Page:The Finding of Wineland the Good.djvu/233

 is on the northern shore of the north-west peninsula of Iceland. Erics-stead, to which Eric removed after his father's death and his own marriage to Thorhild, was is Haukadalr, in western Iceland, and Queen Aud's 'claim;' through this valley the Haukadale river flows, from the east, into the south-easterly bight of Hvamms-firth.

(18) Brokey [Brok-island, which receives its name from a kind of grass called 'brok'] is the largest of the numerous islands at the mouth of Hvamms-firth, where it opens into Breida-firth. Eyxney, Öxney [Ox-island] is separated from Brokey. It is said that the first dwelling upon Brokey was built in the last half of the seventeenth century. Suðrey is no longer inhabited; the present dwelling on Öxney is situated on the southern side of the island, while Eric's home, it is claimed, was upon the northern side of the island, at the head of a small bay or creek, called Eiríksvágr, and it is stated that low mounds can still be seen on both Öxney and Suðrey, which are supposed to indicate the sites of Eric's dwellings.

(19) In the skáli, which was, perhaps, at the time of which this saga treats, used as a sleeping-room, there was a raised daïs or platform, called the 'set,' on either side of what may be called the nave of the apartment, extending about two-thirds the length of the room. This 'set' was used, as a sleeping-place by night, and the planks or timbers with which the 'set' was covered were called 'set-stokkar,' although this name seems to have been especially applied to those timbers, which formed the outer portion of the 'set .'

(20) Drangar [Monoliths] and Breiðabólstaðr [Broad-homestead] were both situated on the mainland, a short distance to the southward of the islands on which Eric had established himself.

(21) One of the famous 'settlers' of Iceland, named Thorolf Moster-beard [Mostrarskegg]; like many another 'settler' [landnámsmaðr], because he would not acknowledge the supremacy of king Harold Fairhair, left his home in the island of Moster, in south-western Norway, and sailed to Iceland, where he arrived about the year 884 [Vigfusson, Tímatal, l. c. p. 493]. He was a believer in the 'old' or heathen faith, and when he reached the land, he cast the pillars of the 'place of honour' of his Norwegian home into the sea; upon these the figure of the god Thor was carved, and where these penates were cast up by the sea, according to the custom of men of his belief, he established himself. The cape upon which the wooden image of the god drifted, Thorolf called Thorsness. This cape is on the southern side of Breidafirth, at the mouth of Hvamms-firth, and here Thorolf subsequently established a district court [héraðsþing] which received from his 'claim' the name of 'Thorsness-thing.' The exact site of this 'thing' is somewhat uncertain. Vigfusson [Eyrbyggja Saga, Vorrede, p. xix] suggests that it was, probably, somewhat to the westward of the mouth of Hvamms-firth. When the 'Quarter-courts' were established in the tenth century, Thorsness-thing was removed farther to the eastward [Eyrbyggja Saga, ed. Vigfusson, p. 12]—and there have been those, who claim to have been able to discover the