The Ancient History of the Norwegian Kings

VIKING SOCIETY FOR NORTHERN RESEARCH TEXT SERIES GENERAL EDITORS Anthony Faulkes and Richard Perkins VOLUME XI THEODORICUS MONACHUS AN ACCOUNT OF THE ANCIENT HISTORY OF THE NORWEGIAN KINGS THEODORICUS MONACHUS HISTORIA DE ANTIQUITATE REGUM NORWAGIENSIUM AN ACCOUNT OF THE ANCIENT HISTORY OF THE NORWEGIAN KINGS TRANSLATED AND ANNOTATED BY DAVID AND IAN MCDOUGALL WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY PETER FOOTE VIKING SOCIETY FOR NORTHERN RESEARCH UNIVERSITY COLLEGE LONDON 1998 © Viking Society for Northern Research 1998 Reprinted 2006 by Short Run Press Limited, Exeter with corrections to the Notes and additional Bibliography ISBN-10: 0-903521-40-7 ISBN-13: 978-0-903521-40-6 Cover illustration: Munkeliv Abbey (Bergen) Head of King Eysteinn (c. 1125) © Bergen Museum Photograph by Ann-Mari Olsen CONTENTS PREFACE vi INTRODUCTION vii 1. The author ix 2. The date of the Historia xi 3. The Historia and other sources xiii 4. Þórir munkr: man, monk and historian xxiii 5. The text xxx THE ANCIENT HISTORY OF THE NORWEGIAN KINGS 1 NOTES 55 BIBLIOGRAPHY AND ABBREVIATIONS 116 MAPS OF NORWAY AND DENMARK 136 INDEX OF NAMES 139 PREFACE The translators and the writer of the introduction have worked closely together, to their mutual benefit; it has been a pleasant collaboration. We are then jointly and severally grateful to numerous friends and colleagues for general advice, particular information and careful reading, most of all to these: Michael Barnes (London), Oren Falk (Toronto), Peter Fisher (Cambridge), Walter Goffart (Toronto), Lars Boje Mortensen (Bergen), Richard Perkins (London), George Rigg (Toronto), Svanhildur Óskarsdóttir (London), Michael Winterbottom (Oxford), Þorbjörg Helgadóttir (Copenhagen), and also to our General Editor, Anthony Faulkes, whose skill and patience have brought this book into print. INTRODUCTION HE WORK translated in this volume is a Latin account of T the kings of Norway from Haraldr hárfagri, who became prime ruler of the country about the middle of the ninth century, to Sigurðr Magnússon, called the Jerusalem-farer, who died in 1130. Descent in the male line from Haraldr hárfagri was counted the chief justification for a claim to the Norwegian throne, but con- ferment of the kingly title by assemblies of local men was also essential. King Sigurðr had long been dead before churchmen succeeded in persuading the Norwegians that primogeniture and legitimate birth had anything to do with right of succession to the crown. Concubinage was commonplace—Haraldr hárfagri (died c. 930), for example, is thought to have had sons by six differ- ent women, Magnús berfœttr (died 1103) by five. Shared kingship was sometimes the outcome, occasionally amicable, more often leading to mistrust and strife. There was also a long spell, from about 965 to 995 and again from 1000 to 1015, when effective rule was in the hands of the Hlaðajarlar, a dynasty based in Trønde- lag and Norway north of there. They were related to Haraldr hárfagri through female lines and never attempted to claim a kingly title. During their time the country was under the suzerainty, more or less nominal, of the king of Denmark and partially of the king of the Swedes; and for five years after the death of Óláfr Haraldsson in 1030 Norway was part of Knútr the Great’s empire, with first a nephew of his and then a son as vice-regent. The author tells us that he ends his history in 1130 because it is better to be silent about the disgraceful misdeeds of the fol- lowing years (34.11–32). Other sources tell us about the faction fighting and virtual civil war of that period, when rival descendants of the royal dynasty struggled to gain or keep the crown. Two moments of particular importance need to be noticed. One was the creation in 1152 of the archdiocese of Niðaróss, whose large province included the Norwegian sees and those of the Western Isles, Orkney, Faroes, Iceland and Greenland. It gave an authorita- tive status to clergy willing to press for reform of church-state relations. Their aim was freedom from secular interference in every sphere and in the last resort they would assert the superi- viii Theodoricus Monachus ority of the power derived from God and embodied in the papal successors of St Peter over that of any mortal monarch. The other was the acceptance in 1161 of a boy of five, Magnús Erlingsson, as king. In effect this put rule into the hands of his father, Erlingr skakki, and his allies. It was also a break with tradition, for Magnús was of royal descent only through his mother, a daughter of the King Sigurðr with whom this history ends. Erlingr rapidly dis- posed of men who could be thought to have a closer claim and then sought acknowledgment of the legitimacy of young Magnús’s reign from the archbishop. This