“King Olaf the Swede, with his troops,” was the answer.
“It were better for these Swedes to be sitting at home killing pagan sacrifices, than venturing so near the weapons of the Long Serpent,” said the King. “But who owns the large ships on the larboard side?”
“Earl Eirik Hakonson,” said they.
“Ah,” said the King, “it is from that quarter we may expect the sharpest conflict, for his men are Norsemen like ourselves.”
The battle of Svold was fought in September, in the year 1000, and it was one of the hardest sea-conflicts ever known in the North.
King Sweyn laid his ship against the Long Serpent, and on either side of him the King of Sweden and Earl Eirik attacked the Little Serpent and the Crane. The forecastle men on Olaf’s ships threw out grappling-irons and chains to make fast King Sweyn’s ship, and they fought so hotly there that the King had to escape to another ship, and Olaf’s men boarded the vessel and cleared the decks. King Olaf the Swede fared no better, for when he took Sweyn’s place he found the battle so hot that he too had to get away out of range.
But it was a different story with Earl Eirik, as Olaf had said. In the forehold of his ship he had had a parapet of shields set up to protect his men; and as fast as one man fell another would come up to take his place, and there he fought desperately with every kind of weapon. So many spears and arrows were cast into the Long Serpent that the shields could scarce receive them, for on all sides the vessel was surrounded by the enemy. Then King Olaf’s men grew so mad with rage that they ran on board the enemies’ ships, to get at the people with stroke of sword at close quarters, but many of them missed their footing and went overboard, and sank in the sea with the weight of their weapons. The King himself stood in the gangway shooting all day, sometimes with his bow, but more often casting two spears at once. Once, when he stooped down and stretched out his right hand, the men beside him saw that blood was running down under his steel glove, though he had told no one that he was wounded.
Einar Tambaskelfer, one of the sharpest of bow-men, stood by the mast, and aimed an arrow at Earl Eirik. The arrow hit the tiller end just above the earl’s head with such force that it sank into the wood up to the shaft. The earl looked that way, and asked if they knew who made that shot, but just as he was speaking another arrow flew between his hand and his side, and fixed itself into the stuffing of his stool, so that the barb stood far out on the other side. “Shoot that tall man standing by the mast for me,” said the earl to one who stood beside him. The man shot, and the arrow hit the middle of Einar’s bow just as he was drawing it, and the bow split into two parts.
“What is that,” cried King Olaf, “that broke with such a noise?”
“Norway, King, from thy hands,” said Einar.