Gone Medieval - The Sagas of the Earls of Orkney

Episode Date: January 13, 2026

Sail north with Gone Medieval to Orkney’s storm-lashed islands, where saints, shipwrecks, blood-feuds and tax disputes all unfold in the Sagas of the Earls of Orkney. Dr Eleanor Janega is joined by Professor Judith Jesch to explore Saint Magnus, turf-cutting Viking Earls, miracle-working dice games, and how a new translation reshapes this Norse world for modern readers.MOREScotland's Stone of SconeListen on AppleListen on SpotifyViking Warrior WomenListen on AppleListen on SpotifyGone Medieval is presented by Dr. Eleanor Janega. Audio editor is Amy Haddow, the producers are Rob Weinberg and Amy Haddow. The senior producer is Anne-Marie Luff.All music used is courtesy of Epidemic Sounds.Gone Medieval is a History Hit podcast.Sign up to History Hit for hundreds of hours of original documentaries, with a new release every week. Sign up at https://www.historyhit.com/subscribe.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

From long-loss Viking ships and kings buried in unexpected places to tales of murder, power, faith, and the lives of ordinary people across medieval Europe and beyond. Join me, Matt Lewis, Dr. Eleanor Jarniger, and some of the world's leading historians as we bring history's most fascinating stories to life, only on history hit. With your subscription, you'll unlock hundreds of hours of exclusive documentaries

with a brand-new release every week exploring everything from the ancient world, to World War II. Just visit historyhit.com forward slash subscribe. Hello, I'm Dr. Eleanorianica and welcome to Gone Medieval from History Hit, the podcast that delves into the greatest millennium in human history. We uncover the greatest mysteries, the gobsmacking details, and the latest groundbreaking research from the Vikings to the Normans, from kings to popes to the Crusades.

We delve into the rebellions, plots, and murders that tell us who we really were. And how we got here. Should the winds ever rise to catch your sails, drawing you away northwards from mainland Britain, you will come across a small archipelago, a flat expanse of barren sands and windswept grass, and a welcome respite before your ship plows through the ferocious North Atlantic waves towards Norway. There are few trees on Orkney, and those which do push through the earth are soon left as knotted roots by the dark winter gales. These are islands rich with the relics of buried civilizations. Instead of trees, monoliths loom so large that they could only.

have been planted by giants. Here, people once farmed and rooted their power into the land. As the family tree grew and twisted over the generations, tales of bloodshed followed. Greed polluted the bloodlines as power slipped between the fingers of these new earls like grains of sand. This small chain of islands bore witness to the true brood. brutality of brother against brother, blood against blood. However, just as violence was carried by the winds of the island, there were short breaths of peace, piety, and holiness.

As in this story of St. Magnus the martyr, Earl Magnus was a man of great worth, righteous in all his deeds, beloved by his people, and steadfast in his faith. descended from the most ancient of Earls, Magnus and his cousin Hakon had shared defense of these islands. Bound by blood, Magnus and Hakon ruled together peacefully, at first. As the winter winds began to quiet, a much greater storm took hold of Earl Hakon. Ambition and greed poisoned his mind.

He was cruel and covetous. hungry to rule alone. In the spring, he sent word that he wished to meet Magnus on Egelseh under the guise of peace. Magnus, trusting in God, gathered his men and went, though he suspected treachery. He agreed with Hacom to make the short journey from the mainland with two ships of men. All of a sudden, out of the calm sea came a single, ferocious wave, which broke over the ship. Magnus's trust in God was unshaken, and he continued to travel towards his faith, in spite of this foreboding omen which now roared beneath his vessel. Magnus was the first to arrive. His two ships rested on the sand, the shallow water lapping against them.

However, the men soon saw the omen fulfilled, dark as the wave that had broken in still waters. On the water's horizon were eight warships. Magnus had been ensnared, but this Earl did not flee. He prayed in the church giving thanks to God and spoke with calmness to his men saying that it was better to meet death honorably than to act in fear. His victory already secured before even setting foot on the beach, Hakan commanded his men to slay Magnus, but none dared. Finally, the cook Liffelther, trembling, lifted his blade above the defeated Earl. Magnus gave the cook his tunic and encouraged him not to fear, for he had forgiven all and commended his soul to God. Kneeling in the springtime dew, Magnus made the sign of the cross, prayed for his enemies, and received his final blow.

His spirit passed to heaven. and the place where he fell bloomed green and fertile, a sign of God's favor. Magnus was thereafter called a saint. Miracles were seen at his tomb and his memory endured among the Orcadians, a holy example of justice, piety, and courage. The saga of the Earls of Orkney is rich with such histories of family feuds, betrayals, and vengeance, which seems to plague most Viking families. Spanning three centuries of Scandinavian rule on Orkney,

these sagas show the high politics and power struggles of Earls, while also exploring the ever-changing relationships between Scotland and Norway, Christianity and paganism. To explore the saga's context, complex family trees, and blood feuds, I'm joined by Professor Judith Yesh. She's a specialist in Old Norse language, literature, and runology. And her most recent publication is a newly translated version of the Sagas of the Earls of Orkney. Judith, welcome to Gone Medieval.

