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kapittel 5. the territorialization of power in the icelandic commonwealth

kapittel 5

The Territorialization of Power in the

Icelandic Commonwealth

Sverrir Jakobsson

Introduction

he Icelandic historian Gunnar Karlsson (b. 1939) has described Icelandic
society before 1262 as being ‘unique in existing without any central power
for centuries after Christianity had brought to the country the art of writ-
ing on parchment in the Latin alphabet’.

1

his pithy statement depicts in

a nutshell both the particular and general about the Icelandic Common-
wealth, which existed until the advent of state power in 1262–1264, when
all parts of the country accepted the overlordship of the king of Norway.
It can be assumed that before the development of executive power in the
country, Icelandic society was similar to many other communities that also
lacked such power structures. Consequently, research into medieval Icelan-
dic society during this period may yield conclusions that are applicable and
signiicant to the study of other such societies. On the other hand, one
factor not applicable to all pre-state societies is that sources about medi-
eval Icelandic society are abundant, meaning that we are able to explore
various elements of this culture that usually elude us in studies of other
similar societies. hus, in this concise observation, two important histori-
cal phenomena are brought into focus: the introduction of literacy and
the development of state power. In many countries these two developed
side by side, but not in Iceland. herefore Icelandic medieval sources are
useful for examining the development of state power and the evolution
of social discourses concerning power.
In this study, I intend to analyse these two themes, looking at their rela-

1

Gunnar Karlsson, Iceland’s 1100 Years: he History of a Marginal Society (London,

2000), p. 1.

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sverrir jakobsson

tionship with space.

2

he interaction between power and space is both com-

plex and interesting. In modern times, what predominantly characterises
state power is that it is territorial, and this has been the case for a long time.
In fact, territorial power in Europe is generally considered to have originated
in the Middle Ages.

3

On the other hand, the Old Norse concept of ríki

(usually translated as ‘state’) often occurs in medieval Icelandic sources but
not in a way that connects it particularly with territorial authority.

4

his

ofers an indication of the diferent types of power relations that existed in
Iceland compared to other societies that contained some elements of state
power. In twelfth- and thirteenth-century Norway there existed a territo-
rial royal power that was supported by a system tax payments and ines.

5

On the other hand, the power of the goðar, the chieftains of the Icelandic
Commonwealth, was not territorially deined in this manner, and there are
few signs of hierarchies that were related to territorial entities.
According to traditional Icelandic law, in the form that was codiied in
the thirteenth century, there were two entities that might be deined as being
territorially demarcated: the quarters (each comprising one fourth of the
country) and the communes (ON hreppr). It is noteworthy that neither of
these entities were used as basis for power hierarchies. According to the law,
chieftains could only have clients within a particular quarter. However, this
principle seems to have been disregarded, as in the commonly cited example
of the chieftain Jón Loftsson (1124–1197) having parliamentary followers in
the Western quarter.

6

he communes were assuredly geographically deined

2

his study is based on an earlier version in Icelandic, ‘Rými og vald í íslensku

samfélagi á seinni hluta þjóðveldisaldar’, Heimtur. Afmælisrit til heiðurs Gunnari

Karlssyni sjötugum, eds. Guðmundur Jónsson, Helgi Skúli Kjartansson and Vésteinn

Ólason (Reykjavík, 2009), pp. 324–39. I want to thank Vala S. Valdimarsdóttir for

her assistance in adapting this material into English.

3

See for example Saskia Sassen, Territory, Authority, Rights. From Medieval to

Global Assemblages (Princeton & Oxford, 2006), pp. 41–53.

4

Johan Fritzner, Ordbog over det gamle norske sprog, 3 volumes (Kristiania, 1883–

1896), III, pp. 110–11.

5

See for example Sverre Bagge, «Borgerkrig og statsutvikling i Norge i middel-

alderen», Historisk tidsskrift, 65 (1986), 145–97 (especially pp. 165–82).

6

See for example Helgi Skúli Kjartansson, Fjöldi goðorða samkvæmt Grágás. Lecture

in a conference, held by he Sigurðar Nordal Institute July 24–26 1988 (Reykjavík,

1989), pp. 15–16; Gunnar Karlsson, Goðamenning. Staða og áhrif goðorðsmanna í

þjóðveldi Íslendinga (Reykjavík, 2004), p. 195.

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kapittel 5. the territorialization of power in the icelandic commonwealth

entities, yet power within them seems to have been decentralized, since
there were a total of ive administrative oicers and there is no indication
that the power of each oicer was geographically deined.

7

his changed in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, but there is no
general agreement as to the origin of this development.

8

What mainly

characterizes the change is that the power of chieftains–formerly dependent
on their personal relationships with their clients–became regional within
a territorial unit that modern historians have termed as ‘state/ríki’. hese
changes were not relected in the traditional law, which might indicate that
they were of a fairly late provenance. In this essay, I intend to illustrate the
connection between these political and social changes and the develop-
ment of a new discourse of power, which became ever more prominent
in the twelfth century. At that time, literacy was introduced into Iceland
with profound social consequences. Following the country’s conversion to
Christianity from the eleventh century onwards, new standards of morality
took over, along with a new system of knowledge. A new discourse about
space also developed, whereby space became deined with reference to events
from the history of Christianity and the saints.

