Chapter II: Introduction (1)

The place of the thirteenth century in the history of human achievement is a subject upon which scholars have not yet come to a general agreement. There can be no doubt that it was, on the whole, an age of progress in many fields; but there is much in its history that points to stagnation, if not to actual decline. From a superficial study of its annals one might be led to class it with the lesser centuries; most writers are inclined to rank it lower than the fourteenth century, and perhaps not even so high as the twelfth. It was in this period that the crusading movement finally flickered out and the Christian world was compelled to leave the cradle of the holy faith in the hands of the infidel. In the thirteenth century, too, the medieval empire sank into hopeless inefficiency and all but expired. The papacy, which more than any other power was responsible for the ruin of the imperial ambitions, also went into decline. Whether the loss in authority and prestige on the part of the holy see was compensated by a renewed spiritual energy in the church at large may well be doubted: what evidence we have would indicate that the religion of the masses was gross and materialistic, that ethical standards were low, and that the improvement in clerical morals, which the church had hoped would follow the enforcement of celibacy, had failed to appear.

Yet the thirteenth century also had its attractive figures and its important movements. The old social order was indeed crumbling, but in its place appeared two new forces which were to inherit the power and opportunities of feudalism and reshape social life: these were the new monarchy, enjoying wide sovereign powers, and the new national consciousness, which was able to think in larger units. In England the century saw the development of a new representative institution, which has become the mother of modern legislative assemblies. The Italian cities were growing rich from the profits of Oriental trade; in the Flemish towns the weaver’s industry was building up new forms of municipal life; the great German Hansa was laying hold on the commerce of the northern seas. In the realms of higher intellect, in science, philosophy, and theology, the age was a notable one, with Roger Bacon, Albertus Magnus, and Thomas Aquinas as the leaders, each in his field. The century also meant much for the progress of geographical knowledge, for it was in this period that Marco Polo penetrated the mysterious lands of the Far East.

As the historian looks back into this age, he is, therefore, able to find broad traces of much that is regarded as fundamental to modern life. Of first importance in this regard is the employment of popular idioms in literary productions. French literature saw its beginnings in the eleventh century with the _chansons de geste_, songs of valorous deeds from the heroic age of the Frankish kingdom. In the next century the poets began to use the themes of the Arthurian legends and sang the exploits of the famous British king and the knights of his Round Table. A little later came another cycle of poems based on the heroic tales of classical antiquity. The twelfth century witnessed a parallel movement in Germany, which at first was largely an imitation of contemporary French poetry. The poets, however, soon discovered literary treasures in the dim world of the Teutonic past, in the tales of the Nibelungs, in the heroic deeds of Theodoric, and in the exploits of other heroes.

Thus in the first half of the thirteenth century there was a large body of French and German verse in circulation. The verses were borne from region to region and from land to land by professional entertainers, who chanted the poems, and by pilgrims and other travelers, who secured manuscript copies. In the course of time the new tales reached the Northern countries, and it was not long before the Northmen were eagerly listening to the stories of chivalrous warfare, militant religion, and tragic love, that they had learned in the southlands.

The Northern peoples thus had a share in the fruitage of the later middle ages; but they also had a share in their achievements. Politically as well as intellectually the thirteenth century was a great age in the Scandinavian countries. The Danish kingdom rose to the highest point of its power under Valdemar the Victorious, whose troubled reign began in 1202. Valdemar succeeded in extending the territories of Denmark along the entire southern coast of the Baltic Sea; but the greatness was short-lived: after the defeat of the Danes by the North Germans at Börnhoved in 1227, the decline of Danish imperialism began. In Sweden, too, men dreamed of conquest beyond the sea. Under the leadership of Earl Birger, the most eminent statesman of medieval Sweden, Swedish power was steadily extended into Finnish territory, and the foundations of Sweden as a great European power was being laid.

During the days of Valdemar and the great Birger Norway also reached its greatest territorial extent. After a century of factional warfare, the nation settled down to comparative peace. All the Norwegian colonies except those in Ireland, were definitely made subject to the Norwegian crown: these were the Isle of Man, the Hebrides, the Orkneys, the Shetlands, the Faroes, Iceland, and Greenland. In every field of national life there was vigor and enterprise. And on the throne sat a strong, wise, and learned monarch, Hakon IV, the ruler with the “great king-thought.”

The real greatness of the thirteenth century in the North lies, however, in the literary achievements of the age. It is not known when the Old Norse poets first began to exercise their craft, but the earliest poems that have come down to us date from the ninth century. For two hundred years the literary production was in the form of alliterative verse; but after 1050 there came a time when scaldic poetry did not seem to thrive. This does not mean that the interest in literature died out; it merely took a new form: the age of poetry was followed by an age of prose. With the Christian faith came the Latin alphabet and writing materials, and there was no longer any need to memorize verse. The new form was the saga, which began to appear in the twelfth century and received many notable additions in the thirteenth. The literary movement on the continent, therefore, had its counterpart in the North; only here the writings took the form of prose, while there literature was chiefly in verse.

These two currents came into contact in the first half of the thirteenth century, when the men and women of the North began to take an interest in the Arthurian romances and other tales that had found their way into Norway. In this new form of Norwegian literature there could not be much originality; still its appearance testifies to a widening of the intellectual horizon. In addition to sagas and romances the period was also productive of written laws, homilies, legends, Biblical narratives, histories, and various other forms of literature. It is to be noted that virtually everything was written in the idiom of the common people. Latin was used to some extent in the North in the later middle ages, but it never came into such general use there as in other parts of Europe. In the thirteenth century it had almost passed out of use as a literary language.

