“Seat Companion to the Whole People”:
Olaf Trygvasson and the Conversion of Norway.
“Cattle die and kinsmen die,
thyself too soon must die,
but one thing never, I ween, will die, -fair fame of one who has earned.”
-Havamal, vs. 76
By
Michael Warsop
Although most of the credit of Christianizing Norway is given to St. Olaf, also
known as Olaf II, the first wave of official Christainization started several years
before hand with the ascension of Olaf Trggvasson, remembered also as Olaf I, in 995
CE. Although his reign ended five years later in 1000 CE, Olaf managed to unify
most of Norway proper under his heavily Christian rule. History tells us the what of
the events that occurred around the life of Olaf Trygvasson, but not the whys. As
such, this paper will investigate just that question, as to why Olaf converted and was
so vehement in his pursuit of a unified, Christian Norway, and will hold that it
stemmed from faintly discernible personal reasons and rather apparent political ones.
I.
First though, a note on sources. There are five primary source documents still
extant and available for the use of the modern scholar for research into the life of Olaf
Trygvasson, barring several more esoteric sources that mention him in passing. 1 The
most well known of these is the Heimskringla, written by Snorri Sturluson around the
year 1225. Sturluson, an Icelandic Noble and poet, left a wealth of the old sagas and
works of the Norse civilization, and gives the oldest and only lengthy Old Norse
account of Olaf Trygvasson.2 A fuller and earlier source is The Saga of Olaf
Trygvasson3, written sometime before 1200 and translated into Icelandic sometime
after that. It is an obvious influence on Sturluson's sections of the Heimskringla, but
it is written in Latin, which may or may not have an effect upon it's usefulness on the
subject.4 It's writer, Oddr Snorrason, was a monk at Þingeryrar who claimed to have
1
Amongst these are two sagas, now lost, that Snorrasson refers to in his text, the works of the Icelandic
Historians Sæmunder the Wise and Ari the Wise.
2Wilson, David
3
4
M. The Vikings and Their Origins: Scandinavia in the First Millenium. London: Thames and Hudson, 1989.
Being a fuller source, this is where most of this papers primary source documentation will come from.
For more on the similarities between these two documents, see Andersson's introduction to Snorrason,
Oddr. The Saga of Olaf Trygvasson; Translated with Introduction and Notes by Theodore M.
Andersson. Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press. 2003.
seen a vision of Olaf which inspired him to write the text.5 Supplementary to these
two sources are two of the king's sagas, the Historia de Antiquitate Regum and the
Historia Norwegiæ. These Latin works are two of the three pieced together works
called the Norwegian Synoptics, which are the oldest records of Norwegian history
currently in existence. Best dating currently puts them at having been written in the
fifteenth century, thus making both Snorrason and Sturluson possible sources for
them. However, there is enough variation between the two sets of later documents
and their forerunners that it seems apparent that they are from different sources. Both
contain stories of the exploits of Olaf Trygvasson. 6 The other source for the history of
Olaf Trygvasson is the Anglo-Saxon chronicles, which although short in their entires
regarding his activities, as he was a viking conquerer of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of
the time, spend more time on his activities than many others during the period, and
corroborate several elements of the other histories, as well as conflicting with a few
others.7
II.
Before getting to the question of the nature of Olaf’s conversion, given the
esoteric nature of the subject matter, a short version of the life of Olaf Trygvasson is
worth discussing. 8 Olaf's father was Tryggvi, a descendant of the Haroldr Finehair
who had once united most of Norway and whose children splintered the kingdom as
5Snorrason,
p. 1, 136
6Ibid,
p. 4
7-The
Anglo-Saxon Chronicles, translated by Anne Savage. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1983. p. 3
8
This narrative section is compiled from several primary and secondary sources, and
hence some details maybe suffer from slightly different interpretations. The
author's direct sources are: Helle, Knut, ed. The Cambridge History of
Scandinavia: Volume 1, Prehistory to 1520. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2003, Jones, Gwyn. A History of the Vikings. Oxford and New York:
Oxford University Press, 1984, Larsen, Karen. A History of Norway. New York:
Princeton University Press. 1950, Forte, Angelo, Richard Oram and Frederik
Pedersen. Viking Empires. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005.