Hello again. I am so excited to have you back because you've got this new translation out of the sagas of the Earls of Orkney. And I suppose the best place to start here is just by asking what exactly the... that means. Well, what are the sagas? Okay, well, it's a saga written or compiled at any rate in medieval Iceland, probably around the year 1200. And we have lots and lots of sagas from medieval Iceland about all kinds of different topics. But this one is a bit unusual because it's set in the Bresch Isles and is about what happened in the Bresch Isles between about 900 and 1200. And that is rather a lot. You know, I suppose it's easy now through the telescope of time to

kind of look back and say, oh, from the 9th century to the 12th. That's, you know, that's 300 years or so. Or the history. So it's a lot to crown into one document. Do we know who wrote these ones? Because, you know, a lot of the sagas, the Icelandic sagas, you know, we get, you know, like the Idriga saga and things like named people. Or is this more of a... regional work. It's like many sagas, it's anonymous, so we don't know who wrote it. And I prefer to think of it as having been compiled, because it's quite clear there's many different kinds of sources went into it.

And there has been some discussion as to, you know, who those sources were. I think there's enough evidence in the saga itself that even though it was probably composed in, compiled in Iceland, the person who compiled it, I had either been to to Orkney and Shetland or new people from there. And so many of the sources do seem to emanate from there. I don't think you can say it's made up. I think it is actually based in events that actually happened. I mean, whether it's a completely accurate version of what happened or not is something that can be debated. But I think it is very much an account. You called it a document. I'm not sure I'd exactly use that word for it. It is a narrative, a story of what happened.

I think it is based on actual events that really happened. Could we dig into that a little bit? Because, you know, I think sagas are such important sources because, well, in the first place, we've got so many of them. And they're really spectacular in terms of giving us some information about a pretty large period of time where we otherwise have gaps. But as a source as well, you know, because there can be a lot of fantastic things that happen in sagas. You know, we have to kind of read between the lines of these things. But you do mention that these have a real sense of place, that they seem as though the compilers have been to Orkney. Do you think that this is a kind of a reliable source that we can use to understand the political goings on?

At one level, certainly. It's funny, I was listening to the talk you had with Claire Downham, and you said something about the sagas go for the bold stories and not for the boring. go, it's more complex than that. I actually think that this saga isn't one of those bold stories. It is actually about the complexities of the past, and I don't think it's boring. I think actually, interestingly, I wouldn't say that every single person in the saga is historical or every single event happened exactly as it's told, but it is an important source precisely because not only do we have a gap, we have absolutely nothing. other than archaeology for that period of Northern Scotland.

And historians often are a little bit wary of sagas that, you know, they think they are these bold stories and there's a lot of fiction in them. But I think this one is a little bit different for various reasons. I love that. That's a real historian's answer. You know, we're the worst, you know, because we're always quite interested in sources that are, you know, that show everyday life, that nitty-gritty, these small changes in political structures, you know, that's the sort of stuff that excites us. And it's terrible to try to explain to ordinary people who, you know, quite like a good monster fight, that sort of a thing.

But really, there are no monsters in this saga. I'm sorry to just disappoint people. Well, that doesn't mean that there is an action, though, which we'll get to you later. I suppose one of my, it's quite interesting to see this new translation because a lot of the time when you are presented with this saga, it's called the Orkneyinga saga. Is there a particular reason why you've decided to go with the sagas of the Earls of Orkney instead of the more complex name? Yes, there's three reasons. First of all, the title Orkneanga saga can't be traced any further back. than the 18th century in one of the first editions of the saga. So we're not sure whether it had a title in the Middle Ages or not.

If it did, it is something along the lines of saga of the Earls of Orkney. And the third reason is that Orkne Inga Saga translates as the saga of the Orkney Islanders. But A, it's not just about the Orkney Islanders. And ordinary people don't feature in it very much. It is very much about the high politics of the rulers. and their kind of feuds and problems with each other, really. It is very political in that way. Well, which is quite exciting.

Of course, I long for a day when we'll get more information about ordinary people in a saga, but it doesn't strike me. There are a few, but not as many as one would like. I mean, exactly. But I do think that this is, that is quite an interesting point, though, because so much of what we have or what we think of as traditional about sources from the Middle Ages oftentimes does have that kind of 18th century, 19th century provenance when there becomes more of a fad for medieval literary works in particular. And doing that work of kind of uncovering and peeling back the modern layers, I think, is a really important bit of historiography. And that

also applies to, I mean, the other question you could have asked is, you know, why translate this when it's already been translated into English four times before? But again, there is stuff to peel back there because every translation is of its time. And actually the most recent one was published in 1978, which, I mean, a year I remember well, but for most people, that's quite a long time ago. So you can tell that I'm a nerdy historian because I'm like, no, I would never ask. Which of course, we need a new translation. Are you joking? More translations? Well, I read somewhere that Homer is translated into English every 10 years, so, you know, I think. Quite right, too, you know. And I think that that is really important because in theory, we should always be kind of growing as researchers. We should be building on the last things. And that means that you do need to go back over translations. It just does, you know, so which keeps us very busy. You know, there's no such thing as being done with history. there, but. No, exactly. Well, in terms of the actual people of Orkney, yeah, we don't get to know that much about ordinary folks in this. We know more about the Earls, but I suppose when do they show up on the Orkney Islands? Well, it's interesting because the one thing, the saga, it starts, it actually starts in the dawn of prehistory, in, you know, mythical past, in order to establish

that the Earls of Orkney are descended from Norwegian rulers, basically. And then it leaped straight into the Viking Age, but it doesn't actually tell us about when people from Scandinavia landed in Northern Scotland. I mean, it vaguely starts at the time of Harold Finehair, which is when many sagas say that people from Norway went out west and settled in various parts of around the North Atlantic. but it doesn't describe any settlement or the earliest settlers. It just kind of assumes that there are people there who are presumably of Scandinavian heritage, although it doesn't necessarily even make that clear.

