FIRST CROSSING OF THE THRESHOLD
There is one part of the Arctic and Sub-arctic regions, and one only,
where a country retaining the warmth and the adaptability of the
temperate zone as an abode for civilised man extends far beyond the
Arctic Circle, and, as it were, connects the vast tracts of ice and
snow with the habitable earth. This is the Scandinavian peninsula.
It stretches northwards to 71° 10′ N., maintaining a temperature
throughout its length which renders it fit for the abode of a race of
men who have been leaders in progress and civilisation. This remarkable
phenomenon is due to the flow of warm water from the Atlantic, which
passes northward along the coast of Norway. The Atlantic current has
the effect of ameliorating a climate which would otherwise be of Arctic
severity, while at the same time it keeps off and checks the polar
icebergs in their southerly drift, so that ice is never seen on the
northern shores of Finmarken. Reclus has very truly said that this
current has played a chief part in the modern history of mankind.
The Norsemen appear to have arrived in the Scandinavian peninsula, and
superseded the Finnish tribes, a century or two before the Christian
era. The physical geography of the region moulded the thoughts and
lives of the new-comers. With a noble foundation to build upon, their
character was evolved by their environment. The stormy seas and
impenetrable fogs, the glories of the fjords with their mighty cliffs
and glittering cascades, the valleys and lakes, the dense forests and
mysterious ice fjells--all were made to form settings for the long
array of fancies created by the glowing enthusiasm of the Norsemen.
But the imagination of these people had a still wider and loftier
range. Influenced by the glories of nature which surrounded them, they
sought for the origin and first impulses of created things and strove
to make their conceptions co-extensive with the universe, while they
peopled nature with supernatural agencies of all kinds. Yet there was
a proud humility in the loftiest flights of their imaginations. They
elaborated a mythology and cosmogony, but alone among religious beliefs
that of the Norsemen recognised that there must be some greater and
higher order of things to follow that which, in the youth of the world,
sufficed partly to satisfy their own aspirations. Fimbultyn, “he who
sent the heat,” the great Helper, the mighty God, would guide the new
order and live for ever.
The most beautiful myth in the northern mythology is that of Arctic
day and night, of Balder and Hoder. It has been the theme of modern
poets from Œhlenschlager to Matthew Arnold. The death of the Sun-God,
the Deity of light and beneficence, through the treachery of Lok, but
by the unknowing hand of his blind brother Hoder, the God of Darkness,
is a myth the meaning of which is obvious. But the story of his death,
of the mourning of all created things, and of the efforts to save the
beloved one from Hela, the Goddess of Death, is deeply pathetic. The
funeral of Balder attended by the whole pantheon, including giants and
dwarfs, each deity with all his legendary attendants, and the launch
of the flaming ship bearing the body into the silent sea, reaches the
highest flight of poetic imagination.
Then Hermod, the messenger of the Gods, is sent by the All-father, on
Odin’s horse Sleipner, with an order for the death-goddess Hela in
Nifelheim, her abode of ice and snow, to release Balder:--
“And he came down to ocean’s northern strand
At the drear ice, beyond the giant’s home:
Thence on he journeyed o’er the fields of ice
Still north, until he met a stretching wall
Barring his way.”
The Arctic Circle! He puts Sleipner at it, the celestial steed clears
it at a bound, and Hermod, the first Arctic explorer, enters Nifelheim.
But the mission fails, for there was one thing that Odin could not do,
and that was to undo what he himself had ruled. So Hela held her prey
until the twilight of the Gods, when the old order passed away.
The Norsemen arrived in the Scandinavian peninsula, as we have seen, a
century or two before the Christian era, and the whole body of their
beliefs and legends, comprised in the Eddas, was written down mainly in
the 14th century, so their gradual conception and evolution occupied
several centuries. The lives of these people were passed in a hard
struggle with Nature, in wild adventures by fjord and forest, and in
constant warfare. The gods and giants seemed very near to them, to some
even visible in those young days of the world. In the black clouds
rolling down from the ice-fjells they saw the mighty Thor followed
by the hosts of Asgard, just as they heard his pealing thunder. In
the clang of battle the Val maidens, sweeping through the air on
their celestial steeds, were realities. The temples and sacrificial
ceremonies of the Norsemen were sacred. The seat-posts with deities
carved on the ends, generally Odin and Thor, were the most venerated
possessions of the chiefs.
As time passed, the districts along the coasts and in the more
accessible parts of the interior rapidly became populous. Constant
strife necessitated chiefs and leaders, but the people loved their
freedom, and the right of speaking and voting in their assemblies. A
free race, divided into many communities by the obstacles of Nature,
continued to work out its destinies, and to multiply on the isles and
fjords until the crowded state of their homes and the wild spirit of
adventure drove them to the building of ships and the search for new
homes beyond sea.
