Document Type
Book Chapter
Publication Date
1989
Abstract
Njáls Saga is above all a story of feud, and a complicated one at that. This paper attempts to give sense to those aspects of the feud between the Sigfussons and the people at Bergporshvall most frequently perceived by readers to be glaring weaknesses in a nearly perfect work. I refer to the apparent lack of motivation for the killing of Hoskuldr Hvitanessgodi, an act which has universally appalled critics and commentators of the saga, and the ease with which Mordr Valgardsson is able to "trick" Skarphedinn, a person otherwise characterized by a brutal wit and penetrating intelligence. In what follows I will offer two complementary explanations for the killing. The first places the death of Hoskuldr Hvitanessgodi firmly within the context of the feud between the Sigfusson kin group and the Bergþorshvall household. It is in the early stages of this feud that the saga writer sets forth a model of the bloodfeud which I call, for lack of a better name, the balance-sheet model. In this construct specific wrongs create debts of blood or debts of honor that require repayment. Bergora uses the idiom of this model when she describes the insults levelled at her husband and sons: "You have all been given gifts and it would be a dishonor if you did not make a return."
Publication Information & Recommended Citation
Miller, William I. "Central Feud in Njáls Saga." In Sagas of the Icelanders, edited by John Tucker, 292-322. Garland Reference Library of the Humanities 758. New York: Garland Publishing, 1989.
Comments
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