#Kaenugard

[kazzarma-blog]

Offtopic: possible spoilers/teaser for future “Vinland Saga”manga chapters? Year 1019 in North/East European history

Basically, in the recent chapters of Vinland Saga the main characters have set up on a trip to Miklagarðr (Constantinople) to sell some narhval horns to the Greeks in order to raise money for their expedition to Vinland. 

Well, it’s quite a detour of course and it’s, I dunno, probably somewhat a “cheesy” move, or how to put it, on author’s part,after arcs about war and thralldom, when main character finally is free and reaches his home, to make him go on a journey in opposite direction than that of Vinland where he’s to go to fulfill his dream, just to sell some stuff,  but I actually liked this turn of events, and I believe it’s really justified to make the characters travel there.

Actually, it would almost be a crime not to make characters make travel there, as there was so much stuff going in those parts of the world in the time period covered by manga events, it really would be weird not to use it, and I hope you won’t find this post too long and boring to read it and see why is it so. Well, we can already see main characters having themselves caught in the middle of war in the Baltic Sea

However, as for what is going to happen on their journey next (of course if they will not find money in result of Baltic Sea war events and will continue their journey), I guess we can guess which historical events are the characters going to get involved into and what the characters are going to encounter, since we’ve seen quite a few hints already.  For example, to reach Miklagarðr from Iceland they could theoretically take two routes: one is to go south and then go through Gibraltar (somewhat like Bjǫrn Járnsíða did) and after that going past Italy to reach Miklagarðr from the West. Though obviously the characters went East right away and went to the Baltic Sea, which indicates that they will likely be taking (of course if they will still be going to Constantinople) the historical trade rout “from the Varangians to the Greeks” which did actually connect Scandinavia with (Eastern) Roman Empire. Actually, as you can see on the manga page below the route the characters were planning to take has already been shown, and it has  “from the Varangians to the Greeks” route as its part, where they would go from Baltic Sea along the Dnieper river (though, theoretically the still can take Dniester) South across Garðaríki to the Black Sea and from there to Grikkland. 

And it’s actually quite interesting, since taking such route they will most likely visit Kænugarðr (or Kijev) along their way. The city was an important point on the trading route and (not surprisingly) an important center (if not capital, though hardly such term is 100% applicable) of Kievan Rus' (or Garðaríki) which was an East Slavic state although ruled by the rulers of the Rurik dynasty which was of Norse origin (named after its founder, who’s mentioned in Slavic sources as Rurik, but, of course if you’ve even simply watched my Dark Souls etymology videos I guess it would be quite obvious that the origin of the name is Germanic, composed of elements *hrōþiz - for loud, or rather famed, in this case, and *rīks - king, ruler, an element we’ve seen in quite a few Dark Souls names).

And it happens so that the years of the manga events (1019 in the recent chapters, possibly 1020 by the time characters would reach Kænugarðr, provided they ever will, of course) match the first years of the reign of a person known to Norse peoples as konung Jarizleifr (also I believe he was called “the Lame” for indeed it seems he used to limp)  as high ruler of Kijev (the stuff I read about when working on an old Cossack cosplay video, which wasn’t even related to the cosplay in the end =/).  Bascially about 50% of the name “Jarizleifr“ has no real meaning in Old Norse, since it’s just an adaptation of a Slavic name Yaroslav (from Proto-Slavic *jarъ- “furious/fierce” and *slava - “fame/glory”), with “lav” part of “slav” element broken separately and taken as “leif” or “leifr” which is Old Norse for “inhertior/heir” and of course can be seen in the name of Leifr Eiríksson who is both a historical character and one of the major characters in the manga.  But, anyway, returning to the historical events which will possibly be covered in manga - the ruler of Kænugarðr in the years the manga events cover was prince Yaroslav the Wise, who himself was a descendant of Rurik and whose wife (whom he married in... 1019) was Princess Ingegerd of Sweden, daughter of king Olaf of Sweden.

And Yaroslav’s way to power as ruler of Kijev was marked by a struggle for power against his brother Sviatopolk  and foreign invasions (like of Poles under Bolesław I Chrobry (the Brave) who supported Yaroslav’s rival Sviatopolk) in 1018, with Yaroslav finally winning the throne against his brother in... 1019.   Although Yaroslav’s victory was only followed by a conflict against own nephew Bryachislav, whom he fought and defeated in 1020. And these historical events are actually covered in Norse sagas (well, more correctly in þættir - sort of “short sagas”) namely the story of Eymundr, which tells of a Norse konung Eymundr who, not willing to fight against king St. Olaf II Haraldsson of Norway (as Olaf began joining Norðvegr under his own rule) and hearing the news of power struggle among brother-princes in Garðaríki following the death of konung Valdemarr (prince Vladimir), leaves his homeland together with his friend jarl Ragnarr and their men (whom include not only Norwegians but also Icelanders) to offer their services as mercenaries to Jarizleifr or whoever will treat them better.  Well, since it’s a Norse story, it’s somewhat hard to say how much does it exaggerate things when it tells about greedy local ruler who can’t handle anything by himself without his wise Norse wife and is several times saved by mercenary Norsemen who aid him in war against his relatives and give him wise counsel, whom he however tries to trick in times of peace when he thinks he doesn’t need them already. And eventually (although after defeating one of the “three brothers” - Burizleifr, whose name is likely derived from the name of the Polish Duke Bolesław who supported and gave army to the actual brother Sviatopolk) Eymundr and Ragnrarr leave Jarizleif to serve “third brother” Vartilafr (likely rather nephew Bryachislav whose name likely has the very same origin as such names as Wrocisław or Vratislav in other Slavic languages) and when the two armies confront each other Eymundr manages to negotiate peace between “brothers” with Ingegerd, Jarizleif’s wife. And subsequently Eymundr got lands for himself becoming a “guardian” of the local state and it’s also said that together with Ingegerd they used to solve all the serious problems in Garðaríki . So, returning to manga, Garðaríki wouldn’t really be that much of a foreign place to the heroes of Vinland Saga (well foreign, but with lots of their kinsmen involved, and I believe the inhabitants of Kijev were called “Danes” in some Western European sources at that age, apparently because the ruling dynasty there was of Norse origin), and there was really lot of interesting stuff going on historically (and described in þættir) involving Norsemen (and particularly Icelanders) in the very same years the manga covers, and that only in that one spot of the route which the heroes, it seems, are going to take.   And I guess it would be strange if it’s not going to be covered in the manga. So, escaping the power struggle for throne of Denmark and power struggle within the Jomsvikings, the characters might arrive to Garðaríki to get involved in power struggle there, and who knows, maybe it will be the pacifist  Þorfinnr Karlsefni of the manga who will negotiate peace between rival parties of Garðaríki  conflict in 1019/1020 ?  Another dimension is that Garðaríki had already adopted Christianity, but from Byzantine Empire, and although Leifr is Christian also, he’s rather a Western Christian, while the events of manga take place just some decades before the East–West Schism (which only finalized the process that had been going on for some time already), so it’s interesting if it’s going to be covered as well.  But anyway, it’s only one point of the possible route, and after Kænugarðr there are Dnieper thresholds to the south with Turkic nomadic peoples ambushing the traders and so on and so forth, all the way to Miklagarðr where Roman emperors had Varangian guard and, for example, one could find some Norse Runic writings on marble parapets mentioning some Norseman Halfdan....

So the historical period is quite exciting offering lots of opportunities to make some very interesting stories, even before finally “sending” the main characters to Vinland and I’m really looking forward to see if my guesses were right or not