each wanted an inheritance. As such, Tryggvi was considered king of the region
known as Vik. His mother was Astriðr, a daughter of a noble named Eirikr. Shortly
before Olaf's birth, Tryggvi became involved in a dispute involving the rulership of
certain parts of Norway with the other descendants of Haroldr Finehair, notably the
sons of one Gunnhildr. She devised a plan to kill Tryggvi so that her own sons would
acquire the lands of Tryggvi, and the plan succeeded. Astriðr was forced to flee in
late pregnancy, and Olaf was born sometime shortly thereafter. Their destination was
the Norse kingdom in Russia where here brother, Sigurðr, was a noble in the court of
Valdimarr. Gunnhildr, knowing that if the boy survived her sons position would be in
jeopardy, had men sent after Astriðr.
This turned out to be unnecessary, as during the journey across the Baltic the
ship that Astriðr and Olaf were on was attacked by Slavic vikings, and mother and son
were separated by being sold into slavery. Astriðr is lost to history from this point
forward, but we know Olaf had three masters during his period as a slave among the
Estonians. He was first in the possession of a man named Klerkon, along with the
man who had become his foster father with during his flight, named Thorolf, and
Thorolf's son Thorgils. Klerkon found Thorolf to be too old, and had him killed
immediately. The two boys were then sold to a man named Klerk for a good ram, and
later to a man named Heres for a fine cloak.
It was from Heres that, nine years later, when Sigurðr was sent to collect taxes
from the Estonians for King Valdimarr, Sigurðr found the young Olaf an honoured
slave of Heres. Sigurðr noted Olaf's distinctive appearance, and spoke to the boy.
Upon hearing who he was, Sigurðr swiftly made purchase of him and his foster
brother, and freed them, taking the boys back with him to Russia. It was there that
Olaf began his career as a Norse noble.
Olaf's career as a Norse noble meant that he learned to command men and
fight by leading raids against neighboring kingdoms and into the Baltic. He quickly
became a court favorite, which made him the object of jealous nobles and possibly
distrusted by Valdimarr himself. As such, Olaf began to sail further afield, eventually
ending up in Wendland after a particularly harsh storm. Here he met the Queen
Geira, who was a widow and ruled the part of Wendland were Olaf put ashore. After
wintering in her court, the two married that spring, as it appeared that Olaf was a
powerful lord and Geira was in need of a husband with an army.
This marriage put Olaf in a position that, when Emperor Otto III of the
Germans went to war with the heathens of Denmark, Olaf was called upon to fight
with Otto as Wendland was within the nebulous German realms and at least
nominally beholden to Otto. Olaf fought with Otto against Harald of Denmark and
Haakon Jarl of Norway, who was at the time in tribute to the Danish king in return for
the kings support for his conquests in southern Norway. Otto won the conflict, and
one of the conditions of victory was that both Harald and Haakon would convert to
Christianity. Of the two, Harald remained converted, but Haakon denounced his
conversion almost as soon as he left Denmark.
After the Danish campaign, Geira died. Although king of her lands now, Olaf
chose not to stay in Wendland and took to viking again. In England (or possibly
Ireland,) the widower became invovled with competition for the hand of an Irish
Queen, wherein he displaced the ambitions of a local champion who he and his men
battled with several times, but never killed their opponents but rather bound them and
left them. In 991, the Anglo-Saxon Chronicles record his first raids on the island of
England, culminating in the 994 when Æthelred the Unready bought off both Olaf and
Svein Forkbeard, whom he had been raiding with, with sixteen thousand pounds and
provisions for the winter at Southhampton. Sources differ, but by this time Olaf had
either become Christian or was converted as part of the agreement with Æthelred.