9

his afected attitudes to

local territorial power structures, since the discourse about foreign hierar-
chies had implications for similar hierarchies at home. he discourse about
the state of the world had to be translated and provided with meaning in
an Icelandic context, but it also inluenced the way people understood their
own society.
A few factors that are related to the discourse about space and power
will be examined in particular in this study. he irst one concerns spatial
discourse in a society in which hierarchies were not territorially deined.
What was the nature of regional power in such a society and what were its
geographical limitations? Secondly, I will try to analyse the introduction
of literacy into Iceland; who beneitted from it and how was it related to
both new and pre-existing systems of discourse? Who were the ones that

7

See for example Grágás. Lagasafn íslenska þjóðveldisins, ed. Gunnar Karlsson,

Kristján Sveinsson and Mörður Árnason (Reykjavík, 1992), p. 180.

8

See for example Jón Viðar Sigurðsson, Frá goðorðum til ríkja. Þróun goðavalds á

12

. og 13. öld (Reykjavík, 1989), pp. 55–60; Gunnar Karlsson, Goðamenning, pp.

280, 286–287, 292–94.

9

Cf. Sverrir Jakobsson, ‘Heaven is a Place on Earth. Church and Sacred Space in

13

th

century Iceland’, Scandinavian Studies, 82 (2010), 1–20.

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sverrir jakobsson

claimed the power to discuss space and deine its meaning? hirdly, I will
discuss the development of regional power in the early thirteenth century
when the supporters of chiefs came to be deined in a new way: by regional
markers. I will attempt to establish how this new discourse about space and
territorial units was related to actual changes in power relations. Finally, I
will analyse the regional units of government that had come into existence
in the thirteenth century, examining whether one can trace the origin of
territorial governance in Iceland to this period. In doing so, I hope to
ofer some general insights into the power structures inherent in the state-
formation process, in contrast to other forms of authority.

Non-territorial power relations in the

Icelandic Commonwealth

One of the most important questions in the political and social history of the
Icelandic Commonwealth is: what was the nature of the relationships between
chieftains and farmers, and what type of power did the chieftains wield?

10

An important issue here is the degree to which the power of chieftains was
territorial, that is, the role played by the chieftains in their local communi-
ties. It has been generally accepted that chieftains were in charge of various
afairs in the vicinity of their habitations.

11

On the other hand, there are few

examples of any speciic duties chieftains had towards their neighbours, apart
from protecting the community against miscreants that robbed the region’s
inhabitants and otherwise behaved disgracefully.

12

On the other hand, there

are countless examples of chieftains’ duties concern towards their individual
followers, farmers who were personally bound to chieftains. Recently, it has
been argued that the social group who attended the hing (the regional assem-
bly led by the chieftains) had no duty or inclination to protect all farmers from
evildoers, as is evidenced by the fact that the chieftains were comparatively
few and unevenly distributed around the country.

13

10

Gunnar Karlsson, ‘Goðar og bændur’, Saga, X (1972), 5–57.

11

See Gunnar Karlsson, ‘Goðar og bændur’, pp. 9–18.

12

Gunnar Karlsson, ‘Goðar og bændur’, p. 10.

13

Gunnar Karlsson, Goðamenning, pp. 156–57.

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kapittel 5. the territorialization of power in the icelandic commonwealth

In many ways, recent research by scholars such as Gunnar Karlsson
seems to undermine traditional ideas about the local authority of chieftains.
It seems evident that the main pillar in the chieftains’ hierarchy of power
was their personal relationship with their followers, rather than their status
within the region. However, the question is, if this was the case, then what
was territorial leadership all about?
Here we must look at the concept of the region (ON herað, pl. heruð),
which is elusive, as these entities had no basis within traditional law.

14

However, the concept is crucial when one has to value the nature of local
government, assuming that it was a possible concern of chieftains. According
to the law, quarters and communes were separate and fairly well deined
entities, but this was not true in the case of the regions.
he concept of the herað seems to have had various meanings in the Old
Norse language; for example a populated area as opposed to an uninhabited
area, or as a rural area as opposed to a village. In translations from Latin
it frequently has the same meaning as regio. In Norwegian documents it is
used for various entities such as states or administrative districts. In sources,
the herað of Oslo is mentioned but also the herað of Telemark, as well as a
region in Denmark named ‘Fyn’, but these entities varied greatly in size.

15

In Iceland, the meaning of the concept is not well deined. In the law
collection Grágás it often has the same meaning as a rural commune (ON
hreppr), and this also seems to be the case in the saga of Guðmundur dýri in
the Sturlunga collection where the ‘herað of Reykjardalr’ is referred to.

16

he

events in that saga take place in the last decades of the twelfth century. In
Þórðar saga kakala and Þorgils saga, both of which take place in the middle
of the thirteenth century, there is, however, mention of heruð in Borgarjörðr,
Skagajörðr and Eyjajörðr, which are much larger entities.

