第13章
Frode is throughout the typical general, as he is the typical statesman and law-giver of archaic Denmark.
There are certain heathen usages connected with war, as the hurling of a javelin or shooting of an arrow over the enemy's ranks as a "sacratio" to Woden of the foe at the beginning of a battle.This is recorded in the older vernacular authorities also, in exact accordance with the Homeric usage, "Odyssey" xxiv, 516-595.
The dedication of part of the spoils to the god who gave good omens for the war is told of the heathen Baltic peoples; but though, as Sidonius records, it had once prevailed among the Saxons, and, as other witnesses add, among the Scandinavian people, the tradition is not clearly preserved by Saxo.
"Sea and Sea Warfare." -- As might be expected, there is much mention of Wicking adventure and of maritime warfare in Saxo.
Saxo tells of Asmund's huge ship (Gnod), built high that he might shoot down on the enemy's craft; he speaks of a ship (such as Godwin gave as a gift to the king his master), and the monk of St.Bertin and the court-poets have lovingly described a ship with gold-broidered sails, gilt masts, and red-dyed rigging.One of his ships has, like the ships in the Chansons de Geste, a carbuncle for a lantern at the masthead.Hedin signals to Frode by a shield at the masthead.A red shield was a peace signal, as noted above.The practice of "strand-hewing", a great feature in Wicking-life (which, so far as the victualling of raw meat by the fishing fleets, and its use raw, as Mr.P.H.Emerson informs me, still survives), is spoken of.There was great fear of monsters attacking them, a fear probably justified by such occasional attacks of angry whales as Melville (founding his narrative on repeated facts) has immortalised.The whales, like Moby Dick, were uncanny, and inspired by troll-women or witches (cf.
"Frithiof Saga" and the older "Lay of Atle and Rimegerd").The clever sailing of Hadding, by which he eludes pursuit, is tantalising, for one gathers that, Saxo knows the details that he for some reason omits.Big fleets of 150 and a monster armada of 3,000 vessels are recorded.
The ships were moved by oars and sails; they had rudders, no doubt such as the Gokstad ship, for the hero Arrow-Odd used a rudder as a weapon.
"Champions".-- Professed fighting men were often kept by kings and earls about their court as useful in feud and fray.Harald Fairhair's champions are admirably described in the contemporary Raven Song by Hornclofe --"Wolf-coats they call them that in battle Bellow into bloody shields.
They wear wolves' hides when they come into the fight, And clash their weapons together."and Saxo's sources adhere closely to this pattern.
These "bear-sarks", or wolf-coats of Harald give rise to an O.N.
term, "bear-sarks' way", to describe the frenzy of fight and fury which such champions indulged in, barking and howling, and biting their shield-rims (like the ferocious "rook" in the narwhale ivory chessmen in the British Museum) till a kind of state was produced akin to that of the Malay when he has worked himself up to "run-a-muck." There seems to have been in the 10th century a number of such fellows about unemployed, who became nuisances to their neighbours by reason of their bullying and highhandedness.
Stories are told in the Icelandic sagas of the way such persons were entrapped and put to death by the chiefs they served when they became too troublesome.A favourite (and fictitious)episode in an "edited" Icelandic saga is for the hero to rescue a lady promised to such a champion (who has bullied her father into consent) by slaying the ruffian.It is the same "motif" as Guy of Warwick and the Saracen lady, and one of the regular Giant and Knight stories.
Beside men-warriors there were "women-warriors" in the North, as Saxo explains.He describes shield-maidens, as Alfhild, Sela, Rusila (the Ingean Ruadh, or Red Maid of the Irish Annals, as Steenstrup so ingeniously conjectures); and the three she-captains, Wigbiorg, who fell on the field, Hetha, who was made queen of Zealand, and Wisna, whose hand Starcad cut off, all three fighting manfully at Bravalla fight.
SOCIAL LIFE AND MANNERS.
"Feasts".-- The hall-dinner was an important feature in the old Teutonic court-life.Many a fine scene in a saga takes place in the hall while the king and his men are sitting over their ale.
The hall decked with hangings, with its fires, lights, plate and provisions, appears in Saxo just as in the Eddic Lays, especially Rigsmal, and the Lives of the Norwegian Kings and Orkney Earls.
The order of seats is a great point of archaic manners.
Behaviour at table was a matter of careful observance.The service, especially that of the cup-bearer, was minutely regulated by etiquette.An honoured guest was welcomed by the host rising to receive him and giving him a seat near himself, but less distinguished visitors were often victims to the rough horseplay of the baser sort, and of the wanton young gentleman at court.The food was simple, boiled beef and pork, and mutton without sauce, ale served in horns from the butt.Roast meat, game, sauces, mead, and flagons set on the table, are looked on by Starcad as foreign luxuries, and Germany was credited with luxurious cookery.
"Mimes and jugglers", who went through the country or were attached to the lord's court to amuse the company, were a despised race because of their ribaldry, obscenity, cowardice, and unabashed self-debasement; and their newfangled dances and piping were loathsome to the old court-poets, who accepted the harp alone as an instrument of music.
The story that once a king went to war with his jugglers and they ran away, would represent the point of view of the old house-carle, who was neglected, though "a first-class fighting man", for these debauched foreign buffoons.
SUPERNATURAL BEINGS.