Godfrey Crovan was of a character to afford his new subjects frequent opportunities of repairing the losses incurred through the pillage of the Islesmen; and he soon extended his conquests over the Irish Norsemen, capturing Dublin, A. D. 1078. and retaining his supremacy for sixteen years, until he was driven out by Murketagh O’Brien, whose family appear to have made more than one attempt subsequently upon Man.[198] His pre-eminence in the same quarter was also disputed by the surviving sons of Eachmarcach; but they perished in a fruitless effort to vindicate their rights, A. D. 1087. and from the date of this failure the descendants of Ragnar Lodbroc never again rose above the rank of subordinate Oirrighs of Dublin.[199] In the year after he was expelled from his Irish conquests, Godfrey died of a pestilence in the Isle of Isla, A. D. 1095 leaving three sons to inherit his dominions. His great power was based upon his fleet, and to prevent any rivalry upon the seas he is said to have forbidden the Scots—the inhabitants apparently of the western coasts and the Galwegians—to build any vessel requiring more than “three bolts” in its construction.[200]
Such was the condition of the Islands when Magnus Olaveson sailed with a powerful fleet from Norway, A. D. 1098. purposing to re-enact the part of Harald Harfager, and establish the rights of the Norwegian crown over the western conquests of his predecessor. First touching at the Orkneys, he seized upon the two Jarls, and dispatching them in safe custody to Norway, carried off their sons as hostages, placing his own son Sigurd over the Jarldom; though, as the new Jarl was a mere child, the real authority was vested in his council. The king then steered for the Hebrides, rapine and slaughter marking his course, and the flames of the crops and houses which he burnt lighting up his onward career. Some of the Islesmen escaped to the mainland of Scotland; others fled further and sought a refuge in Ireland—for the Norwegian fleet was far too powerful to be resisted with any hope of success by the scattered population of the islands—whilst the least scrupulous, or the most insignificant, escaping with life by submitting to Magnus, swelled the number of his followers, and repaired their own losses by relentlessly pillaging their neighbours. Among the unsuccessful fugitives was Godfrey’s eldest son Lagman, who, before he could escape to Ireland, was surprised amongst the northern Hebrides, and captured off Skye, after a vain attempt to baffle his pursuers amongst the islands. In one feature alone was the expedition of Magnus distinguished from the incursions of his heathen ancestors—the sanctity of Iona was respected. The king is reported to have landed on the sacred island, and opening the door of St. Columba’s Church, to have hastily drawn back, forbidding any of his attendants to enter, and departing immediately after granting peace and immunity to the inhabitants. None ever knew whether a vision had appeared to the king, but his clemency was limited to the hallowed island of Columba, nor was the sword of the destroyer stayed in any other quarter.
At length Magnus arrived at Man, where the inhabitants were in no condition to resist his attack, as they had already wasted their strength in a sanguinary contest between the northern and southern clans near Sandwith—Ottir and MacMaras, the rival leaders, both falling in the course of the battle. At once recognising the importance of the island for retaining his western conquests, he ordered the immediate construction of several wooden forts, built in the usual manner of the age; procuring timber for this purpose from the opposite shores of Galloway, and forcing the Galwegians to convey supplies to Man, and to join in labouring at the entrenchments. From Man he crossed to Anglesey, ravaging the country, exacting tribute from the people, and killing Hugh, Earl of Shrewsbury, who attempted to oppose his descent; whilst he could now boast at the extreme limits of his expedition of having extended his conquests further to the southward than any of his predecessors upon the throne of Norway.
