the svastica^[115] and other symbolic signs, and may have been used to carry offerings to the gods.

101

Fig. 71.—Bronze vase, in which were found eleven gold vessels with handles like illustration. Representation of sun ship, ⅓ real size.—Bog find, Rönninge, Fyen, Denmark.

Fig. 72.—A vase of bronze found in a grave-cist in a mound, Fyen. The cist was three feet wide, built of stone slabs, with one on the top. ⅓ real size.

Fig. 73.—Bronze vase, with burnt bones, a gold arm-ring, four double buttons (two of gold and two of bronze), two bronze knives, &c., Denmark.

102

Fig. 74.—Bronze vase. ½ real size.—Broby, Denmark.

Fig. 75.—Bronze pail. ¼ real size.—Ögemose, Denmark.

103

Fig. 76.—Hanging vase of bronze. ½ real size.—Bog, Senāte, Vestergötland.

Fig. 77.—¼ real size. Svastica.

Fig. 78.—⅓ real size. Scania.

Fig. 79.—¼ real size.

Patterns of the bottom of different vases.

The bogs^[116] of Denmark contain large horns or trumpets, made entirely of bronze, with pendant chains (see p. 104). Nothing exactly corresponding to them has yet been discovered in other countries. They have been cast in several pieces, and with surprising skill, and are carefully fastened together by rivets which interlace each other. Sometimes they have been buried in the bogs in a broken state, but generally have been so well preserved that they can still be blown. They produce a dull and not very loud sound. On one occasion they have been found with a shield of bronze and a few bronze swords, hence their use in battle may be inferred. But generally several of them are found together, rarely less than two, and sometimes as many as six on the same spot.

104

Fig. 80.—Battle horn of bronze, ⅛ real size.—Bog, Fredriksborg Amt, Denmark.

Fig. 81.—Ornament to battle-horn. ½ real size.

Fig. 82.—Horn of bronze, ⅐ real size.—Bog, Scania, at a depth of over 6 feet.

Fig. 83.—Battle horn of bronze, with chain ornamented with birds; ⅛ real size, or 30 inches long.—Bog, Ribe Amt, Denmark.

105

Fig. 84.—Bronze boats covered with gold.—Nors parish, North Jutland.

A perfectly unique find belonging to the bronze age is that discovered at Nors parish, Northern Jutland, in 1885. In an urn, greatly damaged, were about 100 small boats of bronze canoe-shaped, about four to five inches in length, placed one into another, all covered inside and outside with a thin sheet of gold; some have been found to be ornamented with concentric 106rings on the side. What was the meaning of the offering or find will always remain a mystery.

The curiously-shaped knives, which are found in very great numbers, seem to be peculiar to the North, and the North of Germany. What they were used for is hard to tell, possibly as sacrificial knives. It can hardly be doubted that the signs upon them are symbolical; some may be representations of the sun-ship, others are somewhat like minute representations of the rock-tracings, or designs upon Greek coins, while the heads of horses remind us of the gold vases represented in this chapter.

Fig. 85.—Bronze knife, with sun ship and fish. Real size. In a mound at Skjellerup, near Aarhus, North Jutland.

Fig. 86.—Bronze knife, without handle, with a serpent. Real size. In a mound, Jutland, with three stone coffins.

Fig. 87.—Bronze knife. Real size. Found in mound in Jutland.

Fig. 88.—Bronze knife in clay urn, with burnt bones, two other knives, &c. ⅔ real size.—Denmark.

107

Fig. 89.—Bronze knife, with a vessel. ⅔ real size. In a mound.—Fyen.

Fig. 90.—Bronze knife.—Jutland.

Fig. 91.—Bronze knife; ship, with two suns and S. Skanderborg Amt, Denmark. ⅔ real size.—Jutland.

Fig. 92.—Bronze knife, with ship, sun, and triskele. ⅔ real size.—In an urn in Holstein.

Fig. 93.—Bronze knife, mound at Dömmestorp, Halland, in a ruined stone cist. Real size.

108

Fig. 94.—Bronze knife, with two ships very like those on rock-tracings. Real size.—In a mound near Vimose on Fyen.

Fig. 95.—Bronze knife, Scania. Real size.—Scania.

Fig. 96.—In a mound.—Zeeland.

Fig. 97.—Found in a field in Fyen, near Svendborg, with two other swords.

Fig. 98.

Fig. 99.—Found with bones and charcoal in a mound.—Fyen.

Handles of bronze swords. ⅓ real size.

109

Fig. 100.—Real size.

Fig. 101.—Real size.

Fig. 102.—Real size.—Zeeland.

Fig. 103.—In urn with burnt bones, together with a bronze knife, tongs, and an arrow-point. Real size.—Möen.

Fig. 104.—Real size.—Möen.

Daggers.

Varying in size from 3 inches to 6½ inches.

110

Fig. 105.—½ real size.

In a field in the side of a lake with 163 pieces of bronze.

Fig. 106.—½ real size.

Fig. 107.—¼ real size.

Found with Fig. 105.

Fig. 108.—½ real size.

Spear-heads, bronze.

Fig. 109.—In a bog, Falster. ⅓ real size.

Fig. 110.—In a bog, Jutland. ⅓ real size.

Fig. 111.—In mound, Jutland. ⅓ real size.

Fig. 112.—Upper part of bronze sword. ½ real size.—Scania.

Swords.—These peculiar bronze swords are found in various towns in England and Germany.

111

Fig. 113.—Spear-point of bronze. ½ real size. In a heap of coals with twenty other spear-points.—Nordre Aurdal, Christiania.

Fig. 114.—Spear-head of bronze. ⅓ real size.—Fálköping, Vestergötland.

Fig. 115.—Knife of bronze. ⅙ real size. In stone coffin in a mound, Island of Möen, in the Baltic, with a sword and a knife.

Fig. 116.—Knife of bronze. ⅓ real size.

112

Fig. 117.—Knife of bronze. ⅓ real size. In mound, Zeeland.

Fig. 118.—Knife of bronze. ½ real size.—Halland, Sweden.

Fig. 119.—½ real size. In urn, Holstein.

Fig. 120.—⅓ real size. In urn, Fyen.

Knives of bronze.

Fig. 121.—Bronze sword. ⅓ real size.—Vestergotland.

113

Fig. 122.—Sword of bronze, ⅕ real size.—Lake Längsjon, Uppland.

Fig. 123.—Dagger of bronze; full length, 24 inches.—Köngshöi find, Denmark.

Fig. 124.—Leather sheath for bronze dagger, handle of horn; in tumulus at Dömmestorp, Halland.

Fig. 125.—One-edged bronze sword, found in a bog, Östergötland, Sweden. Length, about 20 inches. The only one of this type found in the North. Prof. Stephens in his ‘Runic Monuments’ shows that the type is Assyrian, and that it has come by the trade routes through Russia into Sweden from Asia.

114

Fig. 126.—Bronze shield with handle. ⅕ real size.—Denmark.

115

Fig. 127.—Thin shield of bronze, ⅛ real size, found in a bog at a depth of a little more than 3 feet. 66 inches full size diameter; bird-like figures round centre.—Halland.

Fig. 128.—One-eighth part of a small bronze shield, measuring only 27 inches in diameter, containing eight triangles; ½ size. In a bog, Falster.

116

Fig. 129.—⅓ real size.—Flensborg amt. Denmark.

Fig. 130.—⅓ real size.

Fig. 131.—Massive bronze axe, ⅓ real size, ornamented on three sides.—Veile amt, Denmark.

Fig. 132.—In Randersfjord, Jutland. ½ real size.

Bronze axes.

117

Fig. 133.—Bronze axe; ½ real size.—Scania.

Fig. 134.—Bronze axe; ⅓ real size.—Bohuslän, Sweden.

Fig. 135.—⅓ real size. Ploughed up in a field, Zeeland.

Fig. 136.—Fragment of bronze axe, ⅓ real size, with handle of oak.—Near Eskilstuna, Södermanland.

Fig. 137.—Axe of thin layer of bronze, ⅙ real size, cast upon a mould of clay, ornamented with some round plaques of gold, in the midst of which are pieces of amber.—Södermanland, Sweden.

118

Fig. 138.—Two forms of stone for casting; one for four saws, the other for two knives. ⅓ real size.—Scania.

Fig. 139.—Necklace of bronze. ⅓ real size.—Bog, V.-Götland.

119

Fig. 140.—Saw of bronze. ½ real size.—Denmark.

Fig. 141.—Bronze ring. Real size.—Denmark.

Fig. 142.—One of two bronze bracelets round wrist of skeleton in tumulus, Dömmestorp, Halland. ⅔ real size.

Fig. 143.—Bronze ring. Real size.—Denmark.

Fig. 144.—Bronze bracelet, ½ real size.—Denmark.

120

Fig. 145.—Fibula of bronze. ⅔ real size. Found with a bronze ring in bog, Zeeland.

Fig. 146.—Head ornament or hair-ring. Little less than ½ size.

Fig. 147.—Long spiral bracelet, found near a big stone, Scania.

121

Fig. 148.—Tutulus of bronze, with many other objects, in a large mound at Bosgården, near Lund, Sweden.

Fig. 149.—Bracelet. ½ real size.—Denmark.

Fig. 150.—Bracelet of bronze. ⅔ real size.—Scania.

122

Fig. 151.—Diadem of bronze. ½ real size.—Denmark.

Fig. 152.—Button of bronze. Real size.—Scania.

Fig. 153.—Button found with other objects in a small clay urn, with burnt bones, surrounded by little slabs; real size.—Dömmestorp, Halland.

Fig. 154.—Fibula of bronze. ⅖ real size.—Scania.^[117]

Fig. 155.—Bronze pin. ⅓ real size.—Bohuslän.

123

Fig. 156.—In a private collection. ⅔ real size.

Fig. 157.—Found in a bog among the contents of a bronze vessel—rings, pins, knives, etc. ½ real size.—Fyen.

Bronze pins.

Fig. 158.—⅔ real size.—Jutland.

Fig. 159.—In urn with burnt bones. ⅔ real size.—Jutland.

124

Fig. 160.—Bracelet of gold. ½ real size.

Fig. 161.—Twisted necklace of bronze, ½ real size, found in a bog at a depth of 1m. 5c. at Langhö, Södermanland.

Fig. 162.—Ornament of bronze, ⅛ real size, for wooden pail.—Bog of Balkåkra, near Ystad, Scania.

The three historic ages overlap each other—Division of the iron age by archæologists—Gradual development in the mode of burial during the three ages—Appearance of silver, lead, and glass—Greek and Roman objects—Cinerary deposits—Cremation—The Kannikegaard cemetery—Primitive kettle-shaped graves—Intentional destruction of weapons and armour in graves—Cinerary urns—Symbolic signs—Ornaments of the iron age.

In the iron age, when the knowledge of all the metals was known, and weapons were made of iron, bones were still sometimes used for arrow-heads; this age gradually merges into the historic period. It is impossible to assign definite limits of time to the three prehistoric ages; they run by degrees into each other; the classification specifies no division of time, but marks degrees of development in man.

Northern archæologists divide the iron age in the North into the earlier, middle, and later iron age, in the same manner as they have divided the preceding stone and bronze ages; and it may safely be said that in all these ages the North surpasses other countries in the beauty and number of its objects. All the antiquities, as well as the Eddas and Sagas, plainly show that the people who inhabited the eastern and southern shores of the present Scandinavia^[118], the islands of the Baltic, and the southern shores of that sea, to a certain distance inland, which now comprise Northern Germany, were of the same origin and belonged to the same race; and the 126vast number of weapons of various kinds testify equally with the records to the warlike character of the people. The finish of the weapons of the later stone age is something wonderful, many of them are as polished as glass; the weapons of bronze are equally remarkable.

In the beginning of the iron age appear the shears, which are very similar to those now in use. Clothes during this period were generally kept together by pins and buckles, which have been found in great numbers; horns were used as drinking cups, and domestic vessels of glass, bronze, silver, gold, wood, or burnt clay, and objects of Roman manufacture, dice, checkers or draughtsmen, and chessmen, have also been unearthed.

At a very early period of this age remains of brynjas, or coats of ring armour, have been found in graves where burning of the dead has taken place; this shows that they were known in the North even in the beginning of the Christian era, if not before; they are also met with in graves of a later period, and in the bog finds of the third and fourth century.

Along with iron the people became also acquainted with silver, lead, glass, &c., and knew the art of soldering and gilding metals. The jewels and ornaments in their design and workmanship show a considerable advance in taste.

At what time the use of iron began to be known among the people and when it superseded bronze is impossible to tell: the change must have taken place a long time before the ships of the Suiones were described by Tacitus, a wonderful example of the accuracy of whose description is found in the Nydam boat of which I will speak hereafter. Iron is very abundant in Sweden and Norway, and bog iron was no doubt plentiful in the islands of the Baltic; the use of the latter is proved by masses of slag, weapons, &c. found in the earliest graves of the iron age. The use of the bronze of the preceding period continued, and many objects of bronze are evidently of home manufacture.

127

Fig. 163.—Cinerary deposit. Hole, filled with stones, 4½ feet deep, 3 feet in diameter.—Fyen.

Fig. 164.—Cinerary deposit. Grave, 5 feet in diameter, 4 feet deep, lined with cobble stones, burnt bones, and broken fragments of clay urns.—Fyen.

Fig. 165.—Cinerary deposit. Grave, 16 feet long, 6 feet wide, running from north-west to south-west, with hole 2½ feet deep, containing burnt bones and fragments of ornamented clay urns, remains of a large one-edged knife, &c.—Grönneskev field, Fyen.

The earliest graves^[119] belonging to this iron age in the North are called by Northern archæologists depôts cineraires (cinerary deposits). These graves are round bowl-shaped holes, the excavations being from about two to four feet in diameter, and three to four feet deep: into these the remains of the funeral pyre, such as burnt bones of the corpse, ashes, charcoal, fragments of clay, urns, ornaments, jewels, other objects 128and weapons are thrown in, without order or method. The burnt bones and the charcoal are scattered sometimes over a bed covering a certain space, or sometimes in a heap together.

In other graves the antiquities are found resting on the black mould itself. What were the causes which led to the temporary disuse of the mound-burials we cannot tell.

Then came a period when after the burning of the corpse on the pyre the pieces of the bones were gathered into urns of clay, wooden buckets with metal mountings, vessels of bronze or glass bowls; these latter being very rare. These urns, &c., which are frequently found covered, for protection, by other vessels, were placed in chambers of varying sizes, those of the earliest graves being made of slabs, and just large enough to contain the sepulchral urn.

It should be mentioned that the development of the form of these graves runs in an unbroken chain, beginning with the large grave chamber of the stone age, and culminating in the insignificant receptacles for preserving a mere handful of burnt bones.

These graves are found sometimes singly, and at others in many hundreds, and even thousands, together.

The Kannikegaard cemetery on the island of Bornholm in the Baltic, and that of Möllegaard by Broholm on the island of Fyen, are perhaps the two richest antiquarian fields of the earliest iron grave period. Kannikegaard must have been a very large common graveyard; it is over 1,000 feet long and over 150 feet wide, and formed, no doubt, part of a more extensive burial ground, as there are other graves some 200 feet further on. In nearly all the graves scorched stones have been found, often in such quantities that they nearly fill the grave; a clay urn was also often found standing at the bottom of the burnt spots or lying on its side, sometimes with the bottom up or in broken pieces; many graves contain no antiquities, and hold only burnt bones and charcoal.^[120]

129In no other part of Europe do we see such a vast number of graves of this period, showing that the North must then have been inhabited by a far more dense population than other countries; from the number and contents of these depôts cineraires, we gather that the population burned its dead in large burial-grounds.

The practice of burning the dead had already become common in the latter part of the bronze age, and prevailed most extensively, if not entirely, during the iron period immediately following it.

Connected with the burning of the dead was the intentional damage done to objects which were exposed to the heat of the funeral pyre. Special care seems to have been taken to render swords and other weapons thoroughly useless. Swords are cut on the edges, bent and twisted; shield bosses are dented or flattened; and jewels and other objects are entirely ruined, and the illustrations seen in these volumes will show how thorough the destruction was. Bent swords and shield bosses, &c., were sometimes placed over the cinerary urn, at other times they were put at their side.

We find that the same custom also existed during the cremation period of the bronze age,^[121] many of the swords of that period being broken in several places.

Among the objects most commonly found are shears, iron knives, silver and bronze fibulæ, glass beads, melted or whole in many of which the colours are unaltered, and as fresh as if made to-day; iron and bone combs, tweezers of iron, amber beads, buckles, dice, draughtsmen, fragments of trappings for horses and waggons, ornaments of gold and silver, fragments of cloth, weapons, iron keys, fragments of bronze and iron vessels, iron clinch nails, spurs of bronze and iron (showing that horses were used at a very early period in the North), clay urns, &c., &c. A remarkable fact is that the earliest 130swords seem to be chiefly single-edged, a departure from the shape of the bronze swords: the fragments of the shields are of wood, with heavy iron bosses and handles.

Fig. 166.—Axe, ruined by cuts on its edge.—Norway.

Fig. 167.—Shield boss, ruined by cuts, Norway. Found with a double-edged sword, blade broken in two places, a bit for a horse, &c. ⅓ real size.

Fig. 168.

Fig. 169.

Fig. 170.

Half-moon shaped knives, sharp on the outside edge, with one end ending in a loop or ring, and the handle twisted; found at Kannikegaard. ½ real size.

Fig. 171.—Single-edged sword, from cinerary deposit at Kannikegaard. ⅕ real size.

Fig. 172.—Found in cinerary deposit at Kannikegaard, one of nineteen nearly perfect swords. ¼ real size.

131

Fig. 173.—Double-edged sword, found over a clay urn with burnt bones. ½ real size.—Öland.

Fig. 174.—Shield boss. ½ real size.—Kannikegaard.

Fig. 175.—Sword of iron, found with unburnt bones, fragments of a knife, and wooden scabbard. Kannikegaard. ⅛ real size.

Fig. 176.—Bronze needle. Real size. Kannikegaard.

Fig. 177.—Two-edged sword, found in cinerary deposit at Kannikegaard. ⅕ real size.

Fig. 178.—Iron knife; ⅓ real size. Kannikegaard.

132

Fig. 179.—Sword, Odense Amt Fyen. ⅛ real size.

Fig. 180.—Bent sword. Real size.—Kannikegaard.

Fig. 181.—Single-edged sword, found in cinerary deposit Bornholm.

Fig. 182.—Single-edged sword, from cinerary deposit at Kannikegaard.

Fig. 183.—Sword from the grave-place near Horsens; found with a bronze kettle, containing burnt bones, a heavy finger-ring of gold, a torn shield-boss of bronze, a shield handle of iron with nails of bronze, a spear-head, two iron spurs, one pair of iron shears, two knives, one iron buckle, bronze mountings for a drinking horn, melted glass, fragments of a pan and sieve of bronze, different mountings of silver, numbers of pieces of melted iron and bronze; not far from the grave were found more than thirty urns containing burnt bones, and several skeleton graves.

133

Fig. 184.—Neck-ring of silver. ½ real size. Kannikegaard.

Fig. 185.—Sword. ⅕ real size.—Kannikegaard.

Fig. 186.—Spear-point, found near Kannikegaard. ¼ real size.

Fig. 187.—Bent sword. ⅕ real size.—Kannikegaard.

Fig. 188.—Iron comb, real size, found with an urn containing burnt bones of a child, &c., with other objects.

134

Fig. 189.—Stone cist with three layers of stone on the top, containing unburnt bones.—Kannikegaard.

Fig. 190.—Inside of stone cist. Length, 6½ feet; width, 2 feet 10 inches; height, 22 inches. On left shoulder of skeleton, under the right shoulder, on the breast and by the head, were silver fibulæ.—Kannikegaard.

Fig. 191.—Stone coffin, 7½ feet long, 20 inches wide, 18 inches high, showing how the beads were placed.—Kannikegaard.

Fig. 192.—Fibula of bronze, plated with silver. ⅔ real size. Found in a piece of woollen cloth, with numerous beads, &c., in a stone coffin.—Kannikegaard.

135

Fig. 193.—Bead of gold and silver mixed. Real size.—Kannikegaard.

Fig. 194.—Mosaic bead, of red colour. Real size.—Kannikegaard.

Fig. 195.—Mosaic bead, real size, found with a silver ring.—Kannikegaard.

Fig. 196.—Glass bead. Real size.—Kannikegaard.

Fig. 197.—Fibula of bronze: on its pin was a piece of linen—found with mosaic beads in a stone coffin. Real size.—Kannikegaard.

Fig. 198.—Fibula of silver, with fragments of bone comb, long knife, with remains of wooden scabbard, &c. Stone coffin 9 feet long. Real size.—Kannikegaard.