17

his seems to

indicate a development in time, as herað still deined a commune at the
end of the twelfth century, but Borgarjörðr is irst called herað as late as in
1247, in connection with Snorri Sturluson’s inheritance.
he concept of the ‘regional state’ (Icelandic heraðsríki) is in many ways
appropriate for geographically compact areas, governed by a chieftain or a

14

he origin of the word is unknown but it is possibly related control over an

army, cf. Ásgeir Blöndal Magnússon, Íslensk orðsijabók (Reykjavík, 1989), p. 321.

15

See Fritzner, Ordbog over det gamle norske sprog, I, pp. 792–93.

16

See Grágás, p. 534; Sturlunga saga, I, p. 160.

17

See Sturlunga saga, II, pp. 84, 192, 193, 207.

106

sverrir jakobsson

lord.

18

Such regional states existed in Iceland in the ifth and sixth decades

of the thirteenth century, and naturally, the origin of this phenomenon has
been researched extensively.

19

On the other hand, the study of the concept

of the herað itself is diicult due to its manifold meanings. In the law codes
that were written down in the last decades of the Commonwealth era one
cannot detect a shift in its meaning; in these documents it is synonymous
with the hreppr/rural commune when used to deine a territorial entity.
However, the study of the emergence of this concept is central to this
current analysis this for two reasons: on the one hand, it represents the
irst occasion in Iceland where a chieftain–or a ‘foreman’ (ON. formaður)
as it is termed in Þorgils saga skarða–enjoys territorial power. Secondly, the
so-called ‘regional governance’ (ON heraðsstjórn) is the only example of
chieftains involving themselves in issues concerning a territorially deined
entity. herefore, the concept is indisputably connected with the origin of
regional power in Iceland.
he main diiculties in reaching a scholarly deinition of ‘regional
governance’ are, on the one hand, the question of chieftainships and the
traditional inclination of scholars to assume that they were regional in
nature. On the other hand, the problem is the concept of a regional par-
liament, which has inluenced scholarly discourse about regions as a phe-
nomenon. In Grágás and Íslendingabók we see that in each quarter there
were three or four spring parliamentary sessions, and three chieftains were
supposed to attend each one.

20

It is tempting to see such spring sessions as

geographically demarcated entities that were the precursor to the admin-
istrative districts (Icelandic sýslur) that were formed in the ifteenth and
sixteenth centuries, a sort of regional assembly.

21

If this is true, then it is

tempting to regard the regions that had formed shortly before the end of

18

Heraðsríki is an idiom coined by modern historians; in ON. the much more

vague term ríki would have been used to signify such an area, along with many

other things.

19

See for instance Jón Viðar Sigurðsson, Frá goðorðum til ríkja; Gunnar Karlsson,

Goðamenning, pp. 271–315.

20

See Íslenzk fornrit I. Íslendingabók, Landnámabók, ed. Jakob Benediktsson

(Reykjavík, 1968), p. 12; Grágás, p. 413.

21

he concept of the heraðsþing only appears once in Grágás and seems rather to

refer to a parliament for the quarter rather than some sort of a spring parliament

district, see Grágás, p. 249.

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kapittel 5. the territorialization of power in the icelandic commonwealth

the Icelandic Commonwealth era as entities that somehow equalled an
older ‘parliamentary district’ (Icelandic þingumdæmi).

22

However, such

temptations should be resisted. Even though these spring parliamentary
sessions were equally spread around the country, there is no indication
in contemporary sources that any territorially distinct entities developed
around them.
A good example of this is the two spring assemblies held in the region of
Breiðajörðr, Þórsnesþing and Þorskajarðarþing. Our sources about them
are fragmentary but they do not indicate that these assemblies served terri-
torially demarcated districts. In Gísla saga Súrssonar it is stated that horkell
the Wealthy from Dýrajörðr had business across Breiðajörðr in Þórsnesþing
along with the sons of Súr. hey accepted an invitation to the home of
Þorsteinn the Codbiter, the son of Þórólfr Mostrbeard, and in return they
invited the sons of Þorsteinn–Þorgrímr and Börkr the Stout–to come to the
spring assembly Hválseyri in Dýrajörður. hen Þorgrímr settled in Sæból
in Haukadalur. According to the saga, ‘Þorgrímr had a chieftainship and
the brothers got a lot of support from him.’

23

It does not seem to be vital

that Þorgrímr’s chieftainship was in Þórsnes at the site of Þórsnesþing. In
the saga we are also told that Börkr the Stout, Þorgrímr’s brother, who
lived at Helgafell in Þórsnes, went with many of his men across the bay to
Þorskajarðarþing ‘to meet his friends’ there.

24

hese events were supposed

to have happened in the tenth century but the narrative stems from the
thirteenth century. In a narrative dealing with more recent events, Þorgils
saga ok Haliða, we are told about Ólafsgildi, a feast held in Reykhólar
in 1119, during which the participants discuss the purchase of grain at
Þórsnesþing on the other side of the jord.

