{"id":723,"date":"2023-07-05T14:21:06","date_gmt":"2023-07-05T18:21:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/commons.princeton.edu\/makingvikings\/?page_id=723"},"modified":"2023-07-11T14:47:18","modified_gmt":"2023-07-11T18:47:18","slug":"conflict-and-unity-a-voluspa-of-the-icelandic-settlement","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/commons.princeton.edu\/makingvikings\/voluspa-entangled\/conflict-and-unity-a-voluspa-of-the-icelandic-settlement\/","title":{"rendered":"Conflict and Unity: A V\u00f6lusp\u00e1 of the Icelandic Settlement"},"content":{"rendered":"

Then the mighty gods met\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0to give judgement
\nthe holy gods\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0took counsel together:
\nwho had filled the air\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0with evil speech,
\noffered to a giant\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0the goddess Freyja?<\/p>\n

\u2014 The V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em> (trans. Terry)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Perhaps the most noted interpreter of Old Norse poetry in 21st-century English letters was Seamus Heaney. Heaney hailed from Northern Ireland and won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1995. Throughout the 20th century, Heaney\u2019s work fixated on Scandinavia\u2014prehistoric bog bodies as well as Old Norse alliterative verse. These sources provided symbols, so Heaney could comment upon his own political present, the Troubles in Northern Ireland. In \u201cNorth,\u201d the titular poem of his 1975 collection, Heaney uses a viking longship as an entrance point into a history of infighting and revenge\u2014one reminiscent of that which the V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em> depicts.<\/p>\n

The longship’s swimming tongue<\/p>\n

was buoyant with hindsight\u2014
\nit said Thor’s hammer swung
\nto geography and trade,
\nthick-witted couplings and revenges,<\/p>\n

the hatreds and behindbacks
\nof the Althing, lies and women,
\nexhaustions nominated peace,
\nmemory incubated by the spilled blood.<\/p>\n

\u2014 Seamus Heaney, “North”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Most of “North” mimics the quatrain structure of Norse alliterative verse. Icelandic politics and its central body, the Althing, play an outsized role in Heaney’s poetics. He describes the origin of Icelandic settlement in positive terms (\u201cThor’s hammer swung,\/to geography and trade\u201d) before sharply pivoting to a different history, marked by \u201cthick witted couplings and revenges.\u201d The separation between these two registers\u2014lofty and base\u2014is only a comma, implying a natural progression from one to another.<\/p>\n

Why is Heaney so eager to point out \u201cthe hatreds and behindbacks\/of the Althing\u201d? How was Iceland settled, fought over, and lived in? And how can learning the context behind the place where the V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em> was first written down inform our reading of the text? We’ll begin with a discussion of the settlement of Iceland, before moving into a brief discussion of the Althing. We’ll linger on blood feud as a locus both in Icelandic society and in the V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em>, before focusing on material sources, and what leisure might have looked like in Viking Age Iceland.<\/p>\n

Landn\u00e1m<\/h6>\n

For the first half of the 9th century, Iceland was empty. The only inhabitants were a small group of Irish monks, for whom the island’s solitude was the distinct selling point (Byock 11). Jesse Byock, a viking scholar who in 2001 wrote the book on the settlement of Iceland, describes the island as \u201cpristine\u201d and \u201cof striking beauty\u201d when the Icelanders began their landn\u00e0m<\/em>: \u2018land- taking,\u2019 a sixty-year settlement (9). In Byock’s book, he emphasizes how the settlers \u201cestablished a society\u201d out of a political vacuum, created a state from the unformed matter of geography (11). The V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em> also begins with an unformed world, albeit of different kind:<\/p>\n

Nothing was there\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0before time began,
\nneither sands nor seas\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0nor cooling waves.
\nEarth was not yet,\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0nor the high heavens,
\nbut a gaping emptiness\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0nowhere green.<\/p>\n

\u2014 The V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em> (trans. Terry)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The beginning of the V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em> depicts not a political vacuum, but a literal vacuum, \u201cgaping emptiness.\u201d The world has no edges\u2014\u201cneither sand nor seas\u201d\u2014nothing to visually differentiate one thing from the next, maybe no thing<\/em> to differentiate at all. But out of this void several individuals create something extraordinary:<\/p>\n

Then Bur’s sons\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0lifted up the land
\nand made Midgard,\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0men’s fair dwelling;
\nthe sun shone\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0out of the south
\nand bright grass grew\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0from the ground of stone.<\/p>\n

\u2014 The V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em> (trans. Terry)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em> depicts an invention of a livable place. In the Norse mythos, \u201cMidgard\u201d is where humans live; the inauguration of humanity is a conscious and collective effort, marked by physical labor (\u201clifted\u201d) and cooperation between individuals, the formation of groups (\u201cBur’s sons\u201d). The origin of human life gives way to other kinds of life: \u201cand bright grass grew\/from the ground of stone.\u201d Could such a line be a reflection of the origins of agriculture in Iceland, displacing the ice, creating life from a floor of basalt and shanty soil cover (Byock 26)?<\/p>\n

