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tried in warfare. It follows from all this that a girl was free 
to choose her suitor, and to accept whoever seemed most 
pleasing in her eyes. This freedom, however, which is posi- 
tively asserted by Saxo Grammaticus, and of which many Sagas 
give proof, was in most cases restricted by the power of inter- 
vention possessed by the father of the maiden. The Egilssaga, 
which teaches us so very much of the social and ceremonial 
life of the Norsemen, gives us reason to believe that in most 
cases the male head of the family, or, in want of such head, 
the King himself, superintended the betrothal, and might 
forbid it. If the father refused his permission, the lover had 
still one remedy at hand ; he might challenge the father or 
brother of the girl to fight, and might win her by his death. 
Nor would a Scandinavian maiden have shrunk from alliance 
with the man she loved, even though he came to her with his 
hands still wet with the blood of her nearest of kin, supposing, 
always, that this blood had been shed in fair and open fight, 
according to the strict laws of holmgdngr. 
16. Whatever the measure of liberty in choice given to the 
damsel, one thing is certain, that the ceremony of marriage, 
besides being very protracted and formal, was accompanied with 
certain business relations between the families united. The 
bridegroom was said to buy his bride of her father ; it was a 
kind of commercial exchange. The word for wedding, brudkaup, 
which signifies bride-purchase, shows that, in form at least, this 
ancient and barbarous proceeding was continued down to the 
Christian times. No doubt, in the more polished ages, the 
purchase resolved itself into merely a sum paid, as a sort 
of reversed dowry, to the parents of the bride, when they 
became deprived of her services by her marriage; but such a 
gift was always essential if the marriage were to be a legitimate 
one at all. 
17. The wedding, which was always celebrated in the house 
of the bride’s father, was formulated by an appeal to the hammer 
of Thor. The bride and bridegroom exchanged rings, and in 
many respects the ceremonies were much the same as those of 
the same countries in Christian times. One little feature of the 
scene was not without its interest : the wife was invested with a 
bunch of keys, in token of her new position of mistress of 
household arrangements. The wedding was celebrated with 
much pomp and with a lavish display of hospitality, open house 
being held for eight days, or even a month, until the end of 
which time the bride and bridegroom remained in the father’s 
house. The newly-married pair, arriving at last at home, were 