25

Similar tangles often occur in

accounts of parliamentary spring sessions, but these are only problematic if
we assume that the parliamentary districts were territorially demarcated. If
that assumption is the case, then there is nothing curious about narratives
of chieftains from the Western Quarter attending spring assemblies in more
than one place.

22

See for example Gunnar Karlsson, Goðamenning, p. 65.

23

Íslenzk fornrit VI. Vestirðinga sögur, eds. Björn K. Þórólfsson and Guðni Jónsson

(Reykjavík, 1943), p. 19.

24

Íslenzk fornrit VI, p. 89.

25

Sturlunga saga, I, p. 27.

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sverrir jakobsson

he next question to consider is what the concept of the heraðsstjórn
referred to if it did not indicate a territorially demarcated region controlled
by a chieftain. here are least three possibilities. First of all there is an indi-
cation that the concept of the herað signiied a territorial unit that existed
before any lord had claimed overlordship of the area. In this case, regional
governance was probably the joint responsibility of several men, one or more
chieftains and farmers in the neighbourhood. here are some examples of
this in the Sagas of Icelanders (ON Íslendingasögur).

26

Another use of the concept of the heraðsstjórn is the leadership of
chieftains within a certain area, who were therefore in charge of a proto-
state in its initial stages of development. his would, for example, apply
to the authority of Þorgils Oddason (c. 1080–1151) and his son Einar
Þorgilsson (c. 1120–1185) in the Breiðajörðr region. According to Þorgils
saga ok Haliða, Þorgils was among the greatest chieftains in Iceland, yet
he did not have absolute power in his home region. hus, one chieftain
could be superior to others due to a network of friends and inluence at
the Althing but his powers were territorially deined just as those of late
medieval kings. For example, Þorgils Oddason was regarded as bold when
in 1120 he deined the land he possessed as ‘the entire region in which I
possess land’.

27

In the sagas, it is stated that he owned land in Saurbær and

Hvammsdalur, and he possessed some land by Laxá where his protégé Ólafr
Hildisson was slain. Yet, when he claims that territorial units other than
the farmland belong to his sphere of authority, it is seen as an example of
his hubris.
A few decades later the authority of Þorgils and his sons in the region had
increased and they were in charge of several manors. In 1148 Oddi Þorgils-
son, the older son of Þorgils, had settled at the farm Skarð in Skarðsströnd,
but his brother Einar Þorgilsson lived in Sælingsdalstunga.

28

he rule of Þor-

gils and his sons over such manors was short-lived since Skarð soon reverted
to its hereditary owner. Before 1148 the law-speaker Snorri Húnbogason
(c. 1100–1170) used to live there, and later on the sons of Snorri—Þorgils
and Nari—lived at their hereditary manor.

29

Böðvar Barkarson, Þorgils’s

26

See for ex. Íslenzk fornrit VI, p. 141; Íslenzk fornrit VII. Grettis saga Ásmundarso-

nar, Bandamanna saga, ed. Guðni Jónsson (Reykjavík, 1936), p. 226.

27

Sturlunga saga, I. p. 32.

28

Sturlunga saga, I, p. 66

29

Sturlunga saga, I, pp. 64, 81.

109

kapittel 5. the territorialization of power in the icelandic commonwealth

son-in-law, resided at Sælingsdalstunga after he had sold Hvammur to Sturla
Þórðarson in 1150.

30

In the spring of 1151 both Þorgils and his son Oddi died, but Einar
became ‘a chief since he was supported by many; relatives and friends that his
father Þorgils had gathered around him. He also did not lack zeal and bold-
ness’.

31

Einar inherited his father’s network of supporters, but his future was

not glorious since he proved not to be his father’s equal. he hierarchy that
was built up by Þorgils in the Dalir region was partly based on his personal
qualities as a leader; his son could gain an access to his supporters but
nevertheless found it hard to maintain his position if he did not demonstrate
these same qualities.
During Þorgils’ lifetime other leaders in the district seem to have been
forced to yield to him; Snorri Húnbogason gave his manor to the son of
Þorgils, and it is also stated that Þorgils, in his later years, contrived with
his son in killing Skeggi Gamlason, a prominent farmer, and did so with
impunity.

32

However, when Einar Þorgilsson had become the leader of this

group and made the mistake of shielding outlaws in Gilsjörðr, ‘rumour
had it that his regional governance proved to be diferent from that of
Þorgils.’

33

Sturla Þórðarson (1115–1183) was one of those who saw this

as an opportunity to seize the initiative. He was considered to be ‘a great
man, of a good family, and likely to become a lord’ and it became his task
to undermine the hierarchy built up by Þorgils and his sons, the system of
regional governance.

34

When Sturla had become the most powerful chief in these parts, he
also tried to deine his powers in a territorial manner. Other chiefs had to
unite in resistance, but Sturla drove away those farmers in the neighbour-
hood who had allowed his competitors to stay overnight.

35

In this manner,

Sturla strove for regional authority in a manner similar to the way that
Þorgils Oddason had done before. However, his hierarchy never became
territorially deined since he was always competing with less powerful
chieftains.

