The story of Havbor, or Hagbard, and Signelil is a very ancient one. Sven Grundtvig gives it a Russian origin; but, however that may be, it is traced back by other Danish authorities to the dim period of Folk-Migration, before the Skjoldung kings. Sung in an antique Lay—which has perished—it was re-told by Saxo Grammaticus, and frequently referred to in the works of the Icelandic skalds between the ninth and eleventh centuries. The twelfth-century Kormak’s Saga mentions a representation of Hagbard among the carvings in Thorkel’s hall. Snorris’ Edda (Skaldskarparsmal) gives Hagbard’s name in a list of sea-kings; and Brynhild (Volsunga Saga 25) calls him the first of men before the birth of Sigurd Fafnirsbane.
The probable scene of the tragedy is Sigarsted, in Sjælland, near Ringsted, the ancient royal residence. There the sites yet exist of Sigar’s palace and Signe’s bower—there, too, is the howe where the gibbet was raised, and the field where Sigar was defeated by Hagbard’s avenging kinsmen. They were visited by Ole Worm in 1642, and a map of them was published in Monumenta Danica. The Rev. S. M. Beyer, in 1791, excited the antiquarian world by his alleged discovery of a rune-stone commemorating King Sigar—but, since the stone, he was careful to add, had since been destroyed, the statement, to put it mildly, lacks verification.
The ballad-minstrel omits much of the original story, but adds details of his own—Havbor’s reply to the serving-maid, the King’s remorseful outburst, and the punishment of the tale-bearer. The binding of Havbor with Signe’s hair, and his refusal to break it, though appearing at first sight a touch of fantastic mediæval chivalry, probably harks back to a much more primitive superstition, well known to all witches—that which regards the hair as enshrining the life of its possessor. In verse 20 we have a faint reminiscence of the antique Shield-Maidens, Choosers of the Slain.
X
HAVBOR AND SIGNELIL
1
Havbor the King and Sivord the King
Have fallen out in strife,
All for the stately Signelil
That was so fair a wife.