THE ZARNCKE I COLLECTED BY FRIEDRICH .IBRARY ZARNCKE j//l/p..--.- THE GIFT OF William m. Mi 1893 AjkMJLfLsc. Havelok the Dane and the Norse king Olaf Kuaran, By Dr. Gustav JLtorm, Professor of history at the University of Ghristiania. (Christiania Videnskabsselskabs Foi-handlinger 1879. No. l'O). Christiania. I Commission hos Jac. Dybwad. Cornell University Library The original of this book is in the Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924013115757 Havelok the Dane and the Norse king Olaf Kuaran. By Dr. Ghistav Storm. The traditions of Havelok the Dane, which English chronicles of the latest centuries of the middle ages often mention and tri^ to insert in the English history, are happily recovered in this cen- tury. They are found in a French „lai d'Aueloc le Danbis", com- posed in the first half of the 12th century and abridged by Geffrei Gaimar ca. 1145, and in the English „Lay of Havelok the Dane" from about A. D. 1280. I shall here give a short abridgment Of the French Lay and there upon notice the variations of the Etig- lish, in so far as they concern my purpose, to research the histo- rical matter of the tradition. „The Britons made a lay concerning kingAveloc, who is surnamed Cuaran. His father Guhter, king of the Danes, was overran by Arthur, and Gunter perished by the treason of Hodulf, who became king under Arthur. Avelbc was saved by Grim, who crossed the sea and arrived at the haven afterwards named Grimesby by Grim. There he Settled as fisher- man and the child grew up as his son. Grim sent him to the king's court at Lincoln. At that time Alsi (i. e. vElfsige) was king of Lincoln and Lindisey and of the country southward, where the late king Ekenbright had committed his daughter Argentine to the care of Alsi with the command, that she was to be married to the strorigest man that could be found. Aveloc, on his arrival to the court, was employed to carry water and cut wood, and there- fore he was named Cuaran, which in the British language means Vid.-Selsk. Forh. 1879. No. 10. 1 4 G. STORM. HAVELOK THE DANE AND THE NOBSE KING OLAF KUABAN. The lay d'Aveloc is come to the Norman poet from the Welsh, if we may trust to the words of the poet and the evidence of philology. But it is evident from the story, that the tradition is of local origin; the original ballad must have been composed in Lincolnshire, among the places named in the poem (Lincoln, Thet- ford, Grimsby). And the partiality for Aveloc against his English foes makes it as evident, that the original poem is come up among the Danes of Lincolnshire, not the English. It we study the English poem of Havelok, we have to notice that the scene of the story is enlarged. Havelok is not king of Danmark and Lincolnshire, but of all England.; the later poet has forgotten the battles of the English kings in the 10th century for recovering Mercia from the Danes, but he does remember the conquest of all England by the Danes i. e. the history of king Canute, and of course he turns Haveloc into a predecessor of this conqueror. It is then curious to see where he has found the name of Haveloc's father, for the name „Birkabeyn" has also its hiftory. The events of the great Norwegian kingSverre was noti- ced in England by the Latin chronicler, who is known by the name of Benedict ofPeterbourgh ca. A. D. 1180-90; but soon afterwards this chronicle was rewritten by Roger of Howden, who adds a sur- name for the norwegian usurper; he calls him „rexSwerreBirke- bain", taking the nickname of the royal partisans for a surname of the king. This word might therefore in the 13th century be used as a proper name for a Scandinavian king and be employed in a romantic tale of a Danish prince. For from the time of Canute the Danes in England became identical with Scandinavians, and thus it seems quite casual, that the originally Norse king Olave, although the tale makes him Danish, has a father of Nor- wegian origin given to him. The Dano-English tale of Havelok has of course no place for the battle of Brunanburgh, where the Norse king Olave Kuaran along with his cousin from Dublin (Olave son of Godfrid) and his father-in-law king Constantine were put to flight by the English king Athelstan. But the open space is filled up by an English CHBISTIAN1A VIDBNSK.-SELSK. FOEHANDL. 18 7 9. No. 10- a tale, which represents Aveloc as the declared foe of the English people. This tale was known in metrical form at the beginning of the 14* century, and still we find in „Bishop Percys Folio- Manuscript" (vol. II, p. 509—49) a ballad on this battle, the duel of the celebrated hero Guy of Warwick with the heathen giant Colebrand. Here „Avelocke, king of Danmark", comes with a mighty force to England, and with him the „ giant stiff and stark" Colebrand, who has sworn to subdue all England. No English knight dares figt him except the old forgotten Guy, who on God's demand is ready to fight for Englands right, „that I may England ont of thraldom bring". In the duel, which is described at length, Guy cuts of the giant's hand and head „with a Danish axe", the Danish king flees back to Denmark „with sorrow and mickle care", and gives up his claims to England. In another MS. of the poem the heathen king is, as in hi- story, named Anlaf, and this is probably the older version; in changing Anlaf into Avelocke the author or the scribe of the poem acknowledges the identity of the two persons. Cornell University Library PR 2065.H4S88 Havelok the Dane and the Norse King Olaf 3 1924 013 115 757 * ACass/ci OLINLIBH r/tDHIFlf 1 R£UIAT10N MP** KM W.vfittRE DUE IJHACA, t IY 14853 IfiftV ififLJ mtmt&s \ IM&tmzm iW 8 *' ^** r&^ijSjfaft f Ww CAYLORD PRINTED IHU-S. A.