Life and Biography in the Middle Ages: A Heathen King












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            * Life and Biography in the Middle Ages: A Heathen King
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            The speaker at one of the literary lecture offered in the series 'Life and Biography in th

            on the topic of 'A Heathen King' at the Faculty of Arts on the 29th of March was Dr. Rolf 
            lectures on Nordic medieval literature and languages at the Aarhus University in Denmark.
            A glance over the handout provided at the start of the session with extracts of various ol

            made the recurring theme of the lecture become immediately clear – lines such as 'Hogni la
            cut out his heart', 'It was that gave that gramr his death' and 'Dagr, I heard, death's ju
            signaled the tone of the lecture. Jokingly, Stavnem commented that the lecture for the wee

            have been titled 'Death and Biography' and later referred to one ancient King in particula
            note that their life was presumably “so uneventful that we know nothing of them but how th

            The collection of extracts compiled by Stavnem began with Historia Norvegiae, a history of
            in roughly 1200, in which the author describes how the Kings of old were 'worshipped as go
            posterity' before going on, in what seems like somewhat of a contradiction, to say nothing

            of these Kings, but rather to describe – in a rather matter-of-fact way – the manner in wh
            King Domaldi of Uppsala was hanged by the Swedes as a sacrifice to the goddess Ceres, Ingj
            legendary ruler of early medieval Sweden, was killed in an act of fratricide, and their pr

            Swedish throne, Vanlandi, was smothered by a demon in his sleep. In fact, the only King me
            text who was not killed in a rather bizarre and epic fashion was Aun, who died in 'the dra
            of old age', which the author seemed to be fairly displeased with, mentioning that he coul

            instead rather pathetically only sucked milk from a horn 'like an infant' for his last 9 y
            suggesting that perhaps an epic death would have been preferable for the sake of his legac
            Stavnem explained that for example the text 'Hogni laughed/ as they cut out his heart/ the

            alive/ never thought of whining', from the poem Ynglingatal, was a more typical picture of
            presented in these old Norse texts: it describes a classic heroic situation, with someone 
            threatened and ultimately staring into the face of death without showing fear. This braver

            reader at least!), seemingly a more satisfactory end, and provides the King with a more wo
            remembered by than his life itself.
            Stavnem also made reference to an image painted by Carl Larsson in the early 20th century 

            'Midvinterblot' (Swedish for ‘Midwinter sacrifice’), which can be found at the National Mu
            Stockholm, and in which the stabbed victim is the mystical King Domaldi. This story was ta
            famous Old Norse prose Edda written in Iceland by Snorre Sturlasson early in the 13th cent

            this poem, there is no evidence the King actually existed. If you are ever in Stockholm, c
            One of the other texts discussed included an extract from Ynglinga Saga, which is a legend
            originally written in Old Norse by the aforementioned Icelandic poet Sturlasson in about t

            a poem, which Sturlasson claimed to have cited in his work that mentions twenty-seven Nors
            with details about their deaths and even some of their burial places. As Stavnem pointed o
            know to what extent these texts have truth to them and how historically accurate they are.

            made the particularly interesting comment that the quoted poem was supposedly sung orally 
            years before ever having being officially written down and captured in writing – though he
            the question of whether this was truly possible!

            ‘Ynglingatal is written in the style of kvi?uháttr' , which means that the lines alternate
            three and four syllables, and contain a number of metaphors and 'kennings' – which are oft
            old Norse poetry, Stavnem explained, and which are like condensed metaphors in which an ob

            to using a compound, such as 'blood-ember' to mean 'axe'. Typical of old Norse writings, b
            the other texts also contain a fairly pragmatic list of events rather than a huge amount o
            for example: 'Then King Olafr had him taken away and his head cut off' – straight to the p

            language there! Typical of such texts, there is also a harmony between the prose and verse
            being discussed often slip between both forms.
            Near the end of the session, Stavnem questioned whether these texts ought to be called lit

            all, because they were produced on the back of eye-witness accounts and not generated by t
            imagination; yet, as the texts contain the conventions expected of literature, he argues, 
            understand these texts without understanding these conventions and patterns would be usele

            pattern in these texts, which needs to be understood in more detail, it seems, is the biza
            describe and the significance of this in representing the lives these Kings had lived.