Gripla - 20.12.2016, Síða 112

GRIPLA112
derland between original landnám claims, although today the whole area
is considered Skagafjörður. Þórður invites the enraged Skeggi out to this
place with the words, “ek fylgja þér þangat, sem ek drap Özur, frænda þin;
má þér þá minnissamara verða, hvílíkt ættarhögg eg hefi höggvit þér” [‘I’ll
follow you to the place where I killed your nephew Özurr, since it will
remind you of the terrible blow I struck against your family’].62 the “re-
minder” referenced in this speech act is not just a memory of an incident
but is also a physical reminder, in the form of the burial mound erected
over Özurr.63 When they reach the burial mound, Þórður utters a verse
of poetry encouraging Skeggi to redden his sword with Þórður’s blood.
Living up to his reputation as “ballsy”, Þórður is clearly goading Skeggi on
here. But he is also displaying a remarkable appreciation for the rhetoric
of place, for fit between location and action. Burial mounds represent
the ability of landscape to conjure memories, creating a dialogue between
people and place.64 although the move to this location proves a strategic
one as well – it allows time enough for Eiður to come and break up the
fight – the text emphasizes other reasons why this action needed to move
to this hinterland area.
But the clearest example of Þórður’s appreciation for the synergy be-
tween important speech acts and boundary-marking locations is found in
the fragmentary version of the saga, whose lacuna picks up at the moment
when Þórður is leaving Miðfjörður for the last time. It has him pause to
give a memorable and lengthy parting speech at a spot called Bessaborg,
which is a rock that marks the eastern boundary of Miðfjörður. He makes
the following declaration:
on the other side of Kolbeinsdalsá river, and outside of the area that would be visible look-
ing from arnastapi over Skagafjörður. as Chapter 6 quoted above notes, it would have been
within the landnám claim of the Hjaltasons, and therefore not part of the original goðorð
for Skagafjörður.
62 “Þórðar saga hreðu,” 213.
63 the play on words between ‘ættarhögg’, meaning ‘a blow to the family’, and ‘ættarhaugur’,
a family burial mound, is perhaps intentional. for the ubiquity of burial mounds in border
areas, see adolf friðriksson, “Haugur og heiðni: minjar um íslenzkt járnaldarsamfélag,”
in Hlutavelta tímans: menningararfur á Þjóðminjasafni, eds. Árni Björnsson and Hrefna
róbertsdóttir (reykjavík, Þjóðminjasafn Íslands, 2004), 56–63.
64 See Erin Halstad-McGuire, “Sailing Home: Boat Graves, Migrant Identities and funerary
Practices on the Viking frontier,” in Elizabeth anderson et al., Memory, Mourning, Land-
scape (amsterdam: rodopi, 2010).