30

Sturlunga saga, I, p. 68.

31

Ibid.

32

Sturlunga saga, I. pp. 66-67.

33

Sturlunga saga, I. p. 72.

34

Sturlunga saga, I, p. 66.

35

Sturlunga saga, I. p. 96.

110

sverrir jakobsson

he third way in which one can deine regional governance in spatial
terms is to use the concept as deined by law, in connection with the com-
munes that were indeed territorially demarcated entities. hen we would
have to assume that regional governance could be the provenance of one
man and that there might exist proto-states at the level of the commune,
even though the governance of communes was divided up between ive
persons according to the law. One such communal leader would have been
Tori Valbrandsson, who in Landnámabók is depicted as gathering a team
in order to kill a band of outlaws.

36

Yet such leadership of communes would

have been ephemeral in nature, or connected with special projects.
One can also contemplate the possibility that the communes were deined
as separate entities from the start, as part of the formation of teams of settlers
led by a special leader.

37

his would mean that each inhabited commune

was organized during Iceland’s initial settlement period, and that from
then on one chieftain (and his descendants) was the leader of each region.
hus, the main diference between the authority of chieftains in the tenth
and eleventh centuries on the one hand, and that of the regional lords
of the thirteenth century on the other, would be that the older entities
were smaller. However, this hypothesis does not it with the picture of the
distribution of power that the law clearly draws up. In the Sagas of Icelanders
there are also quite a few examples of more than one chieftain ighting in
order to gain inluence within a territorially distinct region. he ideas of
Jón Viðar Sigurðsson (b. 1958) about chieftains being regional leaders of
this kind it with this theory, but his premise is that testimony of the law
about administration of the Commonwealth is more or less invalid.

38

He

also takes for granted that authority and hierarchies must always have been
regional; that they could not have been personal at any point.
From what has been argued before, it can be concluded that authority of
chieftains used to be personal in nature before the thirteenth century, based
on their relations with their followers: the thingmen. In this context, one
can extrapolate the existence of domains or other geographically demarcated

36

Íslenzk fornrit, I, p. 75.

37

See for example Jón Viðar Sigurðsson, Chieftains and Power in the Icelandic

Commonwealth (he Viking Collection. Studies in Northern Civilization, 12),

transl. Jean Lundskær-Nielsen (Odense, 1999), pp. 196–97.

38

See for example Gunnar Karlsson, Goðamenning, pp. 40, 155–57.

111

kapittel 5. the territorialization of power in the icelandic commonwealth

areas, since the geographical entities within the system–quarters and dis-
tricts–had little or no connection with the hierarchies of chieftains. he
dominant tendency among modern scholars to assume that there existed
parliamentary districts that formed a core of the later regional government
does not hold up, since the parliaments were never territorially demarcated.
his so-called regional governance was the only duty of a chieftain, which
might be territorially deined, but the evidence is far from unambiguous as to
whether this really was the obligation of chieftains. Regional governance may
have been a joint duty held by the most powerful men in a given area, both
chieftains and farmers; it may have been a provisional arrangement for speciic
tasks, or an obligation that one expected from chiefs dominating a big area who
had started forming a proto-state. Until the thirteenth century, such experiments
generally did not last for many generations, since competition, distribution of
power and lack of regional authority was built into the law and hierarchies.

The Church, literacy and a new discourse about space

Literacy began to gain ground in Iceland in the irst half of the twelfth cen-
tury, and the oldest written sources about the history of Iceland derive from
this period. From the nature of the earliest Icelandic texts one can deduce
that they mainly belonged to the church, since homilies and translations
of saints’ lives are prominent. here was also some production of scientiic
texts, for example about the position of stars, but such texts were useful
for exact calculations regarding the church year. hese texts are the earliest
sources about the dominant worldview of some Icelanders; their ideas about
geography and world history.
here is no indication that a large group was using the written word at this
time. However, literate texts soon became very inluential, since knowledge
written on parchment was more likely to last than education conveyed
through speech. It became possible to refer to a piece of knowledge in the
same form, and thus standardize the knowledge that was communicated.
his is highly important for the development of the discourse about the
most important elements of worldview, such as space.
It is disputable whether the church of Iceland was powerful or not in
the twelfth century. Until 1190, the division between religious and secular
power was vague, but at that point the consecration of chieftains was deemed

