Still, the disparity of forces was not so great after all. Most of the kingsmen were superb warriors, and all were animated with enthusiasm for Olaf's cause. It was otherwise in the host of the yeomanry; many had small desire to fight for King Canute, and among the chiefs there was an evident reluctance to lead. Kalf had, therefore, no difficulty in securing authority to command—it was almost thrust upon him.
The battle was joined at Stiklestead farm, about forty miles north-east of the modern Throndhjem. The summer night is short in the Northlands and the long morning gave opportunity for careful preparation. At noon the armies met and the battle began. For more than two hours it raged, King Olaf fighting heroically among his men. Leading an attack on the hostile standard, he came into a hand-to-hand conflict with the chiefs of the yeomanry and fell wounded in three places.[351]
Saint Olaf's day is celebrated on July 29th, and it is generally held that the battle was fought on that date. Some historians have thought that it was really fought a month later on the last day of August. Sighvat was that year on a pilgrimage to Rome, and was consequently not an eye-witness; but his lines composed after his return are, nevertheless, one of the chief sources used by the saga-men. The poet alludes to an eclipse of the sun on the day of the battle:
They call it a great wonder
That the sun would not,
Though the sky was cloudless,
Shine warm upon the men.[352]
Such an eclipse, total in that very region at the hour assigned to the climax of the fight, actually occurred on August 31st. It is generally held, however, that the eclipse came to be associated with the battle later when the search for miracles had begun.
The reaction was successfully met, but without any assistance from Canute. Sweyn had prepared a large force of Danes, commanded it seems by Earl Harold, and had hastened northward; but had only reached the Wick when the battle of Stiklestead was fought. It seems strange at first thought that no English fleet was sent to assist Kalf and his associates. It is not likely that Canute depended much on the fidelity of the Northmen—he understood human nature better than most rulers of his time; nor had he any means of knowing how widely the revolt would spread when the former King should issue his appeal. The key to his seeming inactivity must be sought in the international situation of the time: England was just then threatened with an invasion from the south, a danger that demanded a concentration of military resources on the shores of the Channel.
The accounts that have come down to us of the relations of England and Normandy during the latter half of Canute's reign are confused and contradictory; but a few facts are tolerably clear. Some time after the murder of Ulf (1026), Canute gave the widowed Estrid in marriage to Robert the Duke of Normandy (1027-1035).[353] It may be that on his return from Rome in the spring of 1027 Canute had a conference with Robert, who had succeeded to the ducal throne in the previous February. But whether such a meeting occurred or not, Robert had serious trouble before him in Normandy and no doubt was eager for an alliance with the great King of the North. The marriage must have taken place in 1027 or 1028; a later date seems improbable. The father of William Bastard is not famous for conjugal fidelity and may not have been strongly attracted by the Danish widow; at any rate, he soon repudiated her, perhaps to Estrid's great relief, as Duke Robert the Devil seems not to have borne his nickname in vain. The characteristics of the Duke that most impressed his contemporaries were a ferocious disposition and rude, untamed strength.
It is likely, however, that the break with Canute is to be ascribed not so much to domestic infelicity as to new political ambitions; at the court of Rouen were the two sons of King Ethelred, Edward and Alfred, who had grown to manhood in Normandy. It apparently became Robert's ambition to place these princes on English thrones, which he could not hope to accomplish without war. An embassy was sent to Canute (perhaps in 1029), somewhat similar to the one that Canute had sent to Norway a few years before, bearing a similar errand and equipped with similar arguments. Evidently the Norman ambassadors did not receive kind treatment at the English court. Their report stirred the Duke to great wrath; he ordered a fleet to be prepared for an invasion of England.[354] Most likely that was the time, too, of the Duchess Estrid's disgrace.
The expedition sailed, but a storm sent, as William of Jumièges believes, by an overruling Providence, "who had determined that Edward should some day gain the crown without the shedding of blood," drove the fleet in a westerly direction past the peninsula of Cotentin to the shores of Jersey. Robert was disappointed, but the fleet was not prepared in vain: instead of attacking England, the Duke proceeded against Brittany and forced his enemy Duke Alain to seek peace through the mediation of the Church at Rouen.[355]
These events must have occurred after Canute's return from the North,—in the years 1029 and 1030. No other period seems possible; it is not likely that the threatened hostilities could have been later than 1030, for in 1031 a new King, Henry I., ascended the French throne and Robert the Devil became involved in the resulting civil war.[356]