Augvald Granbane: Archaeological Confessions of a Reluctant Eco-Vandal (Interview)

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Driving along the Norwegian coast, you're bound to pass some the many spruce forests dotting the countryside. You'd be excused for thinking that these are naturally occuring features, but in fact they are the wild remnants of man-made plantations. Spruce gardens for the lumber industry. Imported from Canada, it is estimated that some 500.000 acres worth of sikta spruce were planted in the 20th century. Much of it in the years following the second world war, when the rebuilding of the nation raised demand for timber to new heights.

For this, the sitka spruce was a well suited material: It grows fast, straight, and tall. It has excellent strength-to-weight ratio, and more importantly, it thrives in Norway's thin, nutrion deprived coastal soil. There is a sad irony to this, but also a familiar pattern seen wherever the short-sighted decission is made to introduce a new species to a foreign environment.

In a sense, you could say that sitka forests have quite a literal dark side. As anyone who ever set foot in their forests will know, they tend to be dark and lifeless places. The sunless forest floor, though it makes for excellent mushrooming ground, is invariably covered in nothing but spruce needles and cones. If the sitka spruce demands little, it strangles all competition. Considering that most of these plantations are abandoned, they are allowed to spread without regulation. The qualities that made the sitka such a desirable source of timber, have turned it into a monster, and the scheme to meet lumber demands became a sort pact with the devil.

«Guttorm's Mound» (Also called The Prince's Mound), Karmøy. Photo: UiS

«Guttorm's Mound» (Also called The Prince's Mound), Karmøy. Photo: UiS

A new threat to an ancient landscape

Conservationism comes in many forms. In the past, overgrowth was kept in check by traditional livelihoods. A flock of sheep or goats was all you needed to keep the landscape open. With the decline of subsistence farming and rural lifestyles, saplings that would have ended as treats for livestock, now live well into maturity. With landowners uneager to finish the work their grandparents left behind, you can imagine the result. Trees are left as they are, even if they ripe beyond their years for logging. Sooner or later, a gust of wind will tip them over, and their shallow root systems will rip up the soil. This leaves an ugly crater or bare mountain. If a tree grows on a burial mound tips over, which is certainly a realistic scenario, it can ruin the mound forever. And since they they tend to grow in dense concentrations, they'll often take their neighbors with them when they fall. It's not unusual to see huge clusters of fallen trees after winter storms. Sometimes eradicating old pathways.

Landscapes that would have been just as familiar to an Bronze Age sheep herder as they would have been to a 19th century fisherman, are quickly disappearing. Ancient shrublands and pastures are dwindling away in the shadow of an invasive species. It outcompetes local flora, and rips through the innumerable ancient sites along the Norwegian coast.

Today, the sitka spruce is a recognized ecological threat, an unwanted species. It should have happened much sooner, but the fact that it made the national blacklist at all, is probably thanks to a national awareness that has come over time, much through the effort of a few individuals who have gone beyond the call of duty to save our pastures, moors, meadows, and monuments from the sitka's sprawl.

Enter Augvald, vigilante spruce killer

Arguably, the most infamous character in the saga of the sitka spruce, is the mysterious rebel activist going by the name of Augvald Granbane - the spruce bane. Nobody knows who the person behind the name is, only that he (or she) has haunted the ancient landscape of Avaldsnes, on the West Norwegian island of Karmøy, since 2003. His mission? To completely rid the heritage site and its vicinity of the hooligan spruce, as he calls it.

Avaldsnes itself was allegedly the main estate of Harold Fairhair, Norway's first, Viking Age unifier, and forms part of one of the most find dense archaeological areas in the entire country. Including two ship burials from the 8th century, several massive Bronze Age mounds, standing stones, hill forts, and the 3rd century princely burial of Flaghaug, which contained a 600g solid gold torque, among other things. It is also a recurring, important area in the kings' sagas, and was mentioned in mythological Eddic poetry. 

Taking his title from the mythical king that gave Avaldsnes its name, Augvald's nom de plume is not a random choice. In a sense he has written himself into the rich mythology of Karmøy's history soaked moors and mires, taking as his emblem a sketch of a lost, local bronze artifact. Coming and going, issuing updates on his latest activities, leaving a trail of mutilated sitkas in his wake. Emerging every now and then to make statements remniscent of a guerilla leader taking responsibility for an assasination or kidnapping.

But Augvald's intent is not to instil fear or subvert the law. If anything, he seems see himself as a necessary evil against bureacratic passivity. Killing spruce trees at night, and writing by day. His resin stained hands elegantly steering his pen, loaded with literary wit and sarcastic remarks. Demonstrating passion, interest, and understanding of the unique value of Avaldsnes and its surroundings as an archaeological smörgåsbord, which covers the entirety of Norwegian history, from the Ice Age to the Oil Age. Having absolutely no mercy for local politicians without skin in the game, it is hard not to see this anonymous rebel as an example of the great Norwegian archetype of the subversive underdog who sticks it to the big man. As you can expect, not everybody is too thrilled about his vigilante conservationism. Even in the local history scene, he remains a controversial figure.

The Viking Farm by Avaldsnes. Hidden in the sitka jungle. Photo: Eirik Storesund.

The Viking Farm by Avaldsnes. Hidden in the sitka jungle. Photo: Eirik Storesund.

