Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 17.djvu/639



(H. MO.—H. RA.—O. A. Ö.)&emsp;

The early history of Norway is exceedingly obscure. The scanty allusions to Scandinavia and its inhabitants which we find in the classical writers refer to the inhabitants of Denmark and of the south of Sweden. The first mention of names which can be identified with any certainty as those of known Norwegian tribes is found in Jordanes, a writer of the 6th century. The traditions of the earlier times which are preserved in Norse literature can scarcely be said to afford any sure ground for history, for whatever truth may be in them seems to be almost hopelessly concealed beneath an overgrowth of mythological and genealogical legend. It is, however, certain that the first settlers after the nomad tribes of Lapps or Finns, whose traces are still found far south of their present limits, were the ancestors of the present inhabitants,—Germanic tribes closely akin to the Danes, Swedes, and Goths.

The time of their immigration is unknown, but is conjectured with probability to have been at the latest not long after the commencement of the present era. The way by which they came has been the subject of a lengthened controversy. Munch and his school held that the first proper Norwegian settlements took place in the north, and spread thence down the western coast and the centre of the country. Later historians incline to the more probable theory that the country was settled by immigration from the south. To some extent the theory of a northern immigration derived its vitality from a view of early Norwegian history which is now generally rejected. Until recently the collection of old Norse poetry which passed under the name of the Eddas was regarded not merely as the peculiar inheritance of the Norse branch of the Scandinavian family but as the oldest and most primitive relic of Germanic mythology and legend. It fell in