It is a question whether Orkney and Shetland, with their Christian Picts and heathen Norse, in the seventh, eighth and ninth centuries, were the birth-place of some of the Edda lays; and whether any of these lays were current there, as oral tradition, and taken down in writing in the twelfth century by earl St. Rögnvaldr and his Icelandic skálds. The solitary preservation and use of many Edda poetic words in Shetland is significant. The first notices we have of writing in the saga are in 1116, when Kali Kolsson, afterwards (1136), earl Rögnvaldr Kali, in a verse, numbered among his accomplishments, bók, reading and writing, and, in 1152, when earl Erlendr produced king Eysteinn’s bréf, letter, at the þing in Kirkjuvágr.
With regard to person-names, it will have been noted that the Norse earls in the male line, although half Gaels, always gave their children Norse names, while the Gaelic earls, who were only of slight Norse descent, gave their children Norse, Gaelic and English names. So that the gœðingar and other leading families of the late eleventh and early twelfth centuries, who also gave their children Norse, Gaelic and English names, were therefore probably, like the Gaelic earls, also of Gaelic descent in the male line. This is also in accordance with the known practice of other Gaelic settlers in Iceland, etc.
The non-Norse characteristics of persons of Gaelic descent are most pronounced—black hair, swarthy complexion, quarrelsome, given to witchcraft, pawky and glib, oath-breakers, etc., which perhaps point to the Iberian element rather than to the true Gael; and that in comparison with the Norse—fair-haired, accomplished and well-bred, generous, makers of hard bargains, which they, however, kept, true to their word, etc.
It must be remembered that these comparative characteristics are the observations of the Norsemen themselves, who wrote the saga, probably Icelanders, and therefore, presumably, exaggerated in their own favour. They are valuable, however, in placing beyond doubt the large strain of non-Norse people who lived in Orkney.
It has been shown that the Gaelic earls, 1139–1350, adopted Norse patronymics, and that all persons in Orkney and Shetland before 1350 used Norse patronymics, including the numerous Gaelic families, which must have settled in the islands. There was no other alternative, just as it was, conversely, the case in the Hebrides, where the Gaels predominated, and where their language prevailed, and was adopted by the Norsemen. Here the Norse Goðormsson became Gaelic M’Codrum, Þorketilsson: M’Corcodail, Ivarsson: M’Iamhair, etc., etc. Compare also the case in Ireland.
Gaelic names in Orkney and Shetland in their Norse form have already been dealt with.
The blending of Norse and Gael in the Hebrides does not appear to have been more successful than in Orkney, since we find, in 1139, that earl Rögnvaldr said that most Suðreyingar were untrue, and even Sveinn Ásleifarson put little faith in them.
The use of Norse names and patronymics by the leading Gaels in Caithness, who are alone mentioned in the Saga, is accounted for by the fashion set by their Norse earls, as well as through the influence of Norse marriages. While the leading people must have been bilingual, speaking Norse (the court language), and Gaelic, the almúgi, or common people, appear to have maintained their native Gaelic. This is indicated in two striking instances in the Saga. In 1158, earls Haraldr and Rögnvaldr went from Þórs-á up Þórs-dalr and took gisting, night quarters, at some erg, which “we call setr.” The local Gaelic name of such a shieling was àiridh, E. Ir. airge, áirge. In 1152, earl Haraldr, who was living at Víkr, dispersed his men á veizlur, i.e., quartered them on various houses, in accordance with the obligations of the householders, during Páskar, Easter; then the Katnesingar said that the earl was on kunn-mið. Vigfússon suggested that this word was some corrupt form of a local name; Dasent translated it “visitations,” and Goudie “guest-quarters,” which is correct, as kunn-mið must be Gaelic, comaidh, a messing, eating together, E. Ir. commaid; cf. Gaelic coinne, coinneamh, a supper, a party, to which everyone brings his own provisions, E. Ir. coindem, cionmed, quartering. In both these cases the E. Ir. spelling comes nearer to the Norse than the Scottish Gaelic does, and corresponds to the Scottish Gaelic of the twelfth century.
The fact that the earl had the right to quarter his men in Orkney and Shetland, is preserved in the tax, wattle < veizla, which was paid in lieu of actual entertainment. This tax continues to be paid to this day.
“The Inhabitants of Orkney and Shetland after 1350,” will be the subject of a future paper; meanwhile it may be emphasised that the Gaelic earls of Orkney failed in the male line before the Scots began to assume permanent surnames. The Gaelic earls were succeeded, in the female line, by the Lowland-Norman family of St. Clair, bearing a hereditary surname, about the time of whose arrival began the Lowland-Scottish settlement of Orkney, to the influence of which must be attributed the assumption of the Lowland Scottish language and the adoption of place-surnames, and not fixed patronymics, in Orkney, by the Norse-Gaelic inhabitants. Shetland, being far removed from the seat of government and fashion, continued the use of patronymics until the nineteenth century, when they became fixed.