Tag Archives: Jarl Thorfinn the Mighty

Fiction, Non-fiction, Reading

A fatal slip of the tongue

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St. Magnus’ Kirk on Birsay, believed to be the site of the old Christ Church, where Jarl Thorfinn was buried. Photo credit: Chris Downer. Creative Commons license, Wikimedia.

When I wrote last night’s review of Orkneyinga Saga, I’d intended to mention one more thing, but I find I overlooked it. It’s not crucial to appreciating the book. Just an interesting point.

The saga includes one of the earliest references I’m aware of to a Freudian Slip. Not as such, of course. But I hadn’t been aware that the Vikings found such slips of the tongue as significant as psychologists do – only in a different way. Where we look for the voice of the subconscious, the Vikings looked for Fate.

The passage concerns the death of Jarl Ragnvald Brusesson, rival to Jarl Thorfinn the Mighty. He and his men had burned Jarl Thorfinn and his men in his house – or so he believed – and now he has traveled to the island of Papa Stronsay to collect malt for the Christmas ale. As they’re sitting around a hearth fire in a house there, someone mentions that more wood is needed for the fire.

Then the Earl made a slip of the tongue and this is what he said: ‘We shall have aged enough when this fire burns out.’ What he meant to say was that they would have baked enough. He realized his mistake immediately.

‘I’ve never made a slip of the tongue before,’ he said, ‘and now I remember what my foster-father King Olaf said at Stiklestad when I pointed out a mistake of his, that I’d not have long to live if ever my own tongue made a slip. Perhaps my uncle Thorfinn is still alive after all.’

Immediately thereafter the house is attacked by Jarl Thorfinn (who had indeed survived), and Ragnvald and all his men are killed.

I take this to indicate that there must have been some superstition about slips of the tongue being portents of death. It’s reminiscent of their belief in the “fetch,” the separate soul. When you see your fetch, it’s a sign you’re soon to die. It may be that the fetch also speaks audibly through slips of the tongue.

Or, it might just be an isolated anecdote about St. Olaf’s powers of prophecy.

Ragnvald, by the way, was the man who had saved King Harald Hardrada’s life after the Battle of Stiklestad, carrying the wounded 16-year-old prince off the battlefield and getting him safely away to Russia. Harald was now king of Norway, and Thorfinn’s overlord. Nevertheless, when Thorfinn went to Harald in Norway to explain it all, Harald was not greatly upset, and let him off lightly.

It seems he recognized a kindred spirit when he encountered him.

Fiction, Non-fiction, Reviews, Writing

‘Orkneyinga Saga’

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This book review will, on closer examination, turn out to be a sort of bait-and-switch, a partial review embedded in an author’s journal post. I’m still plot-wrestling, and I continue in PAUSE mode, learning the geography and trying to figure out what happens next as I send Erling Skjalgsson home from England by way of the Orkneys (and possibly the Shetlands. Haven’t worked that out yet).

As I told you, I realized the other day that Erling’s journey home to Norway has to bring him into a confrontation with Jarl Thorfinn the Mighty of Orkney, who had a problematic relationship with King (Saint) Olaf Haraldsson, Erling’s enemy. Thorfinn had submitted to Olaf as his overlord, but he felt Olaf had broken their understanding by awarding part of the jarldom to his brother Brusi. He might very well be willing to listen to Erling’s suggestion that he transfer fealty to King Knut of Denmark/England.

However, I discovered a further complication. In reading the Penguin edition of Orkneyinga Saga, the saga of the earls (jarls) of Orkney, I was reminded that Thorfinn ruled not only the Orkneys and Shetland. He also ruled Caithness, the northeastern part of Scotland, an area heavily settled by Norwegians.

And Caithness brings us close to Moray, which was the home of Macbetha – whom I included, you’ll recall, under the name Macbetha, in my last Erling book, King of Rogaland. Macbetha, who wouldn’t have been king yet at this point, would almost certainly have been an enemy of Thorfinn’s. (Though I always think about Dorothy Dunnet’s novel, King Hereafter, which is based on the theory that Thorfinn and Macbeth were the same person. She notes that the annals telling about Macbeth never mention Thorfinnn, and Orkneyinga Saga never mentions Macbeth [well, it mentions an earlier King Macbeth, but he’s a different guy]. In the saga, Thorfinn does fight a mysterious Scottish king named Karl Hundarsson, whom some historians have identified as Macbeth.) Anyway, it would be impolite to my readers not to reunite them with Macbetha while we’re in the neighborhood.

So how will I work all this out? I’m thinking about it. I have some ideas.

In any case, I’ll review the portion of Orkneyinga Saga that I read. I confess I didn’t finish it (this time through), because it covers a lot of history much later than the period I’m dealing with. Some of it, I should note, is very intriguing, especially the conscientious objection of (Saint) Magnus Erlendsson during a raid on Wales, and his subsequent martyrdom.

But my concern was with the career of Jarl Thorfinn. Thorfinn is an intriguing character, bigger than life. Sometimes he’s sympathetic, sometimes emphatically not. His climactic conflict with his charismatic nephew, Rognvald Brusisson, involves some very nice plotting (indicating – probably – a fair amount of fictional embroidering) and dramatic irony. One also notes the appearance of the name “Tree-beard,” very likely where Tolkien found it. The saga also includes one of our sources for the disputed practice of the “Blood Eagle,” a cruel method of execution which showed up in the History Channel “Vikings” series. (I myself incline to the view that there never was such a practice, but that it came from the saga writers misunderstanding a poetic metaphor.)

Orkneyinga Saga is one of the most striking and vigorous of the sagas. It’s not up to Snorri Sturlusson’s literary standards, but it still packs a punch and lingers in the memory.