"...Harald Fairhair had set his son Bjorn as shire-king."
-Poul Anderson, Mother Of Kings (New York, 2003), Book Two, Chapter XV, p. 147.
Shire-king, not shire-reeve?
"That man seldom went to war; instead, he sent merchant ships far and wide, growing wealthy thereby. Thus he came to be called the Skipper or Chapman." (ibid.)
There is a sensible man. However, we learn that he is tight-fisted and surly. Knowing this, Eirik, visiting, sets out to provoke Bjorn, then attacks and kills him. Harald seems to accept that his sons by many women conduct themselves in this manner. War, not trade.
Bjorn's faults notwithstanding, I do not find Eirik's military action on this occasion acceptable. It earns him his nickname Blood-ax:
"Both he and Gunnhild rather liked it." (p. 151)
I am completely out of patience both with the Blood-ax and with his Witch-Queen wife.
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
Norway in King Harald Fairhair's time had a political system which was not as sophisticated as what was seen in either France or the Holy Roman Empire. A "shire-king" was a vassal subordinate to the King of all Norway.
I assume the illustration shows the child Haakon Haraldsson being presented to Aethelstan of England for fostering, thus repaying him for insulting King Harald. Happily, Aethelstan didn't have the heart to kill a child and even came to love Haakon like a son.
And I agree with your comments about the shire-king Bjorn, far better to foster (that word again!) trade and commerce than indulge in needless wars. Eirik Blood Ax was in the process of eliminating possibly powerful rivals to his overlordship of Norway.
Sean
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