Chapter 5

        When the poet makes Sigrún say: 'I have said that Höthbrodd the brave king is (as obnoxious to me) as Cat's son,' it is possible that he used these expressions because he thought of Carpre nia fer as contrasted with Carpre cinnchait, 'cat-head.' The latter is a demoniacal figure in Irish saga. He was a usurper, and therefore the land did not prosper under his rule. His sons were born deformed, and because of this he had them drowned. The Scandinavians who heard stories of such a personage might easily get to think of him as a giant. Among the ON names for giants in Snorri's Edda occurs Köttr, (17) 'cat.' Whoever inserted the name in this place, doubtless got it from H. H., I, 18, where he understood the word as the name of a giant.
        Zimmer has shown that the Irish episode of the Scandinavian troops who came to the aid of Conchobar in Ireland, is a later interpolation from Viking times into an older story of Conchobar and the Battle of Ross na Ríg, which already had taken literary form. In that older account no Scandinavians were named. This is evident from the fact that they play no part in the continuation of the story, although the joyful and splendid reception which they received is particularly emphasised. On the contrary, it is the mighty, heroic deeds of Conall Cernach which are described in the Battle of Ross na Ríg. (18)
        Zimmer has also made an ingenious conjecture as to the reason why the episode of the reinforcements from the islands north of Scotland and other northern lands was inserted in the Battle of Ross na Ríg, which in its oldest form cannot have shown any knowledge of the Vikings. In this oldest version, the fact that the famous Ulster hero, Conall Cernach, did not take part in the first battle between the Ulstermen under Conchobar and the men from Connaught under Ailill and Mebd, was, Zimmer thinks, accounted for on the ground that he was not in Ireland at all, but in the districts of Scotland which had been taken and colonised by the people of Ulster, and in the Scottish Isles, whither he had gone (19) to collect taxes among Gaill (the strangers). This oldest version, Zimmer thinks, went on to say that Conall, receiving information of the proposed expedition of Conchobar, actually mustered his men and took part in it. Since the inhabitants of islands north of Scotland were called Gaill, 'strangers,' in the story, and since in later times Scandinavians dwelt in the Scottish islands, and were also called by the Irish Gaill, 'strangers,' it came about naturally that a number of Scandinavian names were introduced into the tale.
        In the later interpolation, reminiscences of events which happened at different times are fused together, (20) and consequently several historical features appear in an unhistorical form, as e.g. when we read of a king, instead of an earl, of the Orkneys. But I believe that the historical event which, above all others, left its impress on the story of Conchobar's Scandinavian auxiliaries, belongs to a much later time than that of which Zimmer, who does not explain satisfactorily the Norse names, is here thinking. (21)
        This event is connected with the greatest battle fought in Ireland in the course of the long period during which Scandinavians had a firm foothold there---a battle which, indeed, had no momentous historical results, but whose fierceness and impressive shifting scenes fixed themselves firmly by means of poetic images in the minds of both Irish and Scandinavians. I refer to the Battle of Clontarf (22) at Dublin in 1014 between the Norse King of Dublin, Sigtrygg Silkbeard, and the Irish King Brian. Before the battle ships and reinforcements had come to Sigtrygg from nearly all the Scandinavian settlements in the west. That this circumstance left its impress on the description of the Battle of Ross na Ríg becomes clear when we compare the latter with the accounts of the Battle of Clontarf which we possess.
        We read that, before the Battle of Clontarf took place, an Irish king got reinforcements from the Orkneys (insi Orc), the Shetland Islands (insi Cat or insi Cadd), and Lewis (ON Ljóðhús, Ir. Leódús); and this is the only time these places are named in the chronicle Cogadh Gaidhel. In the story of the Battle of Ross na Ríg we learn that an Irish king got reinforcements from the Orkneys, the Shetland Islands and Lewis.
