_crop.png){kind=link}
Detail from Stora Hammars I, Sweden shows a man lying on his belly with another man using a weapon on his back. Note the triangular Valknut symbol above, which is theorized to represent an ecstatic state.
The blood eagle (Old Norse: blóðǫrn) was a method of ritually executing a chosen member as detailed in late skaldic poetry. According to the two instances mentioned in the Sagas, the victims (in both cases members of royal families) were placed in a prone position, their ribs severed from the spine with a sharp tool, and their lungs pulled through the opening to create a pair of "wings". Until the 1980s, there was continuing debate about whether the rite was a literary invention, a mistranslation of the original texts, or an authentic historical practice.[1][2][3]
Accounts[]
The blood-eagle ritual-killing rite appears in just two instances in Norse literature, plus oblique references some have interpreted as referring to the same practice. The primary versions share certain commonalities: the victims are both noblemen (Halfdan haleggr or "Long-leg" was a prince; Ælla of Northumbria a king), and both of the executions were in retaliation for the murder of a father.
Einarr and Halfdan[]
There are two sources that purport to describe Torf-Einarr's ritual execution of Haraldr Fairhair's son, Halfdan Long-Leg, in the late 9th century. Both were written several centuries after the events they depict, and exist in various versions known to have influenced each other.
In the Orkneyinga saga, the blood eagle is described as a sacrifice to Óðinn.
Þar fundu þeir Hálfdan hálegg, ok lèt Einarr rísta örn á baki honum með sverði, ok skera rifin ǫll frá hrygginum ok draga þar út lúngun, ok gaf hann Óðni til sigrs sèr.[4] |
Einarr made them carve an eagle on his back with a sword, and cut the ribs all from the backbone, and draw the lungs there out, and gave him to Odin for the victory he had won.[5] |
Snorri Sturluson's Heimskringla contains an account of the same event described in Orkneyinga saga, with Einarr actually performing the deed himself:
Þá gékk Einarr jarl til Hálfdanar; hann reist ǫrn á baki honum með þeima hætti, at hann lagði sverði á hol við hrygginn ok reist rifin ǫll ofan alt á lendar, dró þar út lungun; var þat bani Hálfdanar.[6] |
...Afterwards, Earl Einarr went up to Halfdan and cut the "blood eagle" on his back, in this fashion that he thrust his sword into his chest by the backbone and severed all the ribs down to the loins, and then pulled out the lungs; and that was Halfdan's death.[7] |
Ragnarr loðbrók's sons and King Ælla of Northumbria[]
In Ragnarssona þáttr (the "Tale of Ragnarr's sons"), Ívarr the Boneless has captured king Ælla of Northumbria, who had killed Ívarr's father Ragnarr loðbrók. The killing of Ælla, after a battle for control of York, is described thus:
...They caused the bloody eagle to be carved on the back of Ælla, and they cut away all of the ribs from the spine, and then they ripped out his lungs. |
The blood eagle is referred to by the 11th-century poet Sigvatr Þórðarson, who, some time between 1020 and 1038, wrote a skaldic verse named Knútsdrápa that recounts and establishes Ívarr the Boneless as having killed Ælla and subsequently cutting his back.
Sighvatr's skaldic verse in Old Norse:
Ok Ellu bak |
And Ívarr, the one |
Skaldic verse, a common medium of Norse poets, was meant to be cryptic and allusive, and the idiomatic nature of Sighvatr's poem as a description of what has become known as the blood eagle is a matter of historical contention, particularly since in Norse imagery the eagle was strongly associated with blood and death.
Saxo Grammaticus in Gesta Danorum book 9, chapter 5,5 tells the following about Bjørn and Sigvard, sons of Ragnarr loðbrók and king Ælla:
Idque statuto tempore exsecuti, comprehensi ipsius dorsum plaga aquilam figurante affici iubent, saevissimum hostem atrocissimi alitis signo profligare gaudentes. Nec vulnus impressisse contenti, laceratam salivere carnem.[8] |
...This they did at the appointed time; and when they had captured him, they ordered the figure of an eagle to be cut in his back, rejoicing to crush their most ruthless foe by marking him with the cruellest of birds. Not satisfied with imprinting a wound on him, they salted the mangled flesh.[9] |
Other accounts[]
Another possible oblique reference to the rite appears in Norna-Gests þáttr. There are two stanzas of verse near the end of its section 6, "Sigurd Felled the Sons of Hunding", where a character describing previous events says:
Nú er blóðugr ǫrn |
Now the blood eagle |
In Reginsmál, the stanza 26 of the Poetic Edda, the story is described as:
Nú er blóðugr ǫrn |
Now a blood eagle is |
Authenticity[]
There is debate about whether the blood eagle was historically practiced, or whether it was a literary device invented by the authors who transcribed the sagas. No contemporary accounts of the rite exist, and the scant references in the sagas are several hundred years after the Christianization of Scandinavia.
In the 1970's Alfred Smyth supported the historicity of the rite, stating that it is clearly human sacrifice to the Norse god Óðinn. He characterized St. Dunstan's description of the Ælla's killing as an "accurate account of a body subjected to the ritual of the blood eagle".[12]
Gallery[]
Videos[]
References[]
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Frank, Roberta (1984). "Viking atrocity and Skaldic verse: The Rite of the Blood-Eagle". English Historical Review. Oxford Journals. XCIX (CCCXCI): 332–343.
- ↑ Tracy, Larissa (2012). Torture and Brutality in Medieval Literature: Negotiations of National Identity. DS Brewer. pp. 109–111. ISBN: 9781843842880 .
- ↑ Dash, Mike (18 March 2013). "The Vengeance of Ivarr the Boneless" - Smithsonian Magazine
- ↑ Guðbrandur Vigfússon, Sir George Webbe Dasent. Orkneyinga saga and Magnus saga, with appendices, Volume 1. Oxford University. H.M.S.O., 1887.
- ↑ Dasent, G.W. (1894). "Icelandic Sagas and Other Historical Documents Relating to the Settlements and Dsecents of the Northmen on the British Isles Vol III - The Orkneyinger's Saga". Rerum Britannicarum Medii Ævi Scriptores, or, Chronicles and Memorials of Great Britain and Ireland During the Middle Ages. London: Great Britain. Public Record Office. 88 (3): xxvi, 8–9. Retrieved 30 March 2015.
- ↑ Haralds saga hins hárfagra - Heimskringla
- ↑ Hollander, Lee (1964). Heimskringla: History of the Kings of Norway (7th, 2009 ed.). Univ of Texas Press. p. 84. ISBN: 9780292786967 .
- ↑ Saxo Grammaticus: Gesta Danorum
- ↑ The Danish History/Book IX
- ↑ Norna-Gests þáttr
- ↑ Hardman's translation of Norna-Gests þáttr
- ↑ Alfred P. Smyth, Scandinavian Kings in the British Isles, 850–880 (1977), Oxford, pp. 212–213