Part 5

We now pass to that Erik whom Saxo mentions in his narrative concerning Halfdan-Berggram, and who, like Svipdag, is the son of a Swedish king's daughter. This king had been slain by Halfdan. Just as Svipdag undertakes an irreconcilable war of revenge against Halfdan-Gram, so does Erik against Halfdan-Berggram. In one of their battles Halfdan was obliged to take flight, despite his superhumnan strength and martial luck. More than this, he has by his side the "champion Thoro," and Saxo himself informs us that the latter is no less a personage than the Asa-god Thor, but he too must yield to Erik. Thor's Mjolnir and Halfdan's club availed nothing against Erik. In conflict with him their weapons seemed edgeless (Book VII, p. 204).

Thus not only Halfdan, but even Thor himself, Odin's mighty son, he who alone outweighs in strength all the other descendants and clanmen of Odin, was obliged to retreat before a mythical hero; and that his lightning hammer, at other times irresistible, Sindri's wonderful work, is powerless in this conflict, must in the mythology have had particular reasons. The mythology has scarcely permitted its favourite, "Hlodyn's celebrated son," to be subjected to such a humiliation more than once, and this fact must have had such a motive, that the event might be regarded as a solitary exception. It must therefore be borne in mind that, in his narrative concerning Hotherus, Saxo states, that after the latter had acquired the sword of victory guarded by Mimingus, he meets the Asa-god Thor in a battle and forces him to yield, after the former has severed the hammer from its handle with a blow of the sword (see No. 101). It has already been shown that Odur-Svipdag, not Hodur, is the Hotherus who captured the sword of victory and accomplished this deed (see No. 101). Erik accordingly has, in common with Svipdag, not only those features that he is the daughter-son of a Swedish king whom Halfdan had slain, and that he persists in making war on the latter, but also that he accomplished the unique deed of putting Thor to flight.

Thus the hammer Mjolnir is found to have been a weapon which, in spite of its extraordinary qualities, is inferior to the sword of victory forged by Volund (see Nos. 87, 98). Accordingly the mythology has contained two famous judgments on products of the ancient artists. The first judgment is passed by the Asa-gods in solemn consultation, and in reference to this very hammer, Mjolnir, explains that Sindri's products are superior to those of Ivaldi's sons. The other judgment is passed on the field of battle, and confirms the former judgment of the gods. Mjolnir proves itself useless in conflict with the sword of victory. If now the Volund of the heroic traditions were one of the Ivaldi sons who fails to get the prize in the mythology, then an epic connection could be found between the former and the latter judgment: the insulted Ivaldi son has then avenged himself on the gods and re-established his reputation injured by them. I shall recur to the question whether Volund was a son of Ivaldi or not.

The wars between Erik and Halfdan were, according to Saxo, carried on with changing fortunes. In one of these conflicts, which must have taken place before Erik secured the irresistible sword, Halfdan is victorious and takes Erik prisoner; but the heart of the victor is turned into reconciliation toward the inexorable foe, and he offers Erik his life and friendship if the latter will serve his cause. But when Erik refuses the offered conciliation, Halfdan binds him fast to a tree in order to make him the prey of the wild beasts of the forest and abandons him to his fate. Halfdan's desire to become reconciled with Erik, and also the circumstance that he binds him, is predicted, in Gróugaldur (9-10), by Svipdag's mother among the fortunes that await her son:

Þann gel eg þér inn fjórða,
ef þig fjándur standa
görvir á gálgvegi:
hugur þeim hverfi
til handa þér mætti,
og snúist þeim til sátta sefi.

Þann gel eg þér inn fimmta,
ef þér fjötur verður
borinn að boglimum:
Leifnis elda
læt eg þér fyr legg of kveðinn,
og stökkur þá lás af limum,
en af fótum fjötur.

The Svipdag synonyms so far met with are: Óður (Hotherus), Óttarr (Otharus), and Eirekr (Ericus).

It is remarkable, but, as we shall find later, easy to explain, that this saga-hero, whom the mythology made Freyja's husband, and whose career was adorned with such strange adventures, was not before the ninth century, and that in Sweden, accorded the same rank as the Asa-gods, and this in spite of the fact that he was adopted in Asgard, and despite the fact that his half-brother Ull was clothed with the same dignity as that of the Asa-gods. There is no trace to show that he who is Freyja's husband and Frey's brother-in-law was generally honoured with a divine title, with a temple, and with sacrifices. He remained to the devotees of the mythology what he was - a brilliant hero, but nothing more; and while the saga on the remote antiquity of the Teutons made him a ruler of North Teutonic tribes, whose leader he is in the war against Halfdan and Hadding (see Nos. 33, 38), he was honoured as one of the oldest kings of the Scandinavian peoples, but was not worshipped as a god. As an ancient king he has received his place in the middle-age chronicles and genealogies of rulers now under the name Svipdag, now under the name Erik. But, at the same time, his position in the epic was such that, if the Teutonic Olympus was ever to be increased with a divinity of Asa-rank, no one would have a greater right than he to be clothed with this dignity. From this point of view light is shed on a passage in ch. 26 of Vita Ansgarii. It is there related, that before Ansgarius arrived in Birka, where his impending arrival was not unknown, there came thither a man (doubtless a heathen priest or skald) who insisted that he had a mission from the gods to the king and the people. According to the man's statement, the gods had held a meeting, at which he himself had been present, and in which they unanimously had resolved to adopt in their council that King Erik who in antiquity had ruled over the Swedes, so that he henceforth should be one of the gods (Ericum, quondam regem vestrum, nos unanimes in collegiam nostrum ascisimus, ut sit unus de numero deorum); this was done because they had perceived that the Swedes were about to increase the number of their present gods by adopting a stranger (Christ) whose doctrine could not be reconciled with theirs, and who accordingly did not deserve to be worshipped. If the Swedes wished to add another god to the old ones, under whose protection the country had so long enjoyed happiness, peace, and plenty, they ought to accord to Erik, and not to the strange god, that honour which belongs to the divinities of the land. What the man who came to Birka with this mission reported was made public, and created much stir and agitation. When Ansgarius landed, a temple had already been built to Erik, in which supplications and sacrifices were offered to him. This event took place at a time foreboding a crisis for the ancient Odinic religion. Its last bulwarks on the Teutonic continent had recently been levelled with the ground by Charlemagne's victory over the Saxons. The report of the cruelties practised by the advocates of the doctrine, which invaded the country from the south and the west, for the purpose of breaking the faith of the Saxon Odin worshippers towards their religion, had certainly found its way to Scandinavia, and doubtless had its influence in encouraging that mighty effort made by the northern peoples in the ninth century to visit and conquer on their own territory their Teutonic kinsmen who had been converted to Christianity. It is of no slight mythological interest to learn that zealous men among the Swedes hoped to be able to inspire the old doctrine with new life by adopting among the gods Freyja's husband, the most brilliant of the ancient mythic heroes and the one most celebrated by the skalds. I do not deem it impossible that this very attempt made Erik's name hated among some of the Christians, and was the reason why "Old Erik" became a name of the devil. Vita Ansgarii says that it was the devil's own work that Erik was adopted among the gods.

The Svipdag synonym Erik reappears in the Christian saga about Erik Vidforli (the far-travelled), who succeeded in finding and entering Ódáinsakur (see No. 44). This is a reminiscence of Svipdag's visit in Mimir's realm. The surname Víðförli has become connected with two names of Svipdag: we have Eirekur hinn víðförli and Óður (Oddur) hinn víðförli in the later Icelandic sagas.