The Northmen in Ireland
There is yet another direction to which we must turn our attention, if
we would understand the grip that the Northmen at this time had taken
on the British Islands, and the general trend of Norse and Danish
history outside their own country. Their conquests and influence in
Ireland were even more widespread and equally lasting with those in
England. We find them from the beginning of the ninth century (from
about A.D. 800 onward) making investigations all round the coast of
Ireland, and pushing their way up the rivers in different directions.
The Norse, many of whom probably reached Ireland by way of the Western
Isles and Scotland, consolidated their conquests in the north under
a leader named Turgesius (perhaps a Latinized form of Thorgils), who
ruled from the then capital of Ireland and the ecclesiastical city of
St Patrick, Armagh. Thorgils was a fierce pagan, and he established
himself as high-priest of Thor, the Northman’s god of thunder, in the
sacred church of St Patrick, desecrating it with heathen practices;
while he placed his wife Ota as priestess in another of the sacred
spots of Ireland, the ancient city of Clonmacnois, on the Shannon, with
its seven churches and its high crosses, from the chief church of which
she gave forth her oracles.
Soon after this there arrived in Ireland another chief, named Olaf the
White, who chose Dublin, then a small town on the river Liffey, as his
capital, building there a fortress, and establishing a “Thing-mote,”
or place of meeting and lawgiving, such as he was accustomed to at
home. From this date the importance of Armagh waned, and Dublin became
not only the Norse capital of Ireland and an important city, but also
the centre from which many Norse and Danish kings ruled over Dublin
and Northumbria at once. We shall see when we come to the time of
Athelstan, and the story of Olaf Cuaran, or Olaf o’ the Sandal, who
claimed kingship over both Ireland and Northumbria, how close was the
connexion between the two.
The Danes, who succeeded the Norwegians, first came to Ireland in the
year 847, probably crossing over from England. They had heard much of
the successes of the Northmen or Norwegians in Ireland, and they came
over to dispute their conquests with them and try to take from them
the fruit of their victories. They did not at first think of warring
with the Irish themselves, but only with their old foes, the Norsemen,
whom they were ready to fight wherever they could find them; but as
time went on we find them fighting sometimes on one side and sometimes
on the other, mixing themselves up in the private quarrels of the
Irish chiefs and kings, often for their own advantage. On the other
hand, the Irish chiefs were often ready enough to take advantage of
their presence in the country to get their help in fighting with their
neighbours.
The Kings of Dublin in the later time were Danish princes, who passed
on to other parts of Ireland, building forts in places which had
good harbours and could easily be fortified, such as Limerick and
Waterford, which were for long Danish towns, ruled by Danish chiefs,
most of them of the family of Ivar of Northumbria. Though their hold
on their settlements was at all times precarious, and they met with
many reverses, and several decisive defeats from the Irish, the Danes
gradually succeeded in building up their Irish and Northumbrian
kingdom. The official title of these rulers was “King of the Northmen
of all Ireland and Northumbria.”
The story we have now to tell is connected with a prince who probably
was not a Dane, but a Norseman, or a “Fair-foreigner,” as the Irish
called them, to distinguish them from the Danes, or “Dark-foreigners.”
This was Olaf the White, who came to Ireland in 853. In the course of
a warring life he succeeded in making himself King of the Norse in
Dublin. He seems to have been of royal descent, and he was married to
Aud, or Unn, daughter of Ketill Flatnose, a mighty and high-born lord
in Norway. Aud is her usual name, but in the Laxdæla Saga, where we
get most of her history, she is named Unn the Deep-minded or Unn the
Very-wealthy. All this great family left their native shores after
King Harald Fairhair came to the throne, and they settled in different
places, Ketill himself in the Orkney Isles, where some of his sons
accompanied him; but his son Biorn the Eastman and Helgi, another son,
said they would go to Iceland and settle there. Sailing up the west
coast, they entered a firth which they called Broadfirth. They went
on shore with a few men, and found a narrow strip of land between the
foreshore and the hills, where Biorn thought he would find a place of
habitation. He had brought with him the pillars of his temple from his
home in Norway, as many of the Icelandic settlers did, and he flung
them overboard, as was the custom with voyagers, to see where they
would come ashore. When they were washed up in a little creek he said
that this must be the place where he should build his house; and he
took for himself all the land between Staff River and Lava Firth, and
dwelt there. Ever after it was called after him Biorn Haven.
