Before It's Time and Into A New Age?

Before It’s Time and Into A New Age?

This blog post will focus on the way Hallgerd was treated during her marriage agreement/contract processes and how that treatment was unlike what other women received or expected at that time. As we all know, Hallgerd’s first marriage to Thorvald does not go well nor does it end well. Although her next two marriages both end with her husband’s death, the marriage agreement process is different than the first marriage. Hoskuld and Hrut finally realize that Hallgerd’s opinion in who she marries may allow for a more successful marriage. Although her next two husbands die, the time before their deaths was not spent between them bickering and fighting like how she did with Thorvald. 

The point I am getting to is that Hurt and Hoskuld may have been the first men at that time to take into consideration the female’s opinion about whom she will marry. This action did not seem common at all given the pursuer went straight to the desired woman’s father to ask for her hand rather than her personally, not to forget that most of the time the pursuer had to meet his desired bride. After letting Hallgerd partake in the deliberation process with her pursuers, Glum and Gunnar, she seemed to act more civil during the marriage towards her husbands, at least for the most part.

Unn, on the other hand, was not offered the ability to talk with her father, Mord, about Hrut’s desire to marry her. Had she been given that chance she could have encourage Mord to resign the marriage offer for she could not ever see herself love Hurt. Or, Unn could have gotten used to the idea of marring Hrut and felt more comfortable doing so knowing she had some say in the marriage. Obviously, their marriage ended for nothing to do with the way Hrut treated Unn but for another, more personal, reason. I’m not saying allowing the desired bride to partake in the marriage agreement process guarantees that the marriage will be a long-term success, but at least entering the marriage would be less of a shock and an uncomfortable situation.

Given that the viking age is very old and our current marriage process is much different than at that time, I wonder if Hrut and Hoskuld’s allowance towards Hallgerd might have started an unintentional trend of giving women the opportunity to decide who they marry. This is a long shot of an idea, but there is a bit of a correlation. That small amount of freedom Hallgerd was granted could have double or tripled in amount from generation to generation, generation leading us to where we are now. And if this is true, it begs the question what the marriage process will be like one hundred years or two hundred years from now. What role will women have then? 

A gesture as simple as “allowing” Hallgerd to help decide who she will marry could have made a profound impact on the role women fill today. 

The Strength of Women Threatening the Strength of Men

     In speaking on the topic of strong female figures in society, I believe an interesting character to note would be the evil foster mother Gothel from Tangled. Through this strange connection Gothel who is an elderly woman looking for the secret to youth is as stubborn and harsh as both Bergthora and Hallgerd in Njal’s Saga. As the story goes, Gothel happens upon a magical flower that when you sing to it, the flower both heals and preserves your youth. Rapunzel’s mother was very sick around the time of child birth and guards found the flower and gave it to her in order to heal her. Because of this, Rapunzel was born with magical hair that assumed the same powers as the original flower. Gothel, seeing all of these events take place, had one goal in mind, to stay young and live forever.

     Gothel kidnapped Rapunzel from the king and queen and set off into the forest. As Rapunzel grew older she became more independent and curious about the world and set off to see it while Gothel was away. After Gothel returned and saw that Rapunzel had left she again feared for her youth and beauty and soon turned into a very spiteful and vengeful woman as she searched for Rapunzel. Along Gothel’s travels in a never-ending search for eternal life and beauty, she encounters two henchmen who are known thieves throughout the forest. In an attempt to convince them to help her, Gothel bribes them with riches beyond belief and revenge on a fellow thief who betrayed them. Throughout the story we see how Gothel easily gets her way as she is tunnel visioned towards retrieving this magical power. Gothel is easily one of the most manipulative and clever characters in the film and truly proves that she will, by whatever means necessary, have her way. Towards the end of the film we see that she ultimately kills the only person who Rapunzel finds true happiness with and again proves the extent of her evil character.

      In a direct comparison, Bergthora and Hallgerd’s feud between each other is also over something as shallow as beauty and they too become tunnel visioned in their plot for revenge and the spite they have for each other. Both of these women characters in Njal’s Saga are very prideful and entitled and will not take offense to their title lightly. When these two hard headed women collide, it is as if Gothel has met her ultimate stubborn and unyielding match. In either case both Gothel, Bergthora and Hallgerd are conniving, manipulative and relentless when it comes to achieving their goal. In one part of the text Bergthora is attempting to coax her husband and sons to seek revenge on Sigmond who has insulted their character. In the text Cook relates, “Gifts have been given to you all, father and sons, and you’re not real men unless you repay them.” (Cook 74) . Evidence of their true authority reveals itself in that the people these women manipulate are not only other women but men as well. Bergotha and Hallgerd both manipulate their husbands to act out against their normal docile character in an attempt to seek revenge on the other. They also use male slaves as a source to get back at the other for petty revenge. Gothel manipulates strong and ill minded henchmen to follow out her will. Gothel also convinces a drunken man outside of a forest pub using her youth and charm in an attempt to obtain more information about Rapunzel and her whereabouts. Again, in both cases Bergthora, Hallgerd and Gothel are all very strong female characters who can easily manipulate and persuade others to get what they want no matter how small or how big their need/want may be. Overall, the true strength of women is shown not through their sexualization but through their cunning minds and their drive to get what they want however they have to go about it.