This is close and familiar ground to me. I grew up around the area, where I spent my formative youth reenacting the Iron Age, eventually working as a seasonal educator and guide at the Viking Farm open air museum, and the Nordvegen History Centre on Avaldsnes. Which in turn led me down the path I find myself on to this day. Augvald had a sort of spectral presence there, I recall, as I would spend the hours after drinking and walking from burial mound to burial mound with my friend Aksel, musing and meditating on the mysteries of the past. Very often, Augvald's signature cutmarks adorned the overgrowth around us. 

It was obviously just a matter of time before I reached out to Augvald Granbane for an interview. The rest of the article, I dedicate to our conversation. 

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Confessions of a reluctant archaeo-activist: Augvald Granbane

Brute Norse: It's not every day one gets the honor of questioning a living, local legend. I think it would be most prudent to let you describe yourself in your own words. Who exactly are you, Augvald?

Augvald: Living legend is a flattering exaggeration. Shady instigator with a narrow, and local agenda is, perhaps, a better description. I've arranged civilly disobedient operations on Avaldsnes since 2003. This is done to demonstrate my severe dismay with a situation where the invasive sitka spruce was allowed to dominate – exceedingly – a cultural landscape, one that has always been clear and wide open, ever since people first began to keep pastures along Karmsund [That is, a narrow strait between the isle of Karmøy and the Norwegian mainland]. I've done this anonymously, and as an eye-catcher for websites where I have published my thoughts and observations under the pen name Augvald Granbane.

Brute Norse: The core of your activism seems rooted in the fact that spruce forests are an anachronistic and destructive element, unfitting in a protected historical landscape such as Avaldsnes. Reading your statements, it seems the spruce has become somewhat of a symbol of some overarching bureaucratic tendency. Perhaps you could you elaborate on that?

Augvald: First of all, sitka spruce is a concrete and obvious foreign element on Avaldsnes. That these trees were allowed to grow in peace for half a century is bad and difficult to comprehend. Personally, this situation became unbearable when the trees were still standing a decade after this mistake was pointed out, loudly and clearly. And all while the spruces kept growing, vast resources were spent on building a reconstructed viking farm in the middle of the spruce forest on nearby Bukkøy, and a history center up on Avaldsnes itself. For my own part, the invading trees became an increasingly potent symbol of a nonchalant, restricted, and embarrassing display of historical ignorance among those people whose responsibility it was to take action.

Part of the Migration Era hillfort at Steinfjell, Karmøy, before and after clearing. Photo: Aksel Klausen.

Part of the Migration Era hillfort at Steinfjell, Karmøy, before and after clearing. Photo: Aksel Klausen.

Brute Norse: The sitka spruce is a blacklisted, invasive species, and is considered a terrible nuisance in other parts of the country as well. Is Granbane's mission primarily cultural historical, or is there an element of ecological conservationism as well?

Augvald: My actions were motivated by cultural history from the start. Eventually, the WWF and other environmental organizations have also begun to combat the «hooligan-spruce». Their methods are clearly more effective than mine. In some places along the coast, there's a real ongoing struggle against these invasive forests, which were planted in the post-war era. But unsurprisingly, this trend has not reached our local backwater. 

Girdled sitka spruce. Photo: Augvald Granbane.

Girdled sitka spruce. Photo: Augvald Granbane.

Brute Norse: You've become somewhat infamous for your weapon of choice: So-called girdling, in which you cut a groove along the circumference of the tree, thereby severing the tree's access to water and nutrients, which slowly kills it. I have to admit it's been a bit eerie stumbling across these girdled trees over the years. This has been a sort of trademark and signature of your presence, but I understand you went through a more experimental phase in your early days, when you used poison. Beyond visibility, are there any other perks to girdling that a budding tree-killer should take note of?

Augvald: Girdling, also known as ring-barking, requires patience, but it's simple and effective if you do it right. In the growing season, poisoning the tree with glyphosate will do the trick in about two weeks. Girdling on the other hand won't take effect until the end of the second growth season. With my long-term perspective, it's okay to wait two years. Besides, if you're going to put down another man's spruce, you might as well do it in a way where you cannot be accused of hurting the environment.

Brute Norse: Absolutely, I imagine pesticides would be somewhat counter-productive to your image in the long run. Do you think your ghostly presence has had an impact on local development, say, in terms of environmental intervention?

Augvald: That's hard for me to determine, but anybody can go there and see for themselves that not even a single spruce remains on Avaldsnes itself. Those involved would of course claim that the trees were due to be removed anyway. That may be partly correct, but obviously they've been forced to deal with a somewhat unpredictable, anonymous figure. A recurring fly in the ointment.

Brute Norse: That's for sure! I know one mutual friend of ours reached for his saw and lopper to clear up a Migration Era hillfort outside of Åkra [a small town South on the island], certainly inspired by your own efforts. Do you hope to inspire others to do similar acts in their own local area?

Augvald: Absolutely! But the fact of the matter is, that there is rarely a reason to do this anonymously and illicitly anymore. On the contrary: Combating «hooligan-spruce» and other examples of overgrowth has by far become accepted as a necessity. There's a lot you can do, and today it's even possible to apply for public funding. 

Hill fort site at Steinfjell, Karmøy. Note the girdled tree in the background. This was done with the landowner's permission. Photo: Aksel Klausen.