Fig. 199.—Bead of gold and silver mixed, made of three pieces soldered together.—Kannikegaard.

Fig. 200.—Axe of iron, found together with human teeth, horn comb, &c. ½ real size.—Kannikegaard.

136

Fig. 201.—Cylinder-shaped receiver of bronze ⅔ real size, with a cover and pieces of a leather band; in it were 7–8 pointed pieces of wood, probably toothpicks or pins.—Kannikegaard.

Fig. 202.—Iron sword, slightly more than ⅛ real size.—Kannikegaard.

Fig. 203.—One-edged sword, from a grave-mound, Norway. 2
9 real size.

Fig. 204.—Double-edged sword, from a grave-mound, Norway, found with other damaged weapons, &c. 2
9 real size.

137

Fig. 205.—Iron spear-point, found in clay urn. Skovlyst, Ribe, Jutland.

Fig. 206.—Spear-point, from a cairn, Norway; found with two unburnt bodies, seven bronze buckles, a bronze key, seven beads of glass and amber, &c. 2
9 real size.

Fig. 207.—Stirrup, from a grave-mound, Norway, found with another similar stirrup, a double-edged sword, spear-point, axe blade, &c., all damaged. 2
9 real size.

Fig. 208.—Cinerary urn and bent sword with iron sheath.—Skovlyst, Ribe, Jutland.

138

Fig. 209.—Black clay urn, with hollow spots, ¼ real size, containing burnt bones.—Broholm, Fyen.

Fig. 210.—Clay urn with svastica, ¼ real size, top of which was closed by the bottom of another, containing burnt bones, a pointed iron knife, a needle of bronze, melted lumps of glass from beads of different colours, &c.—Bornholm.

The cinerary urns are of different sizes and shapes, many of which are not ungraceful: the clay of which they are made is of a black or greyish colour, coarse and rough, porous, and often very tender; the people even at a later period never 139seeming to have been skilled in the potter’s art. Many of the designs upon them are peculiar, and were, no doubt, symbolical. Among these are circles with dots, triangles, the svastika and triad, &c., &c. Glazed pottery was unknown in the North.

Fig. 211.—Dark brown clay urn, ⅓ real size.—Möllegaard, Broholm.

Fig. 212.—Urn with fine vertical stripes and punctuation, containing burnt bones, bone comb with bronze rivets, ornamented with concentric lines along the back. ¼ real size.—Möllegaard, Broholm.

140

Fig. 213.—Urn of dark grey colour, containing burnt bones, &c.—Möllegaard, Broholm.

Fig. 214.—Black urn, containing only burnt bones. ¼ real size.—Möllegaard, Broholm.

Fig. 215.—Urn of reddish clay, ⅓ real size, which had another urn on the top like a cover.—Kannikegaard.

Fig. 216.—Small urn. Real size, containing nothing but earth.—Kannikegaard.

141

Fig. 217.—Clay urn, ⅛ real size.—Kannikegaard.

Fig. 218.—Clay urn.—Kannikegaard.

Fig. 219.—Small greyish clay urn found in a burned spot. ⅓ real size.—Möllegaard, Broholm.

Fig. 220.—Urn, ⅓ real size, and glass mosaic beads, real size; two of the beads found were blue, with bands of red, yellow, and red; two more were blue, with a pattern repeated four times, containing black, yellow, red, and white grounds; one was white, with a wheel-like pattern, repeated three times, having a red centre and black spokes—Möllegaard, Broholm.

Fig. 221.

Fig. 222.

Fig. 223.

Fig. 224.

142

Fig. 225.—Clay urn filled with burnt bones, and numerous objects. ¼ real size—Möllegaard.

Fig. 226.—Wooden bucket with bronze hoops. ¼ real size. Found in large mound, with burnt bones, and a piece of gold spiral ring.—Norway.

Fig. 227.—Wooden bucket, with bronze fittings, ⅓ real size. Found in a large round tumulus inside a stone sepulchral chamber, with two pairs of iron scissors, fragments of two double-edged swords, fragments of several arrow-heads, two shield bosses, &c., &c.—Norway.

143

Fig. 228.—Clay urn, ⅓ real size, found in a tumulus with another clay urn.

Fig. 229.—Clay urn, upside down, to cover a bronze basin, of Roman manufacture, placed on a slab filled with ashes and burnt bones, fragments of bronze ornaments and glass vessels which had been exposed on the pyre; ashes and bones were scattered round, showing the burning to have taken place on the spot. ⅓ real size.—Harf Medelpad, Norway.

Fig. 230.—Clay urn in a stone cist containing the remains of a skeleton, &c. ¼ real size.—Sojvide, Gotland.

144In Gotland, the graves are made of lime slabs. Some of these stone cists are not deep under the ground, and without apparently any mound.

Fig. 231.—Clay urn, ⅓ real size, found in a round mound, inside a sepulchral chamber of the length of 6 feet, width 2 feet, height 1 foot 8 inches.—Norway.

Fig. 232.—Clay urn, ½ real size, found in a mound containing a large stone cist, with fragments of iron objects and another clay urn.—Norway.

Fig. 233.—Clay urn, in a mound. Bohuslan.

Fig. 234.—Clay urn in a stone cist.—Gotland.

145

Fig. 235.—Clay urn, covering one filled with burnt bones. ¼ real size.—Nafverstad, Bohuslån.

Fig. 236.—Clay urn, with three partitions (on the outside are ten knobs), found, with fragments of a belt hook, under a stone slab. ⅔ real size.—Himmelshöi, Bornholm.

Fig. 237.—Clay urn, ⅓ real size, found in a round mound, inside a sepulchral chamber.—Stavanger, Norway.

Fig. 238.—Clay urn, ¼ real size, found in a mound.—Norway.

146

Fig. 239.—Clay urn, ¼ real size, containing burnt bones.—Norway. Earlier iron age.

Fig. 240.—Clay urn, ⅓ real size, found in a mound placed over burnt bones contained in a clay urn.—Norway. Earlier iron age.

Fig. 241.—Clay urn.—Norway. ½ real size. Skeleton grave, found with five other clay urns, a silver fibula, &c.

147

Fig. 242.—Clay urn filled with burnt bones and covered with another vase. ¼ real size. Found in a large round tumulus—Bohuslån.

Fig. 243.—Clay urn, containing burnt bones and fragments of a bone comb, glass beads, lever balance of spindle, &c., found, covered with a slab, in an oblong mound. ⅓ real size. Earlier iron age.

Fig. 244.—Iron urn or kettle, 10 inches high, 12¾ inches in diameter, and 6 inches deep.—Norway. Three other kettles of same shape and workmanship have been found: one in a grave-mound.

Fig. 245.—Bronze cinerary urn; ⅕ real size.—Norway.

148

Fig. 246.—Bronze kettle, ⅕ real size.—Norway. Found under a slab in the border of a round mound. It contained burnt bones, among which was a gold bracelet, and other objects.

Fig. 247.

Fig. 248.

Small clay vessels found in an oblong mound at Greby, Bohuslån, found with a clay urn filled with burnt bones, on which were fragments of a bone comb, glass beads, &c. ½ real size. Earlier iron age.

Fig. 249.—Round clay urn, found in a mound, Greby, Bohuslån, containing burnt bones and two melted glass beads, &c. ¼ real size. Earlier iron age.

149

Fig. 250.—Clay urn, ¼ real size, containing burnt bones, found inside a sepulchral chamber of stone, 6 feet long, nearly 4 feet wide, and 3 feet high, in a round tumulus.—Norway.

Fig. 251.—Cinerary vase of clay, ⅕ real size, found surrounded by burnt bones in a mound at Björkö. Later iron age.

Fig. 252.

Fig. 253.

Fig. 254.

Fig. 255.

Four of seven mosaic glass beads, real size.—Broholm grave.

Of variegated colours, yellow, white, black, blue, and red, and of different designs. Besides those represented were 26 blue glass beads, one of which had red stripes, one red, another lilac; there were also eight amber beads, different shapes, and a fibula of bronze, to which was attached a coarse woven cloth, &c.

Fig. 256.

Fig. 257.

Iron knives, ½ real size, in an urn on the top of burnt bones without coal and ashes.—Möllegaard, Broholm.

150

Fig. 258.

Fig. 259.—Porcelain beads, and beads of gold and silver mixed. Real size.—Bornholm. Earlier iron age.

Fig. 260.—Curved iron knife, ½ real size, and with the remains of a large urn containing burnt bones.

Fig. 261.—Iron knife, ⅓ real size; found in a cinerary urn containing burnt bones, two pairs of shears, a buckle, awl, and ring, all of iron; a bronze fibula, &c.—Möllegaard, Broholm.

The following objects in one grave in Möllegaard will give a thorough idea of the destruction wrought on the pyre.

Fig. 262.—Handle of iron for kettle.—Möllegaard.

151

Fig. 263.—Remains of a damaged iron instrument and silver fibula rusted together. Real size.

Fig. 264.—Silver fibula and other objects rusted together. Real size.

Fig. 265.—Iron comb, ½ real size. Möllegaard.

Fig. 266.—Blue and light green.

Fig. 267.—Dark grey, with white eyes.

Fig. 268.—Red, with red, black, and yellow design.

Melted glass mosaic beads, real size.

152

Fig. 269.

Fig. 270.

Fig. 271.

Fig. 272.

Four of eleven iron ornaments, shaped like buckets. Real size.—Möllegaard.

Fig. 273.—Bronze vessel, 9 inches in diameter, with handle fastened with rivets. It contained numerous articles taken from the pyre, but rust had united them all.

Fig. 274.

Fig. 275.

Two iron spurs in burnt spot.—Kannikegaard.

Fig. 276.—Iron buckle, ⅔ real size.—Kannikegaard.

153

Fig. 277.

Fig. 278.

Two prismatic dice, real size, damaged by fire, the sides pointing towards each other always counting seven; found in an urn with burnt bones, remains of a glass cup, &c., one foot under the ground.—Kannikegaard.

Fig. 279.

Fig. 280.

Fragments of bone comb and iron rivet, real size, found in a cinerary urn.—Broholm.

Fig. 281.—Spiral ring of massive gold, showing the two sides, found near a large bronze cauldron, and fragments of the mountings of a carriage, several iron swords, shield bosses, &c. Real size.—Broholm.

Fig. 282.—Spiral gold ring much alloyed with silver, showing the two sides. Real size.—Broholm.

Early knowledge of the art of writing—Knowledge of rune writing very remote—Archaic Greek characters—Jewels with earlier runes—Runes on memorial stones—Runic alphabets—The origin of runes—Their mystical meaning—Memorial runic stones—Runic staves—The Runatal—Archaic inscriptions compared with runes.

As the early form of writing known as runes occurs so frequently in connection with these Northern relics, it will be well to devote a chapter to the subject. The written records and finds in the North give numerous examples showing that at a very early period the tribes of the North knew the art of writing. The characters used were called “rúnir” runes.

The knowledge of rune writing was so remote, that it was supposed by the people to have come with Odin, thus showing its great antiquity and possibility of the theory that the runes were brought to the North by the people who had migrated from the south-east, and who may have obtained their knowledge from the Greek colonies situated on the shores of the Black Sea or Palus Mæotis. The numerous runic inscriptions, showing in many cases the archaic form of these characters, bear witness to the truth of the Northern records, though it cannot be denied that they often closely resemble the Etruscan letters. To corroborate these records a considerable number of antiquities, the forms of which are unknown in Italy and are similar to those of the North, have been found in Southern Russia, and may be seen in the museums of that country.

At what early date the art of writing runes became known in the North it is impossible to tell. From the Roman coins 155found in the Nydam, Vimose, Thorsberg, &c. finds we know that the people knew the art at the period to which the coins belong, but this is far from proving to us that they had just learned the art of writing; people do not learn how to write first on objects of gold and silver; but, at any rate, we can fix a date as early as the second or third century of the Christian era. It must be admitted as surprising, if the Northern peoples were so advanced as to manufacture the beautiful weapons and artistic articles found in the graves and elsewhere, they had not also instituted a coinage of their own.

That the knowledge of runes did not come to the North before that of working iron is almost certain, as no runes have been found there on the objects belonging to the bronze age. A fact we must bear in mind is, that in the earlier graves of the iron age, many of which are of greater antiquity than the bog finds,^[122] the objects were so thoroughly destroyed on the pyre, that all traces of runic character upon them would disappear.

156

Fig. 283.—Diadem of gold, with earlier runes inside; found in oblong mound of sandy mould with remains of a stone coffin.—Jutland.

Fig. 284.—Silver fibula, with earlier runes,^[123] richly gilt, the zigzag and runes filled with blue niello; ⅔ real size; earlier iron age.—Etelhem, Gotland.

157Besides the runes found inscribed upon jewels, weapons, coins,^[124] &c., there are others engraved on rocks and memorial stones, which are of very great antiquity, some of which seem to be earlier than the runes of the bog finds.

There are two alphabets; the earlier one numbered twenty-four, the later sixteen letters.

Earlier Runes from the Vadstena bracteate.

Later Runes.

The Vadstena alphabet is divided into three sections, each containing eight letters or characters. The earlier runes were written from the right to the left; the later runic inscriptions are read from the left to the right. The later runes differ considerably from the earlier ones, from the gradual changes that took place, some falling out of use, till only sixteen existed in later times. Their signification also changed.

Were it not for the evidence of the finds having runic inscriptions of the fuller runic alphabet, it would have seemed more probable that the less developed one was the earlier; but in the face of the most indisputable proofs of the antiquity of the fuller alphabet, such assertions cannot be made. The only conclusion to which this leads us therefore is, that the runic alphabet must in the course of time have become simplified. There are runic inscriptions which contain both earlier and later runes, but the former at last gradually disappeared.

It seems that the custom of having alphabets on objects 158such as the Vadstena bracteate existed in Greece and Etruria.^[125] The earliest graves in the Roman colonies in which there is writing are very few; what writing there is is never in the language of the people, but always in Latin; and nearly all, if not all such graves, are those of Christian people.

Fig. 285.—A fibula of silver, partly gilt, with same runic letters, with slight variations. Real size.—Charnay, Burgundy, France (of Norse origin).

The art of writing shows the advanced civilisation of the people of the North compared with that of the other 159countries mentioned. The language of Tacitus^[126] is plain enough, and any other interpretation is not correct. The assertion made that the knowledge of writing came to the North through the present Germany is not borne out by the facts. Runic monuments do not occur south of the river Eider, either on detached stones or engraved on rocks. The few jewels found scattered here and there, either in France or Germany are thoroughly Northern, and show that in these places the people of the North made warfare, as corroborated by the testimony of the Eddas and Sagas, as well as of Frankish and old English and other records.

Fig. 286.—Neck-ring of gold, with runes; ½ real size; found (1838) in a round mound.—Wallachia.

Great indeed has been, and still is, the harvest of runic monuments or objects in the North. Every year several new objects with these characters are discovered in fields, bogs, and graves, or when old walls or buildings are demolished.

160England, being the earliest and most important of the Northern colonies, possesses many monuments and objects with runes; among them a large knife, now in the British Museum, found in the bed of the Thames, the blade of which is ornamented with gold and silver, and an inscription in runes.^[127]

From the sagas we learn that runes were traced on staves, rods, weapons, the stem and rudder of ships, drinking-horns, fish bones, and upon the teeth of Sleipnir, &c.

In Runatal (Odin’s Rune song), or the last part of Havamal, there is a most interesting account of the use that could be made of runes. It shows plainly that in earlier times they were not used by the people in general for writing; that they were mystic, being employed for conjurations and the like, and therefore regarded with a certain awe and superstition; just as to-day writing is looked upon by certain savage tribes, who cannot be made to understand how speech can be transmitted and kept on paper for an indefinite period.

In this song, Odin is supposed to be teaching some one, and giving advice; he reckons up his arts thus:—

“Atli was a great, powerful, and wise king; he had many men with him, and took counsel with them how he should get the gold; he knew that Gunnar and Högni were owners of so much property^[147] that no man had the like of it; he sent men to the brothers and invited them to a feast in order to give them many gifts; Vingi was the leader of the messengers. The queen knew of their secret talk, and suspected treachery against her brothers. She cut runes, took a gold ring, and tied on it a wolf’s hair; she gave this to the king’s messengers. They went as the king had told them, and before they landed Vingi saw the runes and changed them so that they meant that Gudrún wished them to come to Atli. They came to the hall of Gunnar and were well received; large fires were made before them; there they drank merrily the best drinks. Vingi said: ‘King Atli sent me hither and wanted you to visit him to get honour and large gifts, helmets and shields, swords and coats-of-mail, gold and good clothes, warriors and horses and large estates, and he says he would rather let you than any others have his realm.’ Then Gunnar turned his head and said to Högni: ‘What shall we accept of this offer? He offers us a large realm, but I know no kings owning as much gold as we, for we own all the gold which lay on Gnitaheath, and large skemmas (rooms) filled with gold and the best cutting weapons and all kinds of war-clothes; I know my horse to be the best, my sword the keenest, my gold the most renowned.’ Högni answered: ‘I wonder at his offer, for this he has seldom done, and it is unadvisable to go to him. I am surprised that among the costly things which Atli sent to us I saw a wolf’s hair tied on a gold ring, and it may be that Gudrún thinks he has a wolf’s mind (mind of a foe) towards us, and that she wants us not to go.’ Then Vingi showed him the runes which he said Gudrún had sent. The men now went to sleep, while they continued drinking with some others. Then Högni’s wife, Kostbera, a most handsome woman, went to them and looked at the runes. She and Gunnar’s wife, Glaumvör, a very accomplished woman, brought drink. The kings became very drunk. Vingi saw this, and said: ‘I will not conceal that King Atli is very heavy in his movements, and too old to defend his realm, 164and his sons are young and good for nothing; he wishes to give you power over the realm while they are so young, and he prefers you to enjoy it.’ Now Gunnar was very drunk, and a great realm was offered to him, and he could not resist fate; he promised to go, and told it to his brother Högni, who answered: ‘Your resolve must be carried out, and I will follow thee, but I am unwilling to go’” (Volsunga, c. 33).

Runes were occasionally used as charms in cases of illness.

Egil went on a journey to Vermaland to collect the tax from the Jarl Arnvid, who was suspected of having slain King Hakon the Good’s men when they went thither for this purpose. On the way he came to the house of a bondi named Thorfinn.

“As Egil and Thorfinn sat and took their meal, Egil saw that a woman lay sick on the cross-bench, and asked who she was. Thorfinn answered that she was his daughter Helga. She had been long ill from a very wasting sickness; she could not sleep at night, and was like one ham-stolen^[148] (crazy). ‘Has anything been tried for her illness?’ said Egil. Thorfinn said: ‘Runes have been traced by the son of a bondi in the neighbourhood, but she is far more ill since than she was before; canst thou do anything for such an illness?’ Egil answered: ‘It may be that it will not be worse though I take charge of it.’ When he had done eating he went to where she lay and spoke to her. He bad that she be taken out of bed and clean clothes put under her, which was done. Then he examined the bed, and there found a piece of whalebone with runes on it. He read them, cut them off, and scraped the chips into the fire; he burned the whalebone and had her clothes carried into the open air. Then Egil sang:—

“Egil traced runes, and placed them under the pillow in the bed where she rested. It seemed to her as if she awoke from a sleep, and she said she was then healed, though she 165had little strength. Her father and mother were very glad” (Egil’s Saga, c. 75).

When persons were deaf, they communicated with others by means of runes.

“Thorkel told his sister Orny that the steersman had come to his house, saying: ‘I wish, kinswoman, that thou shouldst serve^[150] him during the winter, for most other men have enough to do.’ Orny carved runes on a wood-stick, for she could not speak, and Thorkel took it and read. The wood-stick told this: ‘I do not like to undertake to serve the steersman, for my mind tells me that, if I do, much evil will come of it.’ He became angry because his sister declined, so that when she saw it she consented to serve Ivar, and continued to do so during the winter” (Thorstein Uxafót, Fornmanna Sögur, 110).

Runes traced on sticks (kefli), which were sometimes used, did not offer proper security against falsification, unless personal runes were used, which however were known only to a very limited number.

An Icelandic settler named Gris, who had gone on a journey to Norway, was going back to Iceland from Nidaros (Throndhjem).

