The Viking Age. Volume 1 (of 2) / The early history, manners, and customs of the ancestors of the English-speaking nations

by Paul B. Du Chaillu

Fig. 318.

Fig. 319.

Fig. 320.
Baptismal fonts with runic inscriptions, some apparently heathen.

Two rock-tracings found at Ramsund and Gœk, on the southern shores of Lake Mälar, province of Södermanland, Sweden, show how deeply preserved in the memory of the people all over the North is the history of the Volsungar as told in the earlier Edda, and the Saga of that name. To the late Professor Carl Säve we are indebted for the discovery of these two mementoes of the past. I here give the representation of the finer of the two, which is engraved on granite.

Fig. 321.—Tracing of later runes illustrating the Eddaic songs and Volsunga saga. Length, 16 feet; width, from 4 to 5 feet.—Ramsund Rock, Södermanland, Sweden.

The scene is surrounded below by sculpture, and covered with runes above are two serpents twisted together, one without runes. Below the large snake Sigurd on his knee pierces with his sword the body of the reptile. In the midst between the snake the horse Grani is standing, made fast to a tree where two birds are seen. On the left Sigurd, seated, roasts on the fire, at the end of a stick, the heart of Fafnir. Round the fire are deposited pincers, an anvil, bellows, and hammer; the head of the smith (blacksmith) Regin is seen separated from the trunk. Then above is sculptured an animal, which looks like a fox—no doubt the otter—for the murder of which was given, as ransom, the rich treasure so fatal to Fafnir and to all those who possessed it after him. The runic inscription has not the slightest connection with the scene, not even with Sigurd Fafnisbani. As Mr. Säve remarks, Sigurd or Holmger, and perhaps both, believed that they were descended from Sigurd Fafnisbani, the famous hero of the Volsunga.

The tracing on the stone of Gœk, not far from the city of Strengenæs, is about half the length of that on the Ramsund stone, but of the same width, and is not as fine. The subject is treated in a somewhat similar manner: the hammer is on the ground, while on the Ramsund stone it is in the man’s hand. Above the horse Grani is a Christian cross.