        Conchobar sought help from Siugraid Soga, King of Sudíam. The latter has, in my opinion, as an historical prototype that Earl of the Orkneys who is called Sigurðr Hlöðvesson in Icelandic documents. In Cogadh Gaidhel (p. 153) he is called Siucraid, in the Annals of Loch Cé (p. 5) Siograd. In the story this Siugraid is King of Sudíam, a name which hitherto has not been correctly explained, but which is evidently the ON dative Suðreyjum, from the Norse name of the Hebrides. In a similar way, the name Suðreyjar (nom. pl.), as was first pointed out by Munch, was carried over into English as Sodor. Earl Gille, brother-in-law of Earl Sigurth, ruled over Suðreyjar (Southern Isles, Hebrides) as Sigurth's vassal, and paid tribute to him. (23)
        The surname Soga I take to be sugga, which in many modern Norwegian dialects means 'sow.' The king may have been so called on account of his heavy body, just as in the Heimskringla he has the surname digri (the thick). (24) Among Conchobar's reinforcements is named Amlaib (Óláf), grandson of the King of Lochlann. He is doubtless the same as the Amlaib (Óláf), son of the King of Lochlann, who fought in the Battle of Clontarf on Sigtrygg's side.
        Both Conchobar and Sygtrygg get help from two chieftains, Broder (25) and Mael. (26) In the story we are told that Conall, when Conchobar sent messengers to him, was harrying, amongst other places, 'the ways of the Saxons.' According to Cogadh Gaidhel, messengers were sent before the Battle of Clontarf to all the districts north of 'the land of the Saxons.' (27)
        In the Njálssaga, Erling is said to come from Straumey, one of the Faroes, to Sigtrygg. Báre (i.e. ON Bárøðr, later Bárðr) of Sciggire came to Conchobar from Piscarcarla's camp. Sciggire (i.e. ON skeggjar, 'bearded men') has been explained by Kuno Meyer as 'the inhabitants of the Faroes,' since they were most frequently called Eyjarskeggjar. (28) Yet the word is also used of people from the Scottish Isles. Piscarcarla means 'fishers' (ON. fiskikarlar). Among the names of countries mentioned in the story of Conchobar, we find Gothia (i.e. Gautland, in Sweden), and in the Annals of Inisfallen (which, to be sure, are very late, and not to be relied on) it is said (p. 62) that folk came to the Battle of Clontarf 'from the most central part of Gaothland' (o na Goathloighibh meodhanach). (29)
        In my opinion, there can, therefore, be no doubt that Conchobar's Scandinavian reinforcements, which came to him before the Battle of Ross na Ríg, have their historical prototype in the Scandinavian reinforcements which came to Sigtrygg Silkbeard before the Battle of Clontarf. But while the Irish accounts of the Battle of Clontarf were written down from the point of view of the enemies of the Scandinavians, the author of the story of the Battle of Ross na Ríg takes sides with Conchobar, whom the Norsemen were to aid. The episode was, therefore, in all probability foisted in by some Irishman who belonged to the party of the Scandinavian King of Dublin.
        If, then, I am right in believing that the story of the Battle of Ross na Ríg contains reminiscences of the Scandinavian reinforcements which assisted Sigtrygg in the Battle of Clontarf in 1014, we may conclude that the expansion of that story, which we have been discussing here, must in its extant form be later than 1014.
        By a comparison of the Helgi-lay with the Irish tale of Conchobar's reinforcements, I have tried to prove that certain verses from the former show familiarity with an Irish story, and that the relations are not the reverse.
        Thus, I believe, a means has been found of dating pretty definitely the First Lay of Helgi Hundingsbani. It cannot have been composed before ca. 1020-1035. It requires, of course, a little time for an historical incident to come to be treated poetically, especially when a story serves as an intermediary; but, nevertheless, the First Lay cannot have been composed much later than the date assigned, since the Icelandic skalds in the forties of the eleventh century show traces of its influence. (30)
        In what precedes I think I have given good reasons for believing that the author of the First Helgi-lay lived among the Irish, that he understood their language, and that he was not unfamiliar with their tales. Nor, in my opinion, is it going far enough to say that he heard an Irish account of the Battle of Ross na Ríg freely rendered. Some of the expressions in the Helgi-lay resemble so closely those in the text of the Book of Leinster, that it looks as if the Helgi-poet must have come to know the Irish story by hearing it read aloud in Irish.