From here Olaf set sail for Norway. Rumors of his exploits had reached the
ear of Haakon Jarl in Norway, as well as his identity as a descendant of Harold
Finehair. Haakon extorted Olaf’s two uncles (who, as with many characters in the
narrative, just appear out of nowhere,) into luring him to Norway where his men were
to ambush him. However, the uncles doublecrossed Haakon and turned the ambush
upon the Jarl’s men. After this, due to the excesses of Haakon in his older age, most
notably with the women of his domain, as well as the popularity and fame of Olaf, the
farmers of Haakon’s land, known today as Trondheim, moved in support of Olaf and
added to the ranks of his already impressive force. Haakon was forced to flee, finally
coming to rest with only his slave in a hiding place in a pig sty. Olaf and his men
were close behind them, and searched the farm where the Jarl was hidden, but to no
avail. However, both Haakon and the slave heard when Olaf proclaimed a gold mark
for the man who brought him the Jarl’s head. The slave obviously was intrigued by
this, and although he did his best to stay awake, eventually the Jarl dozed, at which
point the slave swiftly took off his head and went to present it to Olaf. Olaf accepted
the head and immediately had the slave killed for doublecrossing his master.
For the next five years, Olaf conquered most of Norway and united it under his
rule, including the areas that had been under Danish rule. All those he conquered he
forced to convert to his faith, and although a few refused, most complied and were
duly given places within his kingdom. He made overtures to Sigrid, Queen of
Sweden, which would have greatly expanded his kingdom, but due to her insistence
on remaining Heathen, he made an enemy of her. 9 Instead he ended up wedding Þyre,
the sister of Sveinn, King of Denmark, who had left her brother’s court in a quarrel
after abandoning the heathen king Burislav her brother had wed her to, thus setting
Olaf in an awkward position with the King of Denmark.
9
Exactly what happened to his Irish wife is unknown. Some scholars believe he in fact kept multiple
wives, but only one Christian one, that being Þyre.
His reign came to an end in the year 1000 when he was tricked into an errand
for his wife that took him to his holdings in Wendland. There, an army composed of
the five men he had managed to anger the most descended upon him near the mouth
of the river Svolf. These men were the sons of Haakon Jarl, Eirikr and Sveinn, as
well as King Olaf the Swede who wished vengeance for the dishonor that Olaf
Trygvasson had heaped up on his mother, and Sveinn, King of Denmark, whose sister
Olaf had married. Jarl Sigvaldi is also particularly noted for his part in the deception
and fighting in the battle, but he was beholden to the King of Denmark and generally
held to have had no pariticular ill will towards Olaf. Although Olaf and his men had
feared an attack, they had waited for one for sometime, which had failed to
materialize, and most of Olaf’s men had left by the time the attack came. Leading
from his grand longship, the Short Serpent, Olaf fought the coalition of kings rather
than flee, but lost the battle. He was last seen on the bow of his longship, but various
sources disagree on exactly what happened at the end of the battle, whether he jumped
to his death, merely “disappeared,” or in one case, was carried off to Russia and
became a monk! No matter what acutally happened to Olaf, his kingdom was quickly
divided amongst those who had killed him and the local Jarls who had initially held
power, and much of the country quickly recanted of their conversion.
III.
Although it is possible that Olaf Trygvasson’s religious campaigning was
entirely an affair of politics and convenience, it would be unreasonable to assume so.
Historically, people have a faith they hold to be true, and although they maybe
converted, if that new faith is not what they then believe, they will often relapse or
have symptoms of less than authentic belief that leave traces we can still find in the
documents from that time. On this subject, all of the sources we have for Olaf
Trygvasson, save one10, are suspect, as they were written by men within the
ecclesiastical structure that was generated by Olaf and his spiritual descendants.
