THE AGE OF THE VIKINGS. THE ORIGIN OF THE VIKING CRUISES.
The Norsemen had up to the middle of the eighth century played no part
in the world's history. Their very existence had been unknown or but
vaguely known to the rest of Europe. But towards the close of the eighth
century they broke like a destructive tempest over the civilized lands,
spreading desolation in their path. When their fast-sailing ships with
two square sails were sighted at the river-mouths, people fled in
terror, and the priests prayed in vain: "Deliver us, O Lord, from the
rage of the Norsemen."
[Illustration: THE VIKING SHIP RECENTLY UNEARTHED AT GOGSTAD, NEAR
SANDEFJORD.]
There were several reasons for this sudden warlike activity on the part
of the Norsemen. They had waged war from immemorial times; because war
was with them the most honorable occupation. As Tacitus says of their
kinsmen, the Germans: "They deemed it a disgrace to acquire by sweat
what they might obtain by blood." But previous to the viking period they
had fought each other. One earl or king made foraging expeditions into
the land of his neighbors, and carried away with him whatever booty he
could lay hands on. But in this perpetual warfare one or the other must
at length become exhausted, and the stronger would be likely to oust or
vanquish the weaker. This was what happened in the north. Large tracts
of land, made up of small conquered kingdoms, were united under one
successful chief, who, of course, made haste to prevent depredations
within his own boundaries. With the growing power of these local kings,
it became more and more risky to attack them, and the field for domestic
warfare thus became constantly narrower. But war was the very condition
of the chieftain's existence among the early Norsemen. His honor was
dependent upon the number of his followers and the splendor of their
equipments, and to gain the means to entertain and to equip them he was
obliged to wage war. When he could no longer do it at home, he
naturally went abroad. It was neither ferocity nor excessive avarice
which impelled him to draw the sword; but the desire to preserve his
honor among men, which, in a warlike state, is merely another form of
the instinct of self-preservation. The high-born chieftain had to make
himself formidable in order to protect his life and property. He had to
live in accordance with his rank, if he wished to live at all. His
men-at-arms were his body-guard as well as his army. He had to behave
royally toward them in order to preserve their good-will; and next to
personal valor, liberality in giving was the first duty of a king. The
king is therefore called the breaker of rings (large solid arm-rings of
gold being used for purposes of payment) and the hater of gold.[A]
[Footnote A: Munch (Det Norske Folk's Historie, 1-124) derives the word
king (old Norse, konungr; Anglo-Saxon, cyning; O. H. German, chuninc and
chunig) from Kun or Kon, meaning race, descent; and interprets the word
as meaning (like Lat., generosus) of high birth or descent.]
There is in the earliest Germanic times no sharp distinction between the
titles "earl" and "king." The viking cruises, however, helped to
establish a distinction. The earl who, having gathered a large number of
warriors about him, went abroad for purposes of conquest, was hailed by
his men as king. A number of vikings, of high birth, assumed the name of
kings, when starting on warlike expeditions; but were known as
sea-kings, in contra-distinction to those who ruled at home over a fixed
domain. The number of these sea-kings increased (for the reasons cited
above) enormously toward the close of the eighth century. They harried
not only the coasts of the neighboring lands, but they crossed the
North Sea and the Baltic, carrying away or slaughtering the inhabitants
and destroying the cities. Churches and monasteries they plundered,
scattering the bones of the saints to the four winds; all that Christian
men held sacred they trod under foot. And yet we must bear in mind that
all we know about these early vikings is derived from the writings of
their enemies, who were smarting under the injury they had done them.
That they were fierce and brutal is credible enough. The warlike state
is in itself brutalizing. It arouses all the slumbering savagery in man,
and smothers his gentler impulses. But certain moral qualities even
their hostile chroniclers concede to them. They admit that the Norse
barbarians were, as a rule, faithful to their oaths and kept their
promises.
