LEACH. — NORWEGIAN AND ENGLISH CHURCHES, 1066-1399. 549 



1309, we learn, by chance from a Bergen church letter, that one of the 

 canons was at that time in England for study. 133 



Pilgrimage also was a link between England and Norway. If we 

 may believe the legendary St. Olaf's Saga, Englishmen visited the 

 shrine of St. Olaf at Trondhjem. 134 Certainly there were so many 

 foreign pilgrims that, in 1297, King Eric issued orders to all officers 

 of the realm to protect foreigners who came as pilgrims to Olaf's 

 shrine. 135 



The death of Thomas a Becket made a profound impression in Nor- 

 way and Iceland, and is frequently alluded to in the sagas. In 

 Iceland the legendary history of his life was translated, soon after his 

 canonization, into the so-called Thomas Archbishop's Saga. It was 

 widely popular in Iceland and Norway, to judge from the large number 

 of extant manuscripts. One of the earliest representations (about 

 1220) of the murder of St. Thomas is a little brass shrine, once used 

 as a reliquary, and still preserved in the church of Hedal in Valders. 136 

 Becket's shrine brought Norwegian pilgrims to Canterbury. The Saga 

 of Hrafn Sveinbjarnarson, the Icelander (1190-1213), tells an amusing 

 tale of how he was fishing and caught a narwhale which he could not 

 land, and promised the narwhale's tusks to St. Thomas if he would help. 

 His prayer was answered. Hrafn went to Norway and stayed there 

 through the winter. 137 In the spring, true to his vow, he voyaged 

 to Canterbury and deposited the tusks on Becket's shrine. In 1225, 

 according to Hakonar Saga, John Steel was met by King Hakon, sail- 

 ing home from England, where " he had gone for a vigil to Saint Thomas 

 the Archbishop." 138 In 1229 the bailiffs of Ipswich were ordered to 

 allow a Norwegian ship held there to go freely, and the passengers who 

 came to England on a pilgrimage freely to perform their vow. 139 In 

 1332 Duke Skuli was given letters of safe-conduct from June 25 until 

 Easter of the following year, " and those whom he shall bring with him 

 into England to visit as a pilgrimage the shrine of Blessed Thomas 



133 Dipl. Norv., VI, No. 72. 



134 Heilagra Manna Sogur, II, 182 (miracle of an English knight who ob- 

 tained relief at Nidaros after other European shrines had failed). 



135 N or g es Gamle Love, II, 31. 



136 T. B. Willson, History of the Church and State in Norway, West- 

 minster, 1903, p. 246, note and photograph. A church in Norway dedicated 

 to St. Thomas of Canterbury was destroyed in 1808. 



137 Hrafns S., chap. 4, printed in Sturlunga S., II, 277. 



138 Hakonar Saga, chap. 130. 



139 Close Rolls, 1227-1231, p. 216: " Permittentes similiter homines ejus- 

 dem navis, qui causa peregrinationis venerunt in terram regis, libere et sine 

 inpedimento exequi votum suum." 



