Torf-Einarr
The son of the Norse jarl Rognvald Eysteinsson and a concubine, his rise to power is related in sagas which apparently draw on verses of Einarr's own composition for inspiration.
According to the sagas and the Historia Norvegiae Rognvald's family conquered the Orkney and Shetland islands in the late ninth century.
[7] Rognvald's brother, Sigurd Eysteinsson, was made Jarl of Orkney and after his death on campaign he was succeeded by his son, Guthorm, who died shortly afterward.
The three eldest, Hallad, Einarr and Hrollaug, were natural sons of Rognvald, and were "grown men when their brothers born in marriage were still children".
Hrólfr "was so big that no horse could carry him", hence his byname of "Göngu-Hrólf" ("Hrólf the Walker"),[9] and he is identified by the saga writers with Rollo, ancestor of the Dukes of Normandy.
Despite his father's misgivings, on arrival in the Scottish islands, Einarr fought and defeated two Danish warlords, Þórir Tréskegg (Thorir Treebeard) and Kálf Skurfa (Kalf the Scurvy), who had taken residence there.
After winning a battle at sea, and a ruthless campaign on land, Einarr spied Hálfdan hiding on North Ronaldsay.
The blood eagle sacrifice may be a misunderstanding or an invention of the sagawriters as it does not feature directly in the earlier skaldic verses, which instead indicate that Hálfdan was killed by a volley of spears.
[18] The sagas then relate that Harald sought vengeance for his son's ignoble death, and set out on campaign against Einarr, but was unable to dislodge him.
Eventually, Harald agreed to end the fight in exchange for a fine of 60 gold marks levied on Einarr and the allodial owners of the islands.
[20] The sagas incorrectly claim that the Earl of Orkney was called "Turf-Einarr" because he introduced the practice of burning turf or peat to the islands since wood was so scarce.
[21] While depletion of woodland could have caused a cultural shift from burning timber to peat, potentially the name arose because the sequestration of the common or allodial rights of the islanders by Einarr forced them away from coppicing towards cutting turves.
[22] The remainder of Einarr's long reign was apparently unchallenged, and he died in his bed of a sickness, leaving three sons, Arnkel, Erlend and Thorfinn who became jarls of Orkney after him.
[24] A couplet that commemorates Einarr's defeat of the two pirate Vikings, Thorir Treebeard and Kalf the Scurvy, has a matching metre and alliterative similarities to the attributed verses.
[25] Einarr must have had some fame as a poet, as his name is used in the Háttatal, an examination of Old Norse poetry written in the thirteenth-century, to refer to a specific type of metre, Torf-Einarsháttr.
After Hallad's failure in Orkney the dialogue between the father and his sons has been interpreted as being about Rognvald's desire to cement his own position as Earl of Møre and an allusion to the early history of Iceland, where the sagas were written.
[30] He is also a heathen whose appearance at the commencement of the saga contrasts with the later martyrdom of his descendant St Magnus which marks a "moral high-point" of the story.