Nevertheless, there are some things we can deduce, even in these sources, for unless
we can hold true that within the writing is some vestige of historical veracity we can
examine, the records are essentially worthless!
Snorrason states that, during his stay in the court of Valdimarr in Russia, Olaf
would not enter the temples, for he felt they were bad and ill tempered gods from the
fact that Valdimarr always seemed dour when going to make sacrifice, and that Olaf
stayed at the door and never entered the temple. Whilst Snorrason uses this statement
as a method of showing his Christian fidelity even before he was converted, if it is a
true event, it does say something of Olaf and his religious leanings at the time. Not
all men are religious, and even some of the heathens were known to attack their own
temples on raids or in piques of rage. 11 This source would indicate that Olaf, for
whatever reasons, held no particular love for the heathen religion. 12
His experience as a child slave may also have affected Olaf’s views on
religion. Slavery was common in the medieval era, but not in the way we know in
later history. Rather, slavery was something one sold oneself into when there were no
other options to continue living, and a thing that could be bought out of. In
Scandanavia, slaving was a widespread occurance, and being a slave, which they
called a Thrall, was the lowest possible position to hold in Scandanavian society.
Olaf’s position at the bottom of this social rung may have instilled within him an
appreciations for the theology of Christinity that involved humility and submission, as
well as such virtues as those espoused by the Beattitudes, even if he did not live them,
as was not his place as a Norse noble. Christianity has also been used throughout
10
Sturluson’s Heimskringla.
Haakon Jarl is said to have done just this after leaving Denmark and renouncing his conversion. See
Snorrason, p.60.
12
Ibid, p.49
11
history to both stand for and against the issue of slavery. Although there is no hard
historical evidence for Olaf towards slaves in either direction, an interpretation of the
faith that came out with a milder view towards the treatment of slaves and/or against
slavery may have found fertile soil in Olaf’s heart.13
Olaf was known to be a man of brutal justice. As was seen with the slave who
betrayed Haakon Jarl, Olaf was one to act definitively to keep his position secure.
There are multiple records of the savage actions he took to convert his fellow
Norwegians, such as when he went to the Orkney Islands. Here, to convince the Jarl
Sigurðr Hlọðvisson to convert, he seized the jarl’s son and held him on the prow of
his ship and drew his sword, asking the jarl to choose between his faith or his son. 14
However, most of these occurances were in pursuit of the Christian faith. There is a
recorded incident where, a favorite of the court having been murdered in Iceland, Olaf
found himself eventually in possession of the man, whom he set dogs upon against the
pleading of one of his head nobles and a bishop. Once the deed had been done
though, the bishop reprimanded him and Olaf felt a great guilt and did penance. 15
This could be an instance of public humility forced by a Church interested in keeping
a moral distinction between works against the pagans and works against the good
Christian folk, but it could also be a moment of actual conscience on the part of Olaf
and an indication of a real moral religiosity.
This establishes that there was an actual religiosity to Olaf Trygvasson. The
nature of this religiosity is a thing that is harder to determine, although we can already
see that is was a very aggressive approach to faith, although this could be due to other
factors we will discuss below. However, a look at the conversion tales may help us
with the discussion of what Olaf's personal religion was like.
13
14
15
Christiansen, Eric. The Norsemen in the Viking Age. Oxford: Blackwell
Publishers, 2002. p. 83
Snorrason, p. 74-75
Ibid, p. 107.