Hill fort site at Steinfjell, Karmøy. Note the girdled tree in the background. This was done with the landowner's permission. Photo: Aksel Klausen.

Brute Norse: There must be room for some hope with that sort of development. I think it's fundamental that we teach the public to see these sitka forests as the run-amok plantations they are, and not as natural occurring forests. How do you think the situation is a hundred years from now?

Augvald:

I hope the sitka spruce is gone from the entire North and West Norwegian coast, but I am a realist. I expect it will continue to be very dominant in the landscape. Keeping it away from selected areas is a realistic goal, and Avaldsnes is obviously one such area, but it seems it's certainly here to stay. The hope of eradicating this foreign element must necessarily lie in some (bio)technological solution, and that doesn't exist as of today.

Brute Norse: As one would expect, there's no shortage of speculation surrounding your identity. Personally, I think the power of Augvald Granbane's activism lies in all the uncertainty, which seems to give it an element of folklore. Like some sort of modern outlaw, shrouded in hearsay and legend. For example, the story of Augvald ties in with the occasion where Olaf Tryggvason, by many considered one of Norway's great tyrants, was subverted by the god Odin. In a sense, the old taking back from the new.

Do you think Augvald would have made the same impact without the evocative imagery, and the mythology surrounding his name? Is he just a mask for you to hide behind, or do you consider him a being with ambitions of his own? I can imagine such a character taking on a life of his own.

Augvald: The pseudonym was, originally, a purely practical device, and it's served this purpose well. But regarding both the name and means of expression, this was a conscious strategy I chose in order to make the message I wanted to convey a topic of discussion, questions, rumors, and at best even jokes among a local audience. I had a pretty concrete and longstanding plan at the base of it, but it took a while before I came to realize that Augvald Granbane also had a more mythological potential. On a day to day basis, Granbane plays only a marginal and passive role in my real life, but after 14 years it's safe to say he's left his mark on me. Maybe I've even contracted something of a personality disorder? At least he's certainly developed a few stances and values that somewhat differ from my own, and I've grown strangely capable of distinguishing between his opinions and those of mine.

The 13th century St. Olaf's Church on Avaldsnes in 2004. Photo: Augvald Granbane.

The 13th century St. Olaf's Church on Avaldsnes in 2004. Photo: Augvald Granbane.

Brute Norse: Speaking of which, the name Augvald Granbane is frequently uttered in the same breath as the terms «vandal» and «eco-terrorist», but many consider you a kind of folk hero. I suppose I am guilty of this line of thinking, too. Do you keep track of all the speculations and characteristics projected onto you?

Augvald: No... Well, I've obviously heard a variety of more or less puzzling guesses and peculiar commentaries, but for the most part I just let Granbane's reputation go wherever it pleases. But I found an exception relatively early on in his career, when there was an overabundance of rumors about my identity, and some of them were quite unfair. I found it best to contribute with some simple facts to dispel a few of the most imaginative and paranoid theories. Hopefully, this served to clear the names of certain people who were unjustly accused, who may unfortunately have felt it as a burden.

St. Olaf's Church on Avaldsnes in 2012. Not a spruce in sight. Photo: Augvald Granbane.

St. Olaf's Church on Avaldsnes in 2012. Not a spruce in sight. Photo: Augvald Granbane.

Brute Norse: The area around Avaldsnes, actually the entire region, is unbelievably rich in ancient and historical monuments, yet, in the local branding, we see that it is the Viking Era and Harold Fairhair that steals the show. Hence the local slogan «Homeland of the Viking Kings», which is probably the first thing people see when they land at the local airport. What are your thoughts about this «viking circus», as you like to call it?

Augvald: «Homeland of the Viking Kings – Norway's Birthplace!» was the most outrageous version. An undocumented and obviously unreasonable claim. Made even more edgy by the fact that it was presented in English only - from the very beginning. As if it would become more true or trustworthy if one could avoid expressing this hollow nonsense in the native language of the primary audience.

Initially, I think it's absolutely great that the municipal council of Karmøy, and other local institutions want to shine a light on cultural heritage. My complaint is that this is done in a narrow, historically ignorant, short-sighted, clumsy, stale, and partly destructive way. All the while the cultural landscape and the real historical sites go for lye and cold water [a Norwegian expression: to suffer in neglect], get overgrown or outright ruined, unless antiquarian institutions or private forces intervene. Local politicians and municipal bureaucrats have barely any understanding of the fact that the landscape forms an entirely central part of cultural heritage. Their attitude seems to be, that only the Viking Age is worthy of interest, and that it is better to construct new and completely artificial Viking cultural sites, than it is to take care of the actual and far too dull monuments, for the simple fact that they too often belong to the wrong period. The remains of the amazing ship burial Storhaug [A late Merovingian/Vendel Era find, straight north of Avaldsnes] is perhaps the most depressing example of this. Not many years ago, Storhaug was conveniently «forgotten» by the local council, and almost ended up as an industrial site. Today, what remains of the mound is wedged up against, and probably partially within the industrial zone. Storhaug was by no measure a lesser mound than those which hid the Oseberg and Gokstad ships, neither in terms of content nor size. Some persons of influence should reserve a field trip to Vestfold and see how the ship-mounds are taken care of there. On the plane back home, it would be nice if they could find a moment to silently contemplate the state of things, and the verdict that will be passed on them by future generations. Do they think that our descendants will favour their efforts to fund construction of «real» viking houses in the spruce forest on Bukkøy, while at the same time letting actual historical sites – some of them world class – be destroyed by industry, roads, and real estate?

