Gripla - 2022, Qupperneq 144

GRIPLA142
eitrad saar þaa dro þat vr allt eitur.150
(a small bag is tied to the hilt in which there is a red healing stone:
if wine is applied to it, and it is laid upon a poisoned wound, all the
poison is drawn out.)
On the one hand, the lyfsteinn is comparable with the lyfsteinar of Laxdœla
saga and Kormáks saga: it is associated with a sword, it heals wounds, and it
is kept in a pouch near the sword’s hilt. On the other hand, the description
and operation of the healing shows influence from the lapidary tradition:
specifically, the use of stones to draw poison from wounds, and the appli-
cation of alcohol to the stone to trigger its operation (cf., e.g., Saffirus in
AM 194 8vo, which, when rubbed in mead, cures headaches).151
As suggested by this brief overview, the scope of functions of stones
in saga literature is similar to that in the lapidary tradition: stones can be
used not only for healing but for protecting and enhancing the body. In
turn, the range of ways in which stones are applied in saga literature paral-
lels the range seen in lapidaries: stones operate through their proximity
to humans (either worn on an item of clothing152 or strung around the
neck)153 or are applied directly to wounds.154 The sagas are generally silent
on the origin of stones’ powers, with the exception of those Íslendingasögur
in which characters treat stones with a degree of suspicion, aligning them
with pre-Christian activities: e.g., Kormáks saga, in which both Kormákr
and Steinarr regard magical practices/supernatural forces with contempt
(including lyfsteinar, see chapters 11 and 12), or Heiðarvíga saga, in which
it is implied that the old woman who gives Bárði the necklace has imbued
the stones with power.155
The operation of the stones in Kormáks saga and in Laxdœla saga is
suggestive of the same porousness of stone and body seen in the lapidary
150 Sigurðar saga þögla, in Late Medieval Icelandic Romances, 5 vols, ed. by Agnete Loth, Edi-
tiones Arnamagnæanæ B 21 (Copenhagen: Munksgaard, 1962–65), 2:139.
151 AÍ, 78.
152 As in Þorsteins saga Víkingssonar.
153 As in Heiðarvíga saga, Hálfdanar saga Eysteinssonar, Kormáks saga (on this instance in
Kormáks saga, see below).
154 As in Laxdœla saga, Göngu-Hrólfs saga, Kormáks saga.
155 See ch. 25; see also ch. 30, where, when Þorbjörn’s sword fails to bite Bárði’s neck on ac-
count of the necklace, Þorbjörn calls Bárði a tröll, a term that often carries connotations of
witchcraft.