So we have to rely on archaeologists to kind of tell us, and that's something that archaeologists debate as well. But I think we can say for certain that by around the year 900, there are mainly people of Scandinavian origin living there. I suppose that also makes sense because fundamentally it's a pretty useful place to stop between Norway and the island of Britain itself. You know, if you're out in longboats, that's quite a good one to be stopping at. So it makes sense. But I do think that that is, you know, a thing that oftentimes people find frustrating because,

yeah, there is this kind of implicit of, of course, you understand where Orkney is. Of course, you understand what the people are there and we're sort of desperate to know these things that they take as read, you know? Yeah, yeah, it's, I think probably, you know, I think there was a long process of first Viking raids and things. And then there's probably, at least the way I read the evidence, a kind of slightly secondary process of them people arriving and settling. there. But it's quite hard to track down exactly what happened. As you say, this is, you know, a pretty century-spanning saga. So in order to dig into it a little bit, we think maybe we're just kind of focus up on one particular bloodline in the story. And this starts off with a man called Turf Einar, which a fantastic name, bring it back, I have to say,

It kind of ends with St. Magnus. So in terms of getting into this, who exactly is Turf Einner? And can we say that this is a reliable look at a real person? He is the illegitimate son of an Earl in Norway. And it's quite funny because the Earl in Norway, one of his sons gets killed while raiding with Harold Finehair in Berschiles, and in compensation, the king of Norway gives him the Northern Isles to rule over, but then he doesn't want to do it and he can't persuade any of his legitimate sons to do it either.

So in the end, Turf Anar, the illegitimate one, gets to go. And he's called Turfaynar, because according to the saga, he kind of, because there was very little wood in the islands, which is true, he discovered. the use of peat, basically. So the turf in this context refers to Pete as a fuel. Is he a plausible person? Funnily enough, I mean, I think quite a lot of what he does is fictional, but in the saga he recites five stanzas, which are, I think, very plausibly from the 10th century. I think whether they were composed by him or not, I don't know. But, you know, that is the kind of thing that the saga is put together from.

There was this poetry which survived in the oral tradition, and then in the 12th century, people started writing narratives around the poetry. So I do think that poetry is genuine, but whether it was by him or not, I don't know. But of course, then it's a wonderful episode, and people love it, because it's got the Blood Eagle scenario going on there. And he's basically what happens is that, some other sons of the king of Norway kill his father back in Norway. Then they come over to Orkney and he exacts revenge on them through this kind of blood eagle thing. Can we talk a little bit about

the blood eagle thing? Because I think this is something that I get asked about all the time, even not as a Viking specialist. This is something that really lives in everyone's imaginations about the Viking. So can you explain what a blood eagle is? Well, the way the source has described it, and it occurs more than once in sagas, is that someone is sliced in some way on their back so that their heart and lungs are pulled out through their back. And then that is the way they die, basically. Yeah, that'll do it. Well, actually, there was an article recently in which various people, including people with medical experience, tried to explore whether this was even possible. And I think they came to the conclusion that it might just about have been possible, but probably not.

Well, yeah, I mean, I hate to be the person, like, you know, an annoying historian, but it just doesn't strike me as particularly plausible, you know. No. And there is a good explanation for it. actually, which a scholar called Robert Frank came up with many years ago, in that, again, it derives from poetry. And in the poetry, there's a lot of description of birds like ravens and eagles, as the kind of beasts of battle feeding on the corpses. And one way of looking at it is just a kind of development from this idea of a carrion bird kind of eating the dead person. And I think that that's quite plausible.

You know, it's a story that's developed from something that has a basis, in fact. But I don't think they actually carved people up in that way, that it's described in the saga. I mean, well, it's a, I'll tell you what, it's a, it's a good story, though. You know, it gets people talking. It's been gruesome and people like a bit of gruesome when it comes to Vikings, I suppose. Absolutely. And that's the difficulty, too, I think, that, you know, we always want people. to be excited about medieval things. I always want people to be excited about the sagas. And then

they ask me about this and then I immediately say, I don't think that's real and, you know, lose my audience, which isn't great. But, you know, sometimes you just give the people a little bit of excitement in something. You know, sometimes things are allegories or metaphors. And I think that that is, that's true with any work of literature. And it's not, it's not just us doing it. You know, It's not just you getting people excited. I mean, the saga writers were doing it, too, that they had exactly the same motivation, I think, telling a good story. Well, so we have the story about the Blood Eagle,

but I find it quite interesting what happens afterwards, because there's a whole complex taxation thing that arises as the result of blood eagling someone's king. So, again, terrible historian to learn. I'm like, oh, that's quite interesting. Can he tell us a little bit about what happens? in terms of the dynamics between the earls and the kings of Norway as a result of this? Well, yes. So I think that is probably something that is a bit retrospective,

because later on in the saga, and I mean, you talk about the 300-year span of the saga, and I think it's important to remember that most of the saga is actually set in the 12th century and not in the Viking age at all. So in the Christian, you know, Christian, 12th century. And, you know, one of the important things that happened then is the building of St. Magnus Cathedral in Kirkwall. And the whole story about the taxes kind of is looking back from that time when the Earl kind of got people to pay the taxes there and gave them, gave them their inheritance back in exchange. And so whoever compiled the saga, I think, well, there must have been a time before when the king took their inheritance off them.