Three periods [A] are recognizable in the viking age, though there are,
in point of time, no sharp divisions between them. It would, perhaps, be
more correct to say that there were three kinds of vikings. The first
cruises were more or less tentative and irregular. Chieftains gather
about them crews for a few ships and sail over to England, Denmark, or
Flanders, where they attack a city or a monastery, and return home with
their booty. The second period shows an advance in the art of war and in
military experience. Several vikings attack in company some exposed
point, take possession of it, erect fortifications, and make forays into
the surrounding country. During the third period the Norsemen abandon
their character of pirates and assume the role of conquerors. With
large fleets, counting from one to five hundred ships, they storm and
sack cities, assume the government of the conquered territories, treat,
as regular belligerents, with kings and emperors, and establish
themselves permanently in the conquered land. Of the two first classes
of vikings we have only scattered and unreliable accounts. To go on
viking cruises is a recognized occupation in the Norse sagas, and it was
regarded as a kind of liberal education for a young man of good birth to
spend some years of his youth on such expeditions. His honor was thereby
greatly increased at home, and his position in society assured. Royal
youths of twelve or fifteen years often went abroad as commanders of
viking fleets, in order to test their manhood and accumulate experience
and knowledge of men.
[Footnote A: Sars: "Udsigt over den Norske Historie," 1-90.]
[Illustration: 1.--SIDE VIEW OF THE GOGSTAD VIKING SHIP. 2.--VIKING SHIP
RESTORED. 3.--DETAILS OF VIKING SHIP.]
The third class of vikings, the conquerors, have found their historians
both at home and abroad; and the different narratives, though not
strictly accurate, supplement and correct each other. It is these
conquering vikings who have demonstrated the historic mission of Norway,
and doubly indemnified the world for the misery they brought upon it.
The ability to endure discipline without loss of self-respect, voluntary
subordination for mutual benefit, and the power of orderly organization,
based upon these qualities, these were the contributions of the Norse
vikings to the political life of Europe. The feudal state, which, with
all its defects, is yet the indispensable basis of a higher
civilization, has its root in the Germanic instinct of loyalty--of
mutual allegiance between master and vassal; and the noble spirit of
independence which restrains and limits the power of the ruler, and at a
later stage leads to constitutional government, is even a more
distinctly Norse than Germanic characteristic. While Norway, up under
the pole, has developed a democracy, Germany, coming at too early a
period into contact with Rome, has developed a military despotism under
constitutional forms. The breath of new life which the vikings infused
into history lives to-day in Norway, in England, and in America.
Among the earliest conquests of the Norse vikings was a portion of the
present Sleswick which after them was called Nortmannia. It is possible
that they recognized the sovereignty of the kings of Denmark, though
there is no direct evidence that they regarded themselves as vassals.
The first intelligence we obtain concerning them is that their king
Sigfrid, in the year 777, received hospitably the Saxon chieftain
Widukind, who, when summoned to meet Charlemagne in Paderborn, fled
northward and sought refuge with his Norse co-religionists. This Sigfrid
belonged to the renowned race of the Ynglings, from whom descended
Harold the Fairhaired, and through him a long line of Norwegian kings. A
later king of Nortmannia, who also had great possessions in Norway, was
Gudroed or Godfrey the Hunter. He came, through the friendship of the
Saxons, repeatedly into collision with Charlemagne, and even threatened
to attack the emperor in Aachen. It is told that he was killed by his
own men in the year 809. He had about a year before attacked and slain
the king of Agder, whose daughter Aasa he married. She bore him a son
named Halfdan the Swarthy, but avenged her father's death by inducing
her servant to kill her husband while he was drunk. One of Godfrey's
sons, Erik, carried on an intermittent warfare with Charlemagne's son,
Louis the Pious, sent embassies to Aachen, and in 845, during the reign
of Louis the German, sacked and burned the city of Hamburg. St.
Ansgarius, the apostle of the North, who had been established by the
emperor as archbishop of Hamburg, fled with all his priests; and the
church and the monastery which he had founded were utterly destroyed.
It was not only in his remote northern domains that Charlemagne came in
contact with the vikings. The chronicles of the Monks of St. Gall relate
that he also encountered them in his Mediterranean provinces. Once, as
he was visiting a city in Gallia Narbonensis, some fast-sailing Norse
ships with square sails were seen out in the harbor. Soon a message was
brought to the emperor that the crews had landed and were plundering the
shore. Nobody then knew to what nationality these ships belonged, some
conjecturing that they were Jewish, others African, and again others
that they were British merchant vessels.