        Since it appears that the Irish episodes of the Scandinavian reinforcements was composed by an Irishman who belonged to the party of the King of Dublin, and since the author of the First Helgi-lay lived at a king's court in England or Ireland, we are justified in concluding that this poet was for a time at the court of the Scandinavian King of Dublin. Probably he knew that the reinforcements which, according to the Irish story, came to Conchobar, came in reality to Sigtrygg at Dublin.
        One of the reasons why the poet introduced several motives from the Irish story into the Helgi-poems may be that the Helgi-story had previously certain similarities with the historical events which the Battle of Clontarf described. Helgi fights with the father and kinsmen of his loved Sigrún, and her father and only brother fall. On the battlefield Helgi speaks with Sigrún about the fight. At the Battle of Clontarf the following events actually took place:---Sigtrygg fought against Brian, whose daughter he had married, and in the battle fell her father, her only brother, and some of her kinsmen. Sigtrygg and his wife stood and looked at the fighting, and talked together about it. But this is almost the whole extent of the resemblance. Sigtrygg himself did not take part in the fight.
        It may be added that valkyries and other female supernatural beings are brought into connection with the Battle of Clontarf, and that battle-maidens appear in the conflict in the Helgi-lay.
        I have already (p. 26 f) compared the kenning which designates the slain on the battlefield as 'the grain of Hugin (Odin's raven),' in the description of the fight in which Helgi conquers Höthbrodd (H. H., I, 54), with the words spoken by those who looked from the walls of Dublin over the battlefield of Clontarf, and likened it to a field of grain which reapers were mowing. This comparison is now of greater moment, since we have seen that the poetic description of a battle in the Helgi-lay appears to have borrowed features indirectly from the historical combat on the plain of Clontarf.
        The First Lay of Helgi Hundingsbani was then, it seems, composed ca. 1020-1035 by a Norse poet who had lived in Ireland. The author had before him in imagination pictures of the heathen world, and there is no sure trace in his poem that he was a Christian. Heathen gods and other mythical beings are introduced, and have a part to play. Helgi's enemies are the subjects of Odin's wrath, and Odin's dogs (wolves) rush about the island; the Norns decide the hero's fate; and Ægir's daughters and Rán try to upset his ship in the storm. But the supernatural world is not treated with reverence. Sinfjötli says that all the einherjar in the hall of the All-Father (Odin) were near fighting because of one valkyrie, and she was a great witch. Here the poet's disdain for the heathen supernatural world appears to reveal itself.
        The introduction of heathen mythical beings into the poem does not prove that the author was not baptized; for it is only in the remote past that he makes the gods and other mythical beings appear, and, as a matter of fact, these were often referred to long after the introduction of Christianity. There was current, for example, a story that Odin visited a peasant at Vestfold, in the south of Norway, shortly before the battle of Lena, in Sweden, in 1208.
        The poem dates from the time when heathendom as a recognised religion, or at least as a religion personally professed, was on the point of dying out among Scandinavians in the west. As early as 943, King Óláf Kvaran had himself baptized in England, and in his last years (979) he went on a pilgrim to Icolmcill. The viking Broder, who took part in the Battle of Clontarf, was at one time a Christian, but afterwards renounced the faith and paid worship to the heathen powers. After this same battle the Scandinavians in Ireland began to adopt the new religion in earnest, and in the next generation bishoprics were founded in the Norse cities there. (31)
        I have given reasons for my opinion that the Helgi-poet lived for a time at the court of the Scandinavian King Sigtrygg at Dublin early in the eleventh century. Óláf Kvaran, father of Sigtrygg, and son-in-law of the Scottish king, ruled both at Dublin and in Northumberland, and made an expedition into the heart of England. It is, therefore, natural that a Norse poet at Sigtrygg's court should show traces of having been influenced by both English and Irish poetry.