In our interest in tales and romances we must not overlook the fact that the thirteenth century also produced an important literature of the didactic type. For centuries the Christian world had studied the encyclopedic works of Capella, Cassiodorus, and Isidore, or had read the writings of Bede and his many followers who had composed treatises “on the nature of things,” in which they had striven to set in order the known or supposed facts of the physical world. The thirteenth century had an encyclopedist of its own in Vincent of Beauvais, who produced a vast compendium made up of several _Specula_, which were supposed to contain all the knowledge that the world possessed in science, history, theology, and other fields of learning. The age also produced various other Latin works of the didactic sort, of which the _Historia Scholastica_ of Petrus Comestor was perhaps the most significant for the intellectual history of the North.

Norway had no encyclopedist, but the thirteenth century produced a Norwegian writer who undertook a task which was somewhat of the encyclopedic type. Some time during the reign of Hakon IV, perhaps while Vincent was composing his great _Speculum Majus_, a learned Norseman wrote the _Speculum Regale_, or _King’s Mirror_, a work which a competent critic has characterized as “one of the chief ornaments of Old Norse literature.”[1] Unlike the sagas and the romances, which have in view chiefly the entertainment of the reader, the _King’s Mirror_ is didactic throughout; in a few chapters only does the author depart from his serious purpose, and all but two of these are of distinct value. The purpose of the work is to provide a certain kind of knowledge which will be of use to young men who are looking forward to a career in the higher professions.

Footnote 1:

R. Keyser in the introduction to the Christiania edition (p. xi).

As outlined in the introductory chapter, the work was to deal with the four great orders of men in the Norwegian kingdom: the merchants and their interests; the king and his retainers; the church and the clergy; and the peasantry or husbandmen. In the form in which the _King’s Mirror_ has come down to modern times, however, the first two divisions only are included; not the least fragment of any separate discussion of the clerical profession or of the agricultural classes has been found. It is, therefore, generally believed that the work was not completed beyond the point where the extant manuscripts close. Why the book was left unfinished cannot be known; but it is a plausible conjecture that illness or perhaps death prevented the author, who was apparently an aged man, from completing the task that he had set before him. It is also possible that the ideas expressed in the closing chapters of the work, especially in the last chapter, which deals with the subject of clerical subordination to the secular powers, were so repugnant to the ecclesiastical thought of the time that the authorities of the church discouraged or perhaps found means to prevent the continuation of the work into the third division, where the author had planned to deal with the church and the clergy.

In form the _Speculum_ is a dialog between a wise and learned father and his son, in which the larger part of the discussion naturally falls to the former. The son asks questions and suggests problems, which the father promptly answers or solves. In the choice of form there is nothing original: the dialog was frequently used by didactic writers in the middle ages, and it was the natural form to adopt. The title, _Speculum Regale_, is also of a kind that was common in those days.[2] _Specula_ of many sorts were being produced: _Speculum Ecclesiae_, _Speculum Stultorum_, _Speculum Naturale_, and _Speculum Perfectionis_ are some of the titles used for writings of a didactic type. The German _Sachsenspiegel_ is an instance of the title employed for a work in a vulgar idiom. There was also a _Speculum Regum_, or _Mirror of Kings_, and a century later an English ecclesiastic wrote a _Speculum Regis_, but the writer knows of no other work called the _Speculum Regale_.

Footnote 2:

It is believed that the title came into use in Europe in imitation of
Hindu writers who wrote “Mirrors of Princes.” Nansen, _In Northern
Mists_, II, 242.

It is an interesting question whether the _King’s Mirror_ was inspired by any earlier work written along similar lines. Originality was a rare virtue in the middle ages, and the good churchmen who wrote books in those days cannot have regarded plagiarism as a mortal sin. The great writers were freely copied by the lesser men, thoughts, titles, statements, and even the wording being often taken outright. It is, therefore, difficult to determine the sources of statements found in the later works, as they may have been drawn from any one of a whole series of writings on the subject under discussion. The writer has not been able to make an exhaustive examination of all the didactic and devotional literature of the centuries preceding the thirteenth, but the search that has been made has not proved fruitful. There is every reason to believe that the author of the _King’s Mirror_ was an independent thinker and writer. He was doubtless acquainted with a large number of books and had drawn information from a great variety of sources; but when the writing was actually done he had apparently a few volumes only at his disposal. In the region where the work seems to have been composed, on the northern edge of European civilization, there was neither cathedral nor monastery nor any other important ecclesiastical foundation where a collection of books might be found.[3] It is likely, therefore, that the author had access to such books only as were in his own possession. But he came to his task with a well-stocked mind, with a vast fund of information gathered by travel and from the experiences of an active life; and thus he drew largely from materials that had become the permanent possession of his memory. This fact, if it be a fact, will also help to explain why so many inaccuracies have crept into his quoted passages; in but very few instances does he give the correct wording of a citation.

Footnote 3:

There must have been important collections of manuscripts at Nidaros
(Trondhjem), where there was a cathedral and several monastic
institutions. The _King’s Mirror_ was probably composed in Namdalen,
about one hundred miles northeast of Nidaros. See below, pp. 59–60.