Magnus was occupied during the ensuing winter amongst the Sudreys, or Southern Hebrides, in securing the conquests of the preceding summer and in arranging a treaty with the Scottish king, who is said by some authorities to have admitted the pretensions of the Norwegian monarch to the whole of the islands in the western seas. To such an arrangement (if it were ever made) Edgar could have offered no valid objection, as the majority of the islands could hardly be said, at this time, to have ever been included amongst the dependencies of the Scottish crown. It is further stated that the king of Norway established his claim to his new possessions by sailing round each of them separately; and he is even said to have been dragged across the isthmus at Loch Tarbert in a boat, with his hand upon the tiller, in order to include Cantyre amongst the islands—a story probably invented at a later period to account for the severance of that district from the mainland possessions of the Oirir Gael, and its lengthened occupation by the Gallgael in dependence on the Norsemen and their kings.[201]
A.D. 1099
Magnus returned to Norway in the following summer, leaving Sigurd in his new Iarldom; and he was occupied during the next three years in warring against the Swedes, until peace was concluded, and cemented by his marriage with a daughter of the Swedish king Inge. But his former successes amongst the Hebrides had inflamed him with the desire of further conquests in the same quarter, and hardly had he ratified his alliance with Sweden before he again fitted out a fleet, to be directed on this occasion against the Irish coasts. A. D. 1102. Murketagh O’Brien, collecting the men of Munster and Leth-Mogh, prepared to oppose the invasion; but an arrangement was soon effected between the kings, by which the daughter of Murketagh was given to Sigurd Magnusson, whilst the claims of that prince upon the allegiance of the Dublin Norsemen were probably supported by the Irish king.[202]
A. D. 1103.
Magnus passed the ensuing winter in Ireland, assisting his new allies the Munstermen against their rivals, the northern Hy Nial, and remaining until the following August, when he prepared to return to Norway, and lay off the coast of Ulster awaiting a supply of cattle for victualling his ships, promised by Murketagh O’Brien. The disastrous defeat of the latter prince by the northern Hy Nial, early in the same month, may have prevented or delayed the dispatch of the cattle; and Magnus disembarked with a body of his men, both to ascertain the fate of the scouts whom he had already sent out, and to victual his fleet with the necessary supplies at the expense of the men of Uladh. Whilst thus employed he gradually became entangled amongst the neighbouring morasses; and his retreat to the ships being intercepted by the Ulstermen, who flocked in numbers towards the spot, he fell, with many of his followers,—through the cowardice or treachery of one of his principal officers,—in a fruitless attempt to open a path through the increasing numbers of the foe. On hearing the tidings of his death, the fleet, weighing anchor, sailed immediately for Norway, touching at the Orkneys, and taking on board Sigurd, who relinquished his Irish princess and his island kingdom to claim a share of his father’s dominions, when all the conquests of Magnus reverted to their original possessors; though the Jarls of the Orkneys, and the lords of the Western Islands long continued, whenever it suited their purpose, to rank themselves amongst the feudatories of the Norwegian crown.[203]
With the exception of the expedition of Magnus Olaveson, the nine years of Edgar’s reign seem to have been absolutely devoid of interest, the total absence of event which distinguishes this period arising probably from the personal character of the king. Of a gentle and inoffensive nature, much resembling the Confessor, in his faults perhaps as well as in his virtues, he provoked neither external hostility from his ambition, nor internal revolt from his oppression; whilst the marriage of his sister Matilda with the English Henry, must have tended materially to strengthen his authority, by overawing the turbulent spirits who otherwise might have presumed upon his indolent disposition. He appears to have cultivated the alliance of the Irish king Murketagh, who, from Edgar’s present of a camel, may have aimed at resembling Henry of England in his partiality for rare animals.[204] In imitation of the pious liberality of both his parents, he founded the priory of Coldingham, granting it to the monks of Durham; thus exhibiting his partiality for his mother’s country, and perhaps, also, his attachment to her ancient confessor Turgot, the friend of his own early youth, A. D. 1107. who at this time was prior of the monastery of Durham.[205] Upon the 8th of January 1107, Edgar sunk into an early grave, with his latest breath bequeathing the appanage of Scottish Cumbria to his youngest brother David; not only as a testimony of personal regard for his favourite brother, but as an acknowledgment of the valuable assistance which he had derived, during his contest for the crown, from the intelligence and sagacity of that able and politic prince.[206]