Gripla - 01.01.1984, Blaðsíða 91

DISPUTE RESOLUTION IN THE SAGAS 87
gories fit with our understanding of a society that operated by consensus
rather than by decree.
Resolutions, whether temporary or final, may be direct, arbitrated, or
rejected. Each type of resolution may occur with or without violence
and either in or out of court. As a saga progresses through a number of
small disputes, the audience is presented with a series of resolutions, not
all of them final. For example, a resolution often failed to satisfy one or
more of the disputing parties and led instead to new acts of conflict and
further resolutions.
The way in which resolutions set within the Icelandic social milieu
could easily be turned into sources of new disputes was a key factor in
the sagaman’s art of constructing large and complex feuds out of often
simple issues. For example, Vápnfirðinga saga (IF 11) describes an
extended feud between two local leaders, Brodd-Helgi Þorgilsson and
Geitir Lýtingsson. This feud, the largest of three similar extended feuds
between kinsmen in the saga, includes arbitrated settlements, a number
of rejected resolutions, and a variety of direct resolutions, including
killings. The animosity that arises from each resolution provides both a
rationale for the coming action and an escalating tension that helps to
bind the tale together.
The importance of resolution, as a necessary step in saga feud, has
been apparent to many researchers. Previous attempts to define resolu-
tion have concentrated on aspects other than the role it plays in the
Icelandic system of limiting violence. For example, Andreas Heusler, in
writing extensively about the legal ramifications of feud,2 directs his
analysis of resolution to the ways in which an injured party could
achieve satisfaction: “Es gibt fiir den Verletzten die drei anerkannten
Wege zur Genugtuung, Rache, Vergleich und Dingklage, hefnd, sœtt,
und sókn,”3 There are several problems with Heusler’s formulation.
One is that the category of “revenge” refers only to the taking of direct
2 Das Strafrecht der Islandersagas (Leipzig: Duncker and Humblot, 1911), esp.
pp. 38-40, and Zum istandischen Fehdewesen in der Sturlungenzeit, Abhandlungen
der königlich preussischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Phil.-hist. Klasse, 1912,
no. 4 (Berlin, 1912), esp. pp. 19-20.
3 Fehdewesen, pp. 19-20.
4 The broader aspects of revenge in both the sagas and Grágás are considered
by: Olafur Lárusson in “Hefndir”, Lög og saga (Reykjavík: Hlaðbúð, 1958), pp.
146-178, and Lúðvík Ingvarsson in “Hefnd”, Refsingar á íslandi á þjóðveldistim-
anum (Reykjavík: Bókaútgáfa Menningarsjóðs, 1970), pp. 62-93.