There can be no doubt that the author had a copy of the _Vulgate_ before him; at least one Biblical passage is correctly given, and it is quoted in its Latin form.[4] It has also been discovered that he had access to an Old Norse paraphrase of a part of the Old Testament, the books of Samuel and of the Kings.[5] It is likely that he was also acquainted with some of the works of Saint Augustine, and perhaps with the writings of certain other medieval authorities. Among these it seems safe to include the _Disciplina Clericalis_, a collection of tales and ethical observations by Petrus Alfonsus, a converted Jew who wrote in the first half of the twelfth century. The _Disciplina_ is a somewhat fantastic production wholly unlike the sober pages of the _Speculum Regale_; nevertheless, the two works appear to show certain points of resemblance which can hardly have been accidental. The _Disciplina_ is a dialog and the part of the son is much the same as in the _King’s Mirror_. In both works the young man expresses a desire to become acquainted with the customs of the royal court, inasmuch as he may some day decide to apply for admission to the king’s household service.[6] The description of courtly manners and customs in the earlier dialog, though much briefer than the corresponding discussion in the Norwegian treatise, has some resemblance to the latter which suggests a possible relationship between the two works.

Footnote 4:

See below, p. 237.

Footnote 5:

Storm, “Om Tidsforholdet mellem Kongespeilet og Stjórn samt Barlaams
Saga”: _Arkiv for nordisk Filologi_, III, 83-88.

Footnote 6:

See _Disciplina Clericalis_, fabula xxiv: Migne, _Patrologia Latina_,
CLVII, 698-700.

The Norwegian author may also have used some of the many commentaries on the books of Holy Writ, in the production of which the medieval cloisters were so prolific. Of the influence of Petrus Comestor’s _Historia Scholastica_ the writer has found no distinct trace in the _King’s Mirror_; but one can be quite sure that he knew and had used the _Elucidarium_ of Honorius of Autun. The _Elucidarium_ is a manual of medieval theology which was widely read in the later middle ages and was translated into Old Norse, probably before the _King’s Mirror_ was written.[7] But our Norwegian author was not a slavish follower of earlier authorities: in his use and treatment of materials drawn from the Scriptures he shows remarkable independence. Remarkable at least is his ability to make Biblical narratives serve to illustrate his own theories of Norwegian kingship. He was acquainted with some of the legends that circulated through the church and made effective use of them. He must also have known a work on the marvels of Ireland[8] and the letter of Prester John to the Byzantine emperor,[9] in which that mythical priest-king recounts the wonders of India. But the chief source of his work is a long life full of action, conflict, thought, and experience.

Footnote 7:

A fragment of the _Elucidarium_, comprising, however, the greater part
of the work, is published in _Annaler for nordisk Oldkyndighed_, 1852
and 1853; in the former volume a Danish translation is given; the
latter contains the Icelandic text.

Footnote 8:

See below, pp. 22–25.

Footnote 9:

See below, p. 101 (c. viii).

The importance of the _King’s Mirror_ lies in the insight that it gives into the state of culture and civilization of the North in the later middle ages. The interest follows seven different lines: physical science, especially such matters as are of importance to navigators; geography, particularly the geography of the Arctic lands and waters; the organization of the king’s household and the privileges and duties of the king’s henchmen; military engines, weapons, and armour used in offensive and defensive warfare; ethical ideas, especially rules of conduct for courtiers and merchants; the royal office, the duties of the king and the divine origin of kingship; and the place of the church in the Norwegian state.

In one of his earlier chapters the author enumerates the chief subjects of a scientific character that ought to be studied by every one who wishes to become a successful merchant. These are the great luminaries of the sky, the motions and the paths of the heavenly bodies, the divisions of time and the changes that bring the seasons, the cardinal points of the compass, and the tides and currents of the ocean.[10] In discussing these matters he is naturally led to a statement as to the shape of the earth. All through the middle ages there were thinkers who accepted the teachings of the classical astronomers who had taught that the earth is round like a sphere; but this belief was by no means general. Bede for one appears to have been convinced that the earth is of a spherical shape, though he explains that, because of mountains which rise high above the surface, it cannot be perfectly round.[11] Alexander Neckam, an English scientist who wrote two generations before the _King’s Mirror_ was composed, states in his _Praise of Divine Wisdom_ that “the ancients have ventured to believe that the earth is round, though mountains rise high above its surface.”[12] Neckam’s own ideas on this point are quite confused and he remains discreetly non-committal.

Footnote 10:

C. iv. See also Larson, “Scientific Knowledge in the North in the
Thirteenth Century”: _Publications of the Society for the Advancement
of Scandinavian Study_, I, 139-146.

Footnote 11:

_De Natura Rerum_, c. xlvi: Migne, _Patrologia Latina_, XC, 264-265.

Footnote 12:

_De Naturis Rerum_, 441.

But if the earth is a globe, there is every reason to believe in the existence of antipodes; and if there are antipodes, all cannot behold Christ coming in the clouds on the final day. To the medieval theologians, at least to the larger number of them, this argument disposed effectually of the Ptolemaic theory. Job does indeed say that God “hangeth the earth upon nothing,”[13] and this passage might point to a spherical form; but then the Psalmist affirms that He “stretched out the earth above the waters,”[14] and this statement would indicate that the inhabited part of the earth is an island floating upon the waters of the great Ocean, by which it is also surrounded. This belief was generally maintained in the earlier centuries of the classical world, and it had wide acceptance in the middle ages. There were also those who held that beyond and around the outer Ocean is a great girdle of fire. It is likely, however, that many believed with Isidore of Seville that it is useless to speculate on subjects of this sort. “Whether it [the earth] is supported by the density of the air, or whether it is spread out upon the waters ... or how the yielding air can support such a vast mass as the earth, whether such an immense weight can be upheld by the waters without being submerged, or how the earth maintains its balance ... these matters it is not permitted any mortal to know and they are not for us to discuss.”[15]

Footnote 13:

_Job_, xxvi, 7.

