Gripla - 20.12.2005, Side 154

GRIPLA152
his future greatness, and his virtuous life as a Viking under the leadership of
Sveinn Forkbeard, Kristni saga mentions only briefly his travels abroad and
engagement in Viking raids (ÓlTm I:280-284, ÍF XV:3-4). Likewise, while
Óláfs saga Tryggvasonar en mesta describes the great esteem and riches
fiorvaldr acquired after his departure from Iceland, receiving honours from the
Emperor of Constantinople and founding a monastery named after himself,
Kristni saga cursorily sends him on merchant journeys for fourteen years
(ÓlTm I:298-300, ÍF XV:13). Later, it is true, we are told that he was buried at
the church of John the Baptist and that „kalla fleir hann helgan“ (‘they call
him a saint’; ÍF XV:37), but who exactly ‘they’ are is not specified, nor is the
veracity of the claim confirmed other than by the citation of Brandr’s verse.
The lukewarm nature of the praise becomes clear by comparison with the
saga’s parting comment on Fri›rekr: „Ok er hann ma›r sannheilagr“ (‘And he
is truly a saint’; ÍF XV:13). It is worth noting that the eulogistic account of
fiorvaldr’s final days was early dismissed as apocryphal by Maurer (1965:
224) and Jón Helgason (1920:32): it seems likely that the compiler of Kristni
saga would have shared their views.
When miracles are included in the saga (and, at a time when they were
believed to be possible, this can hardly be considered as a breach of his-
toricity), they are described with a minimum of sensationalism, and no mora-
listic conclusions are explicitly drawn. This is not to claim, as some have, that
the compiler of Kristni saga was a rationalist at heart (Björn M. Ólsen 1893:
347); but signs and wonders, with their religious and exemplary value, were
not generically appropriate to his historical project in the way they clearly are
to hagiography: the total lack of miracles in Ari’s work provides a precedent.
Particularly interesting is the case of Ko›rán’s conversion, which in Óláfs
saga Tryggvasonar en mesta is something of a tour de force, including speeches
contrasting paganism and Christianity, three appearances from a disguised
devil, and a final triumphant rejection of heathenism (ÓlTm I:284-88). The
moral of the whole is clear from Ko›rán’s parting words to the devil, in which
he reveals its true nature and lauds the superior strength of the Christian God
(ÓlTm I:288):
En nu me› flvi at ek hefir reynt flik flærdar fullan ok miok v meginn.
fla er mer nu rett ok vtan allan glæp at fyrir lata flik en flyia vndir skiol
fless gu› dóms er miklu er betri ok styrkari en flu.