History of Denmark, Sweden, and Norway, Vol. 2 (of 2)

by S. A. Dunham

|1166 to 1169.|

Neither the sanction of the church, nor the vigour of his father, nor even his own virtues, could except Magnus from the common lot of Norwegian kings—open rebellion and rivalry for the throne. The next who troubled his tranquillity was Olaf, a grandson of Eystein II. Proclaimed king by the Uplanders, Olaf had the glory to defeat the regent; but in his turn he was defeated, and compelled to flee into Denmark, where he died the following year (1169).

|1173 to 1177.|

The next was a more formidable rival, in the person of Eystein, a prince of the same family. Placing himself at the head of the discontented, the banished, the proscribed, this prince became a bandit chief, and laid waste the provinces on the borders of Sweden. As the number of his followers increased, so did his boldness, until with a small fleet he sailed for Nidaros, which he subdued. Here he persuaded or forced the people to elect him king (1176). The following year he penetrated into the central provinces, which had the option of either doing homage, or of experiencing all the evils of desolation. In 1177, four years after the commencement of his adventurous career, he met Magnus in the field, and was defeated. His followers hastened into Sweden, the eastern provinces of which were still pagan, and but loosely connected with the crown. He was less fortunate: he was slain in his flight.

|1174 to 1178.|

Of a different character from either of the preceding, and more successful in his object, was the next adventurer, Swerro, whose career is one of romance. His mother, Alfhilda, had been the concubine of Sigurd II.; and he was the issue of the connection. After Sigurd’s death, she became the wife of a smith—a business of high repute in the North—and removed, with her husband and son, to the Faroe isles. Young Swerro was designed for the church, and on reaching the age of twenty-five, he entered into holy orders. Now, for the first time, his mother acquainted him with the secret of his birth. Far more wisely would she have acted by keeping it in her own bosom; for no sooner did the young priest know it, than he indulged in dreams of ambition. As our sleeping are but the images of our waking thoughts, he had a dream which seemed to prognosticate his future greatness. He mentioned it to a friend, who promised him the archbishopric of Drontheim. But he had no relish for the ecclesiastical state; and he mentally interpreted it in a different way. Urged by ambition, he left the obscure isles in which he had been so long imprisoned, and repaired to the court of Magnus. His learning and his martial appearance made a favourable impression on the regent Erling; and he too so admired the vigorous administration of that chief, that in despair of effecting a revolution, he withdrew into the Swedish province of Wermeland. Probably his design was to subsist by plunder, in the service of one of those predatory bands, so frequent on the confines of the two kingdoms. At first, however, his prospects were gloomy; and in his restlessness, he had resolved to go on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, when the band which Eystein had commanded solicited him to become their chief. After some hesitation he consented, was invested with the royal title, and enabled to take the field.