Footnote 14:

_Psalms_, cxxxvi, 6.

Footnote 15:

_De Natura Rerum Liber_, c. xlv: Migne, _Patrologia Latina_, LXXXIII,
1015.

There can be no doubt that the author of the _King’s Mirror_ believed in the Ptolemaic theory of a spherical earth. In speaking of our planet he uses the term _jarðarbollr_,[16] earth-sphere. In an effort to explain why some countries are hotter than others, he suggests an experiment with an apple. It is not clear how this can shed much light on the problem, but the author boldly states the point to be illustrated: “From this you may infer that the earth-circle is round like a ball.”[17]

Footnote 16:

See c. xix.

Footnote 17:

See c. vii.

Toward the close of the medieval period there were certain thinkers who attempted to reconcile the spherical theory with the belief that the inhabited part of the earth is an island. These appear to have believed that the earth is a globe partly submerged in a larger sphere composed of water.[18] The visible parts of the earth would rise above the surrounding ocean like a huge island, and the Biblical passages which had caused so much difficulty could thus be interpreted in accord with apparent facts. It is quite clear that the author of the _King’s Mirror_ held no such theory. In a poetic description of how the eight winds form their covenants of friendship at the approach of spring, he tells us that “at midnight the north wind goes forth to meet the coursing sun and leads him through rocky deserts toward the sparse-built shores.”[19] The author, therefore, seems to believe that the earth is a sphere, that there are lands on the opposite side of the earth, and that these lands are inhabited. He also understands that the regions that lie beneath the midnight course of the sun in spring and summer must be thinly populated, as the sun’s path on the opposite side of the earth during the season of lengthening days is constantly approaching nearer the pole.

Footnote 18:

Ruge, _Geschichte des Zeitalters der Entdeckungen_, 97.

Footnote 19:

C. v.

But while the author seems to accept the Ptolemaic theory of the universe, he is not able to divest his mind entirely of current geographical notions. There can be no doubt that he believed in the encircling outer ocean, and it is barely possible that he also looked with favor on the belief that the whole was encompassed by a girdle of fire. On this point, however, we cannot be sure: he mentions the belief merely as one that is current, not as one accepted by himself.[20]

Footnote 20:

C. xix.

It was commonly held in the middle ages that the earth is divided into five zones, only two of which may be inhabited. This was a theory advanced by a Greek scientist in the fifth century before our era,[21] and was given currency in medieval times chiefly, perhaps, through the works of Macrobius.[22] At first these zones were conceived as belts drawn across the heavens; later they came to be considered as divisions of the earth’s surface. It will be noted that our author uses the older terminology and speaks of the zones as belts on the heaven;[23] it may be inferred, therefore, that he derived his information from one of the earlier Latin treatises on the nature of the universe.[24] For two thousand years it was believed that human life could not exist in the polar and torrid zones. Even as late as the fifteenth century European navigators had great fear of travel into the torrid zone, where the heat was thought to grow more intense as one traveled south, until a point might be reached where water in the sea would boil. The author of the _King’s Mirror_ seems to doubt all this. He regards the polar zones as generally uninhabitable; still, he is sure that Greenland lies within the arctic zone; and yet, Greenland “has beautiful sunshine and is said to have a rather pleasant climate.”[25] He sees quite clearly that the physical nature of a country may have much to do with climatic conditions. The cold of Iceland he ascribes in great part to its position near Greenland: “for it is to be expected that severe cold would come thence, since Greenland is ice-clad beyond all other lands.”[26] He conceives the possibility that the south temperate zone is inhabited. “And if people live as near the cold belt on the southern side as the Greenlanders do on the northern, I firmly believe that the north wind blows as warm to them as the south wind to us. For they must look north to see the midday and the sun’s whole course, just as we, who dwell north of the sun, must look to the south.”[27]

Footnote 21:

Parmenides of Ela (ca. 480 B.C.). Nansen, _In Northern Mists_, I, 12.

Footnote 22:

See below, p. 147 (c. xix). Cf. _Ibid._, 123.

Footnote 23:

C. xix.

Footnote 24:

Probably from the writings of Isidore, who speaks of the zones as
belts on the heavens. _Etymologiae_, iii, c. xliv; xiii, c. vi; _De
Natura Rerum_, c. x.

Footnote 25:

C. xix.

Footnote 26:

C. xiii.

Footnote 27:

C. xxi.

On the questions of time and its divisions the author of the _King’s Mirror_ seems to have had nearly all the information that the age possessed. He divides the period of day and night into two “days” (_dægr_) of twelve hours each. Each hour is again divided into smaller hours called _ostenta_ in Latin.[28] Any division below the minute he apparently does not know. The length of the year he fixes at 365 days and six hours, every fourth year these additional hours make twenty-four and we have leap year.[29] The waxing and waning of the moon and the tidal changes in the ocean are also reckoned with fair accuracy.[30]

Footnote 28:

C. vi.

Footnote 29:

_Ibid._

Footnote 30:

_Ibid._

Medieval scientists found these movements in the ocean a great mystery. Some ascribed the tides to the influence of the moon;[31] others believed that they were caused by the collision of the waters of two arms of the ocean, an eastern arm and a western; still others imagined that somewhere there were “certain cavern-like abysses, which now swallow up the water, and now spew it forth again.”[32] The author of the _Speculum_ has no doubts on the subject: he believes that the tides are due to the waxing and waning of the moon.[33]

Footnote 31:

The Venerable Bede held that the moon is in some way responsible for
the tides. _De Natura Rerum_, c. xxxix: Migne, _Patrologia Latina_,
XC, 258-259; see also _ibid._, XC, 422-426 (_De Tempore Ratione_, c.
xxix).

