The viking age and the sagas of Icelanders

The Middle Ages started later in the Nordic countries than in the rest of Europe. Because here, the Viking Age lasted up until the 12th century. It’s not until the nordic countries became Christian that we say the middle ages started here. Thor and Odin were two of the gods people believed in. We owe the fact that we know as much as we do about the norse gods largely to a collection of poems: The poetic Edda.

The poems were told by mouth for several generations and then written down by writers that we don’t know much about. Old poetic verses of this type are known as: “kväden”. The Poetic Edda starts with a story about how the world is created. Then it goes on to tell what will happen to gods and men until the end of the world “Ragnarök”. This story is called the Prophecy of the Völva, because it’s told in the words of a norse seeress, a völva, or vala.

In The Poetic Edda there is also a collection of rules of conduct that is called: “Havamal”. Typical of the style in which the stories are told are three stylistic techniques. The first technique is that several words in a sentence start with the same sound. It’s like the opposite of a rhyme. A rhyme ends with the same sound.

This is what it may sound like in a swedish extract from The Poetic Edda. Bättre börda bär man ej på vägen än mycket mannavett. Or: Brand brinner av brand, tills han brunnen är, låga tändes av låga. This technique is called alliteration. The second technique is the use of similes for ordinary words.

For example a ship was called a sail-horse. And treasure was called “Fafnir’s bed”. Fafnir’s bed? That sounds odd, right? Well, Fafnir was a famous dragon.

And dragons usually lie on treasure. Do you get it? You can also see these similes as answers to riddles. Can you solve this riddle? What is the whale’s road?

The whale’s road.. is the sea of course. This way of using similes is called: Kenning. Kennings could also be extra clever and contain riddles in two steps. Freja was the goddess of love.

Once, when she had been let down by her lover, she cried tears of gold. That is why “Freja’s eyebrow’s rain” meant: gold. Let’s take it step by step to make it clearer. “Freja’s eyebrow’s rain” means Freja’s tears. And Freja’s tears were made of… Gold! The third technique used in the Poetic Edda is repetition of one or several sentences between the poem’s verses.

Like a refrain in a song. So the verses, called: “kväden” were surrounded by the refrains, called: “omkväden”. This is because “Om” is a Nordic word meaning ‘around’. The sagas of Icelanders take place on Iceland in the 10th century to the 13th century. They are family sagas.

And very violent. Families take revenge on other families. They battle and murder. Honour is very important. Njal’s saga is the longest and the most well known of the sagas.

Njal is a wise man who tries to help Gunnar. Gunnar is strong and good but gets into trouble because of his beautiful but evil wife Hallgerd. Typical of the sagas of Icelanders is that they are very violent and action-filled. Many people die violently. Despite this the people involved comment upon the events in a very casual way as if this was nothing out of the ordinary.

This is called understatement. - Is Gunnar at home? - That, I don’t know, but his spear axe was at home..