I love that. I love the idea of writing a saga in order to explain a taxation system. It's fantastic stuff, you know. It's really good. There is a bit of everything in this saga, actually. You know, it's not just, even though there's not too many ordinary people in there, there's many different. topics are covered in different ways. Well, and it's interesting because it does kind of give us a little bit of a glimpse, you know, as you say, this is really focusing on the earls. But if what we're

talking about is, you know, people's inheritance and the King of Norway taking it, you know, or trying to explain this tricky situation, it does sort of show us that something is happening with the population of Orkdy, you know, the King of Norway must have done something at some point. So we have to explain it. Yeah, and the population does appear a bit like a Greek chorus or something, you know, they're always complaining about their rulers. So, you know, although we don't really meet them individually, they're kind of, you know, you get a sense of the dynamic between the rulers and the ruled. I mean, that particular population is the householders, people who actually own land and have some kind of farmer or estate and probably usually male.

not always. So what at the end of all of this is sort of TIRF Einar's legacy on the island and within the sagas, is he someone that we can see as important in establishing a lineage there, for example? Yes, that's very much what happens. And, you know, there's a certain amount of towing and froing in this early part of the saga as to who's going to rule and various claimants are got rid of. But basically all the earls of Orkney claim their ancestry back to Terfaynard, which is interesting, you know, being descended from an illegitimate son of Urugu, in Norway. I think especially when, once you hit the period in which everybody begins to Christianize, because, you know, as you say, they're these are a series.

of stories that are written probably more around in the Christian period. How does the saga explore this transition into Christianity? Because that's one of my favorite things about sagas in general, is just kind of looking at this conversion process and what that means. Yeah, it doesn't, I mean, it's just an event in the saga, you know, King Olaf Triglinson, who's in saga literature, often given the, the honor of having Christianized the whole of the Viking diaspora, comes sailing along and basically persuades the Earl to become Christian, and then it just sort of happens.

And it's a part of the saga that doesn't actually survive in medieval manuscripts. The manuscript situation of the saga is very complicated, but that particular chapter survives only in an early modern version, not even in Old Norse, but written in Dano-Norwegian. You know, we don't really know whether possibly the medieval version might have been different. It happens in chapter 12, and the saga is 112 chapters. And people do kind of focus a lot on Turfaynor and the early chapters, but actually the vast majority of the saga is set in the Christian period.

But they're aware of the past because the early earls, it's often said, that they're buried in a mound in the heathen fashion, I think at least three of them. And, you know, you can go to those places and there are mounds there, whether those earls are actually buried there or not is another question. But there are places with mounds

that obviously people thought that's where our earliest earls were actually buried. Well, this is a really interesting point to me about this particular chapter being early modern in character, because it does show you that this really is a compilation. There's a continual editing process going on. You know, if we have to have a story explaining the taxation rates, then also we have to explain how it is that Christianity came to be and someone gets in there and has to do that at some point. Yeah, and it's a problem for the translator because there, one thing, I don't think enough people have emphasized enough about this saga is there is no single manuscript which has the whole saga as people experience it, for example, in the painting.

translation, or even in my translation, there are a fragmentary manuscript. Most of them are actually very fragmentary, just a leaf or two. And then there's a couple of longer manuscripts, but even they're not complete. And of course, the longer ones tend to be later, and then you have to allow for the fact they might have made changes or added things or taken things out. So it's been, you know, I'm relying on previous work that previous editors have put together what they think is the closest to what might have been the original compilation. But you always have to be aware when looking at any particular chapter of the saga, which manuscript it's from. And some of those manuscripts are quite early and probably quite reliable and others are not so much.

Well, I mean, I hate to be, you know, again, a bit of a questioner of this. But I don't really see a smooth conversion process happening where, you know, someone shows up and just says, hey, do you want to be a Christian? Yeah, sure, it sounds great. You know, like, taking on a completely new religion is a pretty big decision. Yeah, I'm sure it took time. And, you know, again, in the saga is just presented as the Earl, I think probably rulers did see an advantage to themselves in becoming Christian, but actually converting the population. And who was the population? You know, we haven't really discussed because the saga really has absolutely nothing to say about it is, obviously, Orkney and Shetland were not empty at the time the Vikings arrived, how many, if any, of the

earlier population survived there, and they would have been Christian, and the incomers certainly would have encountered Christianity. So there may have been a kind of process going on even before all of Trigglinson turned up. So when you have this conversion, Does the saga, you know, it says it's a pretty quick, yeah, sure, fine, I'll be Christian kind of a thing. Do we see that this within the saga puts an end to any kind of, I don't know, pre-Christian action, you know, or are we still seeing kind of magic and exciting things happening alongside? No, there are little bits of magic happening. And certainly if it certainly doesn't stop people killing each other,

but then I don't think Christianity has ever managed to stop people killing each other. other, is it really? Not to date. But what's interesting, it kind of happens more than once, because a lot of the story is about earls, co-eurals, it's an unusual political situation. You often have more than one earl who are fairly closely related to each other ruling together. And very often it goes fine for a few years and then at some point one of them decides he wants to get rid of the other one. And there's a guy called Thorfin the Mighty who gets, gets rid of his nephew. And then after that, and this is in the Christian period already, this is in the middle of the 11th century, they never actually kill their relative themselves.