Footnote 32:

Alexander Neckam, _De Naturis Rerum_, 138.

Footnote 33:

C. vi.

In his discussion of the volcanic fires of Iceland he shows that on this subject he was completely under the influence of medieval conceptions. He has heard that Gregory the Great believed that the volcanic eruptions in Sicily have their origins in the infernal regions. Our author is inclined to question, however, that there is anything supernatural about the eruptions of Mount Etna; but he is quite sure that the volcanic fires of Iceland rise from the places of pain. The fires of Sicily are living fires, inasmuch as they devour living materials, such as wood and earth; those of Iceland, on the other hand, consume nothing living but only dead matter like rock. And he therefore concludes that these fires must have their origin in the realms of death.[34]

Footnote 34:

C. xiii.

The author has a suspicion that earthquakes may be due to volcanic action, but he offers another explanation, though he does not give it as his own belief. Down in the bowels of the earth there is probably a large number of caverns and empty passages. “At times it may happen that these passages and cavities will be so completely packed with air either by the winds or by the power of the roaring breakers, that the pressure of the blast cannot be confined, and this may be the origin of those great earthquakes that occur in that country.”[35] In this theory there is nothing new or original: the belief that the earth is of a spongy constitution and that earthquakes are caused by air currents is a very old one, which can be followed back through the writings of Alexander Neckam,[36] the Venerable Bede,[37] and others, at least as far as to Isidore.[38] The elder Pliny, who wrote his _Natural History_ in the first century of the Christian era, seems to have held similar views: “I believe there can be no doubt that the winds are the cause of earthquakes.”[39]

Footnote 35:

_Ibid._

Footnote 36:

_De Naturis Rerum_, 158.

Footnote 37:

_De Natura Rerum_, c. xlix: Migne, _Patrologia Latina_, XC, 275-276.

Footnote 38:

_De Natura Rerum_, c. xlvi: Migne, _Patrologia Latina_, LXXXIII, 1015.
See also _The Christian Topography_ of Cosmas (written about 547),
17-18; Cosmas scoffs at the theory.

Footnote 39:

_Naturalis Historiae_, I, 201 (ii, c. lxxix).

The chapters that deal with the northern lights are interesting because they seem to imply that these lights were not visible in those parts of Norway where the _King’s Mirror_ was written. The editors of the Christiania edition of this work call attention to the fact that there have been periods when these phenomena were less prominent, and suggest that there may have been such a period in the thirteenth century.[40] The author discusses these lights as one of the wonders of Greenland, and the natural inference is that they were not known in Norway. But it is also true that he speaks of whales as if they were limited to the seas about Iceland and Greenland, which is manifestly incorrect. It is likely that the author merely wishes to emphasize the fact that the northern lights appear with greater frequency and in greater brilliance in Greenland than anywhere in Norway. He gives three theories to account for these phenomena: some ascribe them to a girdle of fire which encircles the earth beyond the outer ocean; others hold that the lights are merely rays of the sun which find their way past the edges of the earth while the sun is coursing underneath; but his own belief is that frost and cold have attained to such a power in the Arctic that they are able to put forth light.[41] In his opinion cold is a positive force as much as heat or any other form of energy. To the men of the author’s time there was nothing strange in this belief: it seems to have been held by many even before the thirteenth century that ice could under certain conditions produce heat and even burn.[42]

Footnote 40:

P. ix, note.

Footnote 41:

C. xix.

Footnote 42:

Thus Solinus (pp. xxxiv, xxxvii, 236) says “the sea-ice on this island
ignites itself on collision, and when it is ignited it burns like
wood.” See Nansen, _In Northern Mists_, I, 193. Adam von Bremen
(_Gesta Hammaburgensis Ecclesiae Pontificum_, iv, 34) writes: “they
report this remarkable thing about it that this ice appears so black
and dry that, on account of its age, it burns when it is kindled.”
_Ibid._ The same belief appears in a German poem _Meregarto_: “Thereby
the ice there becomes so hard as crystal, that they make a fire above
it till the crystal glows.” _Ibid._, I, 181.

Among the author’s scientific notions very little that is really original can be found. It is Riant’s belief that he drew to some extent from Oriental sources, the lore of the East having come into the North as the spoil of crusaders or as the acquisitions of Norwegian pilgrims.[43] It may be doubted, however, whether the Saracenic contribution is a real one: almost everything that the author of the _Speculum Regale_ presents as his belief can be found in the Latin scientific manuals of the middle ages. He alludes to the writings of Isidore of Seville, and there can be little doubt that he was acquainted with the ideas of the great Spaniard, though he does not accept them all. His ideas as to the shape of the earth and the probable causes of earthquakes may have been derived from the writings of the Venerable Bede, or from one of his numerous followers. The divisions of time are discussed in many of the scientific treatises of the middle ages, but the division of the hour into sixtieths called _ostenta_ is probably not found in any manual written before the ninth century; so far as the writer has been able to determine, _ostenta_, meaning minutes, first appears in the works of Rabanus Maurus.[44]

Footnote 43:

Riant, _Expéditions et Pèlerinages des Scandinaves en Terre Sainte_,
440-441.