Soon, Iceland was well and truly transformed. An island with only two native mammals was overrun with \u201cdogs, cats, pigs, goats, sheep, cattle and horses.\u201d The husbandry of cattle and sheep were the most important (28), though inhabitants also hunted, fished, and gathered (29). Settlers built turf farmhouses (34), largely isolated and rural but self-sustaining (31). At first, Iceland had native birch forests, though they soon became almost extinct, and \u201cgood timber had to be imported\u201d (33). From this practical basis, a society was formed; by the mid-9th century, the Icelanders inaugurated their political body, \u201cthe Althing\u201d (11).<\/p>\n

The Althing<\/h6>\n

Among of our most important sources for the landn\u00e0m are sagas. They were written in Iceland as histories of what we now call the Viking Age and the time soon thereafter (Byock 22). \u201cMedieval Icelanders wrote the sagas about themselves and for themselves,\u201d Byock argues (24). They show us how descendants of the people who settled Iceland saw their ancestors’ project\u2014 or how they wanted their ancestors’ project to be seen. In one of these sagas, The Tale of Thorstein Bull’s Leg, we see a glimpse of the Althing’s founding. A character in the sage, Ulfljot, went from Iceland to Norway and there established a legal code:<\/p>\n

And when he came back to Iceland, the Althing was established and from that time on all the people of the country were governed by the same law.<\/p>\n

\u2014 The Tale of Thorstein Bull’s Leg<\/em> (trans. Clark)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The later Icelanders saw the creation of the Althing as a paradigm shift. Its genesis was sudden, its influence schematic. Immediately afterwards, \u201call the people of the country\u201d are unified, \u201cgoverned by the same law.\u201d The focus on law, political structure, is notable, and corresponds neatly with a more formal geographic differentiation of Iceland described later in the same text:<\/p>\n

At that time the country was divided into four quarters and there were to be three assemblies in each quarter and three chief temples in each assembly district.<\/p>\n

\u2014 The Tale of Thorstein Bull’s Leg<\/em> (trans. Clark)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The island is divided into thirty-six units. The \u201cchief temples\u201d and \u201cassemblies\u201d create gathering places for what is already a relatively small island to have local-scale political relations; these are in turn mirrored by the large scale Althing, where representatives from each quarter can meet and discuss law for the island as a whole. Governance in Iceland thus occurs over both small and large scales, with both an overarching law for the island (Byock 174) and opportunities for individual landholders to have their voices heard (171).<\/p>\n

This structure has its counterpart in the beginning of the V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em>. Soon after \u201cBur’s sons\u201d create a livable world in the cosmos, there is an assembly of the gods, reminiscent of the Althing:<\/p>\n

Then all the gods\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0met to give judgement
\nthe holy gods\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0took council together.<\/p>\n

\u2014 The V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em> (trans. Terry)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The gods, much like the people of Iceland, \u201call\u201d met in a central place, \u201cmet to give judgement,\u201d to work in a prescribed system of justice. The purpose of the meetings was communicative as well as legal; the gods also sought advice from one another, \u201ctook council together.\u201d Finally, the meeting of the gods is \u201choly,\u201d granting religious heft to political governance in the early Icelandic settlement.<\/p>\n

Blood Feud<\/h6>\n

Political organization is aligned with religion in the V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em>, but it is also marred by violence. In \u201cNorth,\u201d Heaney wrote that the violence of the Althing was ancient and long- brewing, \u201cmemory incubating the spilled blood.\u201d How did the Icelandic society deal with violence? And how was this violence mirrored by the V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em>?<\/p>\n

Christopher Dunn argues that the theme of conflict is fundamental for the Old Norse lays, writing: \u201cEssentially, the leitmotif of all their songs, though variously developed by the singers, was the human dilemma of divided loyalties\u201d (xxi). Byock defines one more or less formalized way for violence to be expressed: \u201cIcelandic blood feud was a form of vengeance taking. It involved deep, smouldering animosities leading to repeated reprisals\u201d (208). Despite the best efforts towards unity in Iceland, bloodshed seemed inevitable. In the V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em>, too, the political organization of the gods eventually breaks down:<\/p>\n

vows were broken,\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0promises betrayed,
\nthe solemn treaties\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0both sides had sworn<\/p>\n

\u2014 The V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em> (trans. Terry)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The breaking of \u201cvows\u201d and \u201ctreaties\u201d eventually gives way to the chaos of Ragnar\u00f6k itself: Brothers will die, slain by their brothers,
\nkinsmen betray (…)<\/p>\n

Brothers will die,\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0slain by their brothers,
\nkinsmen betray\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0their close kin;
\n[…]\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0until the world goes down.<\/p>\n

