The Religion of Ancient Scandinavia

by Sir William A. Craigie

Of the temple which Thorolf erected at his Icelandic home on Thorsness an interesting description is given in Eyrbyggja Saga, which is thus the chief source for what knowledge we have on the subject. It is described as a great house, with doors on the side-walls, nearer to one end of it than the other. In from these doors stood the chief pillars, and in these there were nails, which were known by the name of regin-nails (regin was one of the names for the gods, but its precise meaning here is not certain). The part of the building lying inward from these pillars was a great sanctuary. At the inner end there was a smaller building 'of the same form as the choir in churches is now'; and here, in the middle of the floor, stood a pedestal of the nature of an altar. On this lay a ring weighing two ounces, on which all oaths had to be sworn. It was the duty of the temple-priest to wear this ring on his hand at all assemblies. On the pedestal stood also the sacrificial bowl (hlaut-bolli), and in this were placed the sacrificial twigs (hlaut-teinar), by means of which the blood of the sacrifice (hlaut-blóð) was sprinkled upon those present at the ceremony. 'This was the blood from those animals that were offered to the gods.' Round about this altar the images of the gods were arranged. All those living in the district had to pay toll to the temple, and were bound to attend the temple-priest on all expeditions, 'as thingmen are now bound to attend their chiefs.' On the other hand, the priest had to keep up the temple and not allow it to fall into decay, and to hold in it the sacrificial feasts.

In the late and fictitious Kjalnesinga Saga there is given a similar description of a temple, which may possibly have some basis in local tradition. It is described as having been a hundred and twenty feet long, and sixty broad. At the inner end was a circular annex, the shape of which suggested a cap or hood; this had windows, and was hung with tapestry. Thor was the chief god there, and stood in the middle, with the other gods on each side of him. In front of them was an altar with an iron plate on the top, on which a fire was kept constantly burning: 'they called that hallowed fire.' The silver ring on which oaths were sworn, and the bowl for the sacrificial blood, are also mentioned, but the account of them may be derived from the passage in Eyrbyggja Saga already quoted.

In a much more reliable source, Landnámabók, there occurs the following passage relating to the ring and its use. 'A ring of two ounces or more in weight had to lie on the altar in each chief temple. Each priest had to wear the ring on his arm at all assemblies over which he himself presided, having previously reddened it in the blood of the animal which he himself had sacrificed there. Every man who required to do legal business at a law court had first to take an oath on that ring, and name two or more witnesses. "I name [M. and N.] witnesses herein," he had to say, "that I take an oath on the ring, a lawful oath,—so help me Frey and Njörd and the Almighty God, as I shall pursue (or defend) this suit, or bear witness, or give verdict or judgment, according to what I know to be most right and true and in accordance with the law."' In general agreement with this is the account given in Víga-Glúms Saga: 'That man who was to take a temple-oath took in his hand a silver ring which was reddened in the blood of the sacrificed ox, and which had to weigh not less than three ounces.' In taking the oath, Glúm is represented as using the words, 'I take a temple-oath on the ring, and I say to the god,' etc.; here the names of Frey and Njörd are omitted.[4]

While Iceland was being colonised from Norway, the place and number of the temples would depend on the religious zeal of the settlers in the various districts, but when a fixed constitution was adopted in the year 930 special regulations were made with reference to this. 'The land was divided into quarters, and there were to be three places of assembly in each quarter, and three chief temples in each assembly-district. Men who were noted for intelligence and just dealing were selected to have charge of the temples; these had to appoint the law-courts at the assemblies, and to superintend the legal proceedings there. Each man had to give toll to the temple, as they now give toll to the church.' References to the payment of this tax are not infrequent in the sagas, and one of the results of the preaching of Christianity by Thorvald and Bishop Frederic in 981-985 was that in the north of Iceland 'many men abandoned sacrifices and broke their idols, and some would not pay the temple-tax.' We also meet with such remarks as, 'the men of Geitland had to maintain half of the temple along with Tungu-Odd.' The chief temples were thus legally endowed religious buildings, but it would appear that there were others which were the private property of individuals, and no doubt many of those which were entitled to legal support were originally erected by the more prominent of the settlers. An interesting case of temple endowment is that recorded of Grím Geitskor, who travelled over all Iceland to find the most suitable spot for holding the yearly assembly. For his trouble he received a 'penny' from every man in the island, and this money he gave to the temples. One of the early settlers in the east of Iceland is recorded as having taken formal possession of an unoccupied piece of land for the behoof of a temple which he had built there.

As has already been mentioned, the inner part of the temple was more particularly the sacred place, where stood the altar and the images of the gods. The main part of the building served as a kind of hall, in which were held the entertainments which followed upon the sacrifices, and at which the flesh of the slain animals was eaten. As in the ordinary halls, there were fires in the middle of the floor and seats down each side. In some of the sagas dealing with prehistoric times in Sweden mention is made of a dísar-sal (in connection with the worship of the dísir: see [p. 33]). What relation this had to the usual temple is not clear: it has been supposed to be no more than another name for the temple-hall, but this is not at all certain.

