Conceptualizing the Multicultural ‘North’ in the Íslendingasögur: Peoples, Places, and Phenomena

Solveig Marie Wang

doi:10.7557/13.5480

Abstract

During the early medieval period, a large part of Fennoscandia was inhabited by the Sámi (Zachrisson 2008, 32). With written sources such as Historia Norvegiæ, Ágrip af Noregs konungasǫgum, and Heimskringla referring to Sámi settlements in the Viking and medieval period reaching as far south into Norway as Hadeland (Einarsson 2007, 5-7), alongside archaeological excavations asserting a Sámi cultural presence south of the contemporary cultural borders of Sápmi (Bergstøl 2008), close contact between the groups is not surprising. Despite often being described as ‘desolate’ and ‘remote’ (especially in the terra nullis colonialism exercised by the Scandinavian nation states in early modern times), the northernmost parts of the Fennoscandian landscape complexes are described as already inhabited in several medieval Scandinavian sagas, including the Íslendingasögur. Primarily, these texts explicitly assert that the ambiguous and distant ‘north’ of Fennoscandia was a special, preternatural place, simultaneously internal and external to what medieval Icelanders perceived as ‘Nóregi’. Whether enforced by the ‘othering’ of characters depicted with northern descent through expressive features and abilities traditionally associated with the area or its indigenous inhabitants, by the descriptions of different landscapes and communities unequivocally ‘othered’ and distinct from that of the saga-writers’ reality, or by extraordinary phenomena connected to the two, ‘norðarliga í Nóregi’ is portrayed as somewhat distinct from that of the rest of the ‘national’ landscape. Encompassing an area extending further south than contemporary northern Norway, the notion of a supernatural north in the Íslendingasögur goes beyond an idea of a unified Nóregi. Moving into the land of powerful chieftains in Naumdælafylki and the ambivalent Hálogaland, venturing ‘á fjall upp’ to the Sámi borderlands of Finnmǫrkr, whilst also incorporating the mysterious landscapes and peoples of eastern Fennoscandia, the notoriously equivocal Kvenland and Bjarmarland, distinct descriptions of peoples, places, and phenomena appear and follow literary patterns and stereotypes that are sometimes archaic. By discussing the portrayal of north Norwegian landscapes and geographical understandings in these texts, in conjunction with an examination of the depiction of the Sámi, this essay aims to demonstrate how north Norwegian spatial awareness in the Íslendingasögur can help enlighten cross-cultural relationships and liminal identities, and present fewer rigid contrasts between people and cultures in Fennoscandia than previously accounted for.

Highlights

Despite often being described as ‘desolate’ and ‘remote’, the northernmost parts of the Fennoscandian landscape complexes are described as already inhabited in several medieval Scandinavian texts, including the Íslendingasögur
Our contemporary perception and experience of the landscape is never similar to the way it was perceived or experienced in the past (Bergstøl, 2008), even though certain archaic features might remain: ‘The landscapes, with natural borders and diverse natural conditions, were fundamental for existence and for the establishment of industries in past societies, and might be a major factor in creating long-term historical development.’ (Amundsen 2017, 191) Because of this, the textual representations of landscapes presented in the Íslendingasögur can portray the ideological nature in which they occur, in a sense presenting certain early medieval perceptions of the geopolitical and sociocultural situations in which they were written, as well as an understanding of the past they represent
Tschan 2002, 215) This conceptualizing of northernmost Fennoscandia as a distant and deserted place is sometimes accompanied by negative stereotypes about its indigenous population, emphasized by the Danish historian Saxo Grammaticus in the late twelfth century: ‘To the north it [Norway] faces an undefined and nameless territory, lacking civilization and swarming with strange inhuman races.’

Summary

Introduction

Despite often being described as ‘desolate’ and ‘remote’ (especially in the terra nullis colonialism exercised by the Scandinavian nation states in early modern times), the northernmost parts of the Fennoscandian landscape complexes are described as already inhabited in several medieval Scandinavian texts, including the Íslendingasögur. Fisher 2015, 17) regardless of their own assumptions of an area in northern Norway void of [civilized] people, both authors later assert the presence of a people known to them as Scritefingi and Finni, synonymous with the Finnar found in Old Norse texts, rumoured to be expert hunters and powerful magicians

Results

Conclusion