ENDNOTES:

17. See Sn. Edda, AM. ed., I, 550; II, 615. Back

18. See Zimmer, Ztsch. f. d. Alt., XXIII, 228 f; cf. 235-237. Back

19. Just as in the Irish tale of the Wooing of Emer; see Zimmer, Ztsch. f. d. Alt., XXXII, 237-241. In the earlier version of Tochmarc Emire (The Wooing of Emer) Gall means ‘a Gaul,' in the later version ‘a Norseman'; see Kuno Meyer in Rev. Celt., XI, 438. Back

20. Among the auxiliaries there is named a son of a daughter of Conchobar mac Nessa, who thus would have lived long before the coming of the Norsemen to Ireland. He is said to be a son of Arthur, and a grandson of Brude. On this Zimmer remarks that Brude was the name of a mighty king of the Picts, who lived in the time of Columba (584). Back

21. One division of the reinforcements landed at the mouth of Linn Luachainne. This Zimmer takes to be ‘ein ort in der Dundalk-bay, vielleicht am eingang an das haff, in das der Castletown-river fliesst.' In the landing of these reinforcements Zimmer (Ztsch. f. d. Alt., XXXV, 162) finds a reminiscence of the landing of the Danes in 850 at Linn Duachail, a harbour on the coast of Louth, according to Hennessy probably Dundalk harbour. Back

22. On these events see especially Steenstrup, Normannerne, III, 157 ff, and Todd, Cogadh Gaidhel, Introd., pp. clxvii-cxcii. Back

23. See Njálssaga, chaps. 86, 90. The Irish name for the Hebrides is insi Gall, ‘the Isles of the Strangers.' The later Irish redaction of the Battle of Ross na Ríg (Hogan, p. 62) has Siogra rí Arcadia (S., King of A.), where Arcadia is a corruption of Orcadia. In an older redaction may not Siugraid have been described as King of the Orkneys? Directly after Siugraid in the Book of Leinster, we have the name of Sortadbud Sort, King of the Orkneys. In an older redaction may not he have been described as King of Sudíam? Sortadbud corresponds to ON Svarthöfuð. In the Sturlungasaga, Svarthöfði is the name of an Icelander whose father has an Irish name. Back

24. Sugga may still be used in Norway of a stout, portly woman. Cf. the name of the place Suggaruð in Eystein's Jordebog, p. 495. Back

25. Among the participants in the Battle of Clontarf both Njálssaga and the Irish sources name Broder. Among Conchobar's Scandinavian reinforcements are named Bródor Roth (i.e. rauðr, red) and Brodor Fíuit (i.e. hvítr, white). Back

26. Cogadh Gaidhel B. has Maol, while A. has Conmael. Back

27. Saxons (i.e. Anglo-Saxons) are also named in the Annals of Boyle, and in the Annals of Loch Cé. Back

28. For example, in Fornmannasögur, II, 169. Back

29. The story of the Battle of Ross na Ríg is found, in a form which varies very much from the version of the Book of Leinster, in MSS. of the eighteenth century (printed in Hogan's edition). This redaction has the episode under discussion in a much shortened and evidently modified form; yet there is one expression in it which may have belonged to the episode in its oldest form, but which is lacking in the Book of Leinster. We read (p. 63) that Conchobar sent out a man to collect a large number of these strangers ‘for good gifts and great payment to them.' With this cf. H. H., I, 21, ‘to offer the men and their sons abundance of gold' (iðgnógan ógnar ljóma). On the other hand, we read of the Scandinavian reinforcements in the Battle of Clontarf in Cogadh Gaidhel, p. 153, that ‘they sold and hired themselves for gold and silver and other treasures as well.' Back

30. As I have pointed out above; see Chap. II, and App. I. Maurer, from the fact that the hero in the First Helgi-lay went into battle when fifteen years of age, concluded that the poem was not older than the eleventh century. Sijmons supported the same opinion in Ztsch. f. d. Phil., XVIII, 112-115. Finnur Jónsson (Litt. Hist., I, 66) puts it at ca. 1000-1025. In my Bidrag, p. 49, I did not dare assign its composition to so late a date as that adopted by these scholars. Back

31. See Steenstrup, Normannerne, III, 172; cf. Zimmer, Gött. Gel. Anz., 1891 (No. 5), p. 184. Back