The king said: “Men have come to me before on such errands. It seems to me that this demand of King Sigurd’s is rather more unjust than proper, for I know of no obligation that says I owe him anything. Those who have come here before on this errand have also met with a hard reckoning. It is also clear to me that it was a matter of indifference to the king how this errand would end for you, or even what the outcome would be. Nevertheless, I will deal with you, Torkjell, as before, obtain thanks and friendship from you, and give you money and goods. But the friendship of the sons of Gunnhild I will not purchase.”
In the spring Torkjell set out from the west with a great quantity of goods. He parted from the king on the best of terms, and they vowed fast friendship between them.
When Torkjell had departed from Norway, King Sigurd Sleva had sent his men to Torkjell’s farm, having them fetch his wife Aalov thence to himself, and laid her down in his bed. Then she said: “My lord! You commit an injustice, and it is unworthy to deal this way with the man who trusts you greatly. From this great evil will come. And now you choose to do this, although it is wicked!”
The king said, “First things first; get used to what’s demanded of you. Do not try to teach me manners!”
After that, Aalov lay with the king every night. All men thought this deed of the king’s both ugly and poorly advised, saying that he himself would have to answer for it in time. And in the spring, when Torkjell was expected to come home, the king sent Aalov back.
When Torkjell Klypp learned of all this, it hit him hard. Nevertheless, he went home to his farm and was silent and rather cross.
When he arrived home, Aalov was already there, and went quickly and joyfully to meet Torkjell, saying, “Welcome farmer Torkjell, go into the house and have a rest! I expect you are aware of what has happened, something which is certainly not good. I want to make up for everything of yours that I have used up, and afterward I will take my ease with you, in companionship and reconciliation.”
Then Torkjell answered, composing this verse:
I do not think of going
to bed with
you, women, not even on the pillow.
Through great sorrow I am furious,
and to deadly deeds driven.
Strong drink will not cheer me
until in the blood of the descendant of Bragi1
we redden the wound-hawk’s beak.2
She answered then: “Now it is both wickedly done, and even more [than what has been done] you have thought. It is ill that so much evil should come through my fault.”
Afterward a Thing was summoned, and to it came King Sigurd and many people. A man called Ogmund, son of Horda-Kaare, was in the king’s retinue. He stood beside him with a great spear in his hand. Torkjell went to the [king’s} seat and said, “Lord, here now we see the goods I have brought from England, and tell me now whether my errand was well performed.”
The king looked at it, and so many costly things, and said: “It is indeed well completed, rightly enough.”
Torkjell answered: “So one of the difficulties is solved.” He was wearing a cloak with a decorative border on it. Then he took an axe he had under the cloak, struck at the king and gave him his death wound. When Torkjell then turned from his work, Ogmund Kaaresson leaped at him and pierced him through with the spear he was holding. Torkjell’s kinsmen thought that such an evil deed that they took Ogmund and burned him in his house. They considered Torkjell’s case a much better one than the king’s.
When Gunnhild heard of her son’s death, she thought that she had suffered such evil from Aalov that she desired to repay her shamefully. Aalov learned of this, and hearing that a ship headed for Iceland was ready to embark, [she] sought out the owner, whose name was Bodvar, son of Torstein, brother to Hall of Sida.
Her words were: “I have gotten into a difficulty, and wish to ask you to bear me to your land, away from Gunnhild’s abuses.”
He answered: “I think it is pure necessity that drives you, and I will do as you ask. But you must know that you will owe it to me to do as I wish.”
She said that it would be so. After that she and Gudrun, her daughter, boarded the ship. Afterward they traveled to Iceland and arrived east in Altafjord. There Bodvar had a very large farm. And when they came home, it is said that Bodvar said: “Now I will take up again our agreement, which I made with you in Norway, and propose marriage to you.”
She answered: “I am well aware that it could be said that I now am making a lower marriage than before. But you have well earned my agreement and the benefits of that agreement.” After that it was carried out; Bodvar married Aalov, but their life together did not last long; he died shortly after.
Later Einar Øyolvsson from north in Tveraa heard it said that marriage with Gudrun Klyppsdatter, and getting her [as a wife], must be the greatest honor a man could achieve. – He married her, and had many children with her. Torkjell Klypp was the name given to Einar’s and Gudrun’s son, named after his maternal grandfather. He was a promising man, as is told in many sagas.
