Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 17.djvu/640

Rh naturally with this view to regard the Norse people as leaving their primitive home at a later time, and as travelling by a different route from the rest of their kin. And plausible arguments could also be drawn from archaeology. There is a well-marked distinction between the older and younger iron ages in Scandinavia. The older age, which is more fully developed in Denmark and the southern part of the Scandinavian peninsula, is marked by greater refinement of workmanship, and is more under the influence of southern art. The younger age, which is best marked in Norway and in Sweden proper, is rougher, and has more the appearance of an independent growth. It seemed natural, therefore, to regard the comparatively sudden transition to the more recent archaeological period as evidence that the land had been occupied by a new people, closely akin indeed to the earlier inhabitants of the south, but which had come fresh from the common home and had not been subjected to the same influences. For various reasons, however, this more recent period cannot well be put farther back than the end of the 7th century, a date which brings the supposed northern immigration so near historic times that if it had taken place it must have been distinctly commemorated in tradition; and, at the same time, it is now generally admitted that even the oldest of the Eddic poems must be referred to a period close to or within the limits of authentic history. In all probability, therefore, we may regard the change of custom and the rise of the earliest poetry as marking a period of development and expansion which affected all the Scandinavian peoples, but which, we may well suppose, presented peculiarly individual characteristics in the isolated districts of Norway.

Towards the end of the 8th century we first hear of that phase of history which made the Scandinavian peoples well known during the next two hundred years to the nations of north-western Europe. In 787, if we may trust a record of later date, the ships of the Northern sea rovers first appeared on the English coast, and in 793 and 794 they plundered Lindisfarne and Monkwearmouth. Thence forward we find them in continually increasing numbers on the coasts of Scotland and Ireland, in England and France, and on the southern coasts of the North Sea, isolated expeditions going as far as Spain and the Mediterranean. It is not easy to determine the share taken by the Danes and Norwegians respectively in these earlier expeditions, for the contemporary chroniclers confounded them under common names. But the geographical relations of the two peoples naturally led them into different tracks. The coasts which lay nearest to the Danes were those of the southern shores of the North Sea and the English Channel; but the nearest way for the Norsemen of western Norway lay straight across to the Shetlands and Orkneys and thence south along the Scottish coasts. It seems probable, therefore, that the first expeditions which ravaged the coast of Northumberland, and which swept down by the Hebrides to Ireland, and thence in some instances to the more southern coasts of France, before Flanders and the northern coasts of France began to suffer, started from the western coasts of Norway. Some years later, when the Danish expeditions become numerous and powerful, they fall with heaviest force on Flanders, England, and France. Of course, when the rovers increased in number and their excursions became wider, we find these kindred peoples in the same countries and joining in common expeditions. At an early period they come into collision in Ireland. Northumberland seems for a while to have been almost common ground, and Rollo, the chief who completed the permanent settlement in Normandy, is generally admitted to have been a Norseman, although the point is contested by Danish writers. But on the whole it was

in the north and west that the Norse vikings had their chief haunts and formed their settlements. At first even the largest viking expedition had no further aim than plunder: they simply devastated the coasts on which they landed and returned with their booty to their native country, or sold it in foreign parts; but after a time we find them making permanent settlements, either attracted by the richer countries or driven from their own by the pressure of population or by political reverses. In the middle of the 9th century the Norse kingdom of Dublin was founded. In the latter half of the century the Danes, with a possible admixture of Norsemen, had obtained a permanent footing in England. Towards the end of the century the Scottish islands, which had hitherto formed a temporary refuge and starting-point for vikings, were occupied by permanent Norse settlers, and the colonization of Iceland was commenced.

Before the end of the 9th century we know comparatively little of the internal condition of Norway. The land is divided into fylkis, which in point of relative size answer roughly to the English shire. The word is connected etymologically with “folk,” and seems to indicate that the fylki was originally a district peopled by a subdivision of the race. In the case of many of the fylkis this is borne out by the formation of the individual name, while in others the name seems to have applied directly to the district itself. There seems to have been an early union between some of these fylkis, having laws and customs of their own. The Egil's Saga tells us that Gula-thing was originally constituted from Horda-fylki, Sygna-fylki, and Firda-fylki; and this seems confirmed by the three twelves which form so conspicuous an element in the Icelandic law courts. In this case Horda-fylki may give us the name of the race by which that part of the country was originally settled, while the others are simply names of districts subsequently occupied by the same tribe. At a later time the whole country was divided into great districts, each with a common thing and a body of law of its own. These law districts, which corresponded to natural divisions of Norway of considerable importance in its history, were the district of the Frosta-thing, which comprehended the northern fylkis as far south as Sogne Fjord; that of the Gula-thing, which comprehended the south-western fylkis; and that of the Uplands and Vik, which included all the country south and east of the central mountain chain, and which had in old times its only common meeting-place in the Eidsifia-thing, but from which at a later time the Vik district with its Borgar-thing was separated. Within the fylki we find a minor subdivision called the herad, at the head of which stood the hersir, who held his office by hereditary right, and who, like the Icelandic godi, presided over the civil and religious affairs of the district. At the head of each fylki stood as a rule the king, though occasionally we find more than one king in a fylki, or more than one fylki under the rule of a king. In at least one district of the country, also, the chief power is in the hands of a race of jarls, a title which in later times was conferred by the kings, but which at this early period, although inferior to that of king, does not appear to be necessarily subordinate. It is difficult to define precisely the position of these petty kings. They seem to have represented the fylki in external affairs and to have been its leaders in war, but their power depended greatly on their personal qualities and the extent of their private possessions. That they had no very deep hold is clear from the readiness with which they disappear after the union of the kingdom. But both in fylki and herad every matter of importance was determined at the thing, the meeting of the free people. In some respects the condition of the people in Norway differed materially from that of other Germanic peoples at a similar