Saga - Chapter 27, Part 2
For content, disclaimers, warnings, rating and A/Ns, see the chapter’s part 1.
Einnis’s farm was strangely quiet as he rode along the track past the barrows and into the yard. A few thralls were carrying chopped wood from the woodshed, but left that task to hurry inside their house once Einnis rode up. The usual noise from the animals in stables and byres seemed uncommonly subdued. A small and dismal streak of smoke was rising from the fire hall’s smoke vent into the summer air. There were no other people in the yard, and no animals.
Wearily Einnis got down off his horse, stretching his tired and stiff body and looking around. A head peeked out of the hall door for a moment, then disappeared again. Soon one of the thralls came out from the stable, bowing low and averting his eyes as he took the horse and hurried off with it. Einnis looked after man and horse, frowning.
“Take my gear into the hall once you’ve tended to the horse,” he called, and turned slowly towards the hall. In that moment the door opened again, and Svein stepped out to meet him.
Einnis looked about, worry plain in his stance and his voice. “Svein, where is the mistress? And my little girl? Are they not here yet? They should long since have arrived back home.”
Svein bit his lip and righted himself, bracing for what was to come. “Yes, Einnis Elmarson, Arna Mjodsdottir arrived here five days ago, with a large company of her father’s armed men. She left two days later, carrying away all her goods and gear, and everything that she brought north as part of her dowry…”
Einnis’s head snapped up, his jaws clenching and his eyes turning to slits. “She did what? What are you telling me, Svein?” he whispered hoarsely.
Svein took a small step backwards and once more stood his ground, his voice terse and breathless and he delivered the bad news.
“She gathered the whole household here in front of the hall, all the servants and free men and women, and called on us all to witness that she said herself divorced from you. She told us that you knew the reason well enough, none better, and that it did not bear repeating. She said that if you had any wit or wisdom you would let the matter rest, and not contest or gainsay her when she declared that the divorce was completely your fault. If you would dispute that, she said, she would be very pleased to meet you in public at the ting and tell every man and woman there assembled in detail exactly why she divorced you, though she took Freya herself to witness that such matters were better left unspoken.”
Svein sighed. “She seemed cold, hard and determined. I have never seen her like that before. But even so, she sought me out and bid me tell you that her father had counseled her to let this matter rest without further action or quarrel, unless you were to contest the divorce at the ting. Bringing harm and grief to your clansmen, your friends or anyone else that is close to you would serve no purpose, so Mjod had told her.”
Svein stopped, consulting his memory for a moment, and nodded to himself. “That was all she had to say. Then she ordered all her possessions packed, everything that belonged to her bride gift, her mundr and dowry. She let her men feast on many of the farm’s pigs and most of the ale, and went herself to pick out the animals she claimed as hers. She set some of her armed men to drive half of the cattle and the largest flock of sheep southwards. And she sent some of the thralls along too, as she needed them to care for the animals.”
Svein shrugged nervously, relieved to have come this far in his grueling narrative.
“They loaded everything else on pack-horses, and left three days ago. You didn’t meet them?”
“No,” Einnis said, his voice hollow and distant. “I rode along many narrow tracks and paths in the hillsides on the way - all the shortcuts I’ve known since I was a boy. I was eager to get back home.” He laughed, an ugly, searing sound that stopped as abruptly as it began.
Einnis stood still, his face pale and slightly green of hue as that of a drowned man, staring at Svein with unblinking eyes.
“Little-Arna?” he eventually asked, nearly choking over the barely audible words. “Freidis?”
“Your oldest did not come back north with the mistress, Einnis. The girl stayed behind at Mjod’s farm, so her mother said. But on the day of Arna Mjodsdottir’s departure, when she asked for Freidis to be brought to her so she could take the child south, Tekla her wet-nurse wept so sorely at losing the babe that the mistress changed her mind. She looked down at the child in Tekla’s arms and said… she said….”
Svein came to a complete stop, and Einnis’s eyes bored into him, his stare pitch-black. “Tell me,” he ordered.
“She… she said that the little one could stay here with you, for though she had found that you were no use to any woman as a man or as a husband, still in looking after a baby girl you might yet prove to have some worth.” Svein looked down, embarrassed and careworn at having been the one to repeat such a venomous insult. “With that she turned and did not look at little Freidis again. The child is still here, and Tekla cares for her as before.”
