By
A. W. JOHNSTON
LONDON
Printed for the Viking Society for Northern Research
University of London
1914
Note.—Unless where otherwise stated this paper is founded onOrkneyinga Saga (Rolls Series, text and translation). Page referencesare to Orkney and Shetland Records, Vol. I. Fb., Flateyjarbók.Hkr., Heimskringla. J.J., Jacob Jakobsen’s works. S.S., SturlungaSaga.
This paper is an attempt to describe the mixedraces which inhabited Orkney and Shetlandfrom the foundation of the Norse earldom, in872, until the end of the rule of the Gaelic earls, circa1350, and it is a first instalment of the evidence onwhich a paragraph on “person-names” was founded,in the Introduction to Orkney and Shetland Records,vol. I.
The earliest inhabitants, of whom we have anyrecord, were the Picts, and the Irish papas and Columbanmissionaries, who must have brought some Irishsettlers with them.
It has already been suggested that the Norse musthave settled in Orkney and Shetland, circa 664, amongthe aboriginal race, the Picts, who would have becometheir thralls, and with whom the settlers would haveintermarried.
The first Norsemen who came to Orkney and Shetlandwould have been adventurers, and not settlers withwives, families and thralls, such as later went to Icelandand Orkney. Consequently such adventurers whosettled in the islands would naturally have intermarriedwith the aborigines. This kind of male settlement mayhave gone on for some time, before the actual bona fidecolonisation took place.
It has already been pointed out that Shetland wasnot so fully colonised as Orkney, at the commencementof the Norse migration, which appears to account for[4]the older Norse dialect forms in Orkney, and for thesurvival of more Keltic island-names in Shetland.
A stronger Pictish strain is thus, on that account, tobe looked for in Shetland. The Norse would select theeasiest landing-places, while the Kelts would occupythe inland and inaccessible places, as they did in theIsle of Man. The two inland districts of Hara andStennes in Orkney are especially rich in the remainsof the pre-Norse inhabitants—stone circles, brochs,etc.; and Ireland, the only sea-board of Stennes, is particularlyinhospitable for shipping.
Besides the archæological and topographical proof ofthe continued residence of the Picts in Orkney andShetland, there is the much more reliable evidence ofanthropology, in the existence of a large strain of thesmall and dark race in both Orkney and Shetland,representing the aboriginal race, the later prisoners ofraids and the later settlers from Scotland. Allowancemust also be made for thralls brought from Norway.
Queen Auðr djúpauðga (deeply-wealthy) or djúpúðga(deeply-wise), passed through Orkney, in theninth century, on her way to Iceland, with twentyfreed Irish thralls. After this, Einarr, grandson of earlTorf-Einarr, went to Iceland from Orkney with twoVestmenn (Irishmen). Írar, Irish, occurs in place-namesin Iceland, Orkney and Shetland, in each ofwhich latter there is an Ireland.
It will now be proved that there were only three possiblepure-bred Norse earls of Orkney and Shetland,viz., the first three—Sigurðr hinn ríki, his son,GuÞormr, and his nephew, Hallaðr.
The