“A woman came to him with two children, and asked him to take them with him. He asked: ‘What have they to do there?’ She said that their uncle Thorstein Svörf lived in the district where Gris had a bœr, and that her name was Thorarna. Gris said: ‘I will not do that without some evidence.’ Then she gave him from under her cloak a stick on which were many words known to Thorstein. Gris said: ‘Thou wilt think me greedy for property.’ She asked: ‘Ask as much as thou wilt.’ He answered: ‘Four hundreds in very good silver, and thou must follow with the children.’ ‘It is not possible for me to follow them,’ she said, ‘but I will pay what thou askest.’ She told him the name of the boy Klaufi, and of the girl Sigrid. Gris added: ‘How hast thou become so wretched, thou who art of such good kin?’ She replied: ‘I was taken in war by Snækoll Ljotsson, who is the father of these children; after which he drove me away against my will.’

“Gris had a favourable wind after he had taken these children 166on board, and sailed to Iceland into the same river-mouth as usual; and as soon as he had landed he carried away both children, so that no one knew of his coming. That evening he went to Thorstein at Grund, who received him very well, mostly because his son Karl had gone abroad at the time that Gris had been abroad, and Thorstein wanted to ask about his journey. Gris spoke little. Thorstein inquired if he was ill. Gris answered that it was rather that he was not well pleased with his doings; ‘for I have brought hither two children of thy sister.’ ‘How can that be?’ said Thorstein. ‘And I will not acknowledge their relationship unattested.’ Then Gris showed him the stick, and he recognized his words thereon, though it was long since he spoke them. He acknowledged the children, but paid Gris to bring up Klaufi” (Svarfdæla, c. 11).

“Klaufi and Gris sailed from Solskel southward along the Norwegian coast, until they came to an islet, where lay two ships with no men on them. They jumped on board one of the ships, and Klaufi said: ‘Tell thou, Gris, who has steered these ships, for here are runes, which tell it.’ Gris said he did not know. Klaufi answered: ‘Thou knowest, and must tell.’ Gris was obliged to do so, against his will, and thus read the runes: ‘Karl steered the ship when the runes were carved’” (Svarfdæla, c. 14).

“One summer in the time of King Harald Hardradi it happened, as was often the case, that an Icelandic ship came to Nidaros (Throndhjem). On this ship there was a poor man who kept watch during the night. While all slept he saw two men go secretly up to Gaularas with digging tools and begin to dig; he saw they searched for property, and when he came on them unawares he saw that they had dug up a chest filled with property. He said to the one who seemed to be the leader that he wanted three marks for keeping quiet, and some more if he should wish it. Thorfinn assented to this, and weighed out to him three marks; when they opened the chest a large ring and a thick necklace of gold lay uppermost. The Icelander saw runes carved on the chest; these said that Hakon Jarl had been the owner of this property” (Fornmanna Sögur, vi. 271).

One day Thurid, the old foster-mother of Thorbjörn Öngul, an enemy of Grettir, asked to be taken down to the sea.

“When she came there, she found the stump of a tree with the roots on, as large as a man could carry. She looked at 167the stump, and had it turned round. On one side it looked as if it had been burned and rubbed. On this side she had a small spot smoothed with a knife. Then she took her knife and carved runes on it, and reddened it with her blood, singing words of witchcraft over it. She walked backwards around the stump, in the opposite direction to the sun’s course, and pronounced many powerful incantations thereover. Then she had it pushed out into the sea, and said it should be driven out to Drangey, and cause great mischief to Grettir. When Grettir was cutting the stump for firewood with an axe, he wounded himself severely above the knee”^[151] (Gretti’s Saga, c. 81).

Fig. 287.—Stone axe with earlier runes; ⅔ real size.—Upland.

Fig. 288.—Earlier runic inscription discovered (1872) on a perpendicular bluff 20 feet high and about 200 feet from the shore, at Valsfjord, Fosen, North, Throndhjem. The runes are carved in a perpendicular line from the bottom up. Hardly anything is left of the letters. The Runes; 1
15 real size.

The deeds of warriors were recorded on runic staves:—

Örvar-Odd, when very old, desired to revisit the scenes of his childhood, where a Völva had foretold him that his death would be caused by the head of the horse Faxi, at his birthplace, Hrafnista. When he arrived there he walked around on 168the farm, and his foot struck the skull of a horse, and a viper came out of it and bit him in the leg.

“He suffered so much from this wound that they had to lead him down to the shore. When he got there he said: ‘Now you must go and hew a stone coffin for me, while some shall sit at my side and carve that song which I will compose about my deeds and life.’ Then he began making the song,^[152] and they carved it on a tablet,^[153] and the nearer the poem drew to its end, the more the life of Odd ebbed away” (Orvar Odd’s Saga; Fornaldar Sögur. p. 558).

Fig. 289.—Stone, with earlier runes, height over 6 feet.—Krogstad, Upland.

169

Fig. 290.—Earlier runes on granite block. About 10 feet high, 4 feet 11 inches at widest part, and 9 inches thick.—Tanum, Bohuslän, Sweden.

“The two brothers Jokul and Thorstein were to meet Finnbogi for a Holmganga.^[154] As he did not come, they took a post from the latter’s farm; Jokul carved a man’s head at one end, and traced in runes an account of what had occurred that day” (Vatnsdæla, 34).

The inscriptions of the earlier runes, the translation of which must be received with extreme caution, are short, while those of a later period are much longer.

170

Fig. 291.—Runic stone, showing transition between earlier and later runes, about 4½ feet above ground; breadth, 2 feet 4 inches.—Stentofte, Blekinge, Sweden.

Fig. 292.—Part of stone block, with earlier runes.—Torvik, Norway. Eight feet 10 inches in length by 2 feet 2 inches wide, with a thickness of from 2⅓ to 3⅛ feet.

171

Fig. 293.—Red quartz stone, with earlier runes and warrior on horseback. Height, 8 feet 3 inches, but only 6 feet above ground; greatest breadth, 5 feet.—Hagby, Upland.

Fig. 294.—Granite slab of a stone coffin in a grave-mound, forming one of the sides 1
15 real size.—Torvik, Hardanger, Norway.

172

Fig. 295.—Runic stone, earlier runes. Length, 7 feet 2 inches; width, 2 feet 4 inches.—Berga, Södermanland, Sweden.^[155]

173

Fig. 296.—Runic stone, earlier runes. Height, over 13 feet; greatest width, a little over 3 feet; with letters about 6 inches long; near a dom ring.—Björktorp, Blekinge, Sweden. See p. 314 for grave.

174

Fig. 297.—Earlier runic stone; about 7 feet 7 inches long, and at its broadest part 3 feet 6 inches.—Norway.

175

Fig. 298.—Granite block with earlier and later runes (the earlier runes in the centre). Height, 5 feet 3 inches; greatest breadth, 3 feet; average thickness, 1 foot.—Skå-äng, Södermanland, Sweden.

176

Fig. 299.—Earlier runic stone, Sigdal, Norway.

Fig. 300.—Earlier runic stone discovered in 1880, in a ruined grave-mound which contained a slab stone chest; one of the side slabs bore runes, and is given here. It has probably stood on another mound before it was put to this use.—Bergen Museum, Torvik, Hardanger, Norway.

177

Fig. 301.—Tune stone (with earlier runes) of red granite; found in a graveyard wall surrounding the church of Tune, near Moss, entrance of Christiania fjord. Height, 6 feet 7 inches; greatest width, 2 feet 4 inches.

178

Fig. 302.—Earlier runic inscription on a bluff, 11 feet above high-water mark.—Væblungsnæs, Romsdal, Norway.

Fig. 303.—Runic stone, having the longest runic inscription known, composed of over 760 letters. Height, 12 feet; width, 6 feet.—In the Churchyard of Rök, Ostergötland, Sweden.

179

Fig. 304.—Marble lion, with later runic inscription. Height, 10 feet. Now at Venice, whither it was brought from the Piræus in 1687.^[156]

Not only do the finds prove to us how extensive were the voyages and journeys of the vikings, but many of the runic stones add their testimony to these and the sagas, often mentioning journeys in distant lands both for peaceful and warlike purposes. There are four runic stones extant on which Knut the Great is mentioned as “Knut who went to England”; the Thingamenn or Thingamannalid is mentioned on at least two runic stones.

180

Fig. 305.—Later runic stone, with animal and bird.—Upland.

181

Fig. 306.—Later runic stone, with animals, possibly a representation of Fylgja at Svartsjö Castle, Lake Mälaren, Sweden.

Fig. 307.—Later runic stone, with birds.—Upland.

182

Fig. 308.—Stone with later runes. Height above ground, 10 feet; the width over 5 feet.—Nysätra parish, Upland.

Fig. 309.—Later runic stone, Edssocken, Upland. “Runa rista lit Rahnualtr huar a Kriklanti uas lisforunki.”

Fig. 310.—Later runic stone, 7½ feet above the ground. “Sterkar and Hiorvardr erected this stone to their father, Geiri, who dwelt west, in Thikalid (Thingmannalid). God help his soul.”—Kålstad, Upland.

183

Fig. 311.—King Gorm’s stone, with later runes.—Jellinge, Jutland. Front view.

Fig. 312.—Back view of King Gorm’s stone.

184The inscription on the above stone runs thus, the translation being literal: “Haraltr kunukr bath kaurua kubl thausi aft kurm (Gorm) fathur sin auk aft thæurui muthur sina, sa haraltr ias sær uan tanmaurk ala auk nuruiak auk tana ... t kristnæ” = Harald king bade make mounds these after Gorm, father his and after Thyra, mother his, that Harald who swore, Denmark all and Norway and Dane ... to christianize.

The historical mounds of King Gorm and his queen Thyra are respectively 200 and 230 feet in diameter, and about 40 feet high (see p. 183); the burial chamber of King Gorm was of wood, 22 feet long, 4½ feet high, 8 feet wide. In the grave were found a small silver cup, a bronze cross covered with gold, a wooden figure representing a warrior in armour, several metal mountings, &c.

Fig. 313.—Wooden shield with later runes.—Norway.

185

Fig. 314.—Runic stone in ship-form grave, Upland. In the grave was found a helmet, apparently made of iron-plate, with ornaments of bronze in imitation of eyebrows; also a helmet-crest. On the helmet were numerous representations of horsemen with spears and carrying shields on their left arms, in front of the horses a snake, and in front of and behind each horseman a bird flying.

Fig. 315.—Baptismal stone font.—Langhem Church, Sweden.

186

Fig. 316.—Baptismal stone with runes and a representation of Gunnar in the snake-pit, used as font in a church, Bohuslän. No Christian symbol is marked upon it.

Fig. 317.

Fig. 318.

Fig. 319.

Fig. 320.

Baptismal fonts with runic inscriptions, some apparently heathen.

187Two rock-tracings found at Ramsund and Gœk, on the southern shores of Lake Mälar, province of Södermanland, Sweden, show how deeply preserved in the memory of the people all over the North is the history of the Volsungar as told in the earlier Edda, and the Saga of that name. To the late Professor Carl Säve we are indebted for the discovery of these two mementoes of the past. I here give the representation of the finer of the two, which is engraved on granite.

Fig. 321.—Tracing of later runes illustrating the Eddaic songs and Volsunga saga. Length, 16 feet; width, from 4 to 5 feet.—Ramsund Rock, Södermanland, Sweden.

The scene is surrounded below by sculpture, and covered with runes above are two serpents twisted together, one without runes. Below the large snake Sigurd on his knee pierces with his sword the body of the reptile. In the midst between the snake the horse Grani is standing, made fast to a tree where two birds are seen. On the left Sigurd, seated, roasts on the fire, at the end of a stick, the heart of Fafnir. Round the fire are deposited pincers, an anvil, bellows, and hammer; the head of the smith (blacksmith) Regin is seen separated from the trunk. Then above is sculptured an animal, which looks like a fox—no doubt the otter—for the murder of which was given, as ransom, the rich treasure so fatal to Fafnir and to all those who possessed it after him. The runic inscription has not the slightest connection with the scene, not even with Sigurd Fafnisbani. As Mr. Säve remarks, Sigurd or Holmger, 188and perhaps both, believed that they were descended from Sigurd Fafnisbani, the famous hero of the Volsunga.

The tracing on the stone of Gœk, not far from the city of Strengenæs, is about half the length of that on the Ramsund stone, but of the same width, and is not as fine. The subject is treated in a somewhat similar manner: the hammer is on the ground, while on the Ramsund stone it is in the man’s hand. Above the horse Grani is a Christian cross.

The runic inscription, here also upon a snake, surrounds the figures, but has nothing to say about Sigurd Fafnisbani.

Fig. 322.—Oscan inscription (first three lines) on a bronze tablet in British Museum.

Fig. 323.—Greek inscription on bronze axe from Calabria, in the British Museum.

Fig. 324.—Archaic Greek inscription in the British Museum.

From the facsimile illustrations given of Etruscan, Greek and earliest Roman inscriptions chosen at random from the 189museums, the reader will be able to judge for himself, and probably see how much more closely the earlier runes resemble the Greek archaic and Etruscan inscriptions than the Latin ones.

Fig. 325.—Bronze tablet, first three lines. Treaty between the Eleans and Heræans of Arcadia; copied from “Ancient Greek Inscriptions” in the British Museum.

(Euphorbos.)

(Menelaos.)

(Hector.)

Fig. 326.—These three archaic inscriptions are found on a vase from Camirus in Rhodes, now in the British Museum.

Fig. 327.—Etruscan inscription on a sepulchral urn in the British Museum.

Fig. 328.—Etruscan inscription on an urn in the British Museum.

Fig. 329.—Etruscan inscription on a sarcophagus from Toscanella, in the British Museum.

190

Fig. 330.—Plaque of terra-cotta, representing Poseidon, painted. Found near Corinth. Now in the Louvre.

Fig. 331.—Latin inscription.

Fig. 332.—Early Latin inscription: painted on a vase in British Museum.

191

Fig. 333.—Etruscan inscription, on a sarcophagus from Toscanella, in the British Museum.

Fig. 334.—On an Etruscan sepulchral monument in terra-cotta, British Museum.

Fig. 335.—Bronze spear-point, with earlier runes, and svastica and triskele stamped on it. Length 16½ inches.—Venice, island of Torcello. ½ real size.

Fig. 336.—Iron spear-point, with runes and figures inlaid with silver, discovered in a mound with burnt bones and weapons.—Müncheberg, Mark-Brandenburg. ½ real size.

192

Fig. 337.—Iron spear-point, with runes and figures inlaid with silver.—Volhynia, Russia. ½ real size.

Fig. 338.—Runic stone found at Collingham, Yorkshire.

Numerous Greek and Roman objects—Intentional destruction of weapons—Thorsberg find—Coats of mail—Garments and harness—Weapons and ornaments—The Vimose find—The sax—Bronze and iron spurs—Carpenter’s plane—The Kragehul find—The Nydam find—Discovery of a large oak boat—Its construction—Various weapons, tools, and ornaments—Damascened swords.

Before passing on to other parts of our wide subject, let us examine somewhat more minutely and in detail the various classes of remarkable objects which have been found in the lands of the old Norsemen, belonging to the earlier iron age.

Fig. 339.—Shield boss of bronze with Latin inscription AELAELIANVS. ⅕ real size.—Thorsbjerg find.

The bog finds^[157] are very important, and throw additional light on the earlier history of the people. From them we are able to see how people were dressed, and to learn about their riding equipment, agricultural implements, cooking utensils, household vessels, waggons, tools, and offensive and defensive weapons; from one of these also we were first made acquainted with their sea-vessels. Many of the objects appear to be of Greek or Roman origin, and Roman coins are found, so that we can approximate closely the date when the objects were in use, and consequently the taste and manner of living of the period.

194We can dress a warrior from head to foot, and wonder at his costly and magnificent equipment, and his superb and well-finished weapons, and can realise how magnificent must have been some of his riding and driving vehicles.

Fig. 340.—Bronze breast-plate, covered with gold and silver.—Thorsbjerg find.

All these antiquarian bog-finds are within very easy access of the sea, varying in depth beneath the surface of the earth—in the Thorsbjerg bog, 10–14 feet; in the Nydam, 5–7 feet; the Vimose, 4–5 feet. Those of Denmark have proved far richer than those of the present Sweden, Norway, and the countries situated on the eastern and southern shores of the Baltic. In numerous instances the objects are unique, and many present a great similarity to those found in the skeleton graves, such as swords with Roman characters upon them, fragments of wooden buckets, checkers, dice, &c.

195Here also, as in the graves where the bodies were burnt, we find objects intentionally damaged. This bending, twisting, and hacking of weapons seems to have been a religious custom. The spear-handles, scabbards, bows, arrow-shafts, and shields are often broken into fragments, or rolled together in inextricable knots. Ringed coats of mail and garments are torn to pieces, which afterwards were wrapped carefully together; and the skulls and skeletons of horses are cleft in many places.

Fig. 341.—Fragments of silver shield boss, with gilt ornaments.—Thorsbjerg find.

Fig. 342.—Silver helmet.—Thorsbjerg find.

Fig. 343.—Bronze serpent: probably ornament to helmet.—Thorsbjerg find.

These masses of objects seem to imply that they were either the spoils and remains of great fights between different chieftains, or offers to the gods thrown into sacred springs. In this latter case the finds must be the produce of a long series of years, and have been given to the gods at different times, 196the destruction, instead of taking place on the pyre, having taken place on the water.

This destruction was not apparently peculiar to the inhabitants of the North, for Cæsar relates of the Gauls, that when they went into battle they made a vow to consecrate the booty to the god of war. After the victory the captured animals were sacrificed, and the rest of the booty was brought together into one spot.

Fig. 344.—Bronze buckle inlaid with gold and silver, for ring armour; the back shows how the rings were attached. ⅔ real size.—Thorsbjerg Bog-find.

Reverse.

The narrative of Crosius offers the most striking similarity between this custom and that of the Cimbrians and Teutons, who, when coming from the North after their victory over the Romans at Arausia (near the river Rhone), in the year 105 before Christ, sacrificed the whole of the booty. He relates:—

“When the enemies had taken possession of two camps and an immense booty, they destroyed under new and strange imprecations all that had fallen into their hands. The clothes were torn and thrown away, gold and silver thrown into the river, the ring armour of the men cut to pieces, the accoutrements of the horses destroyed, the horses themselves thrown into the water, and the men with ropes around their necks suspended to the trees, so that there was no more booty for the victors than there was mercy for the conquered.”

197

Fig. 345.—Bronze plate, covered with gold and silver, belonging to ring armour.—Thorsbjerg find.

Fig. 346.

Fig. 347.

Fig. 348.

Fig. 349.

Figures, made of thin silver plates, belonging to bronze plate.

Fig. 350.—Fragment of ring armour. Real size.

198One might suppose that Orosius has here described the feast of victory at Nydam or Thorsbjerg.

If any proofs were needed to show that the objects were intentionally placed in the water, we have them in the fact that several clay vessels have been sunk by heavy stones being put in them, and that other objects were fastened to the bottom by means of large wooden hooks. Finally, we ought to add, the space within which the antiquities were found was in several places marked off by fence-like wicker hurdles of twigs, or by poles, spears or swords, stuck into the mud.

The Thorsbjerg^[158] Bog-find.—The researches in this find cover a period of six years, from 1856 to 1862, and is one of the most remarkable, for here were brought to light objects unknown in other similar finds. From the coins^[159] enumerated below, we 199must come to the conclusion that many of the objects found belong to the second century of our era. Among the most remarkable antiquities of warfare are the superb coats of mail found in the North, and the skill displayed in making war accoutrements at such an early period shows an advanced state of civilisation. These coats of mail (which are also found in graves) are a network of rings each of which is run through four others. In their workmanship they vary:—in some the rings are clinched; in others only every other ring is riveted, the alternate ones being welded together, so that each clinched ring grasps four welded ones, and each welded ring grasps four riveted.

Fig. 351.—Trousers of woven woollen cloth.^[160] Length 45 inches. Width round waist 38½ inches. On the waistband were several small loops which probably held the waistbelt. The socks which are sewn to the trousers are of the same pattern as that of the sleeves of the shirt, but the squares are smaller. 1
18 real size.

Fig. 352.

Fig. 353.

Fig. 354.

Fragments of woollen cloak, with border.

200

Fig. 355.—Woollen shirt or blouse 33½ inches long, 20 inches wide, with wristbands of a stronger cloth and a lighter colour than the shirt, which is brownish red. Both sleeves are of a stronger cloth than that of the body of the shirt. 1
20 real size.

Fig. 356.—Woven border at bottom of the shirt.

Fig. 357.—Pattern of the body of the shirt.

Fig. 358.—Horse head-gear of leather. The heads of the bronze rivets resembling rosettes are covered with ornamented silver plates: the bridle and other mountings are of bronze.

201

Fig. 359.—Flat round wooden shield, made of planed boards of different widths.

Fig. 360.—Wooden sword-hilt with bronze nails, the middle surrounded with braided bronze thread.

Fig. 361.—Fibula of bronze with engraved ornament.

