Religious Strategies for Political Authorization— a Case Study

chapter 3 Religious Strategies for Political Authorization— A Case Study

As noted in chapter 2, the social and political structure differed in the three investigation areas, and it also varied over time. In the following chapter I will delve into the question of the religious strategies for rulership in these three areas, although the investigation here will be limited to the mythical- narrative dimension and a case study. I will investigate and compare traditions connected to three representative ruling families in the investigation areas, namely the Swedish-Norwegian Ynglingar, the Norwegian Earls of Lade, and the Icelandic chieftain family called the Þórsnesingar. These traditions appear in Old Norse skaldic poetry, Kings’ Sagas, and Sagas of Icelanders, and also in Latin texts. None of the descriptions may be regarded as strictly “historical”, but we may at least reach medieval opinions in them about these pre-Christian rulers and their religious-mythic strategies. By means of the skaldic poetry we may also grasp some attitudes prevalent in Viking Age society. It will be argued that the kings called the Ynglingar and the Earls of Lade had a quite similar religious strategy, while the Icelandic chieftains used another strategy. It is sug- gested that these differences are related to the variations in the social-political structures in the three areas. This conclusion has formed the basis for the gen- eral hypothesis of this study.

3.1 The Kings Called the Ynglingar

In my opinion, there was a fundamental ideological and cosmological system of thinking in the uppermost aristocratic milieus of the Late Iron Age Mälaren region. This system of thinking may be seen in the traditions describing the ancient royal family called the Ynglingar. This family appears in different types of sources (see below). According to them, they originally lived in the area around Lake Mälaren, but then emigrated from there, and settled in Vestfold, southern Norway. Perhaps some of these traditions were recited in the halls of the Mälaren region during the ceremonial feasts and when drinking memorial cups to departed rulers and ancestors. However, we have no clear evidence of this.

In what follows I will concentrate on the Ynglinga family and study their mythic strategies for political authority and legitimacy. It will be argued that the real core of this strategy was the notion that these kings descended from the gods. It will also be argued that this mythic-cosmological strategy of the Ynglingar might very well reflect historical conditions in Late Iron Age Svetjud.

3.1.1 Ynglingatal The oldest traditions about the “Ynglingar” appear in the skaldic poem Ynglingatal. This poem has been preserved to the present via manuscripts of Snorri Sturluson’s prose text Ynglinga saga (in Heimskringla) (c. 1230), where it is quoted.1 According to Snorri, it was composed by Þjódólfr inn fróði ór Hvini, who was King Haraldr Finehair’s skald sometime towards the end of the ninth century.2 It is composed in Þjódólfr’s native tongue, and recounts the reigns of twenty-nine rulers. Ynglingatal has twenty-seven stanzas. Each stanza briefly describes the deaths, burials and sometimes burial places of the kings. It seems as if the poem is made up of three distinct units.3 The introduc- tory eight stanzas concern mythical and/or heroic kings living in the Mälaren region. There are then thirteen stanzas about legendary kings of the Svear, with names beginning with a vowel. Finally, the last six stanzas describe six possibly historical Norwegian kings living in the areas around Vestfold. It has been commonly held among scholars that Snorri’s information con- cerning the dating of Ynglingatal is reasonable, that is, c. 890.4 This dating, however, was challenged by Claus Krag in 1991.5 He argued that there are medieval Christian values and ideas present in the poem indicating an anachro- nism. I have previously presented my objections and those of other scholars

1 There are three major witnesses of Ynglinga saga. Two of them are later copies of the medieval parchment codices Kringla and Jǫfraskinna. (1) K—AM 35 fol. is a copy of Kringla made by Ásgeirr Jónsson (c. 1700), and provided with corrections made by Árni Magnússon. (2) J1— Manuscript AM 37 fol. is the oldest and best copy of Jǫfraskinna, unfortunately defective, made by Bishop Jens Nielssön (c. 1567–68). J2—AM 38 fol. is a copy of Jǫfraskinna made by Ásgeirr Jónsson 1698. (3) F—Codex Frisianus, AM 45 fol., was written by an Icelander c. 1325. Cf. Noreen 1925, 195–197. Wessén 1964, v–vii; Bjarni Aðalbjarnarson 1979 (1941), 2. 2 Ynglinga saga, in Heimskringla I, Ísl. Fornr. 26, 4. 3 See Wessén 1964. John McKinnell (2010) argues that the poem is made up of three or four distinct blocks, connected by two “linking” figures, which probably reflects different oral sources. 4 See e.g. Åkerlund 1939. 5 This opinion was not new in the research on Ynglingatal, both Bugge (1894, 108–153) and Neckel (1908, 389–421) have made similar statements earlier, but Krag (1991 and 2009) emphasized it further.