"No," said Charlemagne, "these ships are not filled with merchandise,
but with the most pugnacious foes."
Hearing this everybody seized his weapons and hastened to the harbor;
but the vikings had in the meanwhile learned that the emperor was in the
city, and as they were not strong enough to fight with him, they fled
to sea.
[Illustration: ST. ANSGARIUS, THE APOSTLE OF THE NORTH.]
It is related that Charlemagne, as he stood at his window and watched
their flight, wept. Remarking the wonder of his men, he said:
"I do not weep because I fear that these miscreants can do me any harm;
but I am grieved that, while I am alive, they have dared to show
themselves upon this coast; and I foresee with dread all the evil they
will do to my descendants."[A]
[Footnote A: Munch (Det. Norske Folks Historie 1-414) questions the
credibility of this story, because the Norsemen did not show themselves
in the Mediterranean as early as the chronicle here indicates; in fact
not before 800 A.D.]
This story, endowing the emperor with prophetic vision, has a certain
legendary flavor, and may be a monkish invention. Similar prophecies,
dating after the event, are found in other ecclesiastical authors, and
show sufficiently the feeling with which the Norsemen were regarded. It
is especially one typical viking, the renowned Hasting, who figures both
in sacred and profane chronicles. He sailed up the Loire in 841, with a
large fleet, burned the city of Amboise, and besieged Tours. The
inhabitants, however, carried the bones of their patron saint up on the
walls; and, according to the story, by the intervention of the saint,
the vikings were put to flight. In 845, Hasting is reported to have
attacked Paris, in company with Bjoern Ironside, the son of Ragnar
Lodbrok. To the Baltic and even to the shore of the Mediterranean this
fearless marauder extended his ravages, and as success attended his
banner, he grew more daring and determined to lay siege to Rome.
He even aspired to put the imperial crown upon his brow. With as large a
fleet as he could muster he sailed through the Pillars of Hercules, but
before he reached the mouth of the Tiber, a storm drove his ships to the
city of Luna, near Carrara. Being poorly versed in geography, Hasting
mistook this city for Rome, and resolved to capture it by strategem.
[Illustration: IRON IMPLEMENT OF FREQUENT OCCURRENCE; USE UNKNOWN.]
He sent word to the bishop that he was very ill and desired to be
baptized, so that he might die a Christian. The bishop, as well as the
commander of the town, fell into the trap. Delighted at the prospect of
gaining so valuable a convert, they opened the gates and invited the
Norsemen to enter. These, in the meanwhile, declared, that since sending
his message, Hasting had died; and with great pomp they bore his coffin,
followed by a funeral procession of enormous length, into the cathedral
where the bishop stood ready to read the mass for the repose of the
viking's soul. Suddenly, however, as the coffin was deposited before the
altar and the mass commenced, Hasting sprang up, flung away his shroud,
and stood in flashing armor before the astonished populace. His men, at
this signal, also flung off their mourning cloaks and drew their
swords. The bishop and his priests were killed, and blood flowed in
torrents through the sacred aisles. A terrible carnage ensued, and the
city was captured. Having accomplished this enterprise, Hasting
discovered that, while deceiving, he had himself been deceived. It was
not Rome he had taken after all. Whether he accepted this as an omen or
not, he lost his desire to make his entry into the eternal city. Content
with the booty he had accumulated, he turned his prows toward France
where he became the vassal of Charles the Bald, from whom he received
valuable fiefs.[A]
[Footnote A: The Norse Sagas make no mention of Hasting, and Munch
(1-429) gives several reasons for questioning whether he was an
historical character.]