➼The Man’s Bow and Arrow: How Hallgerd and Merida Challenge Gunnar, Legolas, and Hawkeye➻

D

id you know that the bow and arrow is a symbol of masculine strength?

              This isn’t a crazy suggestion. Well, at least, not according to scholarly research based on several different cultures (http://www.atarn.org/chinese/seligman/seligman.htm).

              In southern India, the Assam state in northeastern India, and China, the bow and arrow is used for fertility rites in which it is associated with masculinity. In southern India, a husband physically gives his pregnant wife an arrow, thereby tangibly representing his role as a father in relation to the mother in the partnership. In northeastern India, a bow and arrow is put up next to the door of a house to publically declare the birth of a boy in the family. And in certain parts of China, a celebration ceremony for a royal prince requires a bow and arrow. However, having kids is just the beginning. The bow and arrow is also related to political transfers of power.

              In areas of Africa and the Far East, a bow and arrow signifies ownership. An African king ascribing to such traditions shoots arrows in the cardinal directions of land that he has recently acquired in order to emphasize his possession. Inhabitants of the Far East have been known to connect the bow and arrow with male death: arrows are fired to call back the souls of departed men, or miniatures of them are sacrificed to ancestors to protect the arrival of a newborn son.

              What does this mean? Why does it matter that the bow and arrow is all about boys as children, or about boys getting the throne and either being summoned home or allowed to stay on Earth?

              It matters because real-world evidence consequently says that the bow and arrow is widely seen as an indicator of manhood. And that changes how we read.

              For example: Gunnar in Njal’s Saga. Do you remember the weapon that his life depends on? Yep—his bow and arrow. His exact words, my friends, are, “[My attackers will] never be able to get me as long as I can use my bow” (128).

              Substitute the concept of “manhood” for “bow.” The sentence now becomes, “My attackers will never be able to defeat me as long as I am still a man—still have authority, still wield the symbolic embodiment of my fighting prowess, still am mastering my defined gender role in our medieval Icelandic society.”

              It’s a mouthful. Anyway, the picture of Gunnar’s request has been altered. As soon as he turns to Hallgerd, he is actually, surprisingly, asking—from a literary perspective—for his spouse to not only provide him with the locks of hair that will enable him to create a new bowstring and save his life from his pursuers, but also, in essence, his manhood. The loss of control of his bow and arrow is the figurative loss of his manhood.

              Hallgerd, of course, refuses to grant him the hair he needs. As a result, she defies his manhood. She flips the script; she turns the tables. The reason is simple—once she is in charge of the usage of the bow and arrow, she is the man. She is the person who decides the rules, and she is no longer merely a housewife (albeit a shockingly spiteful and underhanded one). Does she deny him the hair due to a slap she received many years earlier? Yes. Is she murdering her well-renowned partner, who has always been true to her, over a trivial slight? Yes. Her choice is unjustifiable, morally speaking.

              Even so, she is doing something few women in her time frame do: seizing a chance to call the shots and metaphorically oppose sexist standards. She’s not a child-bearing housecleaner. She’s a powerful female prepared to step into traditionally male shoes—and she does it the second she first objects to the marriage that her father arranges for her, as well as continues to do so with every nuptial agreement thereafter, being present and negotiating her own terms (19-20, 27-28, 52-53).

              Thus Hallgerd, in addition to being evil, is a boss.

“Nope.”

              Along the same lines, Disney’s animated movie Brave, featuring the fiery Scottish Merida as the lead, contradicts stereotypes both openly and subtly. Merida voraciously objects to her kingdom’s age-old custom of marrying princesses off to neighboring princes to afford for state interests and fights her mother, the queen, on the practice over and over again. She likewise engages in a brilliant shooting contest wherein she illegally vies for her own hand and, in an emblematic sense, outperforms her princely suitors with a bow and arrow to illustrate that she can be a “man” as well as or better than they can. In terms of running a country, she’s as fit to wear a crown independently, and to make decisions, as any of her supposedly hardier competitors are.

              Hence, each time Merida ignores her mom’s demands that she abandon her love of the bow and arrow, she is taking their argument concerning her duties and purpose in life to a metaphorical level. She is yelling Éowyn’s line from the Lord of the Rings on the battlefield—“I am no man!”—and proving that the conventional understanding of manliness preventing her from reaching her full societal potential is a joke.

              In the moment that she is readying herself to land the bullseye on the last of the three targets lined up for her suitors, one per man—she gets all of them, not satisfied with simply acing one—her mother orders her not to loose another arrow.

              Merida draws a deep breath, focuses on the target, and, in slow motion, releases her final arrow. Neither she nor Hallgerd were born to conform. They were born to rebel.

              Step aside, Gunnar, Legolas, and Hawkeye. You have some girls to compete with.

              And they’re not taking no for an answer.