But Ketill and most of his family went to Scotland, except Unn the
Deep-minded, his daughter, who was with her husband, Olaf the White,
in Dublin, though after Olaf’s death she joined her father’s family
in the Hebrides and Orkneys, her son, Thorstein the Red, harrying
far and wide through Scotland. He was always victorious, and he and
Earl Sigurd subdued Caithness, Sutherland, and Ross between them, so
that they ruled over all the north of Scotland.[15] Troubles arose
out of this, for the Scots’ earl did not care to give up his lands to
foreigners, and in the end Thorstein the Red was murdered treacherously
in Caithness.
When his mother, Unn the Deep-minded, heard this, she thought there
would be no more safety for her in Scotland; so she had a ship built
secretly in a wood, and she put great wealth into it, and provisions;
and she set off with all her kinsfolk that were left alive; for her
father had died before that. Many men of worth went with her; and men
deem that scarce any other, let alone a woman, got so much wealth and
such a following out of a state of constant war as she had done; from
this it will be seen how remarkable a woman she was. She steered her
ship for the Faröe Islands, and stayed there for a time, and in every
place at which she stopped she married off one of her granddaughters,
children of her son, Thorstein the Red, so that his descendants are
found still in Scotland and the Faröes. But in the end she made it
known to her shipmates that she intended to go on to Iceland. So they
set sail again, and came to the south of Iceland, to Pumicecourse, and
there their good ship went on the rocks, and was broken to splinters,
but all the sea-farers and goods were saved.
All that winter she spent with Biorn, her brother, at Broadfirth, and
was entertained in the best manner, as no money was spared, and there
was no lack of means; for he knew his sister’s large-mindedness. But in
the spring she set sail round the island to find lands of her own; she
threw her high-seat temple pillars into the sea, and they came to shore
at the head of a creek, so Unn thought it was well seen that this was
the place where she should stay. So she built her house there, and it
was afterwards called Hvamm, and there she lived till her old age.
When Unn began to grow stiff and weary in her age she wished that the
last and youngest of Thorstein the Red’s children, Olaf Feilan, would
marry and settle down. She loved him above all men, for he was tall and
strong and goodly to look at, and she wished to settle on him all her
property at Hvamm before she died. She called him to her, and said:
“It is greatly on my mind, grandson, that you should settle down and
marry.” Olaf spoke gently to the old woman, and said he would lean on
her advice and think the matter over.
Unn said: “It is on my mind that your wedding-feast should be held at
the close of this summer, for that is the easiest time to get in all
the provision that is needed. It seems to me a near guess that our
friends will come in great numbers, and I have made up my mind that
this is the last wedding-feast that shall be set out by me.”
Olaf said that he would choose a wife who would neither rob her of
her wealth nor endeavour to rule over her; and that autumn Olaf chose
as his wife Alfdis, and brought her to his home. Unn exerted herself
greatly about this wedding-feast, inviting to it all their friends and
kinsfolk, and men of high degree from distant parts. Though a crowd of
guests were present at the feast, yet not nearly so many could come
as Unn asked, for the Iceland firths were wide apart and the journeys
difficult.
Old age had fallen fast on Unn since the summer, so that she did not
get up till midday, and went early to bed. She would allow no one to
come to disturb her by asking advice after she had gone to sleep at
night; but what made her most angry was being asked how she was in
health. On the day before the wedding, Unn slept somewhat late; yet she
was on foot when the guests came, and went to meet them, and greeted
her friends with great courtesy, and thanked them for their affection
in coming so far to see her. After that she went into the hall, and the
great company with her, and when all were seated in the hall every one
was much struck by the lordliness of the feast.
In the midst of the banquet Unn stood up and said aloud: “Biorn and
Helgi, my brothers, and all my other kinsmen and friends, I call as
witnesses to this, that this dwelling, with all that belongs to it, I
give into the hands of my grandson, Olaf, to own and to manage.”
Immediately after that Unn said she was tired and would return to
the room where she was accustomed to sleep, but bade everyone amuse
himself as was most to his mind, and ordered ale to be drawn out for
the common people. Unn was both tall and portly, and as she walked with
a quick step out of the hall, in spite of her age, all present remarked
how stately the old lady was yet. They feasted that evening joyously,
till it was time to go to bed. But in the morning Olaf went to see his
grandmother in her sleeping-chamber, and there he found Unn sitting up
against her pillow, dead.
When he went into the hall to tell these tidings, those present spoke
of the dignity of Unn, even to the day of her death. They drank
together the wedding-feast of Olaf and funeral honours to Unn, and on
the last day of the feast they carried Unn to the burial-mound that
they had raised for her. They laid her in a viking-ship within the
cairn, as they were wont to bury great chiefs; and they laid beside her
much treasure, and closed the cairn, and went their ways.
One of the kinsmen was Hoskuld, father of Olaf the Peacock, whose story
will be told later on.