The temple being a holy place, there were naturally certain restrictions attached to it, of which a prominent one was that no weapons were to be taken inside it. This is clearly illustrated by an incident in Vatnsdæla Saga, where Ingimund enters the temple first, and Hrafn the Norwegian follows him, wearing his sword. Then Ingimund turned to him, and said, 'It is not the custom to carry weapons in the temple, and you will come under the wrath of the gods unless you make amends for it.' When Olaf Tryggvason entered the temple of Mærin in Thrandheim, he carried a gold-mounted staff, but his own men and those belonging to the district were weaponless.

Another offence which is frequently mentioned is that of slaying a man in a holy place; in this connection, however, the regular word used is not hof but vé, which has a more general meaning. One who committed this offence incurred the penalty of outlawry, and was designated by the name of vargr í véum, 'wolf in holy places.' The same view of bloodshed as a crime against the sanctity of a holy place is illustrated in the cases of Thorsness and Stödvar-firth in Iceland, where the killing of anything was forbidden. In the case of Thorsness it was decided, after a battle had taken place there, that it was defiled by the blood that had fallen on it, and 'was now no more holy than other places.'

Along with the timber-buildings known as hof, there is frequent mention, both in the historical and legendary sources, of other sacred places called hörgar. In its simplest form the hörg was evidently a kind of stone-altar or sacrificial cairn standing in the open air; in modern Norwegian and Icelandic the word is applied to a mountain-top. This is most clearly indicated by the words of Hyndlu-ljóð, where Freyja says of Ottar, 'He made me a hörg, piled up with stones; now these stones are turned to glass. He reddened it in the fresh blood of oxen. Ottar always believed in the goddesses.' In contrast to the burning of temples, the usual expression for the destroying of hörgar is 'breaking,' which also indicates a structure of stones. In some cases, however, the name of hörg seems to be applied to something more approaching the nature of the hof; this not only appears to be implied in the use of 'timbered,' which occurs in at least two poetic passages, but is also suggested by the wording of the old Norwegian law, 'if a man raises a mound (haug), or makes a house, and calls it a hörg,' etc. The stone altars or cairns would naturally be more primitive places of worship than the temples, but they continued in use along with these down to the disappearance of the old religion. The altar in the temple, indeed, was no doubt the representative of the earlier and ruder one in the open air, for both are spoken of as being 'reddened' with the blood of the sacrifice.

It has been already made clear that the gods worshipped were represented in the temples by images, which in the historical accounts are called by the names of líkneski ('likeness') and skurð-goð ('carved gods,' probably an epithet applied by Christians). The description given by Adam of Bremen of those which stood in the temple at Upsala has already been quoted ([p. 4]); here it is only necessary to add that in no other writing of historical value is there any mention of an image of Odin. With Thor the case is very different. Another image of this deity is mentioned by Adam himself, who relates that about the year 1030 an English missionary in Sweden found it standing in the assembly-place of the heathens. In his religious zeal he smashed it with an axe, and was at once put to death by the angry worshippers. Images of Thor are also frequently referred to in the Icelandic sagas. In the year 998, when King Olaf Tryggvason was christianising Norway, he entered the temple at Mærin in Thrandheim, 'and when the king came where the gods were, there sat Thor, adorned with gold and silver, and was most honoured of all the gods.' In the fullest account of this incident it is stated that the image was seated in a splendid chariot, to which were harnessed two goats beautifully carved out of wood; both chariot and goats were on wheels, and the cords attached to the goats' horns were of silver. Thor in his chariot is also mentioned as one of the images in the temple belonging to Earl Hákon and Gudbrand in the Dales, which is described in Njál's Saga. There is no mention of the chariot, however, in the account of this image given in connection with King Olaf's visit to the Dales in 1021. There it is said to have been 'of great stature, and hollow inside, with the hammer in his hand; under him there is a kind of pedestal or platform, on which he stands when he is outside; and on him there is no lack of gold and silver.' This image was carried out to the place where the people of the district held their meeting with Olaf, and those already assembled there paid homage to it. It was set down in the middle of the ground, and on one side of it sat the heathens, and on the other the king and his followers. It is also related that at the battle of Svöldr in the year 1000, Earl Eirík had an image of Thor in the prow of his ship, but threw it aside and put a cross in its place when he found his men unable to board Olaf Tryggvason's vessel.

Mention has already been made ([pp. 7-8]) of the likeness of Thor carved on the chief pillars of the temple in Mostr, and no doubt similar representations of the god were not uncommon. In that part of the story of Thormod the poet which takes place in Greenland, about 1027, a large chair is described as having on its back an image of Thor with his hammer.