Einnis made one step, and one more. Somehow he managed to walk through the hall door and across the floor towards the high seat, stumbling slightly as if walking blindfold. Everyone in the hall rose and made haste to file silently out the door, no-one saying a word, leaving the master completely alone. Einnis sat down on the bench as abruptly as if his feet had given way. After a little while he lifted his head and looked around the empty hall. It somehow looked abandoned. Tapestries, copper pans, decorated drinking horns, carved mead bowls - all of it was gone.
Abruptly he jerked back on his feet and left the hall with hurried steps, passing the many members of his household who were waiting outside. They wordlessly and nervously made room for him, averting their eyes at first, but looking after him with varying degrees of pity, worry, fear and speculation once he had walked on by.
Einnis never stopped and didn’t heed them, but ducked through the door to the separate room where he’d so far slept with his wife and daughter. He looked around the room. Empty spaces and marks in the floor bore silent witness to the removal of the many missing chests and boxes. All Arna’s clothes and possessions were gone, her silver and jewels, and not a single toy nor piece of little-Arna’s clothing had been left behind. The walls were bare, and the floor dirtied and empty. Einnis leaned down over the secluded bench space where little-Arna had so far spent her nights, her little face always so calm and sweet in sleep. Einnis stroked the bare bench lightly with his hand, looking down at it in disbelief and wonder as he did so.
He moved on, aimlessly touching the few remaining objects in the room. They were his, and well used - they had belonged to the farm as long as he’d lived.
Eventually he opened the doors to the boxed-in bench where he and Arna had been sleeping every night as master and mistress of the farm. Their bed space was empty too. The fine duvets, pillows and linens had all been part of Arna’s dowry, and were gone. All that was left was the bare mattress - and a neatly folded piece of clothing, carefully and conspicuously placed in the middle of the bed.
Einnis reached out slowly, picking the garment up and shaking it out, looking at it with bleak eyes.
It was the tunic Arna had so lovingly and carefully been embroidering for him. His tunic still - but it had been altered and re-cut. The collar had been removed, the neckline had been extended and made wider, and the opening down the front had been cut longer and had ribbon laces attached. The cutting scissors had pulled the fabric slightly askew, and all the new edges had been hastily and shoddily hemmed with stitches that had been pulled too tight. There could nevertheless be no doubt about what change Arna had intended to make with her hurried and angry sewing effort.
Einnis stood as if frozen, staring at the tunic, his mouth pulled open in the pained grimace of a wordless cry.
He was holding a woman’s tunic.
All at once the garment dropped from his hand as if he’d touched fire. He stepped back convulsively from the crumpled cloth on the floor, much the same as if he’d come upon a nest of vipers, all of them ready to strike.
Turning away from Arna’s embroidered message he stumbled over to the other side of the cold hearth, sinking down on the bench, bending over his knees and retching violently, heaving up nothing but bitter green gall. He supported his upper body on his arms, briefly hiding his face in his shaking hands before staring ahead with dry eyes that seemed to see nothing. In this tormented position he remained, not moving for hours, sitting pale and stiff and cold in the shadowy fireless room.
The people of the farm, upset and frightened, stayed out of sight and kept themselves quiet. An ominous brooding silence loomed over the ancient clan’s seat. The moon that rose late in the night was chased and many times overtaken by dark serrated clouds on its slow path across the skies. The valley below was cast in heavy gloom.
Thus Einnis Elmarson sat in the darkness, head of his clan still, but master of depleted and weakened farms, bereft of brother, wife, daughter, and friends, alone in the depths of his misery. The future he had struggled and labored to create was unraveling, all his carefully nurtured pride and honor in shreds, slipping through the fingers of his suddenly powerless hands. With his mind’s eye he watched his world falling apart piece by piece all through the long and lonely night.
----
Eoin rode south at an easy pace. The second day he overtook a group of travelers, a tradesman and his family on their way to Kaupang for the season, and asked leave to join their party. They welcomed him gladly, and so he had enjoyable company back to town.
He would be staying at Torgeirr’s clan house now there was no woman to care for the woodcarver’s household in Kaupang. He rode up in front of Torgeirr’s late one afternoon, having briefly stopped by Gunnar’s house first to check that everything was in good order. In the evening he visited the ale hall, having his reason to want to catch up with Ragnvald, but the man was out of town on an errand for his master. Eoin had to wait three days before he returned.
