Gripla - 20.12.2014, Síða 119

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when grettir is about to be hanged by the local farmers for stealing their
cattle and generally misbehaving. she not only rescues him, but hosts him
at her farm for a while; she becomes much renowned for this, and grettir
praises her in a verse.111 thus women are allowed to transcend their nor-
mally restricted gender role, provided that they are not working towards
their own goals, but rather on behalf of the protagonist.
In the sagas of AM 152 fol., fantasies of unrestrained sexual behaviour
are projected onto the other: monstrous men are the aggressors and pose
danger to aristocratic women, but monstrous women are willing sexual
partners and helpers, just like female characters more generally. seen from
another point of view, the prince who rapes in disguise is perhaps a warn-
ing to young women not to trust men, because, despite their charming
exterior, a monster may lurk within. thinking about the historical context,
perhaps redactors and audiences would have made connections between
the monstrous Other and foreigners, such as the english fishermen and
merchants who sailed up to the shores of Iceland in the fifteenth century
and interacted with Icelanders. Dozens (or more) of ships arrived every
year, so a foreign presence, perhaps hundreds of sailors during the warmer
months, must have been tangible for the small population – twice in the
1400s depleted by plague – at least anywhere close to the sea.112 Certain
Icelanders, including the skarðverjar, benefitted enormously from trade
with these foreigners, but as the slaying of Björn ríki shows, this interna-
tional contact sometimes turned violent.113 Presumably, Icelandic fathers
and brothers were not keen on the foreigners coming too close to their
daughters and sisters, and thus these outsiders can be seen as demonised as
monstrous rapists standing outside of human society. However, domestic
power struggles were no less a reality and since the manuscript expresses
such a strong regional identity, it is perhaps conceivable that people from
outside the area were seen by some as outsiders not to be trusted. finally,
if read carefully, many of the protagonists’ behaviour is no different from
111 f. 30r; Grettis saga, 151–152.
112 Englishmen began to sail to Iceland around 1400, while german sailors started arriving
there in ca. 1468; see Saga Íslands, 5:13, and Björn Þorsteinsson, Enska öldin í sögu Íslendinga
(reykjavík: Mál og menning, 1970), 222.
113 Björn Þorsteinsson, Enska öldin, 207–212; Björn Þorsteinsson, ‘fall Björns Þorleifssonar
á Rifi og afleiðingar þess,’ in Safn til sögu Íslands og íslenskra bókmennta að fornu og nýju,
series 2, vol. 1.4 (reykjavík: Hið íslenzka bókmenntafélag, 1953—1993), 1—22.
IDEoLogY AnD IDEntItY In LAtE MEDIEVAL WESt ICELAnD