It is the proud boast of their descendants that the Norsemen were the
first people who definitely abandoned the coast, and sailed boldly
over the open sea. They crossed the North Sea to Shetland, Orkney,
Caithness, and even Ireland, probably as early as the 6th century.
They were also established in the Lofoten Islands and on the borders
of Finmarken in those early days. There the tales of their folk-lore
seemed to lure them further into the Arctic wilds. The fishermen of
Værö and Röst, the most southerly of the Lofotens, when out at sea in
stormy weather, fancied that they got a glimpse of a green and fertile
island which they called Udröst, sometimes Alfland or the “elf land.”
But when they sailed towards its shore, it always disappeared in the
clouds. It was said that only the wise and good have ever been on
Udröst, and then only in thought. So says the Lofoten song:--
“In the westerly sea, off the Halgoland shore,
An isle floats alluring and bright.
But as soon, we are told in the fishermen’s lore
As a sail comes completely in sight,
The clouds sink around it in darkness and mist
And the ship turns away on her keel;
For no man can land on those shores of the blest,
Nor can mortal its secrets reveal.
’Tis only in thought that wisdom can dwell
On the secrets of ice and of sea;
’Tis thus that the beautiful Alfland may well
Yield her wealth to the true devotee.
Let us stand then on Udröst if only in thought,
And there find the knowledge we seek:
The grand northern story as truthfully told
When we learn it from Andenäs peak.”
We hear the first authentic Arctic story from England’s own king,
Alfred--the most truly great, the wisest, and the best monarch that
ever ruled over any country. Always working for the good of his people,
he translated the geographical work of Orosius for their benefit,
inserting his own priceless additions and comments. Among them is the
narrative of an Arctic voyage obtained at first hand from a native of
that Halgoland whence Udröst was sometimes visible on the horizon. The
explorer, named Ohthere, came to Alfred’s court to tell his story, and
so it was saved from oblivion by being inserted in the King’s edition
of Orosius. King Alfred describes Ohthere as a very wealthy man, owning
600 reindeer, horned cattle, sheep, and swine; as having a small extent
of tilled land, but deriving the chief part of his revenues from the
tribute of the Finns (as the Lapps were called) in skins and feathers,
whalebone, and hides for making ropes. Ohthere gave the length of a
walrus as 15 feet, and of a whale as 96 feet. He told the King that the
best whale-fishing was off the coast of Halgoland. Ohthere’s own home
was at Gibostad on the mainland of Senjen in the province of Halgoland,
“the land of fire,” or “of the northern lights.” It was well within the
Arctic Circle.
Ohthere wished to discover the coast beyond his ken, so he undertook
a most adventurous voyage to the north and east, keeping the wild
rocky shore on his starboard hand, and the wide Arctic sea on what he
called his _boec bord_. He explored the whole of the Finmarken coast,
mentioning the business of fishing for walrus or “horse-whales” as he
called them, and he also described the Lapps, who were met with up to
the North Cape.
Ohthere reached the most northern point of Europe. This is Nordkyn
or Kinnerodde, at the eastern entrance of the Laxe fjord; but on the
island of Magerö the low projecting spit of Knivskjärodde reaches still
further north to 71° 11′. The bold black headland of the North Cape,
with its flat summit and nearly vertical strata of mica slate, has a
height of 1005 feet, but a mile less northing. The adventurous Ohthere
was thus the first to round the North Cape. He then shaped a course
eastward and finally entered the White Sea, sailing round the Kola
Peninsula as far as the mouth of the Karzuga river, and coming into
touch with people called Terfinna and Beorma. The former were the Finns
of Ter, the old name for the Kola Peninsula; the Beormas were the North
Karelians. This was the extent of Ohthere’s discoveries as recorded by
King Alfred.
In those far-off days, when Alfred the Great was devoting his life to
the good of his people, England was in the course of being made, and
the Norsemen were destined to have no small share in the making of it.
But it is worthy of note that even then the work of polar exploration
and the achievements of explorers were the subjects of investigation by
Alfred, an interest which has been continued for a thousand years.