Many other vikings are mentioned in chronicles of later date, who by
their incessant attacks upon the coasts, taxed the energy of the weak
Carolingian kings to the utmost. One of them, named Ragnar, is said to
have plundered Paris in 845, and another, named Asgeir, had four years
earlier sacked and burned Rouen and the monastery Jumieges. He spent
eleven years ravaging the coasts of France, and finally, in 851, sailed
up the Seine, destroyed the monastery Fontenelle and burned Beauvois. On
his return to the sea he was defeated by the French, and had to hide
with his men in the woods, but succeeded in recapturing his ships and
making good his escape. Of a third one, Roerek, it is told that about the
year 862 he accepted Christianity, without, as it appears, experiencing
any perceptible change of heart. After having ravaged Dorestad and
Nimwegen, two flourishing cities on the Rhine, and having defended
himself heroically against King Lothair, the younger, he made peace
(873) with Louis the German, and refrained from further depredations.
[Illustration: TWO-EDGED SWORD. HILT OF SILVER AND BRONZE.]
There is a certain uniformity in the deeds of the vikings, whether they
be Norsemen or Danes, which makes further description superfluous. Only
a few of their more daring enterprises may be briefly alluded to.
To Ireland the Norsemen had been attracted at a comparatively early
period. In the last decade of the eighth century they destroyed the
monastery of Iona or Icolmkill, and between the years 810 and 830 they
spread terror and devastation along the entire coast. In the year 838
they sailed with one hundred and twenty ships up to Dublin and conquered
the city, under the leadership of Thorgisl, who still lives in Irish
song and story under the names of Turges and Turgesius.
"After many sharp fights," says an old author,[A] "he conquered in a
short time all Ireland, and erected, wherever he went, high
fortifications of masonry with deep moats, of which many ruins are yet
to be seen in the country." At last he fell in love with the daughter of
Maelsechnail, king in Meath, and demanded of him that he should send her
to him, attended by fifteen young maidens. Thorgisl promised to meet her
with the same number of high-born Norsemen on an island in Loch Erne.
But instead of maidens Maelsechnail sent fifteen beardless young men,
disguised as women and armed with daggers. When Thorgisl arrived he was
attacked by these and slain. On a previous occasion Maelsechnail had
asked Thorgisl what he should do to get rid of some strange and
injurious birds that had got into the country. "Destroy their nests,"
said Thorgisl. Accordingly Maelsechnail began at once to destroy the
Norse castles, while the Irish slew or chased away the Norsemen.
[Footnote A: Giraldus Cambrensis, _De Topogr. Hiberniae_, cap. 37. Quoted
from Munch, 1-438.]
[Illustration: BUCKLE FROM THE IRON AGE.]
It appears probable that Thorgisl's reign in Ireland lasted from 838 to
846, although a much longer period is given by the above-quoted
chronicler. A more enduring sway over the country was gained by the
Norse sea-king Olaf the White, who belonged to the great Yngling race.
In 852 a company of Danish vikings had possession of Dublin; but Olaf
defeated them and compelled them to send him hostages. He then
established himself in the city, built castles, and taxed the
surrounding country. Two other Norsemen, the brothers Sigtrygg and Ivar,
founded about the same time kingdoms--the former in Waterford, the
latter in Limerick--without, however, being able to compete with Olaf in
splendor and power. The dominion of the Norsemen in Dublin is said to
have lasted for three hundred and fifty years. From Irish sources a
somewhat different account is derived of these remarkable events. It is
told that the Norsemen often sailed up the rivers, not as warriors, but
as peaceful merchants, and that the Irish found it advantageous to trade
with them. They thus gained considerable possessions in the cities, and
when the vikings came there was already a party in the larger cities who
favored them and made their conquests easy.
From Dublin Olaf the White made two cruises to Scotland, laid siege to
Dumbarton, sailed southward to England, plundering and ravaging, and
returned to Dublin with two hundred ships laden with precious booty. The
Orkneys, the Hebrides, and the Faroe Isles were also, during this
period, repeatedly visited by the vikings, and even to Iceland
expeditions were made, which did not, however, result in permanent
settlement. The Irish hermits and pious monks, who had retired from the
world into the Arctic solitude, were disturbed in their devotions by the
unwelcome visitors, and the majority returned to Ireland, while some are
said to have remained until the island was regularly settled by the
Norsemen.