Footnote 44:

Rabanus Maurus died in 856.

The discussion of these scientific notions has its chief value in showing to what extent the Norwegians of the thirteenth century were acquainted with the best theories of the age as to the great facts of the universe. The author’s own contribution to the scientific learning of his time lies almost exclusively in the field of geography. “Beyond comparison the most important geographical writer of the medieval North,” says Dr. Nansen, “and at the same time one of the first in the whole of medieval Europe, was the unknown author who wrote the _King’s Mirror_.... If one turns from contemporary or earlier European geographical literature, with all its superstition and obscurity, to this masterly work, the difference is very striking.”[45] This is doubtless due to the fact that our author was not a cloistered monk who was content to copy the ideas and expressions of his predecessors with such changes as would satisfy a theological mind, but a man who had been active in the secular world and was anxious to get at real facts.

Footnote 45:

Nansen, _In Northern Mists_, II, 242.

Among the chapters devoted to scientific lore the author has introduced several which are ostensibly intended to serve the purpose of entertainment; the author seems to fear that the interest of his readers is likely to flag, if the dry recital of physical facts is continued unbroken. It is in these chapters, which profess to deal with the marvels of Norway, Ireland, Iceland, Greenland, and the Arctic seas, that he introduces his geographical data. In the description of Greenland are included such important and practical subjects as the general character of the land, the great ice fields, the products of the country, wild animals, and a few facts from the economic life of the people. In the chapters on Iceland the author limits himself to certain physical features, such as glaciers, geysers, mineral springs, volcanoes, and earthquakes. He also gives a “description of the animal world of the northern seas to which there is no parallel in the earlier literature of the world.”[46] He enumerates twenty-one different species of whales[47] and describes several of them with some fulness. He mentions and describes six varieties of seals[48] and also gives a description of the walrus. The marvelous element is represented by detailed accounts of the “sea-hedges” (probably sea quakes) on the coasts of Greenland, the merman, the mermaid, and the kraken.[49] But on the whole these chapters give evidence of careful, discriminating observation and a desire to give accurate knowledge.

Footnote 46:

Nansen, _In Northern Mists_, II, 243.

Footnote 47:

_Ibid._ “If we make allowance for three of them being probably sharks
and for two being perhaps alternative names for the same whale, the
total corresponds to the number of species that are known in northern
waters.”

Footnote 48:

_Ibid._ This “corresponds to the number of species living on the
coasts of Norway and Greenland.”

Footnote 49:

Cc. xii, xvi.

For all but the two chapters on Ireland the sources of the author’s geographical information are evidently the tales of travelers and his own personal experiences; of literary sources there is no trace. The account of the marvels of Ireland, however, gives rise to certain problems. It may be that the Norwegian geographer based these chapters on literary sources that are still extant, or he may have had access to writings which have since disappeared. It is also possible that some of the information was contributed by travelers who sailed the western seas and had sojourned on the “western isles;” for it must be remembered that Norway still had colonies as far south as the Isle of Man, and that Norsemen were still living in Ireland, though under English rule. When Hakon IV made his expedition into these regions in 1263, some of these Norwegian colonists in Ireland sought his aid in the hope that English rule might be overthrown.[50]

Footnote 50:

_Hákonar Saga_, c. 322.

It has long been known that many of the tales of Irish wonders and miracles that are recounted in the _Speculum Regale_ are also told in the _Topographia Hibernica_ by Giraldus Cambrensis. The famous Welshman wrote his work several decades before the _King’s Mirror_ was composed; and it is not impossible that the author of the latter had access to the “Irish Topography.” Moreover, the _Speculum Regale_ and the _Topographia Hibernica_ have certain common features which correspond so closely that literary kinship seems quite probable. The resemblances, however, are not so much in the details as in the plan and the viewpoint. In the second book of his “Topography,” Giraldus recounts “first those things that nature has planted in the land itself;” and next “those things that have been miraculously performed through the merits of the saints.”[51] The author of the _King’s Mirror_ has adopted a similar grouping. After having discussed some of the wonders of the island he continues: “There still remain certain things that may be thought marvelous; these, however, are not native to the land but have originated in the miraculous powers of holy men.”[52] This correspondence in the general plan is too remarkable to be wholly accidental; at least it should lead us to look for other resemblances elsewhere.

Footnote 51:

Giraldus, Opera, V, 62-64; _King’s Mirror_, c. x.

Footnote 52:

_Topographia Hibernica_, iii, c. 28; _King’s Mirror_, c. x.

In his general description of Ireland the author of the Norwegian work calls attention to the excellence of the land and its temperate climate: “for all through the winter the cattle find their feed in the open.”[53] Giraldus informs us that grass grows in winter as well as in summer, and he adds: “therefore they are accustomed neither to cut hay for fodder nor to provide stables for the cattle.”[54] Both writers emphasize the fact that grapes do not grow on the island. In both writings attention is called to the sacred character of the Irish soil, which makes it impossible for reptiles and venomous animals to live on the land, though Giraldus has his doubts as to the supernatural phase of the matter. Both writers add that if sand or dust is brought from Ireland to another country and scattered about a reptile, it will perish.[55] Both characterize the Irish people as savage and murderous, but they also call attention to their kind treatment of holy men, of whom the island has always had many.[56] In fact, every statement in the _King’s Mirror_ as to the nature of the land and the character of the inhabitants can be duplicated in Giraldus’ description of Ireland, except, perhaps, the single observation that the Irish people, because of the mildness of the climate, often wear no clothes.