Sadly, it is my impression that the occasionally extreme commotion about the Viking Age locally, is a product of a collective inferiority complex, need for attention, awkward search for identity, and a dream of great economic profits when all the tourists start flooding in to experience these constructed delights. A proper mess, in other words. Let me tell you: Pointing this out won't make you popular...

Brute Norse: A firm statement. There are numerous other examples of such local hypocrisy. When they renewed the road to Saint Olaf's Church on Avaldsnes for its 700 year anniversary, they actually removed several burial mounds to save themselves a few extra truckloads of stone! In 1950! Anyway, I guess the last word is yours. Is there anything you want to add?

Augvald: On my homepage, I've explained the prelude to my actions in detail, as well as the development up until today. It's a long and winded saga about delays, narrow-mindedness, and hopeless ignorance of history. The angle is rather localized. Even to readers who understand Norwegian, but lack a local connection, it's probably difficult to pick up all the details. Google translate works badly for this text, and to a non-Norwegian reading audience I'm sorry to say that only the pictures offer some impression of its content.

Apart from this, I'll keep my action firm. Going in the same tempo, and with the same goal and strategy in mind as before.

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http://avaldsnes.blogspot.com/

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The Viking Sword from Vik - A 1000 Year Old Heirloom?

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This summer, I had the pleasure of staying in a 18th century farmhouse, high in the slopes overlooking the historic valley of Gudbrandsdalen, Norway. There was much to be loved about it: Fragrant mountain air, smelly local pultost cheese, juniper ale, the screaming ghosts of Scottish mercenaries, and my favorite person at my side. Simple amenities only added to the charm.

Our hosts were a family of sheep farmers, though the old man who originally bought the farm back in the 1960's had since retired. Now spending his days weeding the carrot patch, and taking ritual weekend baths in his outfarm sauna. To call him a hippie would be too easy, though one might say he had a few of the associated qualities. He seemed like a character who sees the world around him with a grounded, but keen eye, laughing lots, always reading the landscape. He was courteous enough to show us around a bit, wording his concerns about climate change and how it had visibly affected the valley over the past few decades, pointing out ridges where old footpaths and shortcuts were slowly being erased by overgrowth.

The enthusiastic storyteller served up various tidbits of local history, which was highly welcome in our company. After all, visiting historical sites was half the motivation for our trip, and many gems are all too easily overlooked in a landscape as rich as Central Norway's. The candid perspectives of a local guide can't be beaten.

Surveying the landscape from the steep hillside, he pointed to a bend in the bottom of the valley where the Lågen river snakes Southwards. It was the farm Vik - apparently the birthplace of Saint Olaf, according to local legend. While it's hardly the first place to make the claim, I was unaware of this one. First and foremost, I knew the area as an important pagan cult center, associated with the Thor-worshiping chieftain Dale-Gubrand and his estate, Hundorp, further south.

Vik, 1907. Photo: Hans H. Lie / Maihaugen

Vik, 1907. Photo: Hans H. Lie / Maihaugen

I would later realize that I did know about this farm, Vik, after all. It was memorable for an entirely different reason, one that the old man had left out:The Vik sword, which is one of the most peculiar stray finds of Norwegian archaeology, though the term "find" is hardly a fitting description for an item that was never actually lost to begin with.

The Vik sword, an ancient heirloom?

In 1872, the Trondheim Museum of Science came in possession of a very special sword. It was of a kind that would later be dubbed a Petersen type Q sword of continental production, imported to Norway some time in the 10th century. That in itself does not particularly set it apart from other Viking Age swords, as most non-single-edged swords were imported. This one particular sword, however, is uniquely set apart by the fact that it shows no sign of ever having been in the ground. Presumably, it was passed down as an heirloom for just a hundred years shy of a millennium before it came into the hands of archaeologists, who described it with the following, brief words:

Sword of the typical Younger Iron Age shape, but peculiar in that it is entirely unscathed by rust, as it has not been in the ground. The blade is 31'' long, aprox. 2'' broad above. The fuller stops 2 1/4'' from the tip. The hilts are robust and slightly curved, 4'' and 2 1/4'' long. No upper pommel. 3 1/2'' between upper and lower guard. Been kept at Vik in Gudbrandsdalen in the old cottage that the legend calls St. Olaf's.

(Link to the catalog entry here)

Let's stop again for a moment and consider how baffling this is: First of all, most Viking Age swords are found in mortuary contexts. Those that are not, are often stray, accidental finds made in association with agricultural activity and construction. Most of these these, too, were likely put in graves that have since been erased. 

Though the majority of viking swords were in fact produced on the continent, in the Frankish Empire or elsewhere, they are exceedingly rare to find outside of Scandinavia, or wherever Norsemen settled. This is almost entirely thanks to Viking Age mortuary practices, where swords were taken permanently out of circulation by being put in the ground, allowing archaeologists to find them later on. Wherever else, their metal was eventually re-purposed. Statistically, the odds of a sword changing hands continuously for a thousand years in a small, rural community is nothing short of a miracle.

