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the family, its properties and not least its honour, as represented by Penelope. According to this gender ideology, Penelope is a heroine as well as Odysseus is a hero. Among the female tasks in war is to protect the family’s honour by inciting to revenge and war, a custom known in many societies. Moreover, unmarried women of high descent fill the role of services and gifts for the sealing of alliances. Vandkilde states that women contribute to the war system by doing exactly what culture expects (Vandkilde 2006:524).
This point is a crucial one to me. Even though women do not partake directly in the actual fighting of wars, they take part in forming the war system by following the norms of their gender that society stakes out for them.
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CELANDIC SAGA SOCIETYGender in Norse saga literature is a large field to enter. From any way you enter the theme, it is evident that the gender system of the Icelandic saga literature, and probably Old Norse society, is consistently different from the gender system that we live within today. Probably, a profound altering of the gender system took place during the medievalisation of Old Norse society through the introduction of Christianity during the 11th century AD.
Before this change, Carol Clover argues that the gender system can be understood as a one-gender system. There was only one standard by which persons were judged adequate or inadequate, and this standard was something like a masculine gender (Clover 1993:379). Thus, the one sex in question was essentially male, women being viewed as inverted and less perfect men (Clover 1993:377, with reference to Laqueur 1990). Through the introduction of Christianity the system changed into the two-gender system which basic lines we still know in our society today (Clover 1993). In the pre-Christian one-gender system there were no unbreakable demarcation lines between masculinity and femininity. Masculinity and femininity can be understood as the opposite outer points of a continuous line. Both males and females move between the two points on this line during their life cycle, as well as through specific actions and how they individually are perceived by other members of their society. As Clover puts it:
“…maleness and femaleness were always negotiable, always up for grabs, always susceptible to ‘conditions’” (Clover 1993:378).
Furthermore, masculinity or what are perceived as masculine values, as a rule is also expressions of power. Exclusively feminine values are not outspoken in the same way as masculine values are. Instead, on the other end of the scale are explicitly non-masculine values, which are also expressions of powerlessness.
There are many examples in the sagas of outstanding women who move towards the masculine side of this scale through their actions. Women in Germanic and Nordic societies were preceded by men as heirs, but they did inherit, and some women became great landowners. Birgit Sawyer has analysed the runic inscription on the Hillersjö stone, where a woman inherits not from her husband, but from her own family and from her own, deceased children, and becomes a great landowner (Sawyer
2000:49-51).Women also became traders, business partners, and some even took part in Viking raids. There also were a few women skalds. Women could partake in every level of a lawsuit process. Until year 992, from when they were excluded, women could bring suit in Iceland. Women are also known to have served as witnesses and arbitrators, even though these are exceptions.
I also want to mention the so-called maiden warrior tradition. In a section of Grágás called Baugatal, it says that if a sole daughter survives a slain man, and there are no male relatives to revenge his death, she will take over the claim towards his killers like a son. Thus, she operates as a surrogate son, and in this regard her gender changes. This lasts until she marries. Then her kinsmen take over the claim of revenge (Clover 1993:369).
In the archaeological material from Mid-Norway, Live Norderval point out late Iron age graves with an ambivalence between the sex determined from osteological analysis, and sex determined form the archaeological material. She discusses the possibility of graves with female bones and male material as expressions of some female’s role as the head of a family (Norderval 2006:98).
Men would also move towards the non-masculine end of the scale during their life-cycle or through specific situations. As an example, Egill Skallagrimsson, one of the most powerful, masculine figures in Old Norse literature, loses his masculinity as he grows old and disabled. He lives his life innan stokks, surrounded by females and depraved of his former masculinity and power. Another powerful example is the tradition of insulting. Insults could cover a range of themes, but one particular theme was accusing a man of non-maleness or femaleness. An example of this is how Hallgerdr in Njåls saga more than one time points out how Njål has no beard, and thus that he is unmanly. The tradition of nið includes insinuations of the man in question having been penetrated. As an example, Skarphedin suggests that Flosi is the bride of the Svinafell troll every ninth night.
Nið expresses a shame system where the claim of femaleness is striking (Clover 1993:376).
In this way, the gender system of the Old Norse society can be understood as a one-gender system, where the one gender that really counts, is the male gender. Individuals move between the male and the non-male ends of the scale through their position in society and their actions (Clover 1993, Shepherd 1999).