Once back in town, Ragnvald met Eoin with a smile and a happy greeting in the crowded and noisy hall. The men had to shout to hear each other, such was the ruckus that a group of the king’s soldiers was making.
“I want to speak to you about something,” Eoin called. “I want to pick your brain about news from abroad that you’ve heard! It may take some time. We need a quieter place than this!”
The gleam in Ragnvald’s eyes was unmistakable. “Well, I’m a good talker. My tongue is every bit as quick as my…. sword,” he hollered back with a grin. “Let’s meet by the clearing tomorrow!”
Eoin hesitated for a moment, looking around briefly, but eventually nodded. The din in the hall was too loud for them to stay there. Soon thereafter they parted for the night.
The next day Eoin started preparing some larger pieces of oak for carving, but his work was slow and his thoughts clearly on other matters. In the afternoon he laid all tools and wooden material aside and left Gunnar’s house to meet up with Ragnvald, putting his sword belt on out of old habit. As he passed the neighboring craftsmen’s houses he noticed the comb-maker’s wife standing outside her door, talking to a cloaked and well-armed stranger. He made nothing of it; all the craftsmen living along the track frequently had customers calling.
Eoin walked at a brisk pace along the track that wound behind the old ale-hall, and onwards in among the trees. A twig snapping made him stop, looking back down the path. Someone was following along behind him, and seemingly doing so by stealth. One moment later three men appeared on the path, moving quickly, all of them armed.
Before Eoin could react, the strangers noticed him standing there and stopped, all of them staring at him. The first of the three was the one Eoin had seen outside the comb-maker’s. The man now took a bold step forward, drawing his sword. The other two followed suit with a faint ring of steel.
“Jaran the Irish?” the man queried. Eoin hesitated for a second and then nodded once, his whole body going tense. The man spoke up again with a small grin, though there was no humor in his coldly determined eyes. “We bring you greetings from Arna Mjodsdottir,” he said.
Tbc…..
Notes and explanations;
Seid - religious-based magic practised by a female shamans (volva). The seid rituals among other things seem to have involved certain elements and acts connected with female sexuality. For this reason it was illegal and considered deeply shameful for a man to practice seid.
Ergi - The passive, receiving part of homosexual acts, the most despised kind among the Norse, and the type that seid-men supposedly engaged in.
Lapps - indigenous nomadic people in northern Scandinavia, which practiced shamanism as part of their culture till the 1700’s.
Roald Rettilbeine the seid-man - The tale of Ragnvald Rettilbeine who was burned by his own brother is included in Snorri’s Saga of the kings, the epic tale of Norway’s Viking kings, in the Saga of King Harald Fairhair, section 35. I have changed the killed man’s name to avoid confusion with an existing character in my story, but otherwise the tale is taken directly from the source material, including the fact that “Eirik won much praise” for having burnt his half-brother the seid-man alive. Eirik was nicknamed “Blood-axe” because of his exploits when raiding abroad and because he kept disposing of his various half-brothers who might otherwise have claimed the throne of Norway as inheritance - he killed 5 of them. Eirik actually ended up as the king of York (!), once his violent ways had lost him Norwegian support and he was driven from that country, but his sons did return to rule the country for a spell.
Ting - regular gatherings of all the free men in a district. Attendance was required by law. The things were the main social happenings in the Norse communities, and not only men but their whole families traveled there. At the tings laws were made and recited, and disputes and grievances heard and settled
Norse divorce - There were many legal grounds for divorce in Norse society, both for women and men. A woman would certainly need some level of clan support before she went to the step of declaring divorce, since her marriage would have come about as a union between two clans.
A woman had the legal right to say herself divorced from her husband if he was impotent or sexually inattentive, if he was physically violent to her, if he squandered their assets, if he didn’t financially support her and the children, if he insulted a member of her clan, if he engaged in homosexual acts, and if he was seen wearing women’s clothing.
If the divorce was deemed to be the husband’s fault, the woman had the right to take her dowry out of the marriage, as well as the bridal gift and mundr (ie. the husband’s contribution of assets and properties to her upon their marriage), and all that she had inherited during the marriage. Economically such a divorce therefore would clearly harm the husband and his clan. If the husband was at fault the wife also had the right to their children. (If however a woman left her husband without sufficient legal grounds, he had the right to retain her assets and their children).
