[10]. See [Appendix, No. II.]
Section VI.
The Battle of Clontarf.—Power of the Ostmen after the Battle.—Their
Churches and Bishops.—Their Land and Sea Forces.—The English
Conquest.—Remains of the Ostmen.—Their Importance for Ireland.
The cause of the battle of Clontarf, so celebrated in song and legend, or, as it is called in the Sagas, “Briánsbardagi” (Brian’s battle, after King Brian, who fell in it in 1014), is not precisely known. All that we are acquainted with is, that Brian, who was connected by very close ties of relationship with the Norwegian royal family in Dublin, had long availed himself of the assistance of the Norwegians to subdue other Irish princes, until, at length, after gaining victories in that manner, he came to a rupture with King Sigtryg of Dublin. The prospects of Sigtryg, and of the Norwegian power in Ireland, seem really to have been threatening enough; at least it is said that Scandinavian warriors hastened in numbers to Sigtryg’s assistance from the Scandinavian kingdoms in England, the Isle of Man, the Syder Isles, and Orkneys. From the last, in particular, came Jarl Sigurd the Stout, with a chosen force, in the midst of which waved a flag with the image of Odin’s holy raven. Sigurd’s own mother had woven this raven, which, with fluttering wings, had often before led the warriors to victory and glory.
This time, however, the raven was checked in its flight. After many of the standard bearers had been killed, Sigurd Jarl himself took the flag from the staff, and wrapt it about his body. He seemed to foresee, what really happened shortly afterwards, that the raven-flag would be his winding-sheet. The Norwegians were at length forced to give way, even if the battle was not so entirely lost as the exaggerated Irish accounts represent. The Scandinavian auxiliaries withdrew to their ships, and King Sigtryg retired with the remnant of his army to Dublin.
But, as the Irish chronicles contain nothing about Sigtryg and his men having been afterwards expelled from Dublin, or about the Norwegian dominion there having been entirely destroyed, we cannot conclude from them that the power of the Ostmen in the rest of the Irish cities was annihilated in consequence of Sigtryg’s defeat in the battle of Clontarf. It would, besides, have been singular enough if the power of the Norwegians in Ireland had been perfectly destroyed so early as the year 1014, since it was just after that time that the Northmen in the neighbouring countries acquired their greatest power by means of their victories. Instead of the Norwegian influence in Ireland having ceased, we not only find, long after this battle, King Sigtryg of Dublin fighting bravely with his Ostmen, though at times with varying fortune, against several Irish kings and chiefs, but we further behold the Ostmen displaying a very remarkable degree of strength and independence in various places in Ireland.
About five-and-twenty years after the battle of Clontarf (say the Irish chroniclers themselves), Sigtryg, king of the Ostmen in Dublin, and Donat (Dunan), their bishop, built, in the middle of that city, the church of the Holy Trinity, also called Christ Church. That the Ostmen should then have founded one of the principal churches of Dublin, which even lay without their own town (Ostmantown), in the very heart of ancient Dublin, is highly significant. After the church was built, Bishop Donat presented several relics to it, amongst which are mentioned “pieces of the clothes of King Olaf the Saint.” The great respect in which the name of the Norwegian Saint Olaf was held in Dublin is also manifest from the circumstance that a church consecrated to St. Olave, or, as the Irish common people gradually corrupted the name, to “Tulloch” (compare the name of Tooley Street in London, corrupted from St. Olave Street), was to be found there till at least far into the sixteenth century. This church adjoined the northern end of Fishshamble Street, near Wood-Quay; but originally, perhaps, it was just outside the city.