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JÅLS SAGA The main characters of Njåls saga, the wise Njål and the strong and able Gunnar, are close friends who have sworn each other friendship. Their wives, Njål’s Bergtora and Gunnar’s Hallgerdr, however, put this friendship to one test after another. Bergtora is described by the author as “a clever woman and a good human being, but somewhat hard-minded”.Hallgerdr is definitely not the favourite of the author, who describes her as beautiful, but with a temper and a hard mind. Scholars have described the voice of the author of Njåls saga as the most consistently misogynist in Icelandic literature (Kress 1979, Clover 1993). Hallgerdr has been married twice before. In both marriages, her husbands were killed, in the first
instance as a result of her wish, in the second perhaps as a result of her wish, but not as clearly as before.
When she and Bergtora are introduced, they start an argument over who should sit on which seat at the table – in effect, an argument over rank. Their argument does not get settled, and the following summer Hallgerdr has one of Bergtora’s slaves killed.
Bergtora’s answer is to have Hallgerdr’s slave killed.
Hallgerdr then has Bergtora’s freeborn workman killed by her own relative. In reply, Bergtora asks the fosterfather of her sons to kill Hallgerdr’s relative.
Then, on Hallgerdr’s order, Sigmund, a relative of Gunnars’, kills the fosterfather of Bergtora’s sons. In an intermezzo, a scene is described where Hallgerdr and Sigmund both say words of nið towards Njål and his sons. They call Njål a beardless man, and his sons men with beards of dirt. Some beggars hear these words, and bring them to the ears of Bergtora.
Bergtora tells her husband and sons that they are not much of men if they don’t pay back such a gift. Then Bergtora’s sons kill Sigmund. Bergtora’s son Skarphedin cuts Sigmund’s head off and gives it to a shepherd to give it to Hallgerdr. The shepherd does not dear to bring her the head, but he brings her the news of Sigmund’s death. Her answer is that she is sorry he didn’t bring Sigmund’s head – “then I would have given it to Gunnar, and then he must have revenged his relative or sit there in shame”. What Gunnar in effect does, is not to claim revenge over his relative. Since the feud now affects his relative and is therefore finally his business, and no longer his wife’s, he is able to bring it to a stop for a while.
As a rule in Icelandic saga society,
“women were in theory exempt from feud violence, but there are cases of their being specifically included together with able-bodied men as targets of vengeance” (Clover 1993:368, with reference to Miller 1990).
In Njåls saga, there is only one example of a woman being killed as a result of a feud. Bergtora, Njål’s wife, herself chooses to die with her husband when their surrounding enemies set fire to their house.
Still, this is her own choice, since the leader of the enemies, Flosi, asks her to come out and save her life.
However, from the above example we see how deeply involved in the feuds women could be. The example of the feud between Hallgerdr and Bergtora shows how women in high positions could actually start feuds by ordering murders. It is also a good example of the role of honour in this society. The two women start their quarrel over a question of rank.
Then, as the killings escalate, revenge is a main theme. Then, as Hallgerdr and Sigmund insult Bergtora’s husband and sons, they cannot longer stay out of the feud. At this point, the feud is somehow taken over and run by men, but the women behind them still work as agitators.
It does not seem likely that women did partake in actual combat in Old Norse society. Still, war and conflict is much more than just the actual fighting. For one thing, war includes, as mentioned before, the potential for war in any society. This potential is, among other things, expressed in the gender system, but also in the notion of honour within the society. In Norse society, honour is an important issue, and is always involved in blood feuds and conflicts between families in the Icelandic society.
The values praised throughout history connected to warriors are: honour, loyalty, duty, obedience, endurance, strength, sexual potency, courage, and camaraderie (Resic 2006:424). Hallgerdr is ascribed some of these values, but not all of them. Bergtora is somewhat better off, and is described by the author as both honourable – at least honour is important to her – loyal to her husband and sons, but also to her husband’s friend Gunnar, dutiful regarding her tasks in the household, obedient to her husband, enduring and strong as well as courageous. Sanimir Resic notes that all the mentioned values traditionally are synonymous with manliness (2006). But are they? I would rather state that they are synonymous with power. And as demonstrated in Njåls saga, power could be held not only by men, but also by women in Old Norse society.
Flexible gender roles allowed for women to play on the men’s part of the soccer field.
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