Footnote 53:

_Topographia Hibernica_, ii, introd.: _Opera_, V, 74.

Footnote 54:

C. xi.

Footnote 55:

C. x.

Footnote 56:

_Topographia Hibernica_, i, c. xxxiii: _Opera_, V, 67.

But even if Giraldus’ work is to be regarded as one of the sources which the Norwegian author may have used in writing his chapters on the Irish mirabilia, it cannot have been the only or even the principal source. The account of these marvels in the _King’s Mirror_ does not wholly agree with that of the Welshman’s work. In some instances the wonders are told with details that are wanting in the earlier narrative. Frequently, too, the Norwegian version is more explicit as to localities and gives proper names where Giraldus has none. It also records marvels and miracles which are not found in the _Topographia Hibernica_.

In an edition of the _Irish Nennius_ the editor has added as an appendix a brief account of the “Wonders of Ireland,” many of the tales of which have interesting parallels in the _King’s Mirror_. There is also a medieval poem on the same theme[57] which contains allusions to much that the Norwegian author has recorded with greater fulness. Neither of these works, however, can have been the source from which the chapters on Ireland in the _Speculum Regale_ have been derived.

Footnote 57:

See Wright-Halliwell, _Reliquiae Antiquae_, II, 103-107.

The learned editors of the Christiania edition of the _King’s Mirror_ reached the conclusion that the author did not draw from any literary source but derived his information from current tales and other oral accounts.[58] This is also the opinion of Dr. Kuno Meyer, the eminent student of Celtic philology.[59] Dr. Meyer bases his belief on the form of the Irish proper names. As written in the _Speculum Regale_ they can not have been copied, as the spelling is not normally Irish; he believes, therefore, that they show an effort on the author’s part to reproduce phonetically these names as he heard them spoken. But this theory ignores the fact that in writing them the author employs combinations of consonants which are unusual to say the least. Combinations of _ch_ and _gh_ are used in writing nearly all the Irish proper names that occur in the _King’s Mirror_ and the _gh_-combination is found nowhere else in the work.[60] It was probably coming into the language in the century to which the work is credited, but the author uses it only as indicated above. It seems likely, therefore, that he had access to a written source, though it is also likely that he did not have this account before him when the writing was actually done. As has already been stated, the author seems to have written largely from memory, and his memory is not always accurate.

Footnote 58:

P. x.

Footnote 59:

_Ériu_, IV., 14-16.

Footnote 60:

In a letter to the writer Professor Meyer expresses the belief that
the use of _gh_ in the Irish proper names is an invention by the
author. The combination of _c_ and _h_ is also used in certain other
proper names, the system varying in the different manuscripts. For a
discussion of the writing of proper names in the chief manuscript, see
the American Facsimile Edition of the _Konungs Skuggsjá_ (edited by G.
T. Flom), xxxvii-xxxix.

Having discussed the subjects which he considers of chief importance for the education of a merchant, the learned father proceeds to describe the king’s household and its organization, the manners which one should observe at court, and the business that is likely to come before a king. For the part which deals with the royal court, it is probable that no literary sources were used. The author evidently wrote from long experience in the king’s retinue; he is not discussing an ideal organization but the king’s household as it was in Bergen and Trondhjem in his own day. If he drew from any written description of courtly manners, it may have been from some book like Petrus Alfonsus’ _Disciplina Clericalis_, which has already been mentioned[61] and which seems to have had a wide circulation throughout western Europe in the later middle ages.

Footnote 61:

See above, pp. 9–10.

The chapters that are devoted to the discussion of the duties and activities of the king’s guardsmen, to the manners and customs which should rule in the king’s garth, and to the ethical ideas on which these were largely based are of great interest to the student of medieval culture. They reveal a progress in the direction of refined life and polished manners, which one should scarcely expect to find in the Northern lands. The development of courtesy and refined manners may have been accelerated by the new literature which was coming into Scandinavia from France and Germany, a literature that dealt so largely with the doings of knights and kings;[62] but it was probably not so much a matter of bookish instruction as of direct imitation. The Northmen, though they lived far from the great centers of culture, were always in close touch with the rest of the world. In the earlier centuries the viking sailed his dreaded craft wherever there was wealth and plunder and civilized life. After him and often as his companion came the merchant who brought away new ideas along with other desirable wares. After a time Christianity was introduced from the southlands, and the pilgrim and the crusader took the place of the heathen pirate. And all these classes helped to reshape the life of courtesy in the Northern countries.

Footnote 62:

See above, pp. 2–3.

It is difficult to overestimate the influence of the crusader as a pioneer of Christian culture in Scandinavia, but it seems possible that the pilgrim was even more important in this respect. It was no doubt largely through his journeys that German influences began to be felt in the Scandinavian lands, though it is possible that the wide activities of the Hanseatic merchants should also be credited with some importance for the spread of Teutonic culture. It is told in the _King’s Mirror_ that a new mode of dressing the hair and the beard had been introduced from Germany since the author had retired from the royal court.[63] It is significant that the routes usually followed by Norwegian pilgrims who sought the Eternal City and the holy places in the Orient ran through German lands. As a rule the pilgrims traveled through Jutland, Holstein, and the Old Saxon territories and reached the Rhine at Mainz. It was also possible to take a more easterly route, and sometimes the travelers would go by sea to the Low Countries and thence southward past Utrecht and Cologne; but all these three routes converged at Mainz, whence the journey led up the Rhine and across the Alps. It will be noted that a long stretch of the journey from Norway to Rome would lead through the German kingdom. Concerning the people of the Old Saxon or German lands an Icelandic scribe makes the following significant remark: “In that country the people are more polished and courteous than in most places and the Northmen imitate their customs quite generally.”[64]

Footnote 63:

C. xxx.

Footnote 64:

Nikolas Sæmundarson, abbot of Thingeyrar, who made a journey to the
Holy Land about 1151, wrote an itinerary for the use of pilgrims from
which the above quotation is taken. The itinerary is summarized in
Riant, _Expéditions et Pèlerinages des Scandinaves en Terre Sainte_,
80-87.

