Cover image for Ep. 128: Photo of Maeshowe, Orkney, by Tim Bekaert.

It’s our 12th anniversary Halloween episode, in which we look at three examples of encounters with burial mounds in Norse sagas.

Today’s Texts:

The Saga of Hervor and Heithrek. In Stories and Ballads of the Far Past, translated by N. Kershaw, Cambridge UP, 1921, pp. 79-143. Internet Archive.

The Saga of King Heidrek the Wise. Translated by Christopher Tolkien, Thomas Nelson and Sons, 1960. Viking Society.

The Story of Grettir the Strong. Translated by Eiríkr Magnússon and William Morris, New Ed., Longmans, Green, and Co., 1900. Google Books.

Grettis saga. Edited by Valdimar Ásmundarson, 1900. Google Books.

Orkneyinga saga. In Icelandic Sagas and Other Historical Documents Relating to the Settlements and Descents of the Northmen on the British Isles, vol. 1,  edited by Guðbrandur Vigfússon, Eyre and Spottiswoode, 1887, pp. 1-221. Internet Archive.

References:

Farrar, James. Notice of Runic Inscriptions Discovered during Recent Excavations in the Orkneys. R. & R. Clark, 1862. Project Gutenberg.

Historic England. “Prehistoric Barrows and Burial Mounds: Introductions to Heritage Assets.” 2018. https://historicengland.org.uk/images-books/publications/iha-prehistoric-barrows-burial-mounds/heag217-prehistoric-barrows-burial-mounds/.

Klevnäs, Alison. “Surely Every Live Man Fades Among the Dead: Fear and Desire in the Afterlife of Viking Age Graves.” The Norse Sorceress: Mind and Materiality in the Viking World, edited by Leszek Gardeła, Sophie Bønding, and Peter Pentz, Oxbow Books, 2023, pp. 171-184. JSTOR.

Muir, Tom. “The Mystery of Maeshowe.” Orkneyology, https://www.orkneyology.com/maeshowe.html.

O’Donoghue, Heather. Old Norse-Icelandic Literature: A Short Introduction. Blackwell, 2005.

Roesdahl, Else. The Vikings. Revised ed., translated by Susan M. Margeson and Kirsten Williams, Penguin, 1998.

Sävborg, Daniel. “Haugbrot, Haugbúar and Sagas.” Viking Settlements and Viking Society, U of Iceland P, 2011. Academia.edu.

Image Credits: Photo of Maeshowe, Orkney, by Tim Bekaert, via Wikimedia Commons.