The simplest conversion account is the version recorded in Anglo-Saxon
Chronicles. In this version, as part of the deal made by Æthelred the Unready, Olaf
and Sveinn Forkbeard were baptized by the Archbishop Ælfheah, with the King as
their sponsor.16 The most straightforward of the conversion tales, this one is also of
course suspect due to the possibility of it being an attempt to lionize the less than
popular Æthelred by attaching him to a popular Christian figure. However, Ælfheah
is remembered elsewhere as the man who baptized Olaf, so it is likely that if Olaf was
already Christian at the time of his English exploits, he at least reaffirmed his faith
publicly as part of his deal with Æthelred. 17
There are two other, more involved, conversion stories for Olaf. The
Heimskringla and the Historia Norwegiae both have strikingly similar tales of Olaf’s
conversion, possibly demonstrating the use of Sturlesson’s work as a source by the
writers of the Norwegian Synoptics. These accounts place the conversion of Olaf
after Otto’s war with Denmark and the death of Queen Geira, but before his foray to
Ireland where he married an Irish noble. In this history, Olaf hears of a seer on the
Scilly Islands. Curious about this, he sends one of his men in rich raiment to the
fortune teller to test the man’s talents. The seer immediately tells the man he is not
the king, but that he should bring his king there. Impressed, Olaf went to see the seer.
There, he was told:
“You will be a famous king, very devoted to the faith of Christ and most beneficial to your
people. For by your efforts the Christian people will become unnumbered. If what I prophesy
is true, you may take this as a sign: On the day after tomorrow when you leave your ships,
you will see a herd on the shore and you will discover that this has been done by guile because
you will be ambushed by your enemies. You will lose your men and you will be carried to
your ships on your shield barely alive, but after a week you will be healed by divine
16
17
Savage, p. 144-145.
Jones, p. 355.
intervention, and when you have recovered, you will be washed in the fountain of life.”18
The Heimskringla goes on to describe the men as “mutineers and men who would
destroy him,”19when they ambush Olaf, whereas the Historia merely states that the
prophecy came true. Both agree that after this Olaf immediately was baptized, as well
as most of his men.
Snorrason’s account in The Saga of Olaf Trygvasson is slightly different, but
still involves the Scilly Islands. By Snorrason’s reckoning, Olaf returned to Russia
after the death of Queen Geira, but before his involvement with Emperor Otto. 20
Whilst wintering in Russia, he had a vivid dream where in he climbed a great height
and saw above him a bright and splendid place. Then he heard a voice speaking to
him, saying:
“Hear me, you who promise to be a good man, for you never worshiped gods or paid them any
reverence. But rather you disgraced them, and for that reason your works will be multiplied
for good and profitable ends. Still you are very deficient in those qualities that would allow
you to be in these regions and make you deserving to live here in eternity, because you do not
know your creator and you do now know who the true God is.”21
The voice then identified itself as “the Lord your God,” and urged Olaf to go
to Greece and be educated. Olaf then, in his dream, descended the heights he had
climbed to, and saw all sorts of punishments and torments awaiting those who did not
believe, many of whom he recognized. Upon awakening, Olaf was very moved by
the dream, and in a very generalized passage, went to Greece and was educated in the
ways of Christianity.
18
Snorrason, p. 160
Sturluson, section 32.
20
This is an inversion of the timing of events in other sources.
21
Snorrason, p. 54.
19
The next passage tells, in much greater detail than the first passage, of how:
“We are told that Olaf heard reports of a distinguished man on a certain island called Scilly,
not far from Ireland. He was gifted with great natural ability and the prophetic spirit of
Almighty God….The man who lived onteh island knew of their coming through his gift of
intelligence. He bade all the monks who were there dress magnificently and go to the beach
with all their holy relics.”22
The abbot, who was the chieftan of the island according to the account, then
preceded to preach to Olaf and baptize him there on that island, along with all his
followers.
The Anglo-Saxon account makes Olaf’s conversion a simple matter of
political expediency, but the other histories paint a far different picture. The dream
sequence described by Snorrason is a bit suspect, but the baptism on Scilly seems to
be corroborated by both sources, as well as the presence of a soothsayer of some
variety. Both stories have a thread in the narrative about Olaf’s inherent dislike of the
polytheistic heathen faith of his people, which could very possibly be editorialization
of the authors. Still, the sources also require a certain nuministic intervention for Olaf
to actually be converted, which could indicate that in fact Olaf did consult a soothsayer on Scilly that lead to his baptism. This could mean that Olaf was merely
ambivalent about the heathen gods, and that it took an actual religious moment to
incite religious fervor within his breast.