112

sverrir jakobsson

illegal by the Archbishop of Nidaros. Before this separation of secular and
clerical powers, the church could only protect its interests through close
cooperation with chieftains, landowners and the most powerful members
of the secular class. Yet the advent of literacy bestowed upon clergymen
a supreme authority over a new kind of discourse; an authority that can
hardly have been very obvious at irst. he church of Iceland did not gain
an advantage in learning over the secular classes until the written word had
become dominant within educated discourse.
From the start, the hierarchy of the church marked a shift in the tradi-
tional social and cultural relationships that existed in Iceland. To begin with,
ecclesiastical authority was territorial, as its main units were territorially
demarcated bishoprics and parishes, parallel to quarters and districts within
the secular hierarchy. his was diferent from the authority of chieftains,
which was based on personal relations and had no reference to territorially
deined unities. he main diference between these two systems was that
within the church there was nothing similar to the personal hierarchy of the
chieftains. herefore, the discourses of clergymen about space must have
been diferent to those that existed in secular hierarchies. Yet it is likely that
what characterizes written texts from this period is the prevailing discourse
that took place in the church, since literacy only became predominant within
other hierarchies after the fall of the Commonwealth.
In geographical descriptions from the twelfth and thirteenth centuries,
there are descriptions of territorial hierarchies in other countries. In the
world description of Hauksbók there is a description of ‘where countries
lie in the world’, some countries (kingdoms) within each continent are
mentioned, and within the countries, there is mention of stórheruð (plur.
macroregions).

39

his discourse is relected in other medieval Icelandic texts

that also contain descriptions of countries. In the manuscript AM 194, 8vo
(from 1387), it is explained that the states have borders and the borders
and/or outer limits of Norway are described.

40

Yet such descriptions are

39

Hauksbók udgiven efter de arnamagnæanske håndskrifter number 371, 544 and

675

, 4to samt forskellige papirshåndskrifter, eds. Eiríkur Jónsson and Finnur Jónsson

(Copenhagen, 1892–1896), pp. 153–56. he concept stórherað is used for regions

within larger states, such as India or Parthia.

40

Alfræði íslenzk: Islands encyklopædisk litteratur I. Cod.mbr. AM 194, 8vo (Samfund

til udgivelse af gammel nordisk littteratur, 37), ed. Kristian Kålund (Copenhagen,

1908), p. 11.

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kapittel 5. the territorialization of power in the icelandic commonwealth

not standardized, and even though units such as storheruð are mentioned
in various texts, herað did not have a standardized meaning in geographical
literature. In the extensive geographical description of the Old Norse trans-
lation of the bible, Stjórn, words such as partur (part) or hluti (portion) are
more frequently used than heruð (regions). In this text, there is also the
usage of the Latin concept of provincia.

41

World descriptions of clergymen

give readers insight into the discourse about regional hierarchies in other
countries and there standardized concepts were not used, at least not in the
thirteenth century.
In the section Skáldskaparmál in the Prose Edda there is the following
deinition of territorial governance:

Because a king rules over many countries, he has tributary kings [ON
skattkonungar] and earls, who govern with him, and judge according
to the law and protect the land against war in distant countries, and
their judgments and punishments shall be equal to that of the king.
But in one country there are many regions [ON heruð] and it is the
way of kings to make governors rule in these regions—in the Danish
tongue these men are called hersar or lendir menn but counts in Saxony
and barons in England. And they shall be judges and defenders of the
region that is under their authority.

42

he important thing about this paragraph is that in the thirteenth century
ríki and herað evidently meant the same thing. If we accept the com-
monly held belief that Snorri Sturluson (1179–1241) is the author of this
text, then this is one of the oldest examples of the two being considered
identical.
Snorri Sturluson’s herað in Borgarjörðr is one of the oldest examples
of a regional district in Iceland, as mentioned before. It is thus hardly a
coincidence that Snorri seems to have been interested in systems of regional
power in other countries. In the Prose Edda there is a systematic description
of the concept of the herað and it is made clear that a herað submits to the
authority of one person.

41

Stjórn. Gammelnorsk bibelhistorie fra verdens skabelse til det babyloniske fangen-

skab, ed. Carl Rikard Unger (Christiania, 1862), pp. 67–100.

42

Edda Snorra Sturlusonar, ed. Finnur Jónsson (Copenhagen, 1931), p. 161.

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sverrir jakobsson

Since Snorri Sturluson was a courtier of the king of Norway it is tempting
to assume that his attempt to coordinate the use of concepts about regional
power systems takes into account the situation in Norway and the discourse
of power at the royal court. Yet the matter is far from simple. In Heimskringla
one can read that landed men [ON lendir menn] were powerful in Norway in
the eleventh century ‘since in each district [fylki] it seemed as if lendir menn
ruled over farmers’.

43

Heruð, on the other hand, were smaller entities and

most likely some sort of entities similar to those in Denmark.

44

Historians

actually believe that there was some sort of fusion of various phenomena
since districts [ON fylki] prevailed in Trøndelag and in the western part
of Norway, but regions [ON heruð] were the dominant form in Vik and
the eastern region. However, in the thirteenth century the concept fylki
was in most places used as a synonym for the Latin word provincia.

45

It is

not clear in Norwegian law whether there is coherence between fylki and
lendir menn, i.e. whether each fylki was ruled by one lendr maðr, as seems
to be the assumption in Heimskringla.

46

In the present context, however,

the most important thing is how the concept is used in Icelandic texts such
as Heimskringla and the Prose Edda. In these texts it is evident that fylki or
herað are seen as territorial entities, under the authority of a lendr maðr. he
idea of territorial governance in Norway inluenced the Icelanders’ ideas
about such administration in Iceland.
Snorri Sturluson must have been very interested in the situation of lendir
menn, as he became one himself just before he was sent home to Iceland
in 1220.