There's always someone else to do it, but it's very obvious that it's done for their benefit. And after he's got rid of his nephew, he then goes to Rome and is absolved of his everything he might have done and comes back and is an excellent ruler and a popular and successful ruler of Orkney. And that pattern occurs a couple of times in the saga. I find that really quite fascinating. Yeah, you do. In the saga have quite a few people who are going on pilgrimage. You know, we've got people touring in for Rome and Jerusalem, all sorts of interesting things. Yes, no, there's a lot of that kind of Christian activity, mainly in the 12th century. Which I think is great, because it does show you how people really do get around. You know,

if we can expect someone from Orkney to show up in Rome that tells us, us a lot about patterns of movement, actually. Yeah, and later on, as you say, as far as Jerusalem. Well, speaking of Thorfin the Mighty, can we talk a little bit about him and the role he plays in the sagas? He's interesting to me because it's clear in the saga that of his four grandparents, only his paternal grandfather is actually a Scandinavian, a North-speaking. You know, his previous Earl of Orkney, see you're there.

out. And Thorfin, he's the youngest of several sons of his father. He is legitimate, but he's brought up by his mother's father's grandfather in Scotland somewhere. And also on his father's side, there's some kind of Irish person, is his grandmother. So to me, it's really interesting that, so I think he must have grown up at the very least being bilingual and possibly even not not learning old Norse still a little bit later in life when he kind of became Earl of Orkney. But culturally, he was very Scandinavian because he had poets, and in particular, very well-known Icelandic poet called Ardnor Yardloskald, working for him, and composing poetry and praise of him. And scaldic poetry is not easy to understand. You have to be linguistically quite good to decipher it.

So I think he's a quite interesting example of the bledding of cultures that you find there, but that somehow or other, from the 11th century onwards, the culture in Orkney and Shetland becomes almost entirely Norse, at least as far as we can make out. And that's because I think the kings of Norway have really started taking an interest in the place, and their connections are mainly with Norway and not so much. with Scotland. But throughout the saga, then there's more and more connections with Scotland. And eventually that's what happens is that in the 15th century, Orkney and Chetland become a part of

Scotland. This is a particularly interesting bit to me, because it does, you know, it sort of begs a particular question. Yes, you have a lot of people who are within the Scandinavian culture here, but they're very close to Scotland, aren't they? You know, it's, this is, you know, you. This is, you someone who is being heralded as being within this particular Norwegian context, but also, yeah, your mom is maybe the daughter of King Malcolm of Scotland. But we don't really, it doesn't really talk about the Scottishness at all. It's just sort of like, don't worry about that. You don't need to think about Scottish people, even though this guy kind of is, you know?

Well, it depends what you mean by being close to Scotland. I mean, you know, if you go to Shetland, people are quite proud of the fact that the nearest railway station is in Norway. You know, the center of power in Scotland was elsewhere. And, you know, there's this great big area up in the north of Scotland, which is not very fully inhabited. And certainly, I mean, I haven't even mentioned Keith Ness yet. I mean, Keith Ness was a part of the earldom of Orkney. So, yes, so if you look at a map, it looks close, but it's actually not necessarily that close, especially, as you say, these people who are very good at sailing long ships here, there, and everywhere. I think that's a really interesting point because, I mean, certainly within the saga,

the way that the earls consider themselves and comport themselves is, you know, they have power as a result of ties with Norway, not Scotland. You know, I think that for historians, it's almost a little bit disappointing, too, because we have so little information on what's happening in Scotland at this point in time, you know, you sort of look to the song of the Earls of Orkney and say, can you tell us anything? And they're like, no, that's not interesting. We're just talking about Norway. We're, oh, no. Yeah, they do get their King David's mixed up, for example. Okay, well, they're just like me then. That's fantastic news. But I do think that that is interesting because it certainly tells us, at the very least, where power in this region lies. There's simply more to be gleaned, I think, from Norway at this point than Scotland, and that just is how things are.

Yeah, and as you said, it's given that there is this whole kind of area around the North Atlantic, not just power, but, you know, contacts and cultural exchange and everything happened all the way from Norway to Dublin and then to Iceland and Farrow. And, you know, so Orkney is very centrally situated in that particular scheme of things. So just in terms of legacy, what can we say about Thorfen here? You know, is this someone who is seen as kind of being a bridging link to Norway? Is this someone who's important in terms of this sort of normalization of what's happening in Norway? Or am I just interested in it because I like the mystery. Yeah, certainly he and his rival, his nephew, Rögenvalder, they're both kind of highing over to Norway to kind of persuade the king of Norway to support them rather than the other guy.