Fig. 362.—A pendant of gold. Real size.

Fig. 363.—Amber die, rounded so as not to stand on the number. Real size.

Fig. 364.—Remains of leather shoe. ⅓ real size.

202

Fig. 365.—Rake of wood with teeth, about nine inches long.

Fig. 366.—Ornament of bronze for scabbard. Heads of rivets plated with silver. ½ real size.

Fig. 367.—Rein, made of three pieces of leather, with bronze ring.

203

Fig. 368.—Leather sandal in one piece, for left foot. ⅓ real size. Fastened over the foot with narrow straps and buttons.

Fig. 369.—Shoulder clasp of bronze for ring armour, inlaid with gold and silver.

204

Fig. 370.—Fragment of a sandal with silver-plated rivets. ⅓ real size.

Fig. 371.—Ornament of bronze for wooden scabbard, with inscription in earlier runes. Real size.

Fig. 372.—Bronze ornamentation for scabbard, plated with silver and gold. ½ real size.

205

Fig. 373.—Scabbard of wood, with bronze mounting.

Fig. 374.—Embossed mounting of a scabbard strap, silver-plated, the whole centre inlaid with a thin gold plate.

Fig. 375.—A bridle of bronze, the end-piece plated with silver and gold. ½ real size.

Fig. 376.—Silver-plated bronze buckle.

206

Fig. 377.—Bronze mounting on horses’ head-gear, apparently plated.

Fig. 378.—Shield boss with silver top.

Fig. 379.—Mountings to leather straps with svastica and gilt knobs.

Fig. 380.—Bronze and silver-plated mounting for leather used on horses’ head-gear.

207

Fig. 381.

Fig. 382.

Fig. 383.

Fig. 384.

Iron axe-heads. ⅓ real size.

Vimose Bog Find.—The explorations in the Vimose bog,^[161] situated about five miles from Odense, Fyen, commenced in 1848, and since that time 3,600 objects have been gathered together, all of which were found in a space of 9,000 square feet. Sometimes there seemed to be a certain order in the way in which the articles had been sunk, for all the ring armour was together, and a number of small articles had been placed inside a shield-boss, while other articles were surrounded with broad bands of cloth. Many of the objects here were also badly damaged. Only one coin has been found, i.e. a silver denarius of the time of the Empress Faustina Junior (d. 175), with “Pudicitia” on its reverse. The number of single and double-edged swords, many of which are in tolerably good preservation, is 67. The single-edged swords, between 15¾ and 24 inches long, are simply welded, sometimes having ornaments traced on the blade, and several of these were still in their wooden scabbards when found. The double-edged swords vary in size from about 19 or 20 inches, to 35 or 36 inches. On several are factory stamps—a star-shaped sign on one side of the blade near the tongue or hilt point, and a ring-shaped figure on the sides of the hilt points, a mark which looks rather like a scorpion; in one stamp are Latin letters, which are somewhat difficult to decipher. Many are welded or forged from two united blades, while others are made of a single blade and have no factory mark. Fourteen are damascened in different patterns.

Fig. 385.—One of four bronze buckles, enamelled in red, green, and blue, the inside borders of black mosaic enamel. ⅔ real size.

Fig. 386.—Sax, or single-edged sword. ¼ real size.

Fig. 387.—Damascened sax. ¼ real size.

Fig. 388.—Bent sax, or single-edged sword. ¼ real size.

Fig. 389.—Single-edged sax or iron sword. ¼ real size.

209

Fig. 390.

Fig. 391.

Sax, or single-edged swords, one in wooden scabbard. ¼ real size.

In this remarkable find several enamelled objects have been discovered. This art appears to have been unknown to the nations of classical antiquity. There is no word for it in Greek or Latin. Philostratus,^[162] when describing a wild boar hunt, mentions the beauty and fine colour of the harness of the horses, and, when stating how these colours were produced, mentions that they were made by the barbarians living on the shores of the ocean.

210

Fig. 392.—Griffon’s head, ornament belonging to helmet of bronze. Real size.

This description may very well refer to the people of the North, the great splendour of whose riding gear and chariots we see from the finds and sagas.

211

Fig. 393.—Fragments of ring-armour of hammered iron. Real size.

Fig. 394.—Bronze mounting, plated with gold silver, and belonging to ring-armour. Real size.

Fig. 395.—Remains of ring-armour of iron, with traces of gold plating. ½ real size.

212

Fig. 396.

Fig. 397.

Fig. 398.

Spurs, one of bronze, with iron point; the others of iron.

Fig. 399.—Wheel. 1
20 real size.

Fig. 400.—Man’s head on a piece of bronze covered with a thin gold plate. Real size.

Fig. 401.—Ferrule of silver for hilt plated with gold. Real size.

Fig. 402.—Parts of a wooden plane. ⅓ real size.

213

Fig. 403.—Shoulder-strap of leather, with bronze button and design of dolphin. About ⅐ real size.

Fig. 404.—Silver ornament plated with gold. Real size.

Fig. 405.—Fragment of wooden shield with gilt-headed nails.

Fig. 406.—Silver-plated bronze ornament.

214

Fig. 407.—Silver mounting to scabbard. Real size.

Fig. 408.—Silver mounting for scabbard. ½ real size.

Fig. 409.—One of 1,000 spears, inlaid with concentric circles. ⅓ real size.

Fig. 410.—One of 1,000 spears. ⅓ real size.

Over 1,000 spears were found; the handles of most of them were broken off, but five have been preserved complete; these are 8 feet 7⅔ inches long, 9 feet 2 inches long 9 feet long, 11 feet long, and 6½ feet long. The handles are made of ash, and some spears are ornamented with threads of gold, silver or bronze inlaid in concentric circles; sometimes 215ornaments are traced up the middle of the blade, and originally these also were filled with some kind of metal.

Fig. 411.—Crocodile’s head carved in wood. Real size.

Fig. 412.—Brynja, or coat of mail, 3 feet long.

216

Fig. 413.—Bone comb with svastica. ½ real size.

Fig. 414.—Fragments of checker-board. ⅙ real size.

VIMOSE FIND.

Fig. 415.—Bronze enamelled bowl (1867), 2¾ in. high, 4¾ in. wide, in bog at Maltbœk, Jutland. The enamel in the serpentine line is red.

Kragehul Find.—In a small bog called Kragehul, situated near the city of Assens on Fyen, objects have been found which seem to belong to the 4th or 5th century. The first mention of the Kragehul bog is in 1751, when some articles 217with rune inscriptions were found, which, unfortunately, have been lost, but it was not until 1864 that a regular exploration took place.^[163]

Fig. 416.—Bundle of bent weapons.

Fig. 417.—Bronze vessel destroyed by sword cuts. ⅕ real size.

218

Fig. 418.

Fig. 419.

Iron spears with ornaments carved on the wooden handles. ½ real size.

Fig. 420.—Spear, ½ real size.

Fig. 421.—Spear, ⅓ real size.

219The antiquities, none of which are of Roman origin, seem to have been thrown in without any order, but spears with thin iron points on the end formed the boundary of the find.

In this as in the other bog finds, weapons are twisted together in extraordinary knots and many objects destroyed.

The Nydam Bog Find.—The remarkable bog find at Nydam^[164] is extremely valuable on account of the boat, and the discovery of Roman coins enables us to approximate the date of the objects,^[165] which is probably about the years 250 and 300 of our era.

The Nydam oak boat was discovered in 1863 near Slesvig, in Southern Jutland. Its length is about 75 feet; its widest part, about 10½ feet. It held 14 benches, and was rowed with 28 oars, the average length of which was 12 feet. By its side was the rudder, about 10 feet long.

The bottom plank, which is not a keel proper, is 45 feet 3 inches long, and of a single piece. The oar-tholes are fastened to the gunwales with bast ropes, and, though they have all one general shape, there are no two alike.

220

Fig. 422.

The boat is clinch-built; that is, the planks are held together by large iron bolts with round heads outside, and clinch plates on the inside, at a distance of 5½ inches from each other. The space between the planks is filled with woollen stuff and a pitchy sticky mass. The boards are joined in a very common 221manner to the frame with bast ropes. In the frame are holes, which correspond to elevated pieces on the boards which are also bored through; these pieces had not been nailed to the planks, but were hewn out of the latter, which thereby had lost more than half their thickness. Vessels by this peculiar manner of joining frame and boards acquired great elasticity, which must have been of good service in the surf and in a heavy sea.

Fig. 423.—Oar-thole of red pine. ⅒ real size.

Fig. 424.—Oar-thole of the Nydam Boat. ⅐ real size.

Fig. 425.—Inside view of one of the stems of the Nydam boat.

222

Fig. 426.—Rib of boat, showing seat attached.

Fig. 427.—Wooden pegs fastening stem to bottom plank. 1
17 real size.

Fig. 428.—Showing how the boards joined the ribs.

Fig. 429.—End face view of oar-thole. ⅒ real size.

Fig. 430.—Rudder, 10 feet long, found alongside Nydam boat.

223The boat was shaped alike both fore and aft, so that it could be rowed in either direction; and in both stems, which are fastened to the bottom plank, are two holes through which, judging from the manner in which they are worn, ropes were probably drawn, by which to drag the boat ashore at the beginning of winter. In the bottom there is a hole, which probably after the ship had been drawn up served to give outlet to the water collected in the boat.

The boat had undoubtedly been intentionally sunk, for in the planks under the water-line had been cut large holes to let in the water. Rust had destroyed the ends of the iron bolts which had held the planks together, and also the ropes with which the boards and the frame had been held together. The planks fell apart, therefore, and took their original straight shape; the oar-tholes were loosened from the gunwale; the frame fell on different sides, and the two high stems fell down. As the joints loosened, the separate pieces sank to the bottom, and remained lying at about an equal depth, while the turf grew up above them and preserved them from destruction. After all the parts of the boat had been carefully collected and dried, it was possible to restore it to its original shape.

Fig. 431.—Wooden scoop for baling water. ⅑ real size.

Another boat of red pine wood was discovered alongside it. This one was laid on the field and covered with bog mould, until the work connected with the other boat was finished. Unfortunately the war of 1864 put an end to the examination of the Nydam bog, so that the boat was left lying on the field, and strangers have carried off many pieces of it. The bottom plank was about 50 feet long, 13 inches broad, and ends in two spurs 224or rams. How high the prows were raised above the plank cannot be stated. Since this date the diggings have been done by inexperienced men, and consequently have given but little results. This sacred part of the land of the Danes had passed into the hands of its German conquerors, for the Nornir^[166] are fickle, and what is fated to one generation to accomplish is often, in the course of time, undone by another.

Fig. 432.—The end of the bottom plank of a vessel of red pine, with a ram at each end, from Nydam Bog-find. The pointed lines show how the spurs protruded from the stem.

Fig. 433.

Fig. 434.

Fragments wooden scabbard with bronze mountings. ½ real size.

225

Fig. 435.—A throwing spear with line attached, length of spear 10 feet. ⅓ real size.

Fig. 436.—Spear-head. ⅓ real size.

Fig. 437.—Leaf-shaped spear-point ornamented with engraved lines. ⅓ real size.

226

Fig. 438.—Iron axes. ¼ real size.

Fig. 439.—Iron celt. ¼ real size.

Fig. 440.—Tweezer and earpick of bronze hanging on a bronze ring. Real size.

Fig. 441.—Wooden club. ⅛ real size.

227

Fig. 442.—Black glass bead. Real size.

Fig. 443.—Light-green glass bead, with yellow points on a dark-red ground. Real size.

Fig. 444.—Green glass bead with red stripes. Real size.

Fig. 445.—½ real size.

Fig. 446.—½ real size.

Buckles.

Fig. 447.—Silver tweezers. Real size.

Fig. 448.—Silver ear spoon. ½ real size.

Fig. 449.—Iron knife with wooden handle. ¼ real size.

Fig. 450.—Double-barrelled tube of silver found with ear pick. Real size.

228

Fig. 451.

Fig. 452.

Wooden bows, with notches at the end for fastening the string. 1
11 real size.

Fig. 453.—Part of a wooden bow. ½ real size.

Fig. 454.—Part of arrow-shaft bearing runic stave. Real size.

Fig. 455.—Arrow-shaft. ⅓ real size.

Fig. 456.—Arrow-shaft with owner’s mark. Real size.

Fig. 457.—Arrow-point of iron. ⅓ real size.

229

Fig. 458.

Fig. 459.

Fig. 460.

Bronze mountings for a quiver. ¼ real size.

Fig. 461.—¼ real size.

Fig. 462.—½ real size.

Fragments of wooden scabbards with bronze mountings.

Fig. 463.—Wooden quiver. ¼ real size.

230

Fig. 464.—Bearded spear-head, bent and twisted. ⅓ real size.

Fig. 465.

Fig. 466.

Bearded spear-points of iron. ⅓ real size.

Fig. 467.—Iron spear-point, bayonet shaped. ⅓ real size.

Fig. 468.

Fig. 469.

Iron spear-points. ⅓ real size.

Fig. 470.—Leaf shaped iron spear-point. Real size.

231

Fig. 471.—Iron sword, damascened, bearing Latin inscription. ⅔ real size.

Fig. 472.—Iron sword bearing Latin inscription. ⅔ real size.

Fig. 473.—Iron sword bearing Latin inscription.

Fig. 474.—Part of sword blade with runes inlaid with gold.

Fig. 475.

Fig. 476.

Damascened blades. ⅔ real size.

232

Fig. 477.—Wooden bowl. ⅙ real size.

Fig. 478.

Fig. 479.

Iron ferrules to scabbard, inlaid with flat hammered gold wire. ½ real size.

Fig. 480.—Wooden trough. ⅙ real size.

233

Fig. 481.

Fig. 482.—Ornaments of bronze plated with thin silver and gold. Real size.

Fig. 483.—Bit of bronze. ¼ real size.

Fig. 484.—Bit of iron. ¼ real size.

Fig. 485.—Double-edged damascened sword with silver handle. ⅕ real size.

Fig. 486.—Double-edged damascened sword. ⅕ real size.

234

Fig. 487.—Spiral bracelet of gold with triangular ornaments, ½ real size, found in a bog near Horsens, Denmark.

Fig. 488.

Fig. 489.

Damascened iron sword, ¼ real size, of the later iron age, with mounting for scabbard, made of silver, in relief work and gilt. Found in a bog near Slagelse on Zealand, Denmark.

Fig. 490.—Iron sword, with bronze handle, ⅙ real size, found in a bog at Fremlöse, not far from the town of Odense, on Fyen, with fragments of two other iron swords, &c. Earlier iron age.

The custom of hiding objects—Discovery of numerous golden objects near the surface—Necklaces of gold—Golden horns discovered at Mögletönder—The Bangstrup find.

The objects found in the earth, and classified under the name of ground finds, are often not only very valuable but also very beautiful; in many instances they are of the same type and period as those of the bogs and graves. The custom of intentionally hiding objects which existed in the stone and bronze age lasted until the end of the Viking age, and one of the finest archæological fields in the whole of Scandinavia is that of Broholm, situated on the island of Fyen. These finds are divided into three principal groups, viz.:—Lundeborg, Gudme, and Elsehoved. Almost all the objects were so near the surface of the soil that they were discovered either when ploughing, or digging with a spade.

Fig. 491.—Denarius; Trajan (98–117). Broholm. Real size.

Fig. 492.—Fibula of bronze. Broholm. Real size.

236

Fig. 493.—Solidus: temp. Constantine II. (337–61), found near Hesselagergaard, Broholm, 1875. Real size.

Fig. 494.—Largest Neck-ring, Broholm. Heaviest rings, weight 3 lbs., 1 lb. 14½ oz., 1 lb. 2½ oz.; ½ real size. Among other objects discovered with this neck-ring were three other neck-rings, one weighing about 2 lbs. 2 ozs., another 1½ lb.; six pieces of massive gold belonging to neck-rings; six spiral gold rings; a spiral finger-ring of gold; bent gold bars probably used as money; and bracteates.

Fig. 495.—Roll of flat gold band.

Fig. 496.—Gold bead. Real size. Broholm.

Fig. 497.—Gold band.

237

Fig. 498.—Solidus: temp. Constantine II. Broholm. Real size.

Fig. 499.—Gold Neck-ring, from Hesselagergaard, Broholm. ⅗ real size.

Fig. 500.—Fibula of gold. Broholm. Real size.

Reverse of Fig. 500.

238

Fig. 501.—Hollow gold object, ornamented with cornelians, found at Lundeberg, Broholm. Real size.

Fig. 502.—Gold Mounting for sword scabbard. Real size. Broholm.

Reverse of Fig. 502.

239

Fig. 503.

Fig. 504.

Gold bracteates. Real size.

Fig. 505.—Mosaic bead. Real size.

Fig. 506.—Gold bracteate, showing fibula on the neck. Real size.

Fig. 507.—Gold ring used as money. Real size.

240

Fig. 508.—Gold spiral ring. Elsehoved, Broholm. Real size.

Fig. 509.—Fibula of copper covered with gold, and ornamented with garnets, one of which remains intact; a bird will be seen at the bottom. ½ real size.

Fig. 510.—Roman coins of the 5th century, forming part of a necklace, with a string of gold beads (Valentinianus, 425–455; Julius Majorianus, 457–461; two Leo I., 457–474; Zeno, 474–491; two Anastasius, 491–515).

241

Fig. 511.—Gold rings used as money. Real size.

Fig. 512.—Ring of gold. Real size.

Among the finest and most valuable objects found in the North were the two superb golden horns discovered at Mögeltönder on the peninsula of Jutland, which were once the pride of the great Museum of Northern Antiquities in Copenhagen.

They were without equals in any part of the world; their exterior was made of different bands of gold, with figures in repoussé work, fastened to the harder gold of the body of the horn. Both were stolen from the old Danish Museum on the 4th of May, 1802, and the ignorant thief melted them; thus those two superb specimens were for ever lost to science, and with an unfortunate fatality the cast of each has also been lost; but luckily the drawings made can be relied on. The thief was captured a year after, and his punishment was not adequate to the crime he had committed.

The representations given upon them must have had a meaning; these were symbolical, and were probably very significant and not used for mere ornamentation; what the figures and symbolical signs meant is impossible for us to tell. Among the most remarkable of the former is the 242three-headed man, holding in one hand what appears to be an axe, while with the other he leads some kind of horned animal.

Fig. 513.—Golden horn discovered at Mögeltönder, 1639, with thirteen broad rings round it. Length, 2 feet 9 inches; weight over 7 lbs.

⅕ real size.

Fig. 514.—Golden horn discovered at Mögeltönder, 1734. The exact length of this horn, which had round its broadest end an inscription in earlier runes, has not been stated, but, judging from a facsimile in silver gilt made by command of Frederick VII. from the old drawing, and presented by him to the old Northern Museum, it must have been over 20 inches long. Though the lower part was broken off and lost, it still weighed more than 8 lbs.

⅕ real size.

Fig. 515.—Inscription in earlier runes on horn.

243

Fig. 516.—Facsimile of each ring of the damaged horn (Fig. 514).

244

Fig. 517.—Facsimile of the rings of the perfect horn (Fig. 513).

245Bangstrup Find (Fyen).—Conspicuous among many remarkable finds is the Bangstrup find (Fyen, 1865), in which rings of gold used as money, ornaments of peculiar shape, and 46 gold Roman coins, which were pierced or had a loop attached to the top, were discovered. The coins, ranging from the time of Trajanus Decius (249–251) to that of Constantine II. (337–351), give an approximate idea of the time of the deposit of the find; for, while most of the earlier coins are well worn, the later ones are very well preserved and the coinage is very sharp and clear, thus indicating that they cannot have been long in circulation. As the dates of these later coins are about 340–350, the find cannot have been buried much later than that time.

307–323.

Fig. 518.

IMP. LICINIVS. P. F. AVG.
ORIENS AVGVSTORVM.

306–337.

Fig. 519.

CONSTANTINVS PFAVG.
VICTORIA. CONSTANTINI. AVG.

Fig. 520.—Gold coin.

Fig. 521.—Crescent-shaped pendant of gold.

The crescent-shaped ornaments have, so far as is known, never been found elsewhere in the North; but in the Ukraine similar ones have been discovered, and are described in the work “Account of the Mounds, &c., of the Government of Kiew,” by Privy Councillor J. Foundoukleï, Kief, 1848.

Fig. 522.—Crescent-shaped pendant of gold.

Fig. 523.—Crescent of gold pendant-shaped: representing two lions drinking out of a cup.

Fig. 524.—Leaf-shaped pendant of thin sheet gold.

Fig. 525.—Leaf-shaped pendant, sheet gold.

Fig. 526.—Rectangular pendant of sheet gold, with embossed human figure.