IV
Whilst the reasons behind the personal motivations for Olaf’s conversion
maybe difficult to evoke from the records, the political reasonings behind this choice
22
Ibid, p. 55
are manifold and discernible.
Olaf was known for being a wide traveler in all the accounts of his life, and
being a Norse noble, this would appear to be an easily surmised truth, as by the late
period one trained a young noble by sending him raiding with parties of trusted men. 23
In his travels, he must have seen that the rest of the world was quickly or slowly
Christianizing (or in the case of places such as Spain, becoming Muslim.) More
directly, there were several men whom he had become allied with or whom he could
become allied with by becoming Christian. Although Æthelred the Unready had
bought him off, that still said a great deal for the wealth and power of the AngloSaxon king that he could command such funds when needed. King Harald of
Denmark had stayed a converted man after the war with the Germans, thus making
him a potential ally in Olaf’s conquests of Norway, as well as an enemy required by
religion to attempt to resolve any disputes between the two of them peaceably should
a problem arise, such as when Olaf took some of the lands in Southern Norway that
had been recently ruled by the Danes. Olaf had served under Otto III before, and
knew the power that the Emporer would wield, as well as being a neighbor to him to
the south via his holdings in Wendland. Becoming a Christian would have made Olaf
Trygvasson several powerful allies. 24
A trend amongst the men noted above also probably did not escape Olaf’s
notice, that they were powerful men who ruled over kingdoms that were more
organized and richer for it than Norway. Becoming Christian allowed for this in a
number of ways. Normalized trade with the continent could do wonders for the
economy, allowing both for the import of foreign goods in a fashion less haphazard
than viking, as well as creating a market to stimulate markets at home by giving them
23
Graham-Campbell, James. The Viking World. London: Frances Lincoln Limited,
2001. p. 68.
24
Forte, p. 186.
an outlet for a growing material excess due to better conditions in Scandanavia as well
as the increased capitol that had accrued in the area due to two centuries of raiding.
The church also brought with it an organized infrastructure when it converted a
region, which helped maintain stability in the area as well as provide multiple civil
services, such as education, both of which the previous heathen ways failed to do on
an appreciable scale.
Olaf clearly recognized the ability of a Christian nation to organize and
function, and given the alternative of a continued fractitious set of nation states such
as had been the norm in Norway, conversion must have been a very appealing option.
In fact, Olaf, when addressing a great feast he had called at Hlaðir, said:
“It is well known to all of you chieftans in Þroendalog that I am a Christian and that I urge a
religion different from the one you wish to have. I have diminished the standing of your gods
because I would wish to shed their authority so that I might as a consequence maintain my
rule.”25
Olaf clearly saw his rule as tied to the conversion of Norway to Christianity. This is
also evident in his handling of his converts. Repeatedly, he offers the Jarl’s he deals
with the option of death (or the death of a loved one, confiscation of property, or
something equally damaging,) or conversion and a place in his kingdom. The last
clause is the important part. To all those we have records of Olaf seeking to convert,
conversion is synonymous with a position of power and respect on the same level as
their previous position. Olaf clearly equated Christianity with power in his
government, and by doing so most likely spread the same attitude to those within his
domain, helping to explain both the wide spread success of his conversions, and the
speed at which many of his former vassals rescinded on their faith as soon as his rule
25
Snorrason, p. 81.
was gone.26
One further insight available to us comes from the story of the Conversion of
Iceland. During his five year reign, Olaf expended a great deal of time and energy
attempting to convert Iceland by missionaries, as Iceland was far beyond his political
reach. Prior to the Allðing27 in the year 1000 CE, his last missionary, one Hjalti, had
in fact been sentence to lesser outlawry in Iceland for killing several men. The
continued failures of his missionaries is said to have infuriated him, to the point that
he had at one point confiscated the ships of several Icelanders in port and would have
killed them had not cooler heads prevailed. 28
In the summer of 1000 CE, having wintered with King Olaf, Hjalti and his
fellow Icelander Gizurr the White set sail for Iceland with a priest named Þormoðr.
