1 50 Norway and the Norwegians 



It is always reckoned that Norse history begins with 

 this substitution by Harakl of a single rule for that of 

 the numerous petty kings of a former time, with the 

 loose tie of the Things (a.d. 867?). And if Harald had 

 had political sagacity enough to lend all his efforts 

 towards consolidating this rule and ensuring the posi- 

 tion of his dynasty, it would, indeed, have been a 

 momentous epoch in the history of the country, and 

 might have led, who knows, to what supremacy of 

 Norway among the Scandinavian nations, who knows 

 to what power of the Scandinavian nations themselves 

 in Europe? But Harald attempted too much. 



In the step which the new sole King of Norway 

 next took we seem to see a reflection of the difference 

 between Yiken and the rest of Norway. We have 

 already pointed out how different from the beginning 

 was the character of land-holding in Norway from that 

 which obtained in the other Teutonic countries of 

 Europe. Only in the regions near Yiken are there 

 traces of the primitive Teutonic village Avhich other 

 countries possessed ; which, in fact, formed the unit of 

 life to all the other Teutonic countries. Now, the 

 primitive village developed by a natural process into 

 something like the mediaeval manor, that is to say, into 

 the germ of the feudal system of land-holding. 



Not feudalism itself, but what we may call the 

 foundations of feudalism, had been laid in the Christian 

 countries of Europe by the end of the ninth century, 

 and the nearest heathen ones had probably gained some 

 idea of it. Denmark, for instance, though heathen still, 

 was not always in a condition of hostility to the neigh- 

 bouring Christian states. Some of the kings of Southern 