Some winters later, Aalov traveled back to Norway and her kinfolk, and was regarded as a very estimable woman.
1King Sigurd Sleva.
2A carrion bird; possibly also a metaphor for a sword.
Snorri Sturlusson merely calls the tragic hero of this tale “Klypp the Hersir,” mentioning that he killed King Sigurd for raping his wife. Here we get more detail. Torkjell Klypp was, in fact, according to the sagas, the brother of Thora Mosterstang, mother of King Haakon the Good. They were also related to Erling Skjalgsson’s family.
But it goes further than that. Ogmund Kaaresson, who killed Torkjell Klypp, was actually Erling’s paternal grandfather, father of Thorolf Skjalg. Since Skjalg was also burned in his house according to the sagas (I change it a bit in my novels), that amounts to a kind of a run of bad luck for his family tree. And the killing of Klypp by Ogmund would also seem to foreshadow Erling’s own murder by a kinsman, again in defense of a king.
Their family reunions must have been a little tense.
Anyway, perhaps this little translation of mine will be useful to some scholar doing online research, at some point in the future.
(Note: I don’t know what “Klypp” means. A note I found online suggests that it derives from “clump.” Perhaps it’s the name of a farm.)
Acknowledgement: This translation by Lars Walker is of an excerpt from Flatøybok, Bind 1, © 2014, third printing 2016, Saga Bok AS, Stavanger, pp. 94-97.
This is very interesting -thank you!
Thanks to the excellent index in the Monsen-Smith Heimskringla translation I quickly checked all the Sigurd Sleva references – “mentions in passing” indeed, with a very different impression – e.g., of the scene illustrated by Christian Krohg, whom I had not followed up, nor Halvdan Egedius and Erik Werenskiold, for that matter. In his review of that translation, Lee Hollander says “All the woodcuts are from the Nationaludgave […] and hence for the most part excellent” while Bruce Dickins in his says “These cuts, the work of several distinguished Norwegian artists, have more than average merit”, while Monsen in his introduction calls Egedius “an artist of rare talent”, speaks of Werenskiold’s “brilliant style and conception” as having “been much valued”, and says Krohg’s “drawings are masterpieces of their kind”. I must say,I would never have expected their paintings on the basis of these illustrations, but like as much as I’ve seen of those thanks to Wikipedia, at least in terms of style(s). But the English Wikipedia articles give me no immediate detailed sense of any of their politics.
This Norwegian edition of Heimskringla (I have a copy of the cheap version) was published expressly for the purpose of promoting Norwegian independence, and almost every Norwegian home had a copy, on a shelf right next to the Bible and Pontoppidan’s Explanation of the Catechism. The illustrations have become beloved cultural icons, and I’m very fond of some of them (particularly those of Kittelsen and Werenskjold). But Krohg’s look slapdash and crude to me, and I don’t believe he took much time over them. I don’t know for a fact that he was a Communist, but he was definitely part of the Venstre (Left) and he worked for the left-wing newspaper “Verdens Gang.” His paintings have some beauty, but his ideas of human beauty were rather Bolshevik — big, stout men and women. Sturdy workers.
Thanks for all this detail beyond Wikipedia, which I would not know how to go looking for with any ease (e.g., no English biography of Christian Krohg turns up when I search for his name in the Internet Archive)! Wow – a Norwegian Heimskringla next to the Bible! (I have found a scan of a 1900 edition of “Explanation of Luther’s Small Catechism. Based on Dr. Erick Pontoppidan” by Harold Ulrik Sverdrup, “Abridged Edition” translated by Emil Gunerius Lund – but would not have known to look for it!)
Whew! I just ran into the wild and scary 1872 painting Åsgårdsreien by another hitherto unfamiliar Norwegian artist, Peter Nicolai Arbo . It’s Wikipedia article says it’s indebted to a poem by Johan Sebastian Welhaven (also unknown to me!).
I’m not a great fan of Arbo, who epitomized stylized Victorian romanticism — though he’s better at mythology than history. (In his defense, he didn’t have a lot of good archaeology to guide him.) Asgardsreien is pretty effective, though.