And the saga makes quite clear that, I mean, you know, the Norwegian king actually says to Rögenvalder, well, you know, I know if I make an agreement with you, you'll stick to it. But I know if I make an agreement with Thorfin, then he'll say yes, but then he'll go and do whatever he wants to do anyway. So he's the one who eventually wins out in the end through force of personality, I would say. But I'm not sure Thorfin's legacy is not quite so much. The interesting thing is his power base was in Bursi in the northwest corner of the mainland of Orkney, and you can still see remnants of buildings from the period when that was the power base. but then the power base gradually moved. And there's a site called Orpher in the south of mainland of Orkney,

which is facing in a slightly different direction. And Orphor is quite close to Kirkwall, which then becomes the main power center. Thorfin's legacy didn't really, you know, didn't manage to keep Bersie as the power center. It kind of moved with later Earls. Speaking of later Earls, I think we have to get to sort of the big name,

The big name of the saga of the earls of Ortony, I would argue, is perhaps St. Magnus. Yes, absolutely. Can we talk a little bit about the context behind the story of St. Magnus? Well, it's the same situation I was describing earlier that he rules with his cousin. How come Paul Sinia is his cousin? They actually ruled for quite a long time together, and the saga passes over this very lightly, but they spent part of their time ruling together, going on basically Viking raids together, even though we're now in the early 12th century and not really... That's very naughty. Wow. Okay. You know, they go off and they kill off somebody in Shetland that they didn't like. It doesn't say why and so on. But then again, the same thing happens as with Thorfin

that how compulsive decides that really he... They both go to the king of Norway and how compulsive decides that, you know, it's really up to him to be sole ruler. He wants to be sole ruler. Obviously, this co-rulership thing irks people. So that there's tension between them. And then how come does a dastardly thing. He kind of agrees to a peace treaty and says, let's have a meeting to celebrate our peace treaty. And we'll each come with so and so many men. And of course, he shows up with twice as many men as he agreed. And basically, poor old Magnus is killed, you know, and it's a very detailed and moving account of the process. You know, he tries to negotiate. He says, oh, you know, I'll let you be sole ruler, just, you know, let me go away and I'll

go away and I'll go to Rome or whatever. I'll keep out of your way. But Howecon is then persuaded that by one of his followers who says, well, you know, we can't have two earls alive, it's got to be just one. And nobody wants to kill Magnus because he was quite popular. And Howcon gets his cook to do the deed, presumably, because cooks are used to butchering. And of course, the interesting thing from the political point of view, again, Howcon does the kind of same sort of thing that Thorfin did. He also then eventually becomes a popular and successful ruler, but Magnus becomes a saint. And if you look at the kind of overall politics of the saga, there are these guys like Thorfin and Howcon who are successful and powerful. They're

not very nice. And then there are the nice guys like Magnus. And then Magnus's nephew, Rengvalder, who's my favorite character in the saga, who are a bit nicer or a bit different or not so ruthless at any rate in their politicking, and they always get killed by, you know, again, by the henchmen of their co-rulers. So it's kind of interesting that it's, you know, and probably that reflects some kind of tension between the rulers and the church, because then, although at first the bishop didn't want to accept Magnus as a saint, but then he started coming up with lots of miracles, and then the bishop had to give in. Well, yeah, I think this is a really important point

because it's interesting, I think, to see Magnus as a martyr when he was doing some very naughty things earlier in his career, you know, raiding and things like this. And then he's killed, I would argue, in more of a political context than a religious one. You know, this isn't, you know, killed for his beliefs. It's killed for being one Earl too many. So there does seem to be almost going to be,

almost kind of like a pressing of him into martyrdom here. And that's generally through the performance of miracles, right? Yes. And we were talking earlier about ordinary people. And funnily enough, it's in the book, in the miracle section of the saga, that we actually meet some ordinary people. And the other interesting thing there is that most of them are in Shetland rather than Orkney. and there is, again, a sense.

Because the Earldom comprised Shetland Orkney and Keith Ness, there is a kind of sense that they divided the place up between themselves. And I think both Magnus and his nephew at Ergenvalder, their main power base was in the northern part of the earldom and someone like Thorfinder and how come their main power base was in the southern part of the earldom. So there's those kinds of internal tensions happening there as well. But the miracles are wonderful.

Well, there's the usual kind of thing, you know, people with leprosy or, you know, someone was building a house and a bean falls on his head, but he's cured, you know. And there's several which involve people working on farms in Shetland. And the farmer says, oh, well, you should stop working now because tomorrow. is the feast day of St. Magnus, and these contrary workers just decide to carry on working, just to piss off the farmer, I think, not because they really like working. And then they're struck down with some kind of madness, and it's only when they agree to go on pilgrimage or pay money to the shrine of St. Magnus or whatever, that they're cured of this madness that came over them. But the absolute best miracle involves actually some English men, don't know

where they came from, who are playing a game of dice. And one of them throws two sixes. And the other one thinks, oh my God, how am I going to beat him? I can't throw more than two sixes. But he prays to St. Magnus, and one of the dice splits. So he actually throws two sixes and a one. Oh, okay. Patriot saint of gamblers, St. Magnus is a fantastic stuff. I love the idea that a saint would be concerned with your game of dice. Yeah, I don't know quite. Well, I think there's also another one where someone throws dice as to whether, if they're cured, will they go on pilgrimage to Rome or will they give money to the shrine of St. Magnus? And of course, it's giving money to the Shrine of St. Magnus. Surprise, surprise.

Well, where is the Shrine of St. Magnus, then? So is he, you know, we've got a lot. He is buried in one of the pillars of the cathedral in Kirkwall. I love that he's in the pillar. Like, that's not a heavy-handed allegory at all. No, I can't remember exactly when we think he was moved there, obviously, in the beginning. I mean, for the first 20 years he was buried in Bursi, and it's only when the bishop agreed that he should be a saint that they moved him. And so when they built the cathedral of St. Magnus, built by Rögenwald or his nephew, obviously they wanted the saints relics there.