|1178 to 1186.|

The early efforts of this adventurer were bold but unsuccessful. In an expedition through the southern provinces he was indeed joined by some hundred of followers, mostly bandits; but when he proceeded towards the north, where Magnus and Erling had their seat of government, he was abandoned by most of his adherents: the enterprise was too desperate even for them. With great difficulty did he save himself by penetrating through the mountain passes into Wermeland. To escape the pursuits of his enemies, no less than to recruit his numbers, the following spring he plunged into the vast forests of the modern Delecarlia, then called Jarnberaland, or the Iron-being land. The inhabitants knew little of Swedish kings, or of the rest of the world, or of Christianity; but they knew the value of freedom; and in the apprehension that he came to deprive them of it, they prepared a stout resistance. He had no difficulty, however, in persuading those sons of the forest, the mountain, and the river, that he had no design against them—that he wanted hospitality, guides, and troops. Of the last he seems to have obtained none; but he was well entertained, and conducted into Jamtland, where his little band was recruited. The hardships which he underwent in this expedition,—cold, hunger, fatigue—made him resolve to attempt some enterprise, the success of which would rescue him from this wretched mode of life. Appearing suddenly before Drontheim, he hoped to surprise the place; but he was repulsed, and again forced to seek a refuge in the mountains. His next object was to increase the number of his followers; and as he, or some about him, were well acquainted with the haunts of the banditti in the trackless forest, and the inaccessible cavern, he obtained a considerable accession. But a hardy band of peasant archers from Tellmark was his most valuable acquisition. Reappearing before the gates of the capital, he defeated the little army of Magnus, and captured the banner of St. Olaf. As both king and regent were at Bergen, their usual place of residence, he pushed his way into the city, assembled the inhabitants of the province, and was proclaimed king! His task, however, was not half accomplished. A numerous party, including all the churchmen, adhered to Magnus; and he was soon expelled from Drontheim, to seek a shelter in his mountain fastnesses. But with these revolutions he was now familiar: he knew how to recruit his forces—to advance when there was a prospect of victory—retreat when the danger was evident. During two years the civil war raged with violence, and the alternations of triumph and defeat succeeded each other with rapidity. At length Swerro suddenly descended from the mountains, and defeated the regent and his son, leaving the former dead on the field. Magnus fled, but only to return with another army. The second battle, however, was not more fortunate than the first; his army was annihilated or dispersed; and he was glad to seek a refuge in Denmark, while the archbishop fled to England. By the Danish monarch Magnus was supplied with an armament, with which he again contended for the throne, but with no better success. A second time he repaired to that country for aid, and again he fought with the usurper. As on the two former occasions, victory declared for Swerro: his rival fled, and perished in the waves. He was not one of those savage chieftains in whom ancient Norway rejoiced, and whom some of her modern sons would have us mention with respect. If his soul had not been much improved by religion, it had been humanised by education. To the followers of Magnus he exhibited great clemency. He caused the fallen monarch to be magnificently interred in the cathedral of Drontheim; and he himself, in conformity with ancient custom, pronounced the funeral oration of the deceased, to whose virtues, now that he had no reason to fear them, he paid the sincere homage of praise.

|1186 to 1194.|

Swerro (1186–1202) thus obtained the object of his ambition; but he could not expect to hold it in peace. In fact, the whole of his reign was a struggle to preserve what he had so painfully gained. From England archbishop Eystein hurled the thunders of the church at the head of the apostate priest; but the promise of the king, that he would lay his case before the pope, and submit to such penance as his holiness might impose, induced the primate to return and resume his metropolitan functions. Much of his attention was employed on the enlargement and improvement of his cathedral, which he wished to vie with the most splendid Gothic edifices in Europe. From the king he derived considerable aid towards this end; but he lived only to finish the choir. The rest was completed by archbishop Sigurd, in 1248. It was then a very respectable structure. The high altar, which was adorned with a costly silver shrine containing the relics of St. Olaf, and which was visited by pilgrims from all parts of the North, had a splendid appearance. Swerro no doubt expected that by his liberality on this occasion he should win over to his government the great body of the clergy; but he refused to hold the crown as a feudatory of St. Olaf, that is, of the primate; and this rebellion cancelled all his other merits. Aware of the influence which the primate exercised over the people, he endeavoured, on the death of Eystein, to obtain the election of a successor favourable to his views; but in defiance of his influence, that successor was one of his enemies, Eric bishop of Stavenger, who had been the warm friend of Erling and Magnus. From the hands of the new primate he solicited the ceremony of the coronation; but Eric refused, and for so doing he has been severely censured. It should, however, be remembered, that he could not crown an excommunicated prince. That penalty Swerro had incurred by various crimes—by forsaking the altar without the leave of his diocesan, by the shedding of blood at the head of banditti, by assuming the crown without secularisation, and by taking a wife. No bishop, no metropolitan could absolve him: the pope only was competent to dispense with the authority of the canons. In revenge for this refusal, Swerro, a man of vigorous mind, and without a particle of superstition, endeavoured to curtail the revenues and patronage of the church. He insisted that its claim to the pecuniary fine in case of homicide should be abolished, and that the fine should revert to the crown. For this act he must command our praise; but we cannot praise him for attempting to usurp the patronage of the church. We have scarcely an instance in all history of a king exercising the trust in an enlightened and a conscientious manner. Eric supported with firmness the rights of the church, and by so doing incurred the royal displeasure to such a degree that he was compelled to flee into Denmark. From thence he appealed to the pope, who threatened to place the kingdom under an interdict, unless satisfaction were made to the church. In vain did Swerro endeavour to prove that the pope had no right to interfere in such cases: the canons, he well knew, taught a different doctrine. In vain did he attempt to make the multitude believe that the blindness with which the archbishop was visited during the dispute was owing to the wrath of heaven. The people had more confidence in the primate and in the pope, than they had in a monarch whose early career had not been the most edifying.