Fig. 527.—Semi-spherical gold ornamentation of unknown use.

Sepulchral chambers containing skeletons—The objects in these graves not destroyed—Numerous Roman and Greek objects—The Vallöby grave—The Bavenhöi grave—The Varpelev graveyard.

Fig. 528.—Mound, about 13 feet above the ground, showing sepulchral chamber five feet below the surface. The body had been placed upon woollen pillows filled with down. Six oak logs supported the side planks forming the sepulchral chamber, which had an oak floor. The space between the timbers had been filled with tresses of wool and other hair of animals. The chamber had been carefully covered with clay.—Bjerring, near Viborg, Northern Jutland.

To return to the subject of graves, we will now speak of the sepulchral chambers containing skeletons. They generally vary in size, from the length of a man upwards, being about four feet wide and two or three feet high. Sometimes the corpse had been laid upon woollen stuff, cattle-hair, or birch-bark, the head turned southwards, and the feet towards the north. The inside lining is often of planks, between which 248and the outer stone wall bark has been placed, the seams between the timber being filled with pitch. Above the burial-chamber, which was sometimes below the level of the ground, a mound or cairn was often raised.

The objects found in these graves have not been destroyed, and the weapons, which are few, have not been made useless.

Fig. 529.—Burial Chamber, Nörrevingstrup, near Hjörring, Jutland. Inside measurement—height, 4 feet; length, 5½ feet; breadth, 3½ feet.

In the graves containing skeletons are found costly silver and glass cups, pottery, wooden pails with metal mountings, drinking-horns or their fragments; gold, silver, bronze, or silver-gilt jewelry; great masses of glass, amber, gold and mosaic beads; metal mirrors (these are scarce), bone combs, riding and driving harness, &c. The damaged weapons are often richly ornamented, and of exquisite workmanship.

A remarkable fact is the number of unmistakable Roman 249and Greek objects, and sometimes coins, which occur in the finds. In the graves of women the objects chiefly found are pins, needles, buttons, jewels, ornaments, combs, knives, &c.

Fig. 530.—Vallöby Grave; showing the natural eminence, with arrangement of stones, cist, and mound.

Fig. 531.—Horizontal view; showing how the objects were placed. Coffin proper, 9 feet long, 2 feet deep.

Fig. 532.—Bird’s-eye view of grave, seen from above. Length of outer inclosure between 11 and 12 feet; height about 2 feet; width about 2½ feet.

Vallöby Grave.—The antiquities in this grave plainly show two civilisations: the Roman or Greek, as represented by the bronze vessels; and the Northern, by the silver cups and black clay vessels, &c., &c.

250The grave was made with especial care, and was sunk about six feet below the natural surface of the bank; the stone inclosure was built of rounded stones, of the size of a man’s fist, placed together with great regularity.^[167]

Fig. 533.—Samian Clay Bowl. Hunting scenes in bas-relief. Inscription (“Cos. L. Viri—”) partially defaced. ⅖ real size.

Fig. 534.—One of two flat bronze bowls. In the earth above were two small silver knobs, one covering the other, the use of which is unknown. ⅕ real size.

Fig. 535.—Fluted bowl of bronze. ⅕ real size.

251

Fig. 536.—⅕ real size.

Fig. 537.—⅖ real size.

Fragments of bronze kettle.

Fig. 538.—Kettle handle. ⅕ real size.

Fig. 539.—Side view.

Fig. 540.—Front view.

Handle of kettle. ⅖ real size.

Fig. 541.—Bottom of bronze kettle. ⅕ real size.

Fig. 542.—Side view of bottom of kettle. ⅕ real size.

Bavenhöi Grave Find—At Bavenhöi, in Himlingöi, Zeeland, is a large bank of gravel, of slight elevation, only about 200 to 230 feet in length. This had evidently been used as 252a common cemetery, as the bodies were found deposited in the earth without a coffin, though partly surrounded by stone settings. The antiquities found at various times with the skeletons seem to belong to the latter part, or perhaps the middle, of the early iron age.

Fig. 543.—Bronze vase. ¼ real size.

Fig. 544.—Border of silver goblet; plaqué with gold and ornamented with figures in relief—viz., a double head with moustaches and helmets; a helmeted man crouching, with a dagger in his hand; two quadrupeds with manes; a horned animal; and three birds. Between the figures are dots, circles, and crosses.

Fig. 545.—Silver cup. ½ real size.

Fig. 546.—Silver goblet, with repoussé work of silver plated with gold; similar to the Vallöby one. ⅓ real size.

253

Fig. 547.—Flat basin or stewpan of bronze, containing two goblets of silver, &c. ⅙ real size.

Fig. 548.—Bronze pail. ⅙ real size.

Fig. 549.—Bronze vase, ¼ real size, with border upon which are engraved hunting scenes, a lion, two horses, a tiger or leopard, and two bucks, a dog and two deer; these animals are separated by trees and plants, the leaves of which, to judge from some traces, must have been silvered over.

Fig. 550.—Part of the design round the border of vase, representing hunting scene. ½ real size.

254

Fig. 551.—Bronze fibula covered with gold, with an inscription scratched in earlier runes. ⅔ real size.

Fig. 552.—Bronze fibula plated with embossed gold ornamented with 3 blue glass knobs and an oval piece of glass of the same colour. ⅔ real size.

Fig. 553.—Fibula from Storeheddinge, Zeeland, showing the part missing in the one above. ⅔ real size.

Fig. 554.—Gold ring of three spirals flattened and ornamented with heads of animals, found still adhering to the bone of the hand. Real size.

255

Fig. 555.—Ground plan of the Graveyard at Varpelev.

At Varpelev, Zeeland, a grave was found covered by several slabs; it is nearly 4 yards long, 1¾ yard broad, the bottom being about 3 yards under the surface of the earth. Within lay the skeleton of a full-grown man, with its head to the S.S.W., and its feet to the N.N.E.; alongside of it were numerous objects, the most interesting of which are those of glass.^[168]

The graveyard at Varpelev is a low bank 200 feet long, 125 feet wide. The bodies were laid down, generally, in a bent position in the sand or gravel, in their clothes or grave-dress, but without a coffin. Old and young men, women and children lay buried here, and one corpse bears the mark of a heavy sword-cut. In the centre of this skeleton graveyard stood a single clay urn, containing burnt bones. At one place there was a bed made of paved stones burnt and smoked, which had evidently been used as a pyre.

Fig. 556.

Fig. 557.

Grave at Varpelev.

The richest grave was situated under the highest point of the bank, at a depth of 9 feet under the surface; it was made in the gravel, and was surrounded by sixteen rough stones of different size and shape. The majority were 2 feet 256in diameter; the large stone at the head measured 3 feet in length and width, and was 2 feet thick. The interstices were filled up with blue clay. A large slab, 2 feet long, 1½ feet broad, and 8 inches thick, was laid on the head, which like the rest of the bones was much decomposed, and proved to be that of a heavy-built man. The corpse lay on its back, nearly straight, with its head to the south-west; it had originally had over it some kind of covering, as there are remains of clothes or a grave-dress.

Fig. 558.—Skull (with sword-cut?). Varpelev Grave. 2
9 real size.

Fig. 559.—Skeleton of man; above the head two large stones. Varpelev. 1877.

Fig. 560.—½ real size.

Fig. 561.—Real size.

Two silver buckles: one found near the middle of the corpse, one near the head.

Fig. 562.—Real size.

Fig. 563.—Real size.

Gold rings found on finger bones.

257

Fig. 564.       Fig. 565.

Roman Coin of Probus, 276–82; found lying by right ear of corpse. Real size.

Fig. 566.—Fragment of thin ornamented silver plating, probably the mounting of a drinking-horn. ½ real size.

Fig. 567.—Fibula of silver, svastica shape, plated with gold, with amber knob in the centre; beautiful small birds may be noticed on each arm; found in a woman’s grave. ½ real size.

Fig. 568.—Hair-pin of gold, top ornamented with garnet; found in a woman’s grave. ⅔ real size.

258

Fig. 569.—Skeleton of woman.

Fig. 570.—Skeleton lying on its left side, with an iron knife near the hands.

Fig. 571.

Fig. 572.

Fig. 573.

Skull, seen from three sides.

Similar antiquities in the North and in Southern Russia—Roman coins—The trade of Gotland in earlier times—Ornaments and other objects of bronze.

Among the archæological wealth of the North still belonging to the earlier, but not earliest, iron age, we find a class of graves and antiquities which are of special importance, for they help us to fix very closely a date for the period to which they belong, and for this light we are indebted to Roman coins and other objects, both Roman and Greek, which these graves contain.

Many of the finds of this period are most interesting, as showing the taste of the people in the North, and a wealth and civilisation of which we were not aware. They are the more valuable because we see from them the wide extent of the maritime expeditions and overland trading journeys of the people towards the beginning of the Christian era. They show, as has already been pointed out, the intercourse which the people of the North had with those of the Black Sea and the Mediterranean, and also with the newly-acquired north-western provinces of the Roman empire (Gaul, Britain, and Frisia). But, what is still more important, they help to prove the general truthfulness of the earlier Edda and Sagas, for they show that the Asar, or whoever the emigrants were, who came north, and who were said to have brought their civilisation with them and to have given it to the people there, were either related to or on intimate relations with the people who inhabited the shores of the Black Sea; for many of the antiquities which were claimed to be of a peculiar northern origin are identical with those found there; while similar 260ornaments of unmistakable Greek origin are found in both regions. To complete the chain of proof, many of the antiquities, both in the Museums of Kief and Smolensk, are similar to those of the North.

Many of the forms of the antiquities, such as neck-rings and gold snake-shaped bracelets, fibulæ, &c., which were thought to belong exclusively to the North, are found in great number in the graves of Kertch, in Southern Russia, where they lie almost side by side with the exquisite Grecian antiquities—the pride of the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg—mementoes of the colonies established by Greece on the shores of the Black Sea. They show that at that period there were two distinct civilisations and peoples living near each other—one Greek, the other native. The natives were probably of the same stock as a great number of the people of the North.

Western and Eastern, Roman and Byzantine, coins have been found; the gold solidi were for the most part used by the people in the North as ornaments, for loops have been attached to or holes made through them. The two largest discoveries hitherto made of Roman coins are those of Hagestaborg, in Scania, southern Sweden (550 denarii), found in 1871, and of Sindarfe (Hemse parish), Gotland, at which latter spot about 1,500 Roman coins were found, in 1870, in a clay urn.^[169] Few coins dating before the Christian era have been found.

261The people had to learn that these coins had an intrinsic value, and that with them they could buy goods. In every country where barter takes place it has taken a certain, sometimes a great, number of years for the people to learn this value.^[170] The fact that the earlier coins are rare does not conclusively prove that intercourse between the North and the Western parts of Europe had not taken place before that time.

Judging from the extensive hoards of coins discovered, it is not improbable that they were kept for some opportune time when their need would be required, such as for purchases when travelling back to the Western or Eastern Roman provinces. That the people were well acquainted with the value of these coins is beyond dispute, for otherwise they would not have kept them.

We must remember that human nature is and always has been the same; there were misers in those early days as there are now. The Sagas give us some examples of the practice of hoarding, and the probability is that some of the hoards found may have been collected during the lifetime of one or more persons. But the numbers found, in hoards or otherwise, even without those which remain undiscovered, show the existence of commercial intercourse.

One of the countries of whose earlier history we know nothing, except that it is mentioned here and there in the Sagas, is the island of Gotland; but from the finds, which are especially rich in coins, we are led to the conclusion that it was a great emporium of trade at least from the beginning of the Christian era to the twelfth century. Roman, Byzantine, Arabic, and earlier English coins are found in far greater numbers 262than in all the Scandinavian lands together. Of the latter, those of Ethelred are even more numerous than in England itself. Situated in a sea whose shores at that period seem to have been inhabited by a dense population, Gotland appears to have occupied the position of commercial supremacy which England holds in Europe to-day.

We have historical evidence of its being a great emporium of trade as late as the fourteenth century, until Wisby, its chief town, was destroyed by the Danes. Its magnificent towers, walls, and ruined churches still bear witness to its past greatness.^[171]

From the time of Alexander Severus (A.D. 235) to Theodosius (A.D. 395), which comprises a period of 160 years, the coins become very scarce, and Roman gold coins take the place of 263silver.^[172] From the finds we see that this period in the North becomes exceedingly rich in gold jewels, and it seems probable that the people preferred gold coins to those of silver.

The North is particularly rich in finds of bronze vessels, which appear to be more specially of Greek, or some perhaps of Roman manufacture; the scarcity of them in Britain and Gaul would imply that they are chiefly of Greek origin; they seem to have been highly prized by the people.

Fig. 574.—Bronze vessel, ⅕ real size, containing burnt bones, ring armour, coat or mail, dipper of bronze with a sieve belonging to it, two glass tumblers, &c., under a stone slab buried in the ground.

Near the fishing village of Abekås, Southern Scania, in Jutland, a dipper has been found with the name of the Roman manufacturer on it, and the words “P. Cipi Polibi.” Another, with a name on it, was also found in Helsingland, Sweden.

264

Fig. 575.—Piece of the coat of mail. Real size. Oremölla.

Fig. 576.—Vessel of glass. ⅓ real size. Oremölla.

Fig. 577.—Dipper of bronze, with sieve. ⅓ real size. Oremölla.

Fig. 578.—Urn. ⅖ real size. Oremölla.

265

Fig. 579.—Bronze vessel of Roman workmanship, containing burnt bones, and a few pieces of melted glass. Height, 18 inches. Inscribed on it are the following words in silver:^[173] “Apollini Granno donvm Ammillivs Constans præfectvs templi ipsivs votvm solvit libentissimo merito.” Mound, Fycklinge, Vestmanland, Sweden. ⅕ real size.

Fig. 580.—Roman bowl of bronze, found, with several antiquities, under a slab at Sojvide, Gotland.

266

Fig. 581.—Ornament of a large bronze vase, with hole for the handle; found when ploughing. ⅔ real size. Öland.

Fig. 582.—Handle of a Roman bronze vase. ⅔ real size. Öland.

Fig. 583.—Bronze vessel, ⅕ real size, with burnt bones, in a tumulus, with two bronze spurs exactly alike, a bent double-edged sword, a spear-head damaged purposely, lying over the kettle, another larger spear-head well preserved, &c. Norway.

Fig. 584.—Restored bronze vase, containing ashes and bones, length 8½ inches, encircled by glittering stones and inlaid with silver. Angvaldnœs, Karmoen, Norway.

267

Fig. 585.—Bronze statuette,^[174] representing Juno. ⅓ real size. Ösby, Gräsgard parish, Öland.

Fig. 586.—Silver vase. 3
7 real size. Byrsted, Aalborg amt, North Jutland.

Fig. 587.—Sieve of bronze, ⅓ real size, found with ornaments of bronze and a drinking horn, a gold charm, two gold rings, and a small gold button found in a sepulchral chamber of little over 4 yards in length, and about 2 feet 3 inches wide. Norway.

Fig. 588.—Handle of the sieve. Real size.

268

Fig. 589.—Ornament of a bronze vase, 3
7 real size, found in a tumulus. Norway.

Fig. 590.—Ornament of bronze. ½ real size. Norway.

Fig. 591.—Bronze vessel from Mosbœk bog. Jutland.

Fig. 592.—Fragments of a bronze chain, probably part of riding gear. ⅓ real size. Bog, Karby on Mors.

Fig. 593.—Head at fastening of the handle of the bronze vessel.

269

Fig. 594.—Bronze basin, over a kettle containing burnt bones, ¼ real size, in round tumulus, inside a little stone cist built of slabs; with it also were a bronze kettle and a glass cup. Norway.

Fig. 595.—Bronze vase containing burnt bones, wrapped in a dark green woollen cloth with greenish and yellow stripes, fastened with a fibula of silver. In the chamber were a pair of shears and other objects. Ringkjobing amt, Jutland.

Fig. 596.—Vase, ¼ real size, found in a round mound, Vang Hdm., Norway, with fragments of another bronze vessel of the same size, but of a somewhat different form. It has on it the inscription “LIBERTINVS. ET. APRVS. CVRATOR [ES. POS] VERVNT.” Originally it must have belonged to a Roman temple of one of the northern provinces of the empire, and was offered to this temple by two of the administrators (curatores) named above. The shape of the letters leads to the conclusion that the vase belongs to the first century of our era.

270

Fig. 597.—Bronze bucket of Roman make, ⅕ real size, found in a round mound, Norway, together with a spear of iron and other objects of the same metal, but these were so decayed as to be undistinguishable.

Fig. 598.—Bronze vessel about 10 inches high. Angvaldnœs mound, Norway.

Fig. 599.—Flat finger-ring of silver and alloyed gold, real size, found together with fragments of Roman or Greek bronze vessels, four small beads of greenish glass, and two bronze fibulæ, in a mound, Hjörring, Jutland.

Fig. 600.—Bronze ring, real size, with Latin inscription, “Divo Trajano Parth. Avg. Patri.” Holbæk, Denmark.

271

Fig. 601.—Part of bent sword, real size, showing inscription in Latin “RANVICI,” probably a name, and above it a stamp, probably constituting the trade-mark of its maker.—Similar swords have been found at other places in the North, in the Nydam and Vimose bogs.

Fig. 602.—Bent sword, ¼ real size, found in a mound at Einang, Kristians Amt, Norway, on a layer of charcoal and burnt bones.

Fig. 603.—Bronze vessel, of Roman manufacture, mound 48 to 50 feet diameter, 6 feet high, found in a mound at Harf, Meldelpad Sweden, above a slab, filled with burnt bones, an iron spear-point, fibula of bronze, fragments of clay urns, &c. ¼ real size.

272

Fig. 604.—Bronze kettle, ⅑ real size, Brokær, Ribe, Jutland; found with fragments of Roman bronze vessels; and of two massive coats of mail; fragments of artistically woven cloth; double-edged sword with scabbard; comb, fragments of checkers, oblong dice of bone, and fragments of a silver drinking-horn, &c.

Fig. 605.—Ornaments of silver for drinking-horn, Brokær, Ribe, Jutland. ½ real size.

On the farm of Brottby, Ösby, Upland, a grave-mound of about 150 feet in circumference and 13 feet in height was found. The mound, the exterior of which was of earth, covered a cairn, in which was found a stone burial chamber enclosing a clay urn. The upper part contained bones, which were entirely unburnt, below which were pieces of the skull, also unburnt.^[175]

273

Fig. 606.—Grave-chamber found at Bröttby, Upland.

Fig. 607.—A buckle of bronze found with an iron needle. Bröttby.

Fig. 608.

Fig. 609.

Fig. 610.

Glass beads, of pale red colour, with white flowers with light and dark-green leaves; one is fastened to a silver wire. Of the twelve beads, three are represented here. Bröttby.

Fig. 611.

Bronze chain, found in a small elevation ½ foot deep, with a bead covered with some metal, and a silver wire like the one in Bröttby parish. Upland.

Fig. 612.       Fig. 613.

Denarius of Marcus Aurelius A.D. 162. Bröttby.

Fig. 614.—Fibula of gold, ornamented with eight garnets. Aareslev, Fyen. Real size.

Fig. 615.—Fibula with hanging ornament of gold, real size, representing a lion’s head; the filagree work is ornamented with garnets, found with another large silver fibula, a crystal ball, a vase of bronze, an imitation of a Roman coin, &c. Aareslev, Fyen.

Fig. 616.—The crystal ball with Greek inscription found near a skeleton with hanging ornaments, &c. Aareslev, Fyen. Real size.

Fig. 617.—Part of a belt buckle, silver gilt. ⅓ real size.

275

Fig. 618.—Bronze vessel, ⅕ real size, so brittle, that only by covering it all around with clay could it be moved away. It is made of two parts joined together in the middle with small flat rivets of bronze, and contained six quarts of burnt bones, among which were seventeen human teeth, different articles of iron and bronze, which had been packed in apparently coarse linen, small fragments of which only remained; a bronze mounting for a drinking-horn, and different kinds of iron knives; iron mounting for a knife-handle, remains of two iron awls, an iron key, two small melted lumps of silver, remains of about thirty-two bone needles, a glass bead with green ground and yellow stripes, remains of four earthen vessels, &c. Möllegaard, Broholm.

Fig. 619.—Bronze ornament, real size, found with kettle. Möllegaard, Broholm.

Fig. 620.       Fig. 621.

Byzantine gold coins, fifth century, Libius Severus and Leo, found in Björnhofda, Öland, with thirty-three other coins of the same century. Real size.

Fig. 622.       Fig. 623.

Barbaric imitation of Byzantine coin of the fifth century. Real size. Mallgards, Gotland.

Fig. 624.       Fig. 625.

Antonini Pii.