[Illustration: Viking Ship]
The difficulty of communication by land, and the innumerable bays
and fjords in the country of the Norsemen soon led to extensive
ship-building, each district doubtless following its own designs, to
some extent, in build and rig. Fortunately we know exactly the build
of the Viking ships, for one dating from the 9th century was discovered
in 1880, buried in the blue clay at Gokstad near Sandefjord[11]. This
Viking ship is of oak, clinker-built, fastened and riveted with iron
bolts. In those days conifers had by no means superseded oaks in
southern Norway. The ship has the lines of an excellent sea boat, 78
feet long over all, with a 66 ft. length of keel and 16 feet beam, but
only 4 feet in depth. There was a mast and a long yard with a square
sail, as well as 64 rowlocks for oars in the third row of planks from
the top. The steer oar was fitted on the starboard quarter of the
vessel, which was sharp at both ends and drew very little water. Wooden
shields were hung round the bulwarks and the vessel contained utensils
for cooking, bedsteads, and various other articles. Hundreds of such
ships carried the Norse warriors along the coasts or to distant shores,
some of them, such as the “Ormen lange” of Olaf Tryggvason, being
probably much larger than the interesting relic of Gokstad.
The time came--as well in Norway as in Denmark and Sweden, and as it
appears to come sooner or later in all lands--when the most powerful
of the numerous chiefs forced the rest to submit, and united all into
one kingdom. “Harold of the fair hair” descended from the Ynglings
of Upsala, children of the God Frey, was the chief of Ringerike and
Vestfold in the south of Norway, a valiant and persistent warrior. He
succeeded in subjugating the whole country, and founded a dynasty which
lasted for five centuries. Harold reigned from 860 to 930 A.D. His
reign was the period of adventurous expeditions and of colonisation.
The population was increasing, and some of the chiefs could not brook
the enforced allegiance to an overlord. The spirit of adventure and
discovery was in the air. The northern Vikings loved the freedom of a
roving life upon the ocean. Brave and fearless, they were controlled
only by their code of honour, and the precepts of Odin’s rules
contained in the Havamel or high song of Odin, and in the lay of the
Valkyrie Sigfrida alone restrained them. Their fleets were the terror
of all the coasts of western Europe, and no creek or haven was safe
from the ravages of their leaders. Such a man was Rolf the Ganger, a
chief in Nordmore, who finally established himself as Duke of Neustria.
His commanding ability and statesmanship were shown by his great and
enduring achievement. Other Vikings settled in the Faroes, Shetlands,
Orkneys, Caithness, and the chief harbours of Ireland. Naddod seized
the Faroes, and in 863 Gardar Svafarson reached the coast of Iceland.
It is curious that both in the Faroes and in Iceland Irish monks were
found, who had gone there to find lonely places as dwellings for
anchorites. They went away on the arrival of the Norsemen, as they
would not live with heathens.
The great event of the period of Harold Haarfager was the colonisation
of Iceland. It was a forbidding home, yet the leading men of the
Norwegian fjords settled there in numbers. Ingulf Ormsson, who came in
875, was the first. Two years afterwards Gunnbjörn Ulfson followed,
sailing westward until he discovered islets (doubtless on the east
coast of Greenland) which were afterwards called Gunnbjörn’s Skerries.
He turned back, and shaped a course for Iceland, which he had passed
without knowing it.
Iceland is separated from Norway by a wide and stormy sea with a depth
of 2000 fathoms, while it has a sub-oceanic connection with the Faroes
and the Hebrides by banks and ridges with a depth of only 100 fathoms.
The great volcanic mass of the island embraces an area of 40,450 square
miles just south of the Arctic Circle and consists of snowy fjells
pierced by active volcanoes and very difficult of access. It has two
plateaux, built up by volcanic rocks of older and of newer formation.
The two deep bays of Breidifjord and Hunafloi divide the island into
two separate table-lands connected by an isthmus only 4½ miles across,
but 750 feet high. The only habitable parts of Iceland were and still
are the narrow strips of land along the sea shore, and even the famous
place where the Thingvalla or assembly of the people was held is in a
plain which was formerly the bed of a lava stream, between the geyser
district and Reykjavik.
The voyage to Iceland was long and dangerous, the difficulty of
colonising insuperable to all but men endowed with the Viking spirit.
The first settlers sent tidings that the sea abounded in fish, and
that cattle could live through the winter, so the tide of immigration
continued. The Icelanders elected their Judges, established district
courts, and were ruled by their own freely-elected _Althing_ or
assembly, held on the banks of the lake called the Thingvalla Vatn.
This land of freedom, under the Arctic Circle, became the fountain of
northern mythology and history, and it is to the Skalds of Iceland
that we owe nearly all our knowledge of the beliefs, as well as of the
deeds, of the ancient Norsemen. Iceland was also the stepping-stone for
further Arctic discovery.
The settlement of Iceland, with the roll of settlers, is recorded in a
famous work written by Ari Froði (1067–1148) called the _Landnamabók_.