\u2014 The V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em> (trans. Terry)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Relations between symbolic brothers intensify to true familial violence. The mythic proportions of the V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em> create a progression: the breakdown of political structures (\u201cvows were broken\u201c) gives way to the breakdown of familial structure (\u201ckinsmen betray\/their close kin\u201d), which in turn gives way to a breakdown in the functioning of the natural world (\u201cuntil the world goes down.\u201d) Here, the V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em> reflects what its scribes found most terrifying. Early Iceland was a harsh, isolated place, and breakdown in the political order was the furthest thing from trivial. It was a matter of life and death, so its consequences were depicted as of cosmic proportion.<\/p>\n

Gold and leisure<\/h6>\n

Patricia Terry writes that those who wrote the V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em> are distant enough as to seem \u201cunimaginable\u201d (xi). The text’s obscurity and complexity can only augment this difficulty: all we see in the poem are fights with massive serpents, oracles speaking with the weight of prophecy and the pyrotechnic end of the world. What sense is there to make?<\/p>\n

In his 1996 introduction to the text of The Elder Edda<\/em>, Charles Dunn describes the default mode of the Norse gods in the Poetic Edda, and especially in the V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em>, as \u201cawesome, remote, and serious beings\u201d (xxv). This perspective, while largely true, is not conclusive. At the beginning and end of the V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em>, before and following the destruction wrought by Ragnar\u00f6k, we find a glimpse of how the Icelandic elite used leisure to conceptualize the genesis of a society in their poetry.<\/p>\n

The V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em> begins with the origin of the world, and continues with a history of the world’s first conflict. Nested between these events, we have a striking moment breaking from what Hermann P\u00e1lsson would term the poem’s \u201cprincipal mood… of sustained anxiety\u201d (P\u00e1lsson 43). We find the gods at peace:<\/p>\n

Sitting in meadows,\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0smiling over gameboards,
\nthey never knew\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0any need of gold<\/p>\n

\u2014 The V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em> (trans. Terry)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The leisure of the gods is conveyed by the image of a \u201cgameboard,\u201d a symbol not necessarily abstract from Icelandic society. The National Museum of Iceland displays a set of small, equal sized stones that were valuable enough to bury with someone, apparently part of a game. To spend time playing\u2014doing nothing productive, only \u201csmiling\u201d and enjoying leisure\u2014one must have time to burn in the first place.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Gaming Pieces from burial at Baldursheimur, Iceland.
Walrus ivory.
(source: Wikimedia<\/a>)<\/p><\/div>\n

The gods are playing the role of a high class Scandinavian or Icelander. They have no need to execute the back-breaking labor of finding food; their peace isn’t yet broken by Ragnar\u00f6k. They are in what Hermann P\u00e1lsson would term a \u201cgolden age,\u201d perhaps ironic, given that one of the few pieces of information the poem gives us is that the gods do not, and indeed never had, \u201cany need for gold.\u201d<\/p>\n

When society is reformed after Ragnar\u00f6k at the end of V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em>, the gameboard re-emerges as a symbol, but its relationship with gold has shifted.<\/p>\n

Later they will find\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0a wondrous treasure,
\ngold gameboards\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0lying in the grass
\nwhere they had left them\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0so long before.<\/p>\n

\u2014 The V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em> (trans. Terry)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

After the chaos associated with creating a new world order, gameboards are apparently undisturbed: \u201clying in the grass\/where they had left\/them so long before.\u201d The apparatus of leisure has remained. But instead of representing the irrelevancy of gold, the gameboards are themselves \u201cgolden.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gold is an interesting substance with which to consider the Icelandic settlement. It is intrinsically useless, but gains importance as a society is established as a marker of status and wealth. Before the landn\u00e1m<\/em>, when Iceland was still a vacuum, gold wouldn’t have had any use. But as Icelandic society was established, gold gained a monetary value (Byock 315) as well as a cultural one; it can be read as a symbol for the rules, excesses, and incurrent beauty that come with settlement and social order.<\/p>\n

Written poetry, in an early society, is set down by the rich. Only an elite class can spend valuable time and resources towards fixing a narrative instead of working for subsistence. It makes sense that an elite class might be preoccupied with the symbols of wealth and power. Perhaps the paradigm shift of Ragnar\u00f6k is comparable to the one that created a livable society on Iceland. Here we might find the Icelandic elite hearkening back to a nostalgic world prior to the landn\u00e1m<\/em>, when leisure was free and life was without even the memory of hardship. Either way, we see that the V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em> was an outlet for later Icelanders to reflect\u2014critically and symbolically\u2014on the history of their people, the origins of their place.<\/p>\n

\u00ab Previous<\/a> | Home<\/a> | Next \u00bb<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Then the mighty gods met\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0to give judgement the holy gods\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0took counsel together: who had filled the air\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0with evil speech, offered to a giant\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0the goddess Freyja? \u2014 The V\u00f6lusp\u00e1 (trans. Terry) Perhaps the most noted interpreter of Old Norse poetry in 21st-century English letters was Seamus Heaney. Heaney<\/p>\n

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