47

he question is whether he saw himself as lendr maðr ruling a

territorially demarcated region, probably Borgarjörðr.

43

Íslenzk fornrit XXVII. Heimskringla II, ed. Bjarni Aðalbjarnarson (Copenhagen,

1944), p. 58.

44

Sølvi Bauge, ‘Fylke’, Kulturhistorisk leksikon for nordisk middelalder fra vikingetid

til reformationstid V. Frälsebrev-Gästgiveri (Copenhagen, 1960), 39–40, cf. Poul

Rasmussen, ‘Herred. Danmark’, Kulturhistorisk leksikon for nordisk middelalder

fra vikingetid til reformationstid VI. Gästning-Hovedgård (Copenhagen, 1961),

488–91, Sølvi Bauge Sogner, ‘Herred. Noreg’, op. cit, 492–94.

45

Sølvi Bauge, ‘Fylke’, 39-40.

46

See Arne Bøe, ‘Lendmann’, Kulturhistorisk leksikon for nordisk middelalder

fra vikingetid til reformationstid X. Kyrkorätt-Ludus de Sancto Canute duce

(Copenhagen, 1965), 498–505.

47

Sturlunga saga, I, p. 278.

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kapittel 5. the territorialization of power in the icelandic commonwealth

A new discourse of territorialized power seems to have been brewing
during this period. From Sturlunga saga we know that those who opposed
Snorri’s business were ‘Southerners … and mainly those related to Ormr
Jónsson’.

48

here is no other mention of men from the quarters in this

manner in Sturlunga, except in relation to ecclesiastical matters. Indeed,
such solidarity amongst men from the Southern quarter does not occur
again until in 1238, although in 1231 there is talk of Áverjar (he River
People) as a speciic group, supporting the family from Oddi.

49

he southern

chieftain Gissur Þorvaldsson (1209–1268) has a big crowd with him at the
Althing in 1229 and 1232 but on neither occasion is it stated that his group
belongs to a certain quarter of the country. Yet in 1229 the Austirðingar
(men from the Eastjords) are grouped together at the Althing, and it is stated
that this group had as its leaders the brothers Ormr and Þórarinn, the sons
of Jón Sigmundsson. he followers of the chieftain Kolbeinn the Younger
(1208–1245) and his kinsman Kolbeinn Sighvatsson (d. 1238) who settled
at Snorri Sturlusons’s farm in the South in 1234, are called ‘Northeners’.
hese men came from Skagajörðr and Eyjajörðr. When Sturla Sighvatsson
(1199–1238) appropriated for himself Snorri’s possessions in Borgarjörðr
it is also stated that he appropriated for himself ‘the whole region [herað]’.

50

In the battles at Bær in 1237 and at Örlygsstaðir in 1238 it is made clear
that the ighting groups are named after certain regions. he followers of
Sturla Sighvatsson and Sighvatr Sturluson (1170–1238) at Bær are known
as ‘the men from the Westjords’ and some of their followers are called
Borgirðingar (men from Borgarjörðr) during the battle of Örlygsstaðir.
By then the supporters of Gissur Þorvaldsson have become known as
Sunnlendingar (Southerners). he followers of Kolbeinn the Younger are
called Skagirðingar (men from Skagajörðr) in 1231 and again at the
battle of Örlygsstaðir.

51

hus, within a relatively short period, regional

appellations proliferated in order to make sense of battles between secular
groups, whereas until then they hardly ever occur unless in the context of
ecclesiastical hierarchies.

48

Ibid.

49

Sturlunga saga, I, p. 345. he River in this case would be Rangá, in the heartland

of the region where the family from Oddi held hegemony.

50

Sturlunga saga, I, pp. 333–34, 376–77, 392.

51

Sturlunga saga, I, pp. 405, 417–39.

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sverrir jakobsson

he discourse about territory and power seems to have changed greatly
during a short period after 1220. It is tempting to link this diference to a
change in political strategies. Chieftains like Snorri Sturluson envisioned
a diferent situation where they could turn their personal leadership as
chieftains into territorial power. his was the basis for the regional districts
that had formed throughout the country in the ifth and sixth decade of
the thirteenth century. Even though regional appellations had begun to
apply to secular political rivals in 1238 it is evident that the ensuing civil
war between the family of the Sturlungs and their rivals stimulated this
development. Political rulers formed permanent groupings and led raids in
the region of their rivals. For instance, in the 1240s Kolbeinn the Younger
attacked farmers living in the Westjords and in return his rival Þórður kakali
Sighvatsson (1210–1256) conducted raids in the Northern Quarter. In the
following decades, there was no turning back from this praxis.
In these circumstances, there formed a new rationale for the rule of the
Norwegian king in Iceland. While hierarchies were not regional, the king
could only have power over individuals, the chieftains that submitted to
him. When the regional proto-states [ON heraðsríki] had been formed,
however, a few leaders could submit themselves to the king on behalf of
their regions. With this in mind the structure of the events in Iceland from
1262–1264, when men from various parts of the country submitted to the
king of Norway, becomes easy to explain. In the Northern Quarter, three
farmers from Skagajörðr and three from Eyjajörðr took an oath, but other
parts of the quarter seem not to be deined as entities. In the Westjords ive
chieftains, each with three farmers, all took an oath. he most remarkable
example is that of the Borgirðingar who had no chief, but nevertheless three
farmers took an oath on their behalf.