So he would have been by the altar originally, and then at some point was moved into the pillar. And the pillar was opened up in the 1920s. and so there are photographs from then of the bones there. And I once wrote an article together with an osteo-archologist, and we decided that the damage to the skull that can be seen in these photographs does fit very closely with the description of the killing of St. Magnus. And who else would you bury in a pilgrimage? That's true.

In the cathedral. So it hasn't been opened up since the 1920s. And they wouldn't do that naturally. But he's definitely there. And he's not complete. And as the osteoarchologist pointed out at the time, there's enough of him missing to make sure that all the churches dedicated to St. Magnus in Europe have at least a little bone.

Oh, I love that. We have been talking a lot about, you know, these very powerful men, these very powerful earls and saints. Are there any women who crop up in this saga, or are they kind of more of a background feature? They're not many, but they are very memorable in each in a different way. Actually, probably my favorite one is St. Magnus's mother, Thoda, because ostensibly the meeting on Egosay was supposed to be a peace meeting.

So she'd already sent out the invitations for both of them to come and have a feast at her place. And then only one of them shows up, and it's not her son. It's Halkon. And she behaves very, very bravely. She basically says, oh, I was expecting two of you. However, since there's only one of you, I have a request. I would like my son to be buried in consecrated ground because first Halkon didn't allow that. And then you can be as a son to me and I shall be as a mother to you.

And this actually makes that old warren. or how can't cry. He feels guilty. And then he says, okay, bury him where you like. And I just think that whole chapter is just so moving. It's not true, really. That's all she does.

We don't really meet her elsewhere. I mean, she's mentioned once or twice, and she's married again and has another son and so on. But just her behavior in that chapter is really, I think, quite extraordinary and praiseworthy in a way that none of the men are ever presented as being praiseworthy. I think that's a really interesting point

because you have women often show up in these things almost as allegories, I guess. You know, like oftentimes, I suppose when we're presented with named women in sagas, you know, they're temptresses or they're people who are kind of

egging men on to do bad things or otherwise they are this, this peak feminine person. Like, this is how feminine bravery should be established and how women can get things to their ends, even if it's not necessarily having a living son, right? But I do find it interesting because maybe these aren't particularly reliable discussions about what a named woman did, but it does, I suppose, tell us a lot about expectations of women within the culture more generally. Well, I think this is why I think the saga is a bit of a patchwork, because I think

there's two contrasting ones I can't resist mentioning. The first is Rundhilder, so she's in the early part of the saga. She's actually the daughter of Eric Bloodaxe. And she actually, I think she's really a literary device to make sure that the dynasty gets started, because there's five sons of Thorfin skull splitter. And she kind of works her way through several of them, by persuading other men that if only she marries one and then several of them, and then she persuades other men to get rid of her husband promising marriage, but they're never actually fulfilling her promise to marry the guy who killed her. So that kind of takes care of several of the claimants to the earldom. And obviously, being the daughter of Eric Bloodaxe and Gunnhild,

who is a similar man-eater in the sagas, I think that probably is quite a very, fictional story. But it, you know, she plays her role in the politics of the saga. But then later in the 12th century, there's this woman called Ragnah, who is, she has a son, but there's no mention of a husband, and she has two estates, one on North Ronaldsey and one on Papua Westry. So she's obviously a well-to-do, important woman. And twice in the saga, she challenges two different earls. I mean, in the case of Earl Palt, who's the rival of Rögenwalder, she basically goes to him and says, look, you know, you're trying to fend off this claim on the earldom by Rogenwalder, but I think the way you need to do it is you need support, you need friends,

you need people who will support you in your fight with Rogenwalder, and he just looks at her and says, you're not the Earl of Orkney, I'm the Earl of Orkney, but of course he doesn't follow her advice and it ends badly for him. There you go. There you go. Women have work to be doing. Listen, soft power is power. That's what I always say. Yeah, well, I often think of that as the first example of mansplaining in the sagas, you know. I was kind of saying, it's nothing to do with you. You're just a woman, but actually she was right. There you go. There you go. You already mentioned that we have some features of the landscape that

crop up within the saga. So, for example, barrier mounds and that sort of thing. Is there anything else that we see? Everything. It's interesting to compare with Iceland because there was nothing in Iceland when the Vikings arrived and then they created a whole society there and, you know, it still exists. But the only thing, things in Iceland that are a thousand years old are the place names because their building style was different and just don't have buildings from even a few hundred years ago, little alone a thousand years ago. Whereas in Northern Scotland, where the building style is in stone, well, first of all, there's structures that predate the Viking Age, like the Brocks or Mays Howe, which is a 5,000-year-old chambered tomb. And you can't miss them,

because even today, there's still upstanding in the landings. And both of those, both the Brock of Musa in Shetland and Mayshaal feature in the saga, events happen in them. Without the saga really saying, oh, well, this is, you know, this is an old place. I mentioned the mounds in which whoever compiled the saga at any rate thought the earls might be buried again, their prehistoric probably collapsed brocks in most cases. But then there are also places from the Viking Age and, and later in the 12th century, there's a whole host of ruins of 12th century churches all over the islands. There's buildings on the Brock of Bursi, also from the 12th century.