The Vik sword (T921). Photo: NTNU

The Vik sword (T921). Photo: NTNU

Recently, another miracle discovery was made in the highlands by Lesja, not far from the area in question, where a Viking Age sword of amazing condition had spent over a thousand years in a glacier, owing its condition to a combination of sub-zero temperatures, and a sheltered, well ventilated spot between the rocks. Despite this, it's got nothing on the from Vik in terms of conservation.

Though they might exist, I am not aware of any examples quite like it. There are however other artifacts which have been ascribed a similar provenance. One famous case being the so-called King Olaf's Helmet, a relic taken from Trondheim to Sweden in 1564, during the Northern Seven Years' War. In reality, it never belonged to the martyred king, and neither is it viking helmet, but a 15th century sallet, forged some 450 years after king Olaf's death. 

In the humorous 19th century travelogue Three in Norway (by two of them), one of the two English narrators mention a visit to the farm Bjølstad in Heidal, which is right up the road from Vik. There their host Ivar Tofte (amiably nicknamed Bluebeard) presented them with a similar curiosity during a tour of the estate:

Bluebeard first took us through the state apartments, which contained many curious and interesting things of all ages, from an axe nearly a thousand years old, to a Birmingham plated teapot won at the Christiania horse show in 1860.

Of course, we don't know whether or not "Bluebeard" was correct: Knowledge about viking weapon typology was still crude in the 1880's, nearly 40 years before Jan Peteren published his dissertation on the chronology of Norwegian viking swords. As the story of the helmet of Saint Olaf proves; people without the help of modern archaeology couldn't be trusted to identify an object less than a hundred years old, let alone a thousand.

It's doubtful that a farmer would have been able to determine the age of a viking axe without consulting a specialist, which could also have been the case. Ivar Tofte seems to have been well connected, and was apparently somewhat of a local bigman. However, he could also have relied on local legend and hearsay when he claimed it was "almost a thousand years old". The authors go on to mention that he claimed descendance from Harold Fairhair, another important king, and ancestor of Saint Olaf.

It's speculative, but it makes me wonder if the more well-off farmers around the Gudbrandsdalen valley kept such artifacts to give credence to their claims of legendary ancestry. Demonstrating ties to the Norse past was very fashionable at the time, after all, with Norwegian identity going through a veritable renaissance. This was a time where formerly obscure pieces of Norse literature now being translated and widely distributed. Whatever the fate of the axe: No such artifact from Bjølstad is mentioned in the public record. 

Bjølstad in 1926. Riksantikvaren.

Bjølstad in 1926. Riksantikvaren.

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How many dead warriors can you fit in Valhalla? Notes on Viking and Hindu numerology

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This is not a clown car joke. Neither is it a rhetorical question. This very subject is actually addressed in a particular stanza of the eddic lay Grímnismál, wedged in between other nuggets of cosmic knowledge. Never heard of it? Let me give you a quick run down.

Grímnismál - The Sayings of the Concealed One

Our story begins when Odin and his wife, the all wise goddess Frigg, were sitting in the high seat Hlíðskjálf, from whence they could observe the entire world. They noticed the brothers Agnar and Geirrǫd, whom they had kept in foster care when they were children. Look, says Odin; Agnar hasn't amounted to anything at all - he spends all his days boning an ogress! Sad. But look at my boy Geirrǫd here! He's a king, he's got his own country and everything! Now Frigg cast eyes on her husband, and told him that hardly had there ever lived a king more cruel: Geirrǫd is the worst host, she said, and he tortures his guests if he thinks the hall is too crowded. That's a damnable lie, Odin snapped back, rolling his eye, but Frigg insisted it was true. Then husband and wife decided to settle it with a wager to put Geirrǫd's hospitality to the test. Odin went to chieftain's hall disguised as a drifter and called himself Grímnir - the concealed one. But Frigg had sent her servant ahead to rig the game against him, and told the king to be weary of the incoming stranger.

As you can imagine, this only served to whet Geirrǫd's curiosity about the old hobo, but Grímnir revealed nothing but his name when asked. Soon enough the host's patience was exhausted. No more mister nice guy, he might have said, as he made a shibari display of Grímnir between two great fires. For eight full nights he was roasted, but still he revealed nothing. Then Geirrǫd's son, called Agnar after his uncle, thought it was too terrible to see an old man tormented like this. He filled a horn with drink and offered it to Grímnir, whose cape was now beginning to catch fire. The captive chugged down the horn's contents, and immediately started spilling some cosmic beans.

This is where the prologue ends and the actual poem Grímnismál starts, with Odin thanking the boy and giving a lengthy description of the structure of the universe, as well as various past and future events. He talks about the various estates of gods and superhuman entities, of divine animals, and how the various sectors of the cosmos connect through a system of rivers emanating from the cosmic spring Hvergelmir. He ends with a list of his miscellaneous identities, revealing himself as none other than the god Odin. Oh shi- Geirrǫd exclaimed as he got up from his chair, leaping to free the prisoner, but instead he tripped and fell on his sword - killing himself. It is said that Agnar lived a long and prosperous life.

