CHAPTEE IX 



HISTORY 



St. Olaf (A.D. 1015-1030). 



The Sagas from which Snorri compiled are very partial 

 in the attention which they bestow upon the different 

 rulers of Norway. Of those whom they can treat as 

 independent sovereigns, the true heirs of Harald Fair- 

 hair, they have much to tell us ; but when we come to 

 the family of the Earls of Lade, who reigned as kings, 

 but yet either as vassals of the King of Denmark, or 

 else over a portion only of Norway, their epochs the 

 Saga writers pass over with a few words, as if they 

 were short and slight interruptions in the independent 

 history of Norway. These intervals are in reality often 

 longer than the reigns which the Sagas record at length. 

 Thus it is with the history which follows Svold. The 

 league of the two kings and Earl Erik had been 

 founded upon a compact, disgraceful enough for the 

 latter, for the partitioning Norway among the allies. 

 Svend, the Danish king, was to get Vikeu, the richest 

 province of Norway ; the king of Sweden, Olaf, was to 

 have a portion of the Throndhjem country, as well as 

 More and Komsdal ; and Erik the Earl got the rest of 

 Norway. 



•205 



