[10] English translation by Sir G. W. Dasent.
[11] They were pledged by Christian I of Denmark and Norway for the payment of the dowry of his daughter Margaret to James III in 1460 and the pledge was never redeemed.
CHAPTER VII
THE VIKINGS IN BALTIC LANDS AND RUSSIA
The activities of the Northmen during the Viking age were not confined to the lands west and south of their original homes: the Baltic was as familiar to them as the North Sea, to go 'east-viking' was almost as common as to go 'west-viking' and Scandinavian settlements were founded on the shores of the Baltic and far inland along the great waterways leading into the heart of Russia. As was to be expected from their geographical position it was Danes and Swedes rather than Norwegians who were active in Baltic lands, the Danes settling chiefly on the Pomeranian coast among the Wends, while the Swedes occupied lands further east and founded the Scandinavian kingdom of Russia.
Already in the early years of the 9th century we find the Danish king Guðröðr now making war against his Slavonic neighbours in Mecklenburg-Schwerin, now intriguing with them against the emperor. Mention is made of more than one town on the southern coast of the Baltic bearing an essentially Scandinavian name, pointing to the existence of extensive settlements. Interesting evidence of this eastward movement is also to be found in the Life of St Anskar. There we learn how, soon after 830, a Danish fleet captured a city in the land of the Slavs, with great riches, and we hear in 853 how the Swedes were endeavouring to reconquer Kurland which had been under their rule, but had now thrown off the yoke and fallen a prey to a fleet of Danish Vikings—possibly the one just mentioned. St Anskar himself undertook the education of many Wendish youths who had been entrusted to him.
This and other evidence prepare us for the establishment, in the tenth century, of the most characteristic of all Viking settlements, that of Jómsborg on the Island of Wollin at the mouth of the Oder. According to tradition King Gorm the Old conquered a great kingdom in Wendland, but it was to his son Harold Bluetooth that the definite foundation of Jómsborg was ascribed. For many years there had been an important trading centre at Julin on the Island of Wollin, where traders from Scandinavia, Saxony, Russia and many other lands met together to take part in the rich trade between north and south, east and west, which passed through Julin, standing as it did on one of the great waterways of central Europe. Large finds of Byzantine and Arabic coins bear witness to the extensive trade with Greece and the Orient which passed through Julin, while the Silberberg, on which Jómsborg once stood, is so called from the number of silver coins from Frisia, Lorraine, Bavaria and England which have been found there. It was no doubt in the hope of securing some fuller share in this trade that Harold established the great fortress of Jómsborg and entrusted its defence to a warrior-community on whom he imposed the strictest rules of organisation. The story of the founding of Jómsborg is told in the late and untrustworthy Jómsvikingasaga, but, while we must reject many of the details there set forth, it is probable that the rules of the settlement as given there are based on a genuine tradition, and they give us a vivid picture of life in a Viking warrior-community. No one under eighteen or over fifty years of age was admitted to their fellowship, and neither birth nor friendship, only personal bravery, could qualify a man for admission. No one was allowed to continue a member who uttered words of fear, or who fled before one who was his equal in arms and strength. Every member was bound to avenge a fallen companion as if he were his brother. No women were allowed within the community, and no one was to be absent for more than three days without permission. All news was to be told in the first instance to their leader and all plunder was to be shared at a common stake. The harbour of Jómsborg could shelter a fleet of 300 vessels and was protected by a mole with twelve iron gates.
The Jómsvikings played an important if stormy part in the affairs of the three Scandinavian kingdoms in the later years of the 10th and the early 11th century. Many of them came to England in the train of king Svein, while Jarl Thorkell was for a time in the service of Ethelred the Unready. The decline of Jómsborg as a Viking stronghold dates from its devastation by Magnus the Good in 1043, but the importance of Julin as a trading centre continued unimpaired for many years to come.
From Jómsborg Harold Bluetooth's son Hákon made an attack on Samland in the extreme east of Prussia, but the real exploitation of the Eastern Baltic fell as was natural to the Swedes rather than to the Danes. We have already mentioned their presence in Kurland on the Gulf of Riga, and we learn from Swedish runic inscriptions of expeditions to Samland, to the Semgalli (in Kurland) and to the river Duna. The important fortified port of Seeburg was probably near to Riga, while the chief trade route from the island of Gothland lay round cape Domesnæes (note the Scandinavian name) to the mouth of the Duna.
The chief work of the Swedes was however to be done in lands yet further south, in the heart of the modern empire of Russia in Europe.