The magic of numbers

But long before this, in stanza 23, Odin-Grímnir touches upon the spaciousness of Valhalla, which contains "five hundred and forty doors", and through each there are "eight hundred champions [Einherjar]" who shall pass through them when Ragnarǫk finally comes:

Fimm hundruð dura
ok umb fjórum t
ǫgum,
svá hygg ek á Valhǫllu vera;
átta hundruð Einherja
ganga senn ór einum durum,
þá er þeir fara við vitni at vega.

Five hundred doors
and then forty more
I think there are in Valhalla;
eight hundred champions
shall walk through each
when they go to battle the wolf.

I love how even Odin struggles to remember what his own house looks like. But what do these numbers really mean, and how many warriors can we actually fit in Valhalla according to this passage? There are two possible answers to this. First of all, the word hundred didn't always stand equal to the number 100 as it does today. In the viking age, as with the middle ages, the Norse number system conventionally thought of a hundred (hundruð) as the sum of twelve times ten. I.e. 120.

This is usually called a long hundred in current English, or alternately a great hundred (Norwegian: storhundre). I first stumbled across this discussion in Andreas Nordberg's influential PhD dissertation called Krigarna i Odins Sal ["The Warriors in Odin's Hall"], where he seems to mention it mostly as a curiosity. A minor detour to his academic road trip of discourse on the aristocratic warrior cult of Odin.

But as I was saying. If the composer of Grímnismál, when saying hundred, actually meant one hundred and twenty in accordance with the oldest convention, then the equation should go like this:

640×960 = 614,400

In other words, Valhalla should be able to fit just about half a million people. That's guests, mind you. I've not taken the waiting and kitchen staff into account, neither have I considered janitors or cleaning ladies. Odin leaves all of that to our imaginations. Never the less it beats the crap out of the Jehovah's Witnesses' measly claim to a full capacity of 144,000 souls in Paradise. However, if for some reason we assume that the author of Grímnismál had our current concept of hundred in mind, that is to say, that one hundred equals 100, then we get a different equation and a far more interesting sum:

540×800 = 432,000

There are a number of reasons why this number is interesting, so keep on reading. First of all we have a similar account of a troop tally in the first lay of Helgi Hundingsbana ("Helgi Hunding's Bane"), in which the hero states there are "twelve hundred trusty men, though in Hátúna ["The High Estate"] twice as many" (stanza 25). Let us do this calculation twice, like we did above, but this time we shall start with the numbers at face value, disregarding our expectation that the author understood "hundred" as the number 120, rather than 100:
 

1200 + 1200×2 = 3600

A very unassuming number indeed. But let's see what happens when we do it again with the archaic long hundred:

1440 + 1440×2 = 4320

That amounts to exactly 1/100 of the number of champions in Valhalla according to Grímnismál, which we saw could fit as many as 432,000 people! But as we recall, this was only when we used the opposite counting system, disregarding the long hundred altogether. So what does this mean? It could be that both poets intended to reach these numbers, but used differing numerical systems to reach them. But why?

432000, multiplications of three, and the Indo-European connection

If you thought this was trippy, you've got another thing coming. The number 432,000 occurs in another, more famous context, namely Hindu texts: 432,000 is the exact number of solar years in the Kali Yuga, which is the final epoch of the Hindu cosmic cycle before the world destroys itself and a new cycle and golde era begins. The entire cycle, by the way, lasts 4,320,000 years according to the Viṣṇu Purāṇa, which it equates to 12,000 "divine years" (120×100). Puranic literature alleges that the Kali Yuga began roughly 5000 years ago, in the year 3102 BC (corresponding roughly with the aegan bronze age), when the god Krishna left his earthly body, having been shot dead by a stray arrow in a hunting accident. Similarly, the Norse god Baldr was shot dead by the blind god Hǫðr, and this too may be considered a point of no return in Norse mythology, opening the path to Ragnarǫk itself.

Nordberg mentions (on page 230) that scholars have been hard pressed to find a plausible connection between these numerical phenomena. There is no evidence for any continuity between these beliefs back to a common Proto-Indo-European origin, apart from the fact that both may draw from a common Indo-European counting system. As for numbers in Indo-European cultures, that's a fascinating subject in itself.

Any fool that ever cast a quick glance at Norse mythology will be struck by the emphasis put on the number three, as well as its multiplications. Particularly the numbers nine and twelve. Gods and other divine beings often operate in units of three, and mythical events are frequently divided into three phases. The same applies to the number nine, like the cosmological concept of níu heimar – the nine worlds – cryptically alluded to in eddic poetry. In the legendary sagas, berserkers frequently appear in groups of twelve, a peculiar principle they share with outlaws and bandits in later Norwegian ballads and folk tales. It's probably no accident that our poem deals with Grímnir being tortured for eight whole nights: Necessarily, he finds respite on the beginning of the ninth day.

As we've already seen, these numbers may be a feature inherited from a common Indo-European source. The study of numbers in comparative mythology recalls the work of the mythographical scholar Georges Dumézil, who alleged that tripartite socio-religious patterns were characteristic of all Indo-European religions, and consequently the Proto-Indo-European culture itself. This formed the basis for social stratification in Indo-European ideology, with a societal hierarchy of priest-rulers, warriors, and producers. To Dumézil, the trinity of Odin, Thor, and Freyr described by Adam of Bremen at the Temple of Uppsala, generally reflect the same ideas and origins as the Hindu caste system, for example.