To England the Norsemen went for the first time with hostile intent in
787. During the reign of King Beorthric in Wessex a small flock of
vikings landed in the neighborhood of Dorchester, killed some people,
and were driven away again. The Anglo-Saxon chronicle [A] relates the
incident in these words:
[Footnote A: _Monum. Hist. Brit._, pp. 336, 337. Quoted from Munch, i.,
416.]
"In this year (787) King Beorthric married Eadburg, daughter of King
Offa. In those days came for the first time Northmen and ships from
Heredhaland. The _gerefa_ (commander) rode down to them and wished to
drive them to the king's dwelling. For he knew not who they were; but
they slew him there. These were the first ships belonging to Danish men
which visited England."
It is noticeable that the ships are said in the same breath to have
belonged to Northmen and to Danes, and it is obvious that the chronicler
supposes the terms to be synonymous. The Heredhaland from which the men
came was in all probability Hardeland in Jutland, where the Norsemen had
at that time a colony.
The next attack of which we have an account was directed against the
coast of Northumberland, and took place in the year 794. The monk
Simeon of Durham,[A] who lived in the beginning of the twelfth century,
writes as follows:
[Footnote A: Simeon of Durham, _Monum. Hist. Brit._, p. 668. Quoted from
Munch, i., 417.]
"The heathen came from the northern countries to Britain like stinging
wasps, roamed about like savage wolves, robbing, biting, killing not
only horses, sheep, and cattle, but also priests, acolytes, monks, and
nuns. They went to Lindisfarena church, destroying every thing in the
most miserable manner, and trod the sanctuary with their profane feet,
threw down the altars, robbed the treasures of the church, killed some
of the brothers, carried others away in captivity, mocked many and flung
them away naked, and threw some into the ocean. In 794 they harried King
Ecgfridh's harbor, and plundered the monastery of Donmouth. But St.
Cuthbert did not permit them to escape unpunished; for their chieftain
was visited with a cruel death by the English and, a short time after,
their ships were destroyed by a storm, and many of them perished; a few
who swam ashore were killed without pity."
It is an odd circumstance that while an incessant stream of Norse
vikings, during the first half of the ninth century, poured southward,
devastating the shores of the Baltic and the Mediterranean, only a
comparatively small number found their way to England. We hear in the
Sagas of many individual warriors who visited the Saxon kings in England
and took service under them, and of several who sailed up the Thames and
put an embargo on the trade of the river, capturing every ship that
ventured into their clutches. But as a field for conquest they left
England (probably not from any fraternal consideration) to their
kinsmen, the Danes, while they themselves turned their attention to
France, Ireland, and the isles north of Scotland. In the Hebrides, the
Orkneys, the Shetland Islands, and the Faeroe Isles, their descendants
are still living, and Norse names are yet frequent.
[Illustration: RUIN OF NORSE TOWER AT MOSOe, SHETLAND ISLANDS.]
Another notable circumstance in connection with the vikings is, that
the very men whom foreign chroniclers describe as stinging wasps and
savage wolves, and of whom the greatest atrocities are related during
their sojourn abroad, became, as a rule, after their return home, men of
weight and influence, with respect for tradition and law--men who,
according to the standard of the time, were moral and honorable. There
were exceptions, of course, but they go to prove the rule. The
explanation is not far to seek. Religion in those days was tribal, and
morality had no application outside the tribe. Every people is the
chosen people of its own god or gods. As the Jews divided humanity into
Jews and Gentiles, and the Greeks into Greeks and barbarians, so the
Norsemen retaliated towards Jews and Greeks, by including them with all
other nations in the Norse equivalent for barbarians. English, Irish,
and Germans, often men of high birth, were constantly brought to Norway
by the vikings as thralls, bartered and sold and forced to menial tasks.
No law extended its protection to them; and yet maltreatment of thralls
was, both in Iceland and Norway, regarded as unworthy of a freeman. For
all that, the vikings were children of their age, and practised only the
rude morality which their religion prescribed. The humanitarian
sentiment which regards all men as brethren and creatures of the same
God is a comparatively modern growth, and it would be unfair to judge
the old Norsemen by any such advanced standard. It is therefore quite
credible that the vikings may have been guilty of deeds abroad which
they would not have committed at home.
[Illustration]