Fig. 626.       Fig. 627.

Faustina the younger.

Vessels with painted figures—Vessels with Greek letters—Drinking-horns of glass—Cut glass.

Nothing perhaps can give us a better idea of the refined taste of some of the Northmen than the beautiful glass objects which have been found in different parts of the country. Many of these are evidently of Greek, some perhaps of Roman, origin. In the museums of Italy, Greece, or Russia no such exquisite bowls are found, which after having been painted they seem to have been baked or subjected to heat in order that they might retain their colour.

Fig. 628.—2½ inches high; diameter across top, 3 inches; across bottom, 17
10ths of an inch. A blue panther, with grey or brown contours and dots, attacks a brown stag; on the other side of which is a brown lioness. Between the animals are circles of dots, brown and yellow by turns, with a brown spot in their middle.

Fig. 629.—3½ inches high; 39
10th inches diameter. A brown bull, with a blue band with brown dots, attacks a brown bear. To the left a man in yellow coat and green breeches, holding a whip in one hand, in the other a blue shield; to the right a stag, being torn by a lion, both brown.

These two vessels were found in a field, Nordrup, Zeeland, in a grave 3 feet 4 inches under the ground. It contained a skeleton, and, besides the two vessels, a Roman bronze vessel and bronze sieve, a gold finger-ring, a silver fibula, forty-one beads of glass and glass mosaic, a clay vessel, and fragments of two clay vessels.

277

Fig. 630.—4 inches high, 3¾ inches in diameter across top. In a mound, Viborg amt, Jutland.

Fig. 631.—Fragment of glass vessel, with gladiator and shield of blue tint, the gloves and shoulders are brown. Arm and legs of the other gladiator flesh colour. Thorslunde.

Fig. 632.—Fragments of glass bowl found in a grave by Thorslunde, Fyen. ⅗ real size. The wolf is greyish upon light yellow ground. The arm and legs are of a brown tint, the dots yellow and brown. These lay alongside remains of skeletons which seem to have been buried in sitting posture; some of the designs are raised.

Glass, as we have seen, has been found in the later bronze 278age: the ancient name for amber in the North was gler,^[176] which was well known by the stone age people; but we are aware that glass was unknown to them.

Fig. 633.—Fragment of a glass bowl of a green tint, ⅗ real size, found in a grave mound by Thorslunde.

Fig. 634.

Fig. 635.

Fig. 636.

Fig. 637.

Fig. 638.

Fig. 639.

Fig. 640.

Border of the vase.

Besides the glass vessels of Roman or Greek workmanship 279others of inferior quality, as is the case in every country, have been found; some of these, which are generally of a bluish green, yellow or white tint, are cut, some ornamented with thread patterns in relief.

Fig. 641.

Fig. 642.

Fragments of what must have been a magnificent glass vase of a dark blue colour; the figures in relief are of an opaque white and represented most probably some mythological subject. Sölberg, Lower Eker, Norway.

Fig. 643.—Glass drinking-horn. Norway.

Fig. 644.—Thin greenish glass vessel, open at both ends. ¼ real size. Varpelev.

Fig. 645.—Amethyst-coloured glass bowl. ¼ real size. Varpelev.

Fig. 646.—Glass drinking-horn, length 8 inches, diameter of mouth 2½ inches; very rare in the North. ¼ real size. Bavenhöi.

280

Fig. 647.—Vessel or goblet of greenish glass, ornamented with fillets. ¼ real size. Bavenhöi.

Fig. 648.—Glass vessel. ⅓ real size. With white and blue ornamented threads, found with beads, and bronze pans and sieves, in a woman’s skeleton grave. Ringsted, Zeeland.

Glass with thread-like lines have been found in a stone coffin, Roman, near Dusseldorf.

Fig. 649.—Dark blue glass bowl mounted with silver, on which was inscription in Greek letters, ΕΥΤΥΧΩΣ (with good luck). ½ real size. Above the head of the skeleton in the grave, but more or less damaged by the large stone, were at least six glass vessels and fragments of clay urns. Varpelev.

281

Fig. 650.—Vessel of greenish white glass with representations of various animals, found broken in many pieces. ⅔ real size. Bavenhöi.

Fig. 651.—Animals represented on this glass vessel. Lion, yellow and brown; bear, dark brown with light yellow outlines; animal with fore part of body missing, probably an ox. ⅓ real size. Bavenhöi.

Fig. 652.—Portion of glass vessel, much damaged. ½ real size. Two lions, light yellow, blue outlines, a double cross in the middle. Bavenhöi.^[177]

282

Fig. 653.—Vessel of whitish green glass, ornamented in various colours which have been burnt on the vessel itself. The colour of the four letters D.V.B.P. represented on the cup has been destroyed by the effects of time, as has also that of the beak, wings and legs of the bird. This, however, perfectly resembles the bird on the opposite side of the cup, which is better preserved, and on which the wing is light yellow with dark brownish outlines, the beak and legs red. ⅔ real size. Varpelev.^[178]

Fig. 654.—General design of vase. ⅖ real size.

Fig. 655.—Glass cup, funnel shape. Bjorko, Södermanland.

Fig. 656.—Glass cup, ¼ real size, found in a round tumulus, with a large bronze vase with two arms, the bronze ornamentation of a wooden bucket, &c., &c. Norway.

283

Fig. 657.—Glass vessel. ½ real size. Norway.

Fig. 658.—Glass vessel. ¼ real size. Norway.

Fig. 659.—Found deep in a stone circle. The cup or glass covered an urn of clay with burnt bones and some glass beads, etc. ½ real size. Upland.

Fig. 660.—In a stone cist, with a skeleton, some arrow-heads of bone, and a clay urn, etc., etc. ¼ real size. Oland.

Fig. 661.—Glass vessel found in a stone cist containing a skeleton, with a clay vessel, an iron knife, and bronze mounting for two drinking-horns. ⅓ real size. Gotland.

284

Fig. 662.—Tumbler of thick green glass. ½ real size. Varpelev.

Fig. 663.—Glass vessel found in a mound with unburnt skeleton. Norway.

Favourite colours of horses—Splendour of the harness—Iron and bronze bits—Spurs—Bridles.

We have ample proof from the Sagas that the people of the North were great breeders of horses, and took pride in their adornment. We are told of the favourite colours of horses, and the finds bear witness to the gorgeousness of their harness and trappings.

“Stein was for a while with King Knút, and was conspicuous for his weapons and clothes, and was called Stein the Proud. Old and wise men have told how Stein was so haughty that he had his horse shod with gold, and the hoof above adorned. King Knut thought Stein vied with him in magnificence, and therefore Stein left him” (Fms. v. 181).

“King Adils liked good horses very much, he had the best horses at that time. One of his horses was called Slöngvir (the flinging one), and another Hrafn (Raven); the latter he took from Ali when he was dead, and another horse also called Hrafn was bred by him; he sent it to King Godgest in Hálogaland. Godgest rode on it and could not stop it and fell down, and was killed”^[179] (Ynglinga Saga, ch. 33).

The chief Thorstein Kuggason had to seek shelter during bad weather at the farm of Björn Hitdælakappi while going to help his foes. When Thorstein took leave:

“Björn sent for the stud-horses which were near the hay-house, for fodder was given to them while the bad weather lasted. The stallion was a son of Hvíting (some famous stallion) and was white, but the mares were chestnut. Another 286son of Hvíting, also white, was in Thórarinsdal; but the mares (with him) were black. Björn had the stud-horses led to Thorstein, and said he wished to give them to him. Thorstein said he would not take them; ‘for I am not yet worthy of gifts from thee, and if I reward thee not for this entertainment which I have now received from thee then I shall probably not reward thee for further benefits, but, if I reward the entertainment as well as thou deservest, then I will receive the horse, and see that thou gettest something in return’” (Björn Hitdælakappi’s Saga, p. 55).

An Icelander, Odd Úfeigsson, had traded with the Finns, which no man was allowed to do without the king’s leave. Thorstein, one of Harald Hardrádi’s hirdmen, saved him from Harald, who wanted to slay him, and Odd escaped to Iceland. On one occasion, when Hárek, Thorstein’s kinsman came to Iceland:

“Odd sent with him to Norway a good stud of horses as a gift to Thorstein, and said, as was true, that Thorstein had saved the lives of him and his crew. Hárek came to Norway to his kinsman Thorstein, who was still with the king. He brought him the horses and said they were sent to him by Odd. Thorstein said: ‘This is very unfortunate for me as but for this the help that I gave Odd and his men would not have been known; now I cannot hide it, and it is somewhat difficult to escape.’ Thorstein showed the horses to the king, and said, ‘they were a gift sent by Odd.’ The king answered: ‘I was not worthy of gifts from Odd; he has sent them to thee and not to me’”^[180] (Fornmanna Sögur, vi. 383–384).

The magnificence with which the harness used by these people was ornamented is shown by their horse-collars, several of which, made of wood and richly decorated, are now in the Museum of Northern Antiquities in Copenhagen. The fact that such collars have always been found in pairs shows that two horses were generally harnessed to the waggons used; the pair is always similar, and the ornamentation at the ends, often of bronze gilt, or silver, or gold, generally consists of animals’ heads such as are so commonly represented on fibulæ. At the top of the collars is a hole, through which the 287rein passed, and the wood is decorated with representations of human heads of metal, the triskele, and birds, &c., riveted on.

Fig. 664.—Collar for driving of gilt bronze, grave mound, Jutland. ¼ real size.

Fig. 665.—2
9 real size.

Fig. 666.

Fig. 667.

Front view. ⅓ real size.

Horse-collar found in sepulchral chamber at Sollested, Assens, Fýen. Among other interesting finds in this sepulchral chamber were the remains of a cinerary urn with burnt bones and fragments of iron; equipment for two horses, including remains of a magnificent saddle, horses’ bits ornamented with gold and silver; stirrups inlaid with silver and gold, &c., &c.

A remarkable horse-collar was found at Sollested, Assens, Fýen, in a sepulchral chamber, 30 feet long, 9 feet broad, with its entrance facing the north-east; the representations of heads riveted to the collar are similar to numerous ones found in Southern Russia, of which many examples are to be seen in the Hermitage, St. Petersburg.

288

Fig. 668.—Fragments of harness with nails and other ornaments of iron covered with silver, sewn on leather. Real size. Denmark.

Fig. 669.—Iron bits.

Fig. 670.—Chains of iron, ¼ real size, with large rings at the end. Sollested.

Fig. 671.—End of waggon-pole. Real size. Sollested.

289

Fig. 672.

Fig. 673.

Parts of a bit of bronze gilt, ⅔ real size, found in a round tumulus explored in 1852, containing the remains of a ship and a waggon, pieces of a wooden saddle riveted with gilt bronze ornaments, several stirrups, bones of several animals, &c. Vold Borre, Norway.

Fig. 674.—Iron spur found in a tumulus. ⅓ real size. Norway.

Fig. 675.—Ornament to horse collar of bronze gilt. ½ real size.

Fig. 676.—Iron spur, found in a tumulus with a stone vase, a single-edged sword, an axe, two spear-heads, a shield-boss, a pair of stirrups, &c. ⅓ real size. Norway.

Fig. 677.—Part of horse collar of bronze. ½ real size.

Fig. 678.—Bronze bridle, little less than ⅕ real size, found in a tumulus. Norway.

290

Fig. 679.—Iron bit, 2
9 real size, found in a tumulus with a two-edged sword, two spear-heads, an axe, three knife-blades, fragments of a shield-boss, &c., all of iron. Norway.

Fig. 680.—Iron bit, 2
9 real size, found in a tumulus with a large axe, a spear-head, thirteen arrow-heads, six shield bosses, two knife-blades, clinch nails, &c. Norway.

Fig. 681.—Iron bit found in a tumulus. 2
9 real size. Norway.

Fig. 682.—Iron bit. 2
9 real size. Norway.

Fig. 683.—Iron bit, 2
9 real size, found in a tumulus, with burnt bones. Norway.

291

Fig. 684.—Iron bit for horses. ⅓ real size. Ultuna.

Fig. 685.—About ¼ real size. Norway. In a mound.

Fig. 686.—Stirrup, ⅓ real size, found in a mound upon the island of Bjorko.

Fig. 687.—Stirrup of iron inlaid with silver. ⅓ real size. Viborg, Jutland. In a grave with other riding gear.

292

Fig. 688.—Iron stirrup. 2
9 real size. Norway.

Fig. 689.—Iron stirrup, found in the upper part of a large round mound, with two double-edged swords bent in two, three spear-heads, five horses’ bits, a pair of shears, pincers, two bronze fibulæ, horses’ teeth, burnt bones, &c. 2
9 real size. Norway.

Fig. 690.—Iron stirrup. 2
9 real size. Norway.

Fig. 691.—Gold spur, ⅔ real size; weight, 9 ozs. Smaalenenes, Norway; earlier iron age.

Fig. 692.

Full view.

Fig. 693.

Ornaments of above spurs, real size; weight, 1⅙ ozs.; the point of iron missing; traces of the rust still seen. Smaalenenes, Norway.

293

Fig. 694.—Bridle and bit in bronze, Småland. Collection of Count G. Essen. ⅕ real size.

Fig. 695.

Fig. 696.—Spur of iron, ⅓ real size. Found in a large heap of stones of oblong shape, with a spear-head of iron, a double-edged sword, &c.

Fig. 697.—Spur of iron, real size, found in a paved circle, with burnt bones, two spear-points, &c. Norway.

Fig. 698.—Spur of bronze. Öland. Real size.

Fig. 699.—Spur of bronze, real size, found in mound, with another spur quite similar, a bronze kettle, a bent double-edged sword, a spear-head spoiled intentionally, &c. Norway.

294Waggons are seldom mentioned in the Sagas, and no description of their appearance is given; but we learn that dead warriors were sometimes put in them and burned on the pyre, and the correctness of this statement is proved by the finds in various graves, among others in one at Broholm, Fyén, where fragments of a waggon have been found together with burnt bones, a large kettle, several iron swords, shield bosses, gold jewels, &c., &c. But though remains of waggons have been found, it was not till the discovery in the bog of Deibjerg, Ringkjöbing in the North of Jutland, that we obtained a knowledge of their shape and of the splendour of their ornamentation.

Fig. 700.

Fig. 701.

Fig. 702.

Fig. 703.

Parts of perch of waggon with symbolic signs, Denmark.

295

Fig. 704.

Fig. 705.

Fig. 706.

Parts of sides of different waggon; with symbolic signs. Denmark. ¼ real size.

In this bog two waggons of a similar pattern, one of which in an almost complete state of preservation is represented here, were discovered. The spokes of the wheels had evidently been bent by heat, and the iron tires round them had apparently been bent by force; the pole, which was also richly ornamented with bronze, and the bottom and sides were well preserved, but the waggon of which a representation is given was more copiously ornamented with mystic signs than its companion. The following extracts from Sagas refer to the use of these waggons by the people. It is interesting to note that these waggons are almost identical in shape with the modern Kärra, used in Sweden. (See ‘Land of the Midnight Sun,’ Vol. i., p. 51).

“King Sigurd of Hringariki had two children, a daughter Ragnhild, and a son Guthorm. Haki the Berserk slew him and took his son and daughter home with him. Hálfdán the black sent one hundred men for them, who fetched them and burned the hall of Haki. They tented a very fine waggon, and put Ragnhild and Guthorm in it” (Hálfdán the black’s Saga, ch. 5).

“One summer King Eirek had a feast made at Uppsalir. Then he had two waggons driven to the place where he sacrificed to the god called Lýtir. It was customary for the waggon to stand there during the night and for the god to come in the morning. Now Lýtir did not come as he usually did, and the king was told that he disliked to do so. The waggon stood for two nights and he did not come. Then the king began to offer much greater sacrifices than before, and the third morning they became aware that Lýtir had come. Then the waggon was so heavy that the horses fell dead from exhaustion before they could pull it to the hall. The waggon was then put on the middle of the floor of the hall, and the king walked to it with a horn, and welcomed Lýtir, and said, he wanted to drink to him and was very anxious that he should undertake the journey, and that he would give him large gifts as before” (Flateyjarbók, i. 579–580).

“When he was ready to ride away two white horses with black ears were led forward, they belonged to Thord Breidavad and had disappeared that summer at the Thing” (Heidarviga Saga, c. 20).

“The queen ‘Yrsa’ had twelve horses led forward, they were all brown except one which was white as snow, and on this one Hrolf was to ride. They were the best horses of King 297Adils and covered all over with armour” (Hrolf Kraki Saga, c. 44).

Fig. 707.—Scene with waggon; bas-relief; length, 5 feet 9 inches; height, 4 feet 6 inches. This remarkable stone had been a good deal cut in order to range with other stones forming the flooring of the church of Alskog, Gotland. It was preserved from entire destruction by Prof. P. A. Save. Unfortunately, from the softness of the sandstone and the tramping of feet, it has become very indistinct. What the scene was intended to represent it is difficult to say.

298“There were four stud horses of Thorstein’s of red colour. They looked well but not fully broken. Thorstein offered to give him the horses, but Gunnlaug said he needed no horses as he was to leave Iceland. Thereupon they rode towards the stud horses, there was a gray stallion with four mares. It was the best stallion in Borgarfjord” (Gunnlaug Ormstunga, c. 5).

Fig. 708.—Runic stone, with waggon and horse.—Near Levede, in Gotland.^[183]

We find that the laws contained regulations in regard to the making of the roads, and the shutting of gates.

“The highroad shall be so broad that a man can sit on a saddled horse and put his spear-handle on the ground and put his thumb as high up as he can and the spear shall be one span longer. It shall be laid down across the road. It shall not be broader” (Gulath).

“If a man walks through the gate of a fence he who opens it shall be answerable as to shutting it. If cattle or horses go inside and spoil a field or meadow, then the opener of the gate shall pay back according to valuation all the damage made” (Gulath).

Different forms of graves—Picturesque situation—Various shapes of mounds—Bautastones—The Hjortehammar burial-ground—Stone-set graves—Ship-form graves—Triangular graves—Anund’s mound.

Mouldering bones and ashes of mighty heroes and noble women now forgotten under the mounds, or in the graves made hoary by the centuries that shroud you by their oblivion, I salute you! We also shall be forgotten.

The thousands of mounds, cairns, bautasteinar (memorial stones) and graves found to this day all over the North show the high veneration the earlier English-speaking tribes had for their dead; these mounds or cairns are always situated on some conspicuous place by the coast, from which a magnificent view can often be had.

We have already treated of graves at some length with special reference to the age—stone, bronze, or iron—to which they belonged, and also with relation to the objects found in them. Before, however, proceeding to speak of the burial customs of the Norsemen it may be well to give some further idea of the various classes of graves.

Sweden is particularly rich in these mementoes of the past, in the midst of which the high roads not unfrequently pass, forming a most impressive scene. What emotion have I felt when standing upon many of these graves, deeply impressed by the beauty or loneliness of the site chosen and of its surroundings; perhaps never more so than on the coast of Bohuslän—the Viken of yore.^[184] There the cairns have been 300erected on the summit of the bare solid rocky hills of primary formation, several hundred feet above the level of the water, and overlooking a panorama of fjords, sounds, barren islands and desolate coast, with the open seas beyond, and with the sun sinking below the horizon. The waves strike at their base, and with the wind sing mournfully a requiem over the forgotten dead; their work is done, the glorious mission they had to accomplish in the history of the world is ended, the mighty drama of the sword is closed.

Fig. 709.—Cairn, Bohuslän, Sweden.

It is towards evening, before the twilight fades gradually into darkness, that the scene of this weird landscape is most impressive, and no one can really imagine its effects until he stands upon the spot and sees the view spread before him.

In some parts of Norway the contrast is often great in the extreme; the mounds there have huge mountains in the background with their summits clad in snow, and in the foreground the grand open sea. One of the bleakest spots in the country, where these have been erected, is on the flat gravelly coast of Lyster, which lies between the mountain and the sea;—there, over the last resting-places of those warriors, the wind blows 301most fearfully in winter-time, and the sea dashes on the shore in huge foamy white waves.

In Denmark and parts of Sweden there are places on the elevated points of the coast full of charms, looking over the Sound, the Cattegat, the Baltic, or the waters of some of the great lakes. Many of these resting-places of man are now covered by forests, and upon some of the mounds huge oaks sprung from the acorn of their sires tell forcibly of the centuries that have passed over them.

Fig. 710.—Grave, Einang, Norway; diameter, 50 feet; earlier iron age.

We can vividly realise why the people laid their dead to rest by that sea they loved so much during their lifetime, and upon which they had sailed so often. The mariner as he passed by could behold the graves of the dead and victorious champions, whose memory was always kept fresh by the scalds^[185] who sang his exploits generation after generation, thus filling the youth of the country with pride, and making them wish to emulate the deeds of these men, often their kinsmen of old, who had gone to Valhalla.