While Dumézil might be on to something, his model works best if we choose to cherry pick and simplify our body of evidence. For example, the Hindu caste system operates with four rather than three distinct classes. Any overly rigid application of tripartite theory seems bound to fall apart when faced with the inconsistencies and variations of our evidence. Units of three seem universal, but the contents of these units are unstable. But that is a subject for another time.

Wild men and bearded women of the medieval North

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Struggling to keep up with the ethnographic trends of the time, medieval Norsemen were also familiar with such creatures. Icelandic and Norwegian scholars demonstrated their access to continental thought by writing books such as Konungs skuggsjá, or "The King's Mirror" if you prefer it by its English title. Which is a 13th century Norwegian handbook in courtly customs (smile a lot, don't pull a knife on the king), street-smartness (don't get drunk, don't be a horndog, rise early), and natural wonders (there's a hot spring in Iceland that tastes like beer). Needless to say it is one of my favorite works of medieval literature.

 

Among those aforementioned wonders, we find a number of curiosities and facts both true and false from all around the North Atlantic. In a chapter dedicated to the peculiarities of Ireland, the author relates an anecdote from the apprehension of a wild man:

It once happened in that country (and this seems indeed strange) that a living creature was caught in the forest as to which no one could say definitely whether it was a man or some other animal; for no one could get a word from it or be sure that it understood human speech. It had the human shape, however, in every detail, both as to hands and face and feet; but the entire body was covered with hair as the beasts are, and down the back it had a long coarse mane like that of a horse, which fell to both sides and trailed along the ground when the creature stooped in walking. (1917: 110)

One should say that woolly halfwits hardly make the weirdest entry in a book that eagerly encourages its readers to rub whale sperm in their eyes, but don't mind me: Such wild men occur in various cultures across Europe under various names, such as the Old High German schrato and English "woodwose", which likely originated from Old English *wudu-wāsa, or "wood-being". This might recall the Old Norse vættir "nature spirits, trolls", as both share a common Proto-Germanic etymology: *wihtiz meaning "thing, object, essence, creature". Perhaps a euphemism, a taboo name used to avoid naming the creatures directly, as was originally the case with the huldufólk ("hidden people") and hittfolk ("those people") of Nordic folklore.

 

Stained glass wild man. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Private photo.

Stained glass wild man. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Private photo.

Here as always, the world of monsters mirrors the world of men. While the author of Konungs skuggsjá did not doubt that wild men lived in the outskirts of other realms, I can't help but wonder whether he thought it possible that such a creature could be found in his own native Norway. The German medieval chronicler Adam of Bremen offers answers. Adam, whose main claim to fame is his descriptions of the pagan temple at Uppsala in Sweden, also penned some fetching descriptions of the rest of the Nordic area in his Deeds of the Bishops of Hamburg. There he gave the following and rather unflattering account of the Northern Norwegian population in the 1070's:

I have heard, in the rugged mountains that exist up there, that there are women with beards, while the men live in the forests and rarely show themselves. They use the skins of wild beasts for clothing and when they speak, it supposedly resembles snarling rather than speech, so that they are hardly intelligible even to their closest neighbors. (1968: 282 [My own translation])

Interestingly, he goes on to describe the Sami next, or Stride-Finns as he calls them, who are easily the prime victims of literary dehumanization in the Nordic middle ages. Specifically he notes their inability to exist without snow - on which they rely to get around, and which also allows them to traverse the landscape "faster than the wild beasts" (read: skiing). Adam also refers to Scandinavian speech as snarling elsewhere. This could imply that he thought these bearded women belonged to Germanic Scandinavian stock, or at the very least were of some other ethnicity than the Sami, which is interesting insofar that Norse literature often refers to trolls and Sami as if they were entirely interchangeable.

Wild man on a church panel in Sogn Folk Museum, Norway. Private photo.

Wild man on a church panel in Sogn Folk Museum, Norway. Private photo.

Pardoning their overall gullibility and hyper-violent tendencies, Adam claims Norwegians make model Christians. None the less he describes a general problem of rampant witchcraft and heathendom across Scandinavia. No wonder: Adam refers to Norway as "the remotest country on Earth" (1968: 279). He considers Scandinavians half-civilized at best, and utter barbarians at worst. They are contested only by the barely human hybrids living further North and East of the Baltic Sea, or "Barbarian Sea" as Adam likes to call it. In line with his extravagant use of the word "barbarian", which he fits wherever he can.

Finland, he asserts, is populated exclusively by amazons who mate either with passing merchants or wild beasts, and isn't too shy to provide a theory of his own either: First of all it's extremely unlikely that any sailor would have sex with strange, allegedly gorgeous women. Besides, any male specimen of the amazonian race is born with the head of a beast, while the women are all bombshells. Whether or not you accept Adam's reasoning he makes a distinction between amazons, who sire offspring through bestiality, and the hound-faced people of Russia whom he implicitly equates to the Huns, based on the rock solid science of folk-etymology (Hun and hound sound similar, ergo there must be a connection).