52

Borgarjörðr had become a territorial

unit, regardless of lordship in that area.
If one tries to deine the development from personal to territorial power
within a temporal framework, there seems to be a turning point with the
forming of territorial ecclesiastical hierarchies in the eleventh and the
twelfth centuries. he discourse about the constitution of the church was
diferent from that of secular power, since the hierarchy of the church was
territorial, modelled on international institutions. As the discourse of the
church became more independent in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries,

52

See Sturlunga saga, II, pp. 281–82.

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kapittel 5. the territorialization of power in the icelandic commonwealth

the more it inluenced society. In this respect the separation of secular and
ecclesiastical power in 1190 must have been a turning point. After this,
regional dominions [heraðríki] formed more rapidly. he clearest example
of this is the state of the Sturlungar in Breiðajörðr, as their main rivals
for power in the region became servants of the church and thus no longer
suited for secular power. Amongst these were, for example, the descendants
of Einar Þorgilsson and family at Skarð. As a result of this, a power vacuum
appeared that ensured the Sturlungar the leadership amongst chieftains in
these parts.

53

his fusion of power did not entail a shift in the legal basis of

power, which remained the same throughout the Commonwealth period.
Yet territorialization became imminent partly through ecclesiastical and
foreign inluences passed on through the medium of literacy. One can view
the descriptions of regional governance in the Prose Edda and Heimskringla
as an attempt to add new dimensions to the discourse of power and place
regional hierarchies on the agenda. It is hardly a coincidence that both these
works are connected to the irst Icelander who came to Iceland as a lendr
maðr–the subtle politician Snorri Sturluson. With this in mind, it is indeed
ironic that in 1262 Snorri’s district of Borgarförðr had become an anomaly
among the regional proto-states, as it did not have a chief.

Conclusion

he unique position of Icelandic society regarding the development of state
power has often been commented upon, but in this study, I have tried to
draw out further ramiications of this uniqueness. It is clear that the absence
of state power, as demonstrated by the law codes, sagas and contemporary
sources, was indeed very diferent from the social situation in most Euro-
pean states in the Middle Ages. What mainly characterizes power relations
in the Icelandic Commonwealth is that hierarchies were built on personal
relationships, not territorialized. he rule of chieftains extended to their
followers, the thingmen, but this rule was not geographically demarcated.

53

See Sverrir Jakobsson, ‘he Process of State-formation in Medieval Iceland. he

Process of State-Formation in Medieval Iceland’, Viator. Journal of Medieval and

Renaissance Studies, 40:2 (Autumn 2009), 151–70.

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sverrir jakobsson

here existed entities, demarcated in space, such as communes and quarters,
but they were not related to hierarchies.
In the thirteenth century, a new system, built on territorialized space
replaced the old system, mainly based on personal associations. Many events
led to this development; one important factor is that the Icelanders started
discussing spaces and hierarchies in a diferent way. I have argued that a dif-
ferent discourse about regional hierarchies was mainly connected with two
factors developing side by side. One was the initiation of an ecclesiastical
power structure that was diferent from secular hierarchies, resting on a ter-
ritorial basis. he other was the initiation of literacy, which was important
since with it the nature of discourse changed, giving knowledge a more per-
manent shape a more standardised method of dissemination. In geographi-
cal texts and written sources of various kinds, one can ind a standardised
discourse about regional hierarchies around the world, where concepts such
as the herað could gain a new provocative meaning. An example of this is
the description in the Prose Edda of hierarchies in kingdoms, which could
easily be compared to the circumstances in medieval Iceland, clarifying the
ambitions of chieftains to form regional hierarchies. In the Prose Edda there
are descriptions of regional hierarchies abroad, which stemmed from the
period during which Snorri Sturluson attempted to create such a structure
around himself in Iceland. Later, other chiefs followed his example with
more success.
Around the year 1220, a development occurred that proved to be a
turning point, namely that lords throughout the country began to deine
their powers as territorial. his shift in thinking began to gain momentum
after 1238, and the followers of such lords also eventually came to regard
themselves diferently; the groups that supported certain chiefs gradually
became identiied with reference to space. In the ifth decade of the thirteenth
century, the followers of Kolbeinn the Younger were called ‘Northeners’,
those following Gissur Þorvaldsson were known as ‘Southerners’ and those
of Þórðr kakali were called ‘men from the Westjords’. he forming of
regional groupings, such as these, was a novelty at the time, and there are
few traces of them in contemporary sources until around the time of the
battle at Örlygsstaðir. he systematic change that this led to occurred before
the Icelanders became subject to the king of Norway, but it was this same
transformation that gave territorial authority a more permanent form.