The mounds and cairns are not always round, they are sometimes square, oblong, rectangular or triangular. The 302round mounds and cairns exist in different parts of the world, and in Scandinavia as far back as the stone and bronze ages; the vast number of bautastones seen all over the country shows also how well the injunctions of Odin were carried out by his followers in that respect. Some of these are very imposing, and their dark forms look weird enough against the landscape or the clear or gloomy sky. One of the finest stood in Brastod parish, Bohuslän, now lying prostrate and broken, its height being 26 feet; and its place was on one corner of a stone set of rectangular graves 40 feet in length and 28 feet in width.

Fig. 711.—Bautastone (from grave shown on p. 301) with nineteen runes; 1
15 real size; 5 feet 8 inches in height; width, 3 feet 2 inches; 9 inches thick; length of rune, 2 feet 1½ inches.

303

Fig. 712.—Bautastone on a mound 200 feet in circumference and 7 feet high, Runesten Grimeton (Bohuslän), Halland; 19½ feet high, 4½ feet wide. Surrounding it are mounds and graves of various shapes.

Fig. 713.—Oblong mound, Yttersala, Södermanland; 33 feet in diameter. In the vicinity are numerous other graves of various shapes.

Fig. 714.—Square stone-set grave. Södermanland.

304

Fig. 715.—Rectangular stone-set graves with bautastones. Length, 70 feet; width, 24 feet.—Färentuna parish, Upland, Sweden.

305

Fig. 716.—Rows of mounds with bautastones from 4½ to nearly 6 feet high, Rekarnebygden, Södermanland. Near by are many other mounds and stone-set graves.

306

Fig. 717.—Square stone-set graves with large boulders at the corners and centre.

Fig. 718.—Triangular grave; sides of triangle about 50 feet; corner stones about 3 feet high. In the middle of the south-west side are two stones, 5 feet apart, with a slab between them, one 3 feet, the other 4 feet high. Thorsbacken, Nerike, Sweden.

The most interesting of the graveyards which I have seen is that of Hjortehammar, situated in the province of Blekinge on a narrow promontory lost in the maze of islands which dot the coast of Sweden on this part of the Baltic. It is joined now to an island situated near its further end by a causeway and a small bridge. This is not only remarkable from its position 307and size, but on account of the numerous forms of graves of various sizes it contains. The length of the cape is about 1,200 feet, and its greatest breadth about 200 feet. The engraving gives an idea of the shape and size of the different graves, some of which are shown in large scale. This cape is but a continuation of a ridge full of graves; heather and juniper cover many of them; and well chosen was this secluded and quiet spot for the last resting-place of their departed kinsmen or friends.^[186]

Fig. 719.—Hjortehammar burial-ground, with various shaped graves.

In the Háleygjatal, a poem on the genealogy of the famous Hákon jarl, tracing his pedigree to Odin, there is a passage which recalls the burial-place Hjortehammar.

308

Fig. 720.—Vedby ridge, Blekinge. The large stones are from 4 to 6 feet high. Length of each side, 40 feet.

Fig. 721.—Stone-set grave, Blekinge. Length, 38 feet.

Fig. 722.—Triangular grave. Sides 60 to 65 feet long, with a small elevation in the middle, and a bautastone nearly 5 feet high and 2 feet 6 inches broad. Lyngstad, Södermanland.

309Among the most remarkable and not uncommon stone-set graves are those of the so-called “ship-form” setting; they belong both to the earlier and later iron age. This peculiar form of grave is found on the peninsula of Scandinavia and on the islands of Gotland, Öland, and other islands of the Baltic, in Courland and Livonia, and was also erected in England and Scotland by the people of the North.

Fig. 723.—Blekinge. Diameter, 30 feet.

Fig. 724.—Listerby ridge, Blekinge. Diameter, 18 feet.

Stone-set graves.

Fig. 725.—Graveyard with mounds and stone-set graves at Åsby, Södermanland.

One of the most interesting is that where the rowers’ seats 310are marked, and even a stone placed in the position of the mast.

The longest ship-form grave which I think is known is one near Kåsberga, a fishing village in the southern part of Sweden, with a length of 212 feet and a width of 60 feet. It is made by thirty-eight stones, the two forming the prow being 12 and 18 feet in height above the ground—the latter being the northern one.

Fig. 726.—Ship-form grave, Karums parish, Öland.

But the finest of all, though less in size, is the famous one of Blomsholm, near Strömstad, the whole neighbourhood of which is surrounded with mementoes of the past—graves, dom-rings, mounds, bautastones, and rock-tracings.^[188]

311

Fig. 727.—Ship-form graves, Blomsholm, Bohuslan, made of forty-nine upright stones (formerly there were fifty-one). Length, 141 feet; greatest breadth, 31½ feet; prows north and south, the northern headstone 11 feet high, the southern 14½, the stones gradually diminishing in size towards the centre, where the largest is about 3 feet. Built on a small mound or elevation which was higher in former times.

312

Fig. 728.—Sjusta mound, Skog parish, Upland; 204 feet in circumference; 28 feet high; with a row of stones at its base. At the south end is another stone-set mound.

313

Fig. 729.—Type of Mound with bautastone at the top and circle of stones at the base.

Fig. 730.—Mound, 3 feet high, with bautastone, Balunda parish, Westmanland.

314

Fig. 731.—Triangular graves; stone forming the apex, with runes, is about 25 feet from the two others, which are 14 feet apart—Björktorp, Blekinge.

Fig. 732.—Incomplete mound; 50 feet in circumference; 10 feet high; largest stone over 6 feet high; in Thortuna parish, Westmanland.

315

Fig. 733.—Mounds on Kjula-ridge. Södermanland.

Fig. 734.—Mound set with boulder-stones, Dalsland; circumference of boulders, 100 feet; height of mound, 4 feet, on the top of which are two flat stones standing on edges. Near it is a boulder stone-setting, probably a dom-ring.

316Many of the cairns, which are often beautifully arranged, are small, being 4 or 5 feet in height, or sometimes almost even with the ground, their diameter varying from 20 to 80 feet. Numbers of them have stone-settings, sometimes close, sometimes not.

Fig. 735.—Diameter, 20 feet.

Fig. 736.—Diameter, 16 feet.

Fig. 737.—Diameter, 16 feet.

Cairns—Blekinge.

Fig. 738.—Round cairn at Björkeby, Foresund, Södermanland.

Fig. 739.—Square cairn, island of Öland.

317

Fig. 740.—Anund’s mound, Vestmanland. Circumference, 652 feet; height 84 feet. A great number of standing or fallen bautastones are found near the mound.

318One of the most interesting graves which have been recently opened in England is one belonging to the manor of Taplow, near Maidenhead, about fifty miles by river above London. The mound, 240 feet in circumference, and 15 feet high, overlooks the Thames and the surrounding lands.

Fig. 741.—Gold fibula ornamented with garnets and red glass. ⅔ real size. Taplow, England.

Fig. 742.—Fibula of bronze, ½ real size, the edge of the triangle and nail heads of bronze, the middle a thin silver plate. Found in a mound with 14 urns and burned bones, a spear point of iron, &c. Zeeland, Denmark.

Among the objects were two shield bones, one sword, fragments of others, fragments of a spear head, one bronze vessel, one wooden bucket so common in the graves of the North, with bronze hoops, &c., two pairs of glass vessels (one of which is here represented) similar to one found with a burial ship in Vold in Norway, forty checkers, two pairs of ornaments for drinking horns (all of silver gilt), one green glass bead, &c. &c.; a fibula of the same form as those of the North. But the most remarkable article was a quantity of gold thread belonging to a garment, the triangular form of the pattern still remaining.

This grave, like the one of King Gorm of Denmark and several others of the North, is in the old churchyard where the ancient parish church stood. On the slope of the mound 319itself several Christian graves are seen. The viking, like some of the chiefs of the North, was probably buried on his estate, on the land that had descended to him through his ancestors or which possibly he might have conquered from some of his foes. These antiquities by their form seem to belong to the later iron age.

Fig. 743.—Vessel of green glass. ⅔ real size. Taplow, England. 11⅛ inches in height.

Fig. 744.—Ornament of silver gilt, showing end of drinking horn. ½ real size.

Fig. 745.—Silver gilt ornamentation for mouth of drinking horn. ½ real size. The horn itself, found in a mass of small fragments. Taplow, England.

The two modes of burial—Burning of the dead on the pyre—The law of Odin—Ceremonies after death—Laws and superstitions connected with the dead—The journey to Hel—The burial of Sigurd and Brynhild—Burial on waggons—Burial of weapons with the dead—Burials in ships—The Gökstad ship’s sepulchral chamber—The Moklebust mound.

The Eddas and Sagas abound with descriptions of funeral rites and burials, the accuracy of which is most fully vindicated by the finds.

Two modes of burial were prevalent among the people, one that of burning the dead, the other of burying them unburned.^[189]

It was the belief of the people that the dead burned on the pyre would go to Valhalla with all the weapons and wealth burned with them, and that these would afterwards resume their original shapes. Horses, dogs, falcons, or other animals which the deceased had liked, were often added, and sometimes some of his thralls were killed and burned on the pyre with him.

“Odin enacted the same laws in his land as had formerly prevailed with the Asar. Thus he ordered that all dead men should be burned, and on their pyre should be placed their property. He said thus: that with the same amount of wealth should they come to Valhalla as they had on the pyre; that they should also enjoy what they had themselves buried in the ground. But the ashes should be thrown into the sea or buried in the earth; that over great men mounds should be raised, as memorials; and over men who had some manfulness bautasteinar should be erected, and this custom was observed for a long time” (Ynglinga Saga, c. 8).

“It was the custom of powerful men, whether kings or jarls, 321at that time to learn warfare and win wealth and fame; that property should not be counted with the inheritance, nor should sons get it after fathers, but it should be placed in the mound with themselves” (Vatnsdæla, 21).

“The first age is called the age of burning; then all dead men were burned and bautastones raised after them. But after Frey had been mound-laid at Uppsalir many chiefs raised mounds as well as bautastones to the memory of their kinsmen. Afterwards King Dan the Proud had his own mound made, and bade that he and also his horse with the saddle on and much property should be carried to it when dead in king’s state and in war-dress. Many of his kinsmen did the same afterwards, and the mound-age began in Denmark. But the burning age lasted a long time after that with the Northmen and the Swedes” (Prologue of Heimskringla).

“The first age was the one when all dead men were to be burnt. Then the mound-age began when all powerful men were laid in mounds and all common people buried in the ground” (St. Olaf’s Saga. Prologue).

Fig. 746.—Largest pavement of pyre, 33 feet in diameter.—Broholm, Fyen, Denmark.

322As we read the Sagas we get a vivid and impressive idea of the grand and solemn pageant that must have taken place when the body of a great warrior was put on the funeral pile, and his companions in arms, relatives or former foes bid him happy speed to Valhalla, as the flames ascended high up towards the sky, or the ship sailed from the land in a lurid blaze, while the purifying fire was consuming the corpse. Then followed the ceremony of carefully gathering the charred bones, which were sacredly preserved in an urn or valuable vessel.^[190]

The first duty to the dead was to close the eyes and mouth and pinch together the nostrils, which ceremony was called nabjargir.

It appears to have been a case of outlawry not to cover a body with mould, and if a slayer maimed the body of his enemy when dead he was fined. The body seems to have been left on a cover until they could lay it in the mound.

“No man shall have a dead man longer than five days in his house except in a necessity, such as if there is impassable ice or a snowstorm. Then it shall be taken to an outhouse and covered with timbers or straw, and removed as soon as the weather is good” (Eidsivathing law II. 41).

If the deceased had during life been a wild and unruly man, fierce in temper, who it was feared might after death, as a 323ghost, cause trouble in the house where he had lived, some very peculiar ceremonies were observed. The person who was to perform the nabjargir did not approach the body from the front, but from behind, and closed the eyes, and not till then did any one else venture to approach to prepare it for funeral. Such a corpse was not carried out of the house through one of the usual entrances, but a hole was broken in the wall behind it, through which it was carried backward.

“Snorri godi (temple priest), the great chief, had received a forest from Thorólf Bœgifot (lame-foot), who wanted to get it back.

“Thorólf Bœgifot (after visiting his son to get his help in this matter) came home in the evening, and spoke to no one. He sat down in his high-seat, but did not eat that evening. He sat there when the people went to sleep, and in the morning when they rose Thorólf still sat there, and was dead. The housewife sent a man to his son Arnkel to tell him the death of Thorólf. Arnkel rode to Hvamm with some of his servants, and saw that his father sat dead in the high-seat. All the people were full of fear, for all thought there was something frightful in his death. Arnkel went into the hall and in along the seats to the back of Thorólf; he bid every man to beware of walking in front of him while the nabjargir had not been performed. Arnkel then took hold of the shoulders of Thorólf, and he had to use his strength ere he could lay him down. Then he wrapped a cloth around his head, and prepared his corpse for burial according to custom. Thereupon he had the wall broken behind him, and got him out there. Then oxen were yoked to a sledge, on which Thorólf was placed, and driven up to the valley of Thorsa; but he was not easily brought to the place where he should be. There they buried him carefully. After the death of Thorólf many thought it bad to be out of doors after the sun had set; and as the summer was about to close, they became aware that Thorólf did not rest quiet, for then men could never be at peace outside after sunset. In the spring, Arnkel took Thorólf’s body out on a ness, and there buried it anew. He had a fence made across the cape above the grave, so high that nothing but a flying bird could get over it. There Thorólf lay as long as Arnkel lived, but when he afterwards again became troublesome his body was burned, and the ashes thrown into the sea” (Eyrbyggja, c. 33).^[193]

324The ceremony was sometimes considered as an incitement for the performer to avenge the dead.

Höskuld, an illegitimate son of Njal and Hródný, was attacked by six men on his way home and slain. Hródný’s shepherd found the corpse and told her. They went during the night to Njal’s farm, Bergthórshvál.

“Then they both walked to the house and knocked at the door. A húskarl opened the door. She ... went to Njal’s bed. She asked if Njal was awake. He answered: ‘I have slept till now, but now I am awake, and why art thou here so early?’ She said: ‘Rise from the bed of my rival and walk out with me, with her, and with thy sons.’ They rose and went out. Skarphédin (Njal’s son) said: ‘Let us take our weapons with us.’ Njal said nothing; they ran in and came out armed with their weapons. Hródný walked in front till they came to the sheephouse. She went in and told them to follow her. She took a creeping light (lantern) and said: ‘Here, Njal, is thy son Höskuld. He has got many wounds and now needs to be healed.’ Njal said: ‘I see marks of death on him but no marks of life. Why hast thou not given him nabjargir as his nostrils are open?’ She answered: ‘I intended that for Skarphédin.’ Skarphédin walked to the corpse and performed the nabjargir. Then he said to his father: ‘Who, sayest thou, has slain him?’ Njal answered: ‘Lýting of Sámsstadir with his brothers has probably slain him.’ Hródný said: ‘I intrust it to thy hands, Skarphédin, to avenge thy brother. I expect thou wilt do thyself honour though he is not legitimate, and that thou wilt take the revenge into thy hands’” (Njala, c. 98).

Before putting a body in the mound hel shoes were put on for the journey to Hell.

“Thereafter Gisli and all his household made ready for the mounding of Vestein, his brother-in-law. He intended to mound him in the sand plain ... below Sæból. When they were on their way with the corpse Thorgrím with many men joined him. When they had made the mound Thorgrím godi walked to Gisli and said: It is now the custom, brother-in-law, to tie Hel-shoes on the feet of men before they are mound-laid. For it was said that they (the shoes) should go to Hel when the man was dead, and therefore a man who dresses much when he goes out, or is long in dressing, is said to prepare for Hel. Thorgrím said: I will do this with Vestein and tie the Hel-shoes on his feet. When he had done it, he said: I know 325not how to tie Hel-shoes if these are unfastened” (Gis Súrsson’s Saga).

In the weird description of the burial of Sigurd and Brynhild^[194] we see that the mound was reddened with blood, and that human beings were burned with them on the pyre.

326Another custom no less imposing was to bury the chiefs with their carriages and horses, so that they might make their entries driving into Valhalla, or riding on horseback; and it was considered honourable to go to Odin with many slain.

“The second day after the battle (of Bravoll), in the morning, King Hring caused a search to be made among the slain for the body of King Harald, his kinsman, and a great part of the slain host lay on the top of it. It was mid-day before the search was completed and it was found. King Hring took the body of his kinsman, and washed the blood from it, prepared it magnificently, according to old custom, and laid it in the waggon which King Harald had in the battle. He then raised a large mound, and caused the body to be carried in the same waggon with the horse which King Harald had in the battle, and thus he had him driven to the mound. There the horse was killed. Then King Hring took the saddle he himself had ridden on and gave it to King Harald his kinsman, and bade him do as he liked, either ride to Valhalla or drive. He held a great feast to celebrate the going away of his kinsman. Before the mound was closed, King Hring bade all his high-born men and champions who were present to throw into the mound large rings (gold and silver) and good weapons, to honour King Harald Hilditönn, and the mound was carefully closed” (Sögubrot of Fornkonungum).^[201]

If circumstances allowed, the deceased seems to have been placed on a bed prepared for the purpose, until the burial could take place.

“Glúm also went home with his men, and had the dead carried into an outhouse, where Thorvald’s body was prepared more honourably than the others, for clothes were laid under him, and he was sewed up in a skin” (Viga Glúm’s Saga, c. 23).

In a large burial chamber at Lower Aure, Norway, were found the remains of a chair, thus confirming the accounts of the Sagas about men being placed on their chair in the grave. Some of these chambers were occasionally built of wood.

“Aran, a foster-brother of Asmund, died suddenly. Asmund had a mound raised over him, and placed at his side his horse 327with saddle and bridle, his standards, and all war-dress, his hawk and dog. Aran sat on a chair in all his armour. Asmund let his chair be put into the mound and sat down upon it, and then the mound was closed. The first night Aran rose from the chair, killed the hawk and the dog, and ate them both. The second night he rose, killed the horse and cut it to pieces, tearing it much with his teeth; he ate the horse, the blood streaming down from his mouth; he invited Asmund to eat with him. The third night Asmund began to feel sleepy; and suddenly Aran seized his ears and tore them off. Then Asmund drew his sword, and cut Aran’s head off; and afterwards burned him to ashes. He thereupon went to the rope and was drawn up, and the mound was closed; Asmund took with him the property which had been placed in the mound” (Egil and Asmund’s Saga, c. 7).

“Angantyr had a large mound raised below the Havada-mountains, at the place where the king had been slain. It was built with timber, and was very strong” (Hervarar Saga, c. 16).

Sometimes the body of a man was divided into several portions, and each of these buried in different parts of the country.

“While he (Hálfdán) was king there were very good years. The people made so much of him that when they heard he was dead, and that his body had been taken to Hringariki to be buried there, powerful men from Raumariki, Vestfold and Heidmörk came, and all asked for leave to take his body and mound it in their fylki;^[202] they thought that those who got it were likely to have good seasons. They agreed to divide the body in four pieces, and the head was mounded at Stein in Hringariki; the others took their pieces home and mounded them, and they are all of them called the mounds of Hálfdán (in Snorri’s time)” (Hálfdán the Black’s Saga, ch. 9) (Heimskringla).

Friends often wished to be buried near each other, for they believed that their spirits could talk to each other or look over their household before important events occurred.

“Then Thorstein fell sick. He said to Fridthjof: ‘My son, I beg of thee that thou wilt yield to the king’s sons with regard to thy temper, for that befits thee on account of their dignity, and I have good hope of thee. I want to be laid in a 328mound opposite to King Beli, on this side of the fjord, near the sea, for then it will be easy for us to call to each other before great events.’ The foster-brothers of Fridthjof were Björn and Asmund; they were tall and strong men. A short time after Thorstein died; he was mounded as he had prescribed, and Fridthjof got his land and personal property” (Fridthjof’s Saga, c. 1).

Several persons were often buried in the same mound; and after a battle many of the slain were buried together.

“After this Hjálmar died. Odd then placed the Berserks in a heap, and piled upon them boughs. This was near the sea. He put with them their weapons and clothing, divesting them of nothing. He covered this with turf and cast sand over it. He then took Hjálmar on his back, carried him to the sea, and laid him down on the shore. He went out on the ships, took ashore every one who had fallen, and there threw up another mound over his men. It is said by those who have gone thither, that to this day are seen those mounds which Odd there made” (Orvar Odd’s Saga, c. 14).^[203]

“On the following morning Hrolf had the field cleared, and divided the booty among his men. There were raised three very large mounds. In one Hrolf placed his father Sturlaug and Krák, Hrafn’s brother and all the best champions of their host who had fallen. In that mound were put gold and silver and good weapons, and all was well performed. In the second was placed King Eirik, Brynjólf and Thórd and their picked men. In the third was Grim Ægir, near the shore, where it was thought least likely that ships would approach. The warriors were buried where they had fallen” (Göngu Hrolf’s Saga, ch. 34).

