I wanted to do this last week, but… time. And also I’m still parsing out chapter 18…
“Now Thorgrim slew Vestein Vesteinson at the harvest feast in Hawkdale; but the autumn next after, when Thorgrim was five-and- twenty years old, even as his father, Gisli his brother-in-law slew him at the harvest feast at Seastead. Some nights after Thordis his wife brought forth a son, and the lad was called Thorgrim after his father.”
(trans. Morris & Magnusson, 1892)
I like how the author of Eyrbyggja just crams Gisli’s Saga into half a paragraph of text. It reinforces my feeling that the sagas were like the comic books of the medieval Icelanders, where a small nod to a whole other story can add in a lot backstory and context in a few words. (It’s just up to us to catch up on the back issues.)
This also nods to how entangled relationships get in these stories.
So we know Thorgrim Thorsteinsson (son of Cod-Biter Thorstein, not Surt) was a powerful goði and pretty well regarded. But who is Vestein Vesteinsson? Since there is hardly enough genealogy in Eyrbyggja Saga, I’ll add in some more.
Thorgrim married Thordis Sursdottir, sister to Gisli and Thorkel Sursson, making Thorgrim Thorsteinsson Gisli’s and Thorkel’s brother-in-law.
Gisli is married to Aud Vesteinsdottir, making Vestein Vesteinsson Gisli’s and Thorkel’s brother-in-law.
So Thorgrim and Vestein have a slight, but not solid family relationship to each other.
Gisli’s Saga frames the four men as getting on rather well, and they apparently get the group nickname of the Haukdel Men at assemblies. But then a spooky wise-man, Gest the Wise, (That oddly enough isn’t made out to be Odin for once) foretells troubled times for the four men in the years to come.
The obvious solution was they would each swear blood-brother oaths to each other. Since Gisli’s Saga also gives some interesting detail to an old rite, I’ll just drop the passage here:
“We shall bind ourselves by more lasting utterances than ever. Let us four take the oath of foster-brothers.”
Well, they all thought that good counsel; and after that they went out of their booth [at the assembly] to the point of the “ere,” and there cut up a sod of turf in such wise that both its ends were still fast to the earth, and propped it up by a spear scored with runes, so tall that a man might lay his hand on the socket of the spear-head. Under this yoke they were all four to pass–Thorgrim, Gisli, Thorkel, and Vestein. Now they breathe each a vein, and let their blood fall together on the mould whence the turf had been cut up, and all touch it; and afterwards they all fall on their knees and were to take hands, and swear to avenge each the other as though he were his brother, and to call all the gods to witness.
But now, just as they were going to take hands, Thorgrim said: “I shall have quite enough on my hands if I do this towards Thorkel and Gisli, my brothers-in-law; but towards Vestein I have no tie to bind me to so great a charge.” As he said this he drew back his hand.
“Then more will do the like,” says Gisli, and drew back his hand. “I will be bound by no tie to the man who will not be bound by the same tie to my brother-in-law Vestein.”
(trans. G. W. DaSent, 1866)
So before we know it the relationship between the four is already unravelling. It eventually becomes that Gisli and Vestein form one side and Thorkel and Thorgrim another.
This gets us to “Now Thorgrim slew Vestein Vesteinson,” though in Gisli’s Saga it’s left a bit more ambiguous as to whether it was Thorgrim or Thorkel that did the murder. Either way, Vestein was a guest at Gisli’s home when he was found to have a spear run through him during his sleep. (FUN FACT: The spear used to kill Vestein was reforged from a magic sword that was in the possession of Gisli and Thorkel’s uncle but ended up getting shattered.) Gisli pulls the spear out of Vestein, which because of cultural reasons left him honor-bound to avenge Vestein’s death. He also recognizes the steel of the spear and knows Thorgrim and Thorkel are behind the murder.
Gisli won’t go against his own brother, but he does eventually repay Thorgrim in kind by sneaking into Thorgrims house in the middle of the night and affixing him to his bed (in which his own sister Thordis is also asleep) with the same spear that killed Vestein, which is a nice message to Thorkel. [A few days later, Snorri Thorgrimsson is born!]
Thordis suspects, and later tells her brand-new husband Bork the Stout, her suspicions that Gisli was behind Thorgrim’s murder. Gisli ends up being outlawed and leads a band of bounty hunters on a years long game of cat-and-mouse with the help of his wife Aud.
This band of bounty hunters is lead by Eyjolf (though Helgi the Spy is the one that holds onto the one collective brain cell of the band), who we may remember Thordis stabbing in the leg with his own sword. (Thordis is an interesting character, never quite sure where her motivations lie.)
And this isn’t the first time Eyjolf has been emasculated by the women of sagas.
Aud and Gisli are a good power-couple. They’re ride-or-die to the literal bitter end.
At a few points during the hunt for Gisli Sursson, Eyjolf stops by the farm that Aud is still running (And at most times, Gisli is still hiding out at. He’s never able to spend too much time away from her.) and offers money for her giving up Gisli. She always refuses. One last time he offers her 300 marks of silver, help in remarriage, and reintroduction into social circles. This time Aud feigns interest in Eyjolf’s offer.
Gisli and Aud’s foster-daughter sees this and panicks, runs off to Gisli to warn him, and he just responds “Aud will never betray me.” [heart emoji, crying face emoji]
Aud, on the other hand, leads Eyjolf on, questioning him that “And this silver, should I take it… I can do whatever I wish with it?” Thinking he has her, and thusly Gisli, Eyjolf assures her that is so. Aud takes the heavy pouch of silver and promptly swings it square into Eyjolf’s face, breaking his nose, and then chastising him for being a coward, a sneak, and being beaten by a woman, all in front of his men.
Eyjolf orders the men with him to cut Aud down in his rage, but one of them, Havard, stays the men saying they won’t commit to such a heinous act.
Eventually though, Gisli is tracked down and slain in one hell of a last stand. During that last stand though, Aud does manage to also break Eyjolf’s arm, so Aud 2 - Eyjolf 0.
This brings us to the scene where Eyjolf and the few survivors of Gisli’s last stand hobble into/march triumphantly into Bork and Thordis’ home, only for Eyjolf to get stabbed by Gisli’s sister.
And next time: Snorri Thorgrimsson the goði!