Divorce was declared the way Arna does it in this fic - the woman said herself divorced in the presence of witnesses by the marriage bed and the house door, and thereafter took her assets and returned to her clan. Her male relatives would then later publicly declare the divorce at the ting. Any dispute concerning the divorce would also be heard and (hopefully) settled there - the alternative was settling it with swords.
Judging from the sagas of clans and kings, divorce was not common, but neither was it rare, and the sagas include many examples of divorce, for a number of reasons. It seems clear that if one or both spouses found they were not compatible either “at board or in bed”, they did have divorce as a very real option to consider.
Norse women’s and Arna’s behavior in relation to honor, husband, clan and children
(A lengthy explanation for those who might be interested):
As previously mentioned, I use the Icelandic clan saga Laxdoela Saga http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laxd%C5%93la_saga as a main source of inspiration. Three Laxdoela women and their actions have contributed to Arna’s behavior in this chapter. All of the women are proudly focused on honor and revenge, and in various ways deliberately insult the masculinity of their menfolk in order to drive their will through and uphold their own and their clan’s honor. And before going on, let me hasten to add that similar examples (or worse) can be found in many other sagas!
Gudrun Osvifursdottir - (Laxdoela saga’s main protagonist): At 15 Gudrun is married off for the first time to a man who is rich and completely smitten with her. She however does not care much for her husband and makes him jump through hoops to please her. In the end he slaps her across the face, and in retribution and in order to get out of the marriage to marry another man whom she fancies, Gudrun cajoles her husband into wearing a tunic she has made that has a neckline reminiscent of that on a woman’s dress. She thereafter turns around and divorces him for “wearing woman’s clothing!” He does not contest the divorce - clearly by then he must have been happy to be rid of her. Gudrun gets half their earthly possessions and leaves the two-year marriage at 17 as a wealthy woman. Her new husband dies after 2 years’ marriage and she eventually marries Bolle, whom she drives to kill his foster-brother Kjartan, the love of her life - who jilted her.
This is what Gudrun in part has to say to her husband and brothers to make them fight Kjartan: “With your temperament, you'd have made some farmer a good group of daughters, fit to do no one any good or any harm. After all the abuse and shame Kjartan has heaped upon you, you don't let it disturb your sleep while he goes riding by under your very noses. ( ) Such men have no better memory than a pig. ( ) The lot of you just sit here at home, making much of yourselves, and one could only wish there were fewer of you."
Turid Olavsdottir (Kjartan’s older sister) - in spite of her father’s misgivings she marries a Norwegian man who’s visiting Iceland. The marriage is not happy and after a couple of years her husband prepares ship to leave Iceland, his wife and their one-year daughter behind. Turid does not take this desertion lightly. She lets herself be rowed out to her husband’s ship, and while he sleeps there she steals his fine sword (the symbol of his masculinity), instead leaving behind their little daughter for him to care for (ie. Showing him that in her eyes he’s not a man, but womanishly fit for the role of nurse-maid.) Extremely cold as this seems, she values her “pride” and the opportunity to insult the manhood of her deserting husband more than she wants to keep her child by him.
Torgerd Eigilsdottir - (Kjartan’s and Turid’s mother) - she is much aggrieved and angry when her husband Olav makes peace with Bolle their foster-son after Bolle has killed Kjartan. She barely heeds her husband’s settlement and truce, and only as long as he is alive. When Olav dies she immediately drives her other sons to go after Bolle with swords. This is, in part, what she tells one of her other sons: “You my sons do not much resemble your honored ancestors when you do not revenge a brother as worthy as Kjartan. My father Eigil would never have acted this way, and it hurts to have such timid sons. You all seem better fit to have been my daughters whom I could have married off.” Torgerd joins her sons when they go to kill Bolle, insisting she wants to be there. She watches the fight, and when her son Steintor ends up chopping the severely wounded Bolle’s head off with a battle axe, she congratulates him on the lucky strike, saying coldly that Gudrun should feel free now to comb her husband’s hair.
For those who want to read more on the attitudes, temperament and role of women in Norse society, this online article gives interesting insight into the subject: http://www.hurstwic.org/history/articles/society/text/women.htm