THE SCENE: Father was pitted against son when Sven Forkbeard wrestled control of the crown away from his father Harald Bluetooth. Harald, though, was able to arrange a trap that proved to be deeply embarrassing for his son.
THE TEXT: In the course of time envoys arrived to repair the discord which had arisen between the fugitive father and the son who occupied the royal throne. The king therefore decided that his father and the Slavs should meet him in the straits of Grønsund to make peace. The king arrived there first with the Danish fleet at the time appointed, and waited a long time for his father. The fugitive Harald meanwhile accepted the suggestion of one of his counsellors—that is, of Palna-Toki, a man with two names—and constructed for himself a rapid vessel best suited for rowing. This he manned with the most experienced sailors and put the above-mentioned Palna-Toki in charge, who set off with all speed to meet the king. When he reached the Danish fleet, he ranged his oarsmen on deck and, with treachery in mind, gave orders that his ship should make for the king’s. With his crew in position, at the first light of dawn he quietly roused the king in his resting place.
When the king woke, he asked who it was. ‘It is us,’ he said, ‘the envoys of your father. We have been sent over to you to discuss peace-terms.’ When he gathered this, the king wanted to inquire more closely into how his father was, and he put his head a little way over the gunwale of the ship. Then Palna-Toki grabbed him by the ears and the hair, gave a more powerful heave against his unavailing resistance, and dragged him willy-nilly out of his own ship. Although he yelled and shouted, just a little, they made their escape with furious oarstrokes while everyone else slumbered in ignorance. Nor did they heave to until they reached the city of Jomsborg.
When the Slavs caught sight of him, the people rose up and condemned the prisoner to various forms of death and refined torture. However, the better sort of their leaders prevailed with wiser counsel. They decided that, rather than put an end to him by killing him forthwith, they would be better advised to have him ransomed for a large tribute; in that way the Danes would be impoverished and Slavia would perpetually rejoice in her wealth. It would yield but little profit to the community if they were to condemn their prisoner to death. So they charge their envoys to announce to the kingdom that they may buy back their king with three times his weight in gold and silver; and they did so without much delay. The Danes collected a levy from almost the entire kingdom, and when the Slavs arrived at Vindinge with the captive monarch, they were eager to redeem their king. But the levy proved insufficient to release him, and in order to ransom him the married women agreed to make up the shortfall in coin with their own jewelry. They topped up the king’s levy by adding rings, bracelets, ear-rings, necklaces and all their chains. And when it was complete, the Danes obtained from the king their first common rights over woods and groves.
Moreover, in recognition of the goodwill and generosity of the married women, he was also the first to concede that in future a sister should share with her brother a half portion of the division of the family inheritance; for women had previously been wholly excluded from any share in what was inherited from the father.
– Brevis historia regum Dacie, Sven Aggesen, 12th Century AD
[Image Credit: Sweyn Forkbeard and Palnatoke by Louis Moe]