was Eysteinn Erlendsson, a man of great family and an energetic reformer, consecrated as the second metropolitan of Niðaróss in 1161. A concordat which gave substantial concessions to the church resulted in the sanctifica- tion of Magnús’s reign by a coronation ceremony in 1164. His kingship was thus doubly hedged about, but in the event secular and clerical powers combined could not prevent men who claimed kingly descent in the male line from finding threaten- ing support here and there in the country. One unsuccessful claimant was Eysteinn meyla Eysteinsson, mentioned in this history (31.49). The one who was notably successful is not mentioned. He was Sverrir, who claimed to be a son of King Sigurðr munnr (died 1155), son of King Haraldr gilli (34.1–9; died 1136). After Eysteinn meyla’s death in 1177 Sverrir inherited command of the insur- gent band called the Birkibeinar. In a battle against him in 1179 Erlingr skakki was killed, in another in 1184 King Magnús fell. Sverrir, hated by the hierarchy, sat insecurely on the throne un- til his death in 1203 but was forefather of a dynasty which sur- vived into the fourteenth century. The tale of the kings of Norway is economically told in the Historia, with more expansive accounts in particular of Óláfr Tryggvason, the missionary king, who was lost in battle in 999/1000, and of the martyr Óláfr Haraldsson, who completed the conver- sion of the country and fell at Stiklastaðir, fighting his own people, in 1030. But the 270 years of the monarchy fill only half the book. The narrative sequence is interspersed with digressions, calculated, the author says, to delight the mind of the reader. These excurses, undoubtedly modelled on the practice of Paul the Deacon in his Langobardic history (cf. 17.9–12; notes 153–155), Introduction ix take us far afield, but they are often designed to guide our thoughts on various issues. They are, however, issues whose significance can only be gauged in the light of the history the author did not write, the history of Norway from 1130 on, the history of his own times. Extant twelfth-century writings by Icelanders and Norwegians are vastly exceeded in volume by the conflicting comment of modern scholars on them. Few topics in Norse–Icelandic stud- ies have roused more controversy than these early works, and the substance of these introductory pages is more a rehearsal of problems than a statement of conclusions. The probabilities can- vassed are however generally in line with suggestions or find- ings made by previous commentators. The credit, or discredit, for these views will be readily discovered by the reader who goes deeper into the study of the Historia with the translators’ notes and the appended bibliography as guides. 1. The author The prologue and explicit of the work refer to the author as Theo- doricus monachus (Prol. 1; p. 54). There is nothing specific in the text itself to support the attribution but few scholars have doubted its authenticity. It is generally believed that Theodoricus is a latinisation of the name Þórir, and his Norwegian national- ity is clear from numerous passages (e.g. Prol. 12; 1.6; 14.8, 19, 20; 15.17; 24.12–13; 31.39–40). In twelfth-century Norway the designation monachus could hardly imply anything but mem- bership of a Benedictine community. We might compare this Þórir munkr with two of his Icelandic contemporaries, also known as authors and usually referred to in early sources as Gunnlaugr munkr (Leifsson) and Oddr munkr (Snorrason), who both belonged to the Benedictines of Þingeyrar. Since he dedicates his book to Eysteinn Erlendsson, archbishop of Niðaróss 1161–1188, it is generally assumed that Þórir munkr belonged to the Bene- dictines closest to his cathedral. Their abbey, founded (or re- founded) about 1100, was on the islet called Niðarhólmr, just off shore from the township itself. The alternative house would be the St Michael monastery (often known as Munkalíf) in Bergen, x Theodoricus Monachus founded by King Eysteinn Magnússon ten or fifteen years later than Niðarhólmr. A pointer to the former might be that Þórir munkr refers to the Niðaróss house as a ‘renowned’ monastery (31.32), but bestows no such accolade on the Bergen community (32.31–32). Unfortunately we are miserably ignorant of the state of these monasteries in the time of Þórir munkr. Although at some stage Niðarhólmr may have claimed to belong to the Cluny congregation, it appears not to have escaped episcopal jurisdiction, from which acknowledged Cluniac houses were exempt. There is no reason to think that the Rule was not decently ob- served. In Eysteinn Erlendsson’s time the abbot was on the doorstep and under the eye of a zealous reforming archbishop, who might be trusted to keep him up to the mark.

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