The cultural influences which followed in the wake of the returning crusaders were no doubt largely of Frankish origin. As a rule the crusading expeditions followed the sea route along the coasts of France and the Spanish peninsula; thus the Northern warriors came in contact with French ideas and customs in the Frankish homeland as well as in the Christian armies, which were largely made up of enthusiastic and venturesome knights from Frankland. The author of the _King’s Mirror_ urges his son to learn Latin and French, “for these idioms are most widely used.”[65]

Footnote 65:

C. iii. It is likely that English culture found its way into the North
along with the French. When King Sigurd sailed to the Orient in 1107,
he spent the winter of 1107-1108 at the English court.

One of the reasons why the son wishes to master the mercantile profession is that he desires to travel and learn the customs of other lands.[66] In the thirteenth century the Norwegian trade still seems to have been largely with England and the other parts of the British Isles. It is also important to remember that the Norwegian church was a daughter of the church of England, and that occasionally English churchmen were elevated to high office in the Norwegian establishment. It is likely that Master William, who was Hakon IV’s chaplain, was an Englishman; at least he bore an English name.[67]

Footnote 66:

C. iii.

Footnote 67:

_Hákonar Saga_, c. 228.

Information as to foreign civilization and the rules of courteous behavior could also pass from land to land and from court to court with the diplomatic missions of the time. The wise father states that envoys who come and go are careful to observe the manners that obtain at the courts to which they are sent.[68] Frequent embassies must have passed between the capitals of England and Norway in the thirteenth century. It is recorded that both King John and his son Henry III received envoys from the king of Norway, and that they brought very acceptable gifts, such as hawks and elks,[69] especially the former: in twelve different years Hakon IV sent hawks to the English king.[70]

Footnote 68:

C. xxix.

Footnote 69:

_Rotuli Litterarum Clausarum_, I, 382, 506, 509.

Footnote 70:

Olafsen, “Falkefangsten i Norge”: _Historisk Tidsskrift_, Femte Række,
III, 351.

Embassies also came quite frequently from the imperial court in Germany. It was during the reign of Hakon IV that the Hohenstaufens were waging their last fight with the papacy, and both sides in the conflict seemed anxious to secure the friendship of the great Norwegian king. The Saga of Hakon relates that early in the king’s reign “missions began between the emperor and King Hakon.”[71] In 1241, “when King Hakon came to the King’s Crag, that man came to him whose name was Matthew, sent from the emperor Frederick with many noble gifts. Along with him came from abroad five Bluemen (negroes).”[72] Just how acceptable such a gift would be in medieval Norway the chronicler does not state. There can be no doubt, however, that Hakon returned the courtesy. The saga mentions several men who were sent on diplomatic errands to the imperial court. One of these emissaries had to go as far as Sicily, “and the emperor received him well.”[73]

Footnote 71:

_Hákonar Saga_, c. 191.

Footnote 72:

_Ibid._, c. 243.

Footnote 73:

_Ibid._, c. 191.

The relationship with the other Scandinavian kingdoms was more direct. The _King’s Mirror_ states that occasionally kings find it necessary to meet in conference for the discussion of common problems; and that on such occasions the members of the various retinues note carefully the customs and manners of the other groups.[74] These meetings were usually held at some point near the mouth of the Göta River, where the boundaries of the three kingdoms touched a common point. In 1254 such a meeting was held at which Hakon of Norway, Christopher of Denmark, and the great Earl Birger of Sweden were in attendance with their respective retinues.[75]

Footnote 74:

C. xxix.

Footnote 75:

_Hákonar Saga_, c. 281.

The kings of the North were not limited, however, in their diplomatic intercourse to the neighboring monarchies; their ambassadors went out to the remotest parts of Europe and even to Africa. Valdemar the Victorious, in his day one of the greatest rulers in Christendom, married as his first wife Dragomir, a Bohemian princess who brought the Dagmar name into Denmark, and took as his second consort Berengaria of Portugal, Queen Bengjerd, whose lofty pride is enshrined in the Danish ballads of the age. Hakon IV married the daughter of his restless rival, Duke Skule; but his daughter Christina was sought in marriage by a prince in far-away Spain. The luckless princess was sent to Castile and was married at Valladolid to a son of Alfonso the Wise.[76] Louis IX of France was anxious to enlist the support of the Norwegian king for his crusading ventures and sent the noted English historian Matthew Paris to present the matter to King Hakon.[77] The mission, however, was without results. Norwegian diplomacy was concerned even with the courts of the infidel: in 1262 an embassy was sent to the Mohammedan sultan of Tunis “with many falcons and those other things which were there hard to get. And when they got out the Soldan received them well, and they stayed there long that winter.”[78]

Footnote 76:

_Hákonar Saga_, c. 294.

Footnote 77:

Matthew Paris, _Chronica Majora_, IV, 651-652.

Footnote 78:

_Hákonar Saga_, c. 313.