After reaching the island, initially Hjalti was left behind because of his sentence that
was still in place, but when the two men, who had at this point collected most of the
Christians in Iceland (for Olaf's men had made some headway on the island,) came
near the plain of Þingvellir where the Law Rock was, they found that many of the
heathens barred their way with force, and quickly Hjalti was called to their aid in case
fighting did break out.29
However, no violence occurred that day, and on the following day Hjalti and
Gizurr spoke their piece at the Allðing. Once this had been done, the men on the
plain divided themselves between those who were Christian and those who were
heathen, and declared themselves out of law with each other. The heathens
immediately left, but the Christians stayed and bribed the Law Speaker, Þorgeirr, to
speak what laws the Christians should be beholden to, as they no longer held to the
26
27
Christiansen, p. 83.
This was a meeting of all the free men of Iceland to decide upon th e laws of Iceland for the year. It
was presided over by the Law Speaker, whose place it was to listen to all the men and then decide
what was the best thing to do.
28Snorrason,
29Ibid,
p. 88-89.
p90-91.
same laws as the heathens. This he did, then retreated to his tent and laid down with
his cloak spread over his head in silence for the rest of that day and the following
night.30
Given that the missionaries of Olaf apparently talked at length with the Law
Speaker, and that they had in fact been charge to do so by Olaf, the pronouncement of
the next morning made by Þorgeirr, both by this inference as well as it's insight as an
observation of the times, may speak volumes as to the motivating ideas behind Olaf's
drive to convert Norway.
The next day, before the gathered audience, the Law Speaker declared that it
would not do for the people of the country to have more than one law. He spoke of
how Denmark and Norway had fought and struggled until peace had been the only
option, even though they did not want it.
“It seems to me advisable that we not yield to those who are most eager to kindle
hostility. We should rather mediate the matter so that each party gets some part of what
it desires, but we should have one law and religion.”31
Both sides saw this as a wise statement, and both also thought that their views
would win out, as the heathens thought surely that the heathen Law Speaker would
not pronounce against them, and the Christians had a deal with him. Þorgeirr
pronounced in favor of the Christians, officially converting Iceland, not out of faith,
but out of necessity for the peace of the land.
This would seem to be the type of sentiment, given what we have seen, that
would have been in agreement with Olaf. He wanted a united kingdom under him,
and most likely saw that one, unified religion would do this. That he was Christian
30
The exact importance of laying beneath the cloak is not entirely clear, but may have been a religious
action whose meaning has been lost.
31Ibid,
p. 91.
and that Christianity espouses this sort of ideology would go hand in hand with that
belief.
The important accounts of who Olaf was are lost to history, as they were most
likely only oral stories remembered by those who knew him. However, by studying
the sources we do have, we constructed a picture of a man who was religious in a
personal sense, and seems to have had a genuine religious experience that motivated
his rule, as well as a possible early ambivalence for the religions of his people. We
also see a man who had seen the wider world outside of Scandanavia, and understood
the values of a unified state with a unified religion, preferably one connected to his
neighbors. Perhaps reform and standardization of the heathen faiths would have been
possible, but it was both easier and more profitable to convert to an already extant
faith, even without accounting for a personal religious belief.
As stated at the beginning of the paper, the credit for Christianizing Norway is
often given to Olaf's later namesake, Olaf II, the patron saint of Norway. However,
without the work Olaf Trygvasson undertook, this would have been a much harder
task, and it seems that Olaf's work was one he found both to be a joy, and of profit.
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