“If the land lies (is in possession of the buyer) for twenty winters and no notice is given, full value must be paid for it” (Gulath., 272).
The right of redemption was not forfeited until the land had been in the family of the new owner for the period of sixty years without any notice of redemption having been given.
“If the land belongs to the same line of family for sixty years or more, it becomes the odal of the owner, so that no man can buy it from him” (N. G. L., ii. 93).
“If there are two brothers, and one of them dies before his father and leaves a son, then he shall redeem that part of the odal at four-fifths[[455]] of the value from his father’s brother. But he cannot do it before his grandfather is dead” (Gulathing’s Law, 294).
“When the redeemer has claimed the land according to law, he shall carry the money to the land at the middle of the fast on the morning next after the washing-day (Saturday), when three weeks of the fast are left. He shall put it on a stone where field and meadow meet. He shall speak thus: ‘Be here on the land Thursday in the Easter-week, and take the value of the land, as much as it is valued in lawful money. I will come here with honest men, and thou shalt have as many here. They shall value the land as it is done when men redeem their odals. The half of the money shall be in gold and silver, and the other half in native bondsmen not older than forty and not younger than fifteen winters’” (Gulath., 266).
If the king was odalsman (i.e., next of kin) to land in the possession of another, then the redemption was to take place within the reigns of three kings, for otherwise the right of redemption was forfeited.
“If land falls to the king it must be redeemed from his steward who has the survey in the Fylki in which the land lies. If there is no king’s steward in the Fylki, it must be redeemed from the steward who is next in rank and before the lives of three kings are gone. If the land is not redeemed before, it must lie where it is. Though three kings rule the land the time is reckoned as the life of one king. If the king wants to redeem land his steward shall redeem it as we do among ourselves. He must have redeemed it also before the lives of three kings are gone, else it lies where it is. Land cannot be redeemed while the king is in the Fylki in which the land lies” (Gulath., 271).
“The land of no man can become odal before three generations have owned it in unbroken succession and it falls to the fourth (as inheritance)” (Frostath., xii. 4).
“Land becomes the odal of a church if she has owned it for thirty winters” (Frostath., xii. 4).
The land was bought in the following manner, and the bargain was closed by weapon-taking and the shaking of hands.