Wild men are to a point what most people are not. They are uncanny, and their ambiguity is often underlined in the fact that some authors cannot decide whether or not they qualify as human. Which is to ask what a human is. Surely with no lack of poetic doubt and self-questioning, an existential level to the wild men which seems strengthened by the fact that the stories about them are shrouded in hearsay, as if the possibility of their existence is compelling, yet dreaded for its implications. They are recognized partly as kin, partly as a natural counterpart to man. Something that links him to savage and untamed nature on one side, and that which is unspoiled, raw and potent on the other. In case you couldn't tell, Adam was taking any argument he could to further his claim that Scandinavia needed some more of that Christian religion. Make of that what you will, but if you come to Norway looking for our bearded women I'm afraid you'll be severely disappointed.

Sources

  • Adam Bremensis. 1968. De hamburgske ærkebispers historie og nordens beskrivelse. Translated by Carsten L. Henrichsen. Rosenkilde og Bagger: Copenhagen.
  • Larson, Laurence Marcellus (tr.). 1917. The King’s Mirror[Speculum regale - Konungs skuggsjá]. Scandinavian Monographs 3. The American-Scandinavian Foundation: New York. 

The Norse saga of Gautama Buddha

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Some time around the year 1250 AD, the Norwegian king Hákon Hákonsson laid eyes on one of his court scribes' latest work: It was a brand new saga – or more accurately: an Old Norse retelling of a Latin story, handed down from Greek sources, describing events that happened in the distant land of India a long time ago. They named it Barlaams saga ok Jósafats.

The saga of Barlaam and Jósafat

The story begins with a conservative Indian king who fears that a hip, new spiritual trend will overthrow his authority. His paranoia grows even greater once he hears word of a prophecy foreshadowing the religious conversion of his one and only son. Hoping to secure his legacy, the king puts the young prince in a secluded fortress, hoping he will grow up totally ignorant of outside life. Meanwhile, the king does all he can to pursue hermits, holy men and other spiritual freaks in a futile attempt to drive them out of his realm. One day a hermit named Barlaam approaches the adolescent prince, whose name is Jósafat, and opens his eyes to the compassionate, anti-materialist teachings of Christianity. The prince is baptized in secret, and Barlaam returns to the desert from whence he came. The now infuriated king desperately tries to revert his heir back to the religion of their ancestors, but to no avail. Western spirituality is there to stay. Instead, Jósafat converts the king, accepting Christ on his deathbed. Finally inheriting the kingdom, Jósafat abdicates. He leaves not only his crown but his entire country behind. Preferring the simple life of an ascetic to the luxuries of a king. He wanders the desert to live with his old master Barlaam.

St. Buddha

If the story sounds familiar, it's probably because you've heard parts of it many times before, as the Buddhist story about the life of Siddhārtha Gautama, whom most Westerners know simply as «The Buddha». To its Norse audience, the Saga of Barlaam and Jósafat served as a moral commentary on the vanity of material life, with the protagonist turning his back on his earthly kingdom to partake in the Kingdom of Heaven. Actually, the name Jósafat is a severe bastardization of bodhisattva – a title denoting a person who has experienced the enlightenment of Buddhahood, but has sworn to stay behind in the world in order to work for the salvation of all living things.

Nobody knows what medieval Norwegians might have thought about the saga's Buddhist roots. Their only knowledge of India came from fantastic medieval romances, where it was described as a magical place inhabited by monsters and elves. As for Buddhism, they were blissfully unaware of its existence. However, far Eastern Christianity was a staple of medieval folklore: From the Nestorian church in Asia to the legends of Prester John. It was a widely believed that the apostle Thomas had brought Christianity to India after Christ's death, which gave credence to the idea that isolated pockets of early Christians persisting throughout the uncharted East.

The Helgö Buddha. Photo: Historiska Museet

The Helgö Buddha. Photo: Historiska Museet

From Bengal to Björgvin

Before becoming available to Norwegian audiences in the 13th century, the story had already undertaken an impressive journey: It was brought into Catholic circulation via Greece, who got it through Georgia where it was first adapted to Christianity from an Arabic version in the 10th century. This version had in turn come from Persia. The legend provides an amazing example of how stories can acquire new meanings outside their original contexts as they move across cultures.

The story is not the first Buddhist creation to reach Scandinavia though. In 1956 a small bronze statuette of the Buddha was found in a viking era settlement on the isle of Helgö in Sweden. Produced in North-East India, the figurine depicts him peacefully meditating on a lotus blossom. How did it get there? As far as the vikings are purported to have traveled, it's very unlikely they had any significant contact with Buddhists, if at all. The explanation is probably more mundane, but interesting none the less: Typologically the statue is dated to the 6th century AD, a time when Scandinavians by all accounts lacked sailing technology. Their rowing capabilities allowed them to trade across the North and Baltic seas, but direct contact with the middle east is pretty much out of the question. Of course, I cannot leave this without addressing the unfortunately named «Buddha bucket» of the Oseberg burial, as well as similar examples from various viking era burials. Don't let anybody fool you: they are Irish, not Indian in origin. The Helgö Buddha is a genuine example though, but it was likely a centuries old antique by the time it reached Sweden, having made its way North on a slow journey that took it generations to complete. Which is pretty impressive in itself. I wonder what they must have thought of it! 

Despite any similarities with oriental art, the so-called buddha bucket of Oseberg is Irish in origin.

Despite any similarities with oriental art, the so-called buddha bucket of Oseberg is Irish in origin.