From many descriptions we see with what awe the ancient Vikings regarded the mounds under which renowned chiefs were buried. Over the mounds of great warriors flames were seen at night, and the ghost of the departed was believed to remain there.

When the burning did not take place, the warrior was buried with his weapons and entire equipment. Sometimes he slept with his sword under his head. Angantyr’s shoulders rested upon the famous sword Tyrfing, and Angrim’s sons were buried there in that manner. Many of the weapons placed 329with them were very famous and supposed to possess special or supernatural qualities, and mounds were sometimes broken for the sake of getting.

“A little after she (the Amazon Hervör) left by herself in a man’s dress and weapons and went to Vikings, and was with them for awhile, and was called Hervard. A little after the chief of the Vikings died, and Hervard got the command of them. Once they came to Sámsey. Hervard went up on land, and none of his men wanted to follow him, for, they said, it would not do for any man to stay out there at night. Hervard said that much property was likely to be in the mounds, and went up on the island near sunset. They lay in Munarvag. She met a herd-boy there, and asked him about news. He said, ‘Dost thou not know the island? Come home with me, for it will not do for any man to stay out here after sunset; I am going home at once.’ Hervard replied: ‘Tell me; where are the mounds of Hjörvard?’ The boy said: ‘Thou art unwise, as thou wantest to search for that at night which few dare search for at mid-day; burning fire plays on the mounds after sunset.’ Hervard replied he would certainly go to the mounds. The shepherd said: ‘I see that thou art a bold man, though thou art unwise. I will give thee my necklace if thou wilt come home with me.’ Hervard answered: ‘Though thou wouldst give me all thou ownest thou couldst not hinder me from going.’ When the sun set they heard hollow noises in the island, and the mound fires appeared. The shepherd got frightened and took to his feet, and ran into the forest as quickly as he could, and never looked back.”

As she comes by the mound she sings:—

Then the mound opened and looked as if it were all on fire and flame.

Angantyr sang:

Then the sword was flung out into the hands of Hervör.

332“Then she went down to the sea, and when it dawned she saw that the ships had left. The vikings had been afraid of the thunderings and the fires in the island”^[210] (Hervarar Saga, c. 10).

Burial in ships.—The mode of burial in ships would appear to have belonged exclusively to the North, where it seems to have been in much favour, and shows in a remarkable manner the seafaring character of the people.

Until recently few descriptions have been more ridiculed by persons who did not believe in the Saga literature, than those which gave accounts of burials of chiefs, warriors, and others in ships. Here again archæology has come to our aid to prove the truthfulness of the Sagas, and in such a perfect manner as to settle the question beyond controversy; for we find ships in which the body of the dead warrior was not burned, and other ships which have been used as a pyre. The earliest account of such burial is in Voluspa, amplified in the later Edda, which gives us a vivid description of the funeral of Baldr, the son of Odin.

“The Asar took the body of Baldr and carried it down to the sea. Hringhorni was the name of Baldr’s ship; it was larger than any other ship. The gods wanted to launch it for the burning-voyage of Baldr, but it did not move. Then the gyg (Jötun-woman)^[211] in Jötunheim, named Hyrrokkin, was sent for. She came riding on a wolf, with snakes for reins. She leapt from the steed, and Odin called to four Berserks to take care of it, but they could not hold it except by throwing it down. She went to the stem of the ship and pushed it forward at the first attempt, so that fire issued from the rollers and the ground trembled. Then Thor grew angry, seized his hammer, and would have broken her head if the gods had not asked him to spare her. The body of Baldr was carried out on the ship, and his wife Nanna, Nep’s daughter, on seeing this died 333from grief. She was laid on the pyre and it was set on fire. Thor went to it and consecrated it with Mjölnir. At his feet there ran a Dverg named Lit. Thor pushed him with his foot into the fire, and he was burned. To this burning came many kinds of people. First went Odin and his ravens and Frigg, as well as the Valkyrias. Frey drove in a carriage drawn by the boar called Gullinbursti (gold bristle) or Slidrugtanni (the awful-tusked). Heimdal rode the horse Gulltopp (gold tuft), and Freyja with her cats. There came also many Hrim Thursar and Bergrisar. Odin laid on the pyre the gold ring Draupnir; afterwards every ninth night there dropped from it eight equally heavy gold rings. The horse of Baldr was led on the pyre in full harness” (Gylfaginning, ch. 49).

“They carried him in the snowstorm to Naustanes, where a tent was put over him at night. In the morning, at high water, Skallagrim was laid in a ship, and they rowed to Digranes. Egil had a mound made near the end of the ness (cape), and in this he was laid, with his horse, his weapons, and smithying tools. It is not mentioned that loose property was put in the mound with him. Egil took the inheritance, lands, and loose property; he took care of the farm” (Egil’s Saga, c. 61).

Gudrun after having slain her husband Atli said:

“Geirmund died at Geirmundsstadir, and was laid in a ship in the woods near the farm (gard).”

Of this Geirmund much is told of in Sturlunga as a great chief.

“Thórir, An’s brother, fell in a battle against king Lugjaldi of Naumdœlafylki.

“An had a mound made and put a ship in it and placed Thórir in its lypting, but the king’s men he placed along both sides of the ship that it might look as if all served him” (An Bogsveigi’s Saga, ch. 6).

“The brothers Eirik and Jorund became very famous by this deed (slaying King Gudlaug of Hálogaland), and they thought themselves far greater men than before. When they heard 334that King Haki had allowed his champions to go away, they sailed to Sweden and collected a host, and when it was known that the two Ynglings had returned the Swedes flocked to them in great numbers. They sailed up into the Log (Lake Mälar) and went to Uppsalir against King Haki, who met them on Fyrisvellir. A great battle ensued; King Haki rushed forward with such valour that he slew all that were near him, he finally killed Eirik and cut down the standard bearers of the brothers, whereupon Jorund fled to his ship with his men. Haki received such severe wounds that he saw his days would not be long. He then had a skeid which he owned loaded with dead men and weapons, he had it launched on the sea, and the rudder adjusted and the sea sail hoisted. He had tarred wood kindled and a pyre made on the ship, the wind blew towards the sea. Haki was almost dead when he was laid on the pyre. Then the burning ship sailed out to sea. This was very famous for a long time after” (Ynglinga Saga, c. 27).

“King Hakon then took the ships belonging to Eirik’s sons, which lay on the dry beach, and had them dragged ashore. He placed Egil Ullserk, together with all who had fallen on his side, in a ship, which was covered with earth and stones. He also had dragged ashore several more ships, and into these were laid the dead. The mounds are still to be seen south of Frædarberg. High bautastones stand at the mound of Egil Ullserk” (Hakon the Good’s Saga, ch. 27).

Women were sometimes buried in ships.

“After this Unn, who was now quite old, as was her custom, went into her sleeping-house to rest, but bade her guests enjoy themselves, and ordered that they be entertained as splendidly as possible. When she retired the feast continued until it was time to go to bed. The next day, as Unn remained longer than usual in her sleeping-room, Olaf went in and found her dead. He returned to the guests and announced this to them, who all said that Unn had well kept up her dignity to the last.

“At the same time Olaf’s wedding and Unn’s arvel were held. On the last day of the feast her body was carried to the mound which had been prepared for it. She was placed in a ship therein, and with her a great deal of property, and then the mound was closed.” Olaf then took possession of his grandmother’s property, and, after the feast was over, gave fine presents to the foremost of those present, and all departed (Laxdæla, ch. 8).^[214]

335Men were sometimes buried in a ship’s boat.

“Ingimund was laid in the boat of the ship Stigandi, and his body prepared honourably as was the custom with high-born men. Thorstein said to his brothers: ‘It seems to me right that we shall not sit in our father’s seat at home, or at feasts, while his slaying is unavenged.’ This they did, and neither went to games nor other gatherings” (Vatnsdæla Saga, 22).

One of the most valuable discoveries, showing the burial of a warrior in a ship without his body being burned, is that of the Gökstad ship.

Very few things in the North have impressed me more than the sight of this weird^[215] mausoleum, the last resting-place of a warrior, and as I gazed on its dark timber I could almost imagine that I could still see the gory traces of the struggle and the closing scene of burial when he was put in the mortuary chamber that had been made for him on board the craft he commanded.

336

Fig. 747.—Sepulchral chamber, Gökstad ship.

The greatest length of the mound was from N.E. to S.W. About 150 feet in diameter, height above the soil 15 feet; above the sea 18 feet. The roof of the structure had been broken through by the weight of the earth of the mound above it. The large cut in the side was probably made by thieves wishing to get possession of the weapons, &c.

Fig. 748.—Bedstead, upon which the dead warrior had been placed, found in the sepulchral chamber, Gökstad ship.

337

Fig. 749.

Fig. 750.

Axe, ¼ real size, found in mound.

Fig. 751.

Fig. 752.

Fig. 753.

Fig. 754.

Fig. 755.

Fig. 756.

Fig. 757.

Fig. 758.

Fig. 759.

Fig. 760.

Some objects of bronze or iron.—Gökstad ship.

338

Fig. 761.—Part of a sledge.

Fig. 762.

Fig. 763.

Fig. 764.

Fig. 765.

Fig. 766.

Fig. 767.

Some objects of bronze or iron. Gökstad ship. See Vol. ii., Frontispiece and pages 162 to 168.

The warrior had been buried according to his position in life; remains at least of twelve skeletons of horses were found in different parts of the mound on each side of the ship; there 339were also remains of skeletons of several dogs. The bones and feathers of a peacock were inside the ship, the prow of which, like that of the Tune boat, looked towards the sea as if ready for a voyage.

One of the finest discoveries, illustrating the use of a ship as a pyre for the burial of the dead warrior, was in a mound 12 feet high and 92 feet in diameter, opened in 1874 in Moklebust Eids parish, Bergen Stift, Norway.

Among the objects were a vast number of rivets or clinch-nails, and a great number of shield-bosses belonging to shields which adorned the sides of the ship; perhaps several warriors had been burned together. On the bottom of the mound, on the level of the ground, was a layer of charcoal and burned soil intermingled with small pieces of bone, which extended nearly to the sides, but was heaviest in the middle. Separated from this by a layer of light shore-sand was another similar layer.

Inside an oval about 28 feet in length and 14 feet in width these two layers were interspersed with burned bone-splints, clinch-nails, and spikes.^[216] In the eastern half of the charcoal layer were found six shield-buckles; and in the western half, shield-buckles scattered about in various ways, sometimes singly, sometimes close to one another. In nearly every one of them lay a clinch-nail, evidently placed there intentionally, 340just as some of the shield-buckles were filled with bone fragments and charcoal.

A little to the west of the centre of the mound was found a large bundle of strongly-bound and intentionally bent weapons and other implements. Right under this bundle was a bridle-bit of iron, and under this, in a hole dug below the natural level of the ground, a whole collection of shield-bosses, which all lay with their convex sides downward, and formed a covering for a large bronze kettle, represented above, without any other protection but the above-mentioned bosses.

Fig. 768.—Bronze kettle filled with burnt bones mixed with ashes, charcoal, &c., and covered with twelve shield-bosses; nearly ⅓ real size. Moklebust.

Fig. 769.—Handle of kettle; real size. Moklebust.

In the middle of the bones lay an arrow-point 6 inches long; also six draughtsmen and three dice of bone. The draughtsmen were ball-shaped; on one side a small part was cut off, so as to give a flat surface, in the middle of which there was a small hole (fitting the pegs in the board itself, as seen from other finds of boards with pegs which were undoubtedly made thus for use at sea, so as to keep the pieces in position).

341

Fig. 770.—Enamelled bottom of kettle on p. 340 (inside), ⅔ real size; found in a mound, Moklebust.

Fig. 771.—Enamelled bottom (outside), of most brilliant colours, real size. Moklebust.

It seems as if the men of this warrior had dragged his ship ashore, placed the corpse therein with all his weapons and one or more horses, and had adorned it and hung their shields on its sides, hoisted the sails, and then let the flame consume the whole. The bones were then gathered and placed in the urn, and the twelve shield-bosses placed over it, provisions placed at its side, and the whole covered with a mound. But right over the urn the bridle had been placed, so as to be near at 342hand; then his weapons and the remains of the ship’s chest, and then the two layers of other remains from the pyre.

Fig. 772.

Fig. 773.

Bronze figure representing a man; with inscription. Found with a bronze kettle containing burnt bones, a double-edged sword bent, several spear-heads, a shield boss, melted pieces of glass, &c.; earlier iron age. Norway.

Odin’s religion—Sun worship—The Three Annual Sacrifices—The Atonement Boar and Bragi Toast—The Victory Sacrifice—Temple Priests—Animals for Sacrifices—Sacrificial ceremonies—Divination—Chips—Drawing of lots—Consecration of land and property—Worship of Thor—Sign of the Hammer—The Svastica—Story of Framar.

The earlier Edda or Sagas which relate to us the traditions about Odin and the Asar do not give any description of the sacred ceremonies or rites they performed.

From the Ynglinga Saga we learn that the hero Odin of the North sacrificed after the manner of the Asar, and that the sacrifices made by him, Njörd, Frey, and Freyja, were to a power worshipped by them, but we are not told who the god or power was. It probably was in some instances the sun, represented perhaps by the eye of the earlier and mythical Odin of the Völuspa—who, as we have seen, pledged his eye for a drink from the well of Urd; we know that the worship of the sun was widely spread at one period in the history of the world.^[217] How the change from the worship of this unknown power to the worship of Odin and the other gods took place we are not told; but it may, we think, be taken for granted that many of the ceremonies and beliefs mentioned in the Sagas were of very ancient origin.

It is only by a study of all the Sagas that we gain a knowledge of the beliefs, religious ceremonies, mode of worship and superstitions of the people of the North, which are often minutely described. It is somewhat difficult for the present 344generation of English people, living in Great Britain and other countries, to realise that no more than eight centuries ago many of their forefathers believed and practised the rites we are going to describe, and that so slow was the march of Christianity, that six or seven hundred years ago the provinces of North-Eastern Prussia, Vindland, Pomerania, &c., whose inhabitants are among the finest in Europe, were still heathen.

It is certain that Odin and some of the Asars were deified and worshipped in all the countries of the North, and with the lapse of time their fame is found to increase. The attributes of Odin were believed to be many.

There were three principal sacrifices a year, at which the people assembled in the chief temples:—Vetrarblót, Midsvetrarblót, and Sigrblót.

“It is their custom to have a sacrifice in the autumn and welcome the winter, another at mid-winter, the third at the beginning of summer; then they welcome the summer. The Eynir, Sparbyggjar, Verdælir and Skeynir take part in this. There are twelve men^[218] who are the foremost in managing the sacrifice-feasts: this spring Ölvir is to hold the feast; he is now very busy in Mæri, and all provisions needed for the feast are brought thither.” (St. Olaf, 115; cf. id. 123).

The first of these, called Vetrarblót^[219] (Winter sacrifice), which took place on winter nights^[220] in the month of Gói, was a sacrifice for a good winter. The 14th of October, which was the ancient month of Gói, is still called winter-night, or the first night of winter.

“That autumn the news was told King Olaf from Thrándheim that the Thrands had had great feasts during the winter nights: there had been great drinking. The King was told that all cups were hallowed to the Asar according to ancient custom. 345It was also said that cattle and horses were slaughtered there, the altars reddened with blood, and sacrifices made for the bettering of the year. Also it was said that they all thought it evident that the gods were angry because the men of Hálogaland had become Christians” (St. Olaf, 113. Heimskringla).

The second Midsvetrarblót (Mid-winter sacrifice), also called Jólablót^[221] (Yule sacrifice), was held at mid-winter, or in the beginning of the month of Thór (middle of January), to ensure a good year and peace, and lasted three days; at this feast it was customary to make vows to some of the gods, especially Frey, at Yule-eve. It seems to have been the greatest and most important of all, and many animals were slaughtered at it.^[222] The 12th of January is still called mid-winter in Norway.^[223] This sacrifice plainly shows that the blessings of peace were appreciated by this warlike race. The Swedes, as we have read, wept over the death of Njörd, for during his time there were good years and peace.

“King Fornjót ruled Jötland (Jötunland) which is called Finnland and Kvenland, that is east of the arm of the sea which goes on the opposite side of Gandvik and which we call Helsingjabotn (Bothnian Gulf). Fornjót had three sons: Hler, whom we call Ægir, Logi, and Kári, who was father of Frosti, the father of Gnár the old; his son was Thorri, who had two sons, Nor and Gor; his daughter was Gói. Thorri was a great sacrificer; he had a great sacrifice every year at mid-winter which was called Thorra blót; from this the month was named (Thorri). One winter Gói disappeared at the Thorri sacrifice; she was searched for and not found. When the month had passed Thorri had a sacrifice in order to find out where Gói was; this they called Góiblót, but they learnt nothing about her” (Fornaldar Sögur ii., p. 17).

On the Yule-eve it was the custom to lead in procession a boar, consecrated to Frey, called Sónar golt (atonement-boar), and on this those present placed their hands, made solemn vows, and drank the Bragi toast.

“King Heidrek had a boar fed; it was as large as the largest bull, but so fine that it seemed as if every hair on it was of 346gold. He placed one hand on its head and one on its bristles, and made a vow that never should a man transgress so much that he should not have the lawful judgment of his wise men, and these men should take care of the boar, or else he should come with riddles which the king could not guess” (Hervarar Saga, c. 14).

In the evening vows were made, and the atonement-boar (sónar golt) was led forward; the men laid their hands on it, and made vows at the Bragi toast (Helga Kvida Hjörvardssonar).^[224]

“In the winter the foster-brothers (Ingólf and Leif) made a feast for the sons of the Jarl (Herstein, Hástein and Hólmstein, the sons of Atli-jarl). At this feast Hólmstein made a vow that he would marry Helga, the daughter of Örn, or no other woman. Men disliked this vow, but Leif was seen to become red (in his face), and he and Hólmstein were no friends when they parted at the feast” (Landnáma i., c. 3.)

“Thórodd was with another man at Thórar’s. There was a great Yule-feast, the ale being provided by each one himself. There were many besides in the hamlet, who all drank together during Yule. A short way off there was another hamlet. There the brother-in-law of Thórar, a powerful and wealthy man, lived; he had a grown-up son. They were to drink during the half of the Yule at each other’s farm, and first at Thórar’s” (St. Olaf, c. 151).

“One winter at Yuletide, when the people were assembled to drink, Finn said: ‘Vows will be made in many places this evening, where it is not better to be than here; now I vow that I will serve the king who is the highest and in all things surpasses others’” (Fornmanna Sögur ii., ch. 201).

The third, called Sigrblót (Victory sacrifice), for luck and victory, occurred in the beginning of spring, about the middle of April, being fixed at that time of the year because warfare and most Viking expeditions took place in the summer. It was in honour of Odin, to whom alone, as we see from the Sagas, sacrifices were made for victory.^[225]

In those warlike days sacrifices relating to war were the most important, for the life of the nation depended upon victory, and they were consequently foremost among the people.

347“Dag, son of Högni, made a sacrifice to Odin, to avenge his father (who was slain by Helgi); Odin lent his spear to him. Dag met his brother-in-law Helgi at the place called Fjoturlund, he pierced him with the spear, and Helgi fell there” (Helga kvida Hundingsbana II).^[226]

“In Sweden it was an old custom, from heathen times, that the chief sacrifice (höfudblót) should be at Uppsalir in the month of Goi, and that the sacrifice should be for peace and victory for the King, and men should come thither from all over the Swedish realm” (St. Olaf, c. 76, Heimskringla).

When Hakon jarl returned from Denmark, he ravaged both shores.

“When he had sailed eastward as far as the Gauta Skerries (rocky islets), he went ashore and made a great sacrifice. Two ravens, which croaked loudly, flew towards him, and the jarl thought that Odin must have accepted the sacrifice and that he would have a good chance of victory. He thereupon set fire to his ships and burned them all, and went into the country with his men with warlike intentions” (Fornmanna Sögur, vol. i.).

Sacrifices.—The superintendents of the sacrifices as we have seen were in the earliest times in the North the Hofgodi (temple priests), who were called Diar and Drotnar, and were held in great esteem and veneration by the people; but in later times temporal rulers were also priests, and had charge of the sacrifices.^[227]