Olaf the Glorious

Olaf the Glorious

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Title: Olaf the Glorious A Story of the Viking Age
Author: Robert Leighton
Release Date: December, 2005 [EBook #9415] [Yes, we are more than
one year ahead of schedule] [This file was first posted on September 30,
2003]
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Produced by Martin Robb.

OLAF THE GLORIOUS A STORY OF THE VIKING AGE
BY ROBERT LEIGHTON

PREFACE
The following narrative is not so much a story as a biography. My hero
is not an imaginary one; he was a real flesh and blood man who reigned
as King of Norway just nine centuries ago. The main facts of his
adventurous career--his boyhood of slavery in Esthonia, his life at the
court of King Valdemar, his wanderings as a viking, the many battles
he fought, his conversion to Christianity in England, and his ultimate
return to his native land--are set forth in the various Icelandic sagas
dealing with the period in which he lived. I have made free use of these
old time records, and have added only such probable incidents as were
necessary to give a continuous thread of interest to the narrative. These
sagas, like the epics of Homer, were handed down from generation to
generation by word of mouth, and they were not committed to writing
until a long time after Olaf Triggvison's death, so that it is not easy to
discriminate between the actual facts as they occurred and the mere
exaggerated traditions which must surely have been added to the story
of his life as it was told by the old saga men at their winter firesides.
But in most instances the records corroborate each other very exactly,
and it may be taken that the leading incidents of the story are
historically true.
The Icelandic sagas have very little to say concerning Olaf Triggvison's
unsuccessful invasion of England, and for this part of the story I have
gone for my facts to the English chronicles of the time, wherein
frequent allusion to him is made under such names as Anlaf, Olave, and
Olaff. The original treaty of peace drawn up between King Ethelred the
Second and Olaf still exists to fix the date of the invasion, while the

famous battle of Maldon, in which the Norse adventurer gained a
victory over the East Anglians, is described at length by a nameless
contemporary poet, whose "Death of Brihtnoth" remains as one of the
finest of early English narrative poems, full of noble patriotism and
primitive simplicity.
I have given no dates throughout these pages, but for the convenience
of readers who may wish for greater exactness it may be as well to state
here that Olaf was born A.D. 963, that he started on his wanderings as a
viking in the year 981, that the sea fight between the vikings of
Jomsburg and the Norwegians took place in 986, and the battle of
Maldon in the year 991. Olaf reigned only five years as King of
Norway, being crowned in 995, and ending his reign with his death in
the glorious defeat at Svold in the year 1000.
ROBERT LEIGHTON.

CHAPTER I
: THE FINDING OF OLAF
It happened in the beginning of the summer that Sigurd Erikson
journeyed north into Esthonia to gather the king's taxes and tribute. His
business in due course brought him into a certain seaport that stood
upon the shores of the great Gulf of Finland.
He was a very handsome man, tall and strong, with long fair hair and
clear blue eyes. There were many armed servants in his following, for
he was a person of great consequence, and was held in high honour
throughout the land.
He rode across the marketplace and there alighted from his horse, and
turned his eyes towards the