In Orpher, which I mentioned earlier in the south of mainland, there's a very small but beautiful remains of a round church, which is also mentioned in the saga, because Orpher plays quite a large part in several episodes in the saga. there is, of course, St. Magnus Cathedral, which, I mean, if you haven't been to Orkney, you really must go. It's an absolutely wonderful building. I don't know if you've been to Durham. It's very like Durham, smaller and pink, because it's made of this kind of red sandstone. Because I think Orkney is until the 20th century really is largely an agricultural society. It still is to a very large extent. There hasn't been a lot of buildings. So, you know, it's enabled these older buildings to survive from the Neolithic right through to more recent times. And then, of course, there are the place names as well. The majority of the farm names in Orkney are actually, were actually given in the Norse period in Old Norse and a lot of the minor names as well.

So you can actually just go with the saga in your hand and kind of look at all these places that are mentioned there and imagine what's happening because the landscape hasn't changed that much. And as I said, there are still outstanding buildings you can visit. I think that it's a must to read this before one goes because you can have the context for everything, not just kind of reading a plaque on the side of the road. That's brilliant. Well, I suppose just kind of coming towards the end now, what was the process of translating this like? You know, yes, there were translations before, but for you, what really called you to begin this? first of all, it took me some while to realize, but once you start looking into, it's very, very obvious that every single previous translation is translating a slightly different version of the text because of what I mentioned earlier about how it's been kind of reconstructed. And I wanted just to make that clearer.

And because of all the archaeology I've mentioned, I'm very well aware that the saga is often read by historians and archaeologists who may not know so much old. Norse. So I wanted them to be aware of that aspect of the text. So it's designed for people who don't read Old, obviously, don't read Old Norse, but I tried to incorporate a lot of the kind of knowledge that people who do read Old Norse might already have, but it's not, doesn't come across in the previous translations. But at the same time, I also wanted, and this is a slight trend now in saga translations. Back in 1978 and even earlier,

what translators are doing is writing what they think of as good English. And there's many aspects of this that it means that you're not translating the saga the way it was written

because saga style is a bit different from good English style. There's this kind of various aspects of it that I really like. One is that they don't mind repeating words.

I'm sure you were taught in school that you should never use the same word, you know, in a paragraph, you should find synonyms and things, was they didn't bother. If the word was the right word, they kept using it. They switch between past and present tense. That's a very well-known feature of saga style, which sounds odd at first in English translation, but you get used to it very quickly, and actually it sounds quite okay. And then it's also very, it's all kind of coordinated causes rather than subordinated causes.

Very kind of, and they did this and they went there and they did and and and. Again, and all of this together, I think, actually works better in English than people might have thought. And particularly if you read it out loud, I kind of encourage people to try reading bits of the saga out loud. Because I think without having to learn Old Norse, you get a little bit of a sense of what the text was like in Old Norse. So that was a large part of my motivation as well. Fun question, just a little bit of dessert at the end here. You've already mentioned it, but what's your favorite character or story from the saga? You know, just in a 300-year-long saga, what's your favorite?

Actually, it's one I haven't mentioned. The whole of Chapter 85, it's Rogenvalder, who is the nephew of St. Magnus and grew up in Norway, but his mother was the sister of St. Magnus, and through that he wants to claim the earldom. So he keeps trying to come over and kind of win people over, and on one of his trips over, he gets shipwrecked in Shetland. And there's just this amazing, all kinds of weird things happen in that chapter. There's a really detailed description of the actual shipwreck down to the day of the week in which it happened. which meant that in the 1970s, various archaeologists thought that they might actually be able to find the ship, which in Goldberwick and in Shetland, they didn't find it. But it's very, very realistic. And then there's Rögenvalder, who is a kind of slightly superficial, jokey sort of character anyway, composes all strange stanzas. And that's another of these chapters. And again, it's in Shetland where we meet some ordinary people. So, for example, there's a serving

And after the shipwreck, they're drying off in a farmhouse. And there's a serving woman comes running in and she's all wet. And she's cold. And everyone says, what are you saying, woman? I can't understand you. And Bergen-Valda says, I can understand her. And it turns out that her friend had fallen into the well or something. You know, it's snowing outside and they're all wet.

And just all kinds of little interesting things. And then there's even more going on in that chapter, but I could spend the next hour talking about that chapter. I know you don't want me to do that. So I just suggest everyone go away and read chapter 85. I really like that because it's those little details that tell us so much about what life was like, you know, that yeah, okay, maybe that story didn't happen. But it is believable to think that these people are living in a world with extreme cold, with these little dangers. And it does highlight things. that happen and what life might have been like. This is fundamentally a work that focuses on the great and the good and the grand. You do get an idea of life at every level, I think. Yeah, exactly. And whether or not it happened, it could have happened because, you know, it's very true to life. You know, I think people were being a shipwrecked all the time. This wasn't a particularly bad shipwrecked because they lost the ship and everything on it, but nobody died. I said, we'll take it. That's what counts as good luck.

Well, Judith, I can't thank you enough for coming back to visit with us, and thank you so much for all your work on this new translation. Well, thank you for the chat. This is, you know, really good talking to you about this and proper conversation. My thanks again to Professor Judith Yesh, and thanks to you for listening to Gone Medieval from HistoryHit. Remember, you can enjoy unlimited access to award-winning original TV documentaries, including my recent film The Trial of Joan of Varg, by signing up at historyhit.com forward slash subscription. You can follow Gone Medieval on Spotify, where you can leave us comments and suggestions or wherever you get your podcasts, and tell all your friends and family that you've, Gone Medieval.

Until next time.