[97] They were the sons of a female slave. The surviving legitimate sons of Rognwald were Thorer, who succeeded his father in Norway, and the famous Gangr Rolf, founder of the Norman dynasty, and ancestor of William the Conqueror. The _Holder_ was the old _Allodial_ proprietor amongst the Scandinavians of those days, answering to the _Eorlcundman_. [98] Eric Blodæxe was killed in the year 954. His sons attacked Hakon the Good for the second or third time, after he had reigned twenty years, _i.e._, about 957. The arrival of Gunhilda and her sons in the Orkneys must have fallen between those two years.--_Heimsk. Saga_ 4, c. 22. [99] Hakon reigned for 26 years, and Harald Greyskin for 15, after the death of Harfager in 937, which would place the death of Harald in 978.--_Heimsk. Saga_ 4, c. 28; _Saga_ 6, c. 13. When the sons of Eric escaped to the Orkneys, immediately after the death of Harald, they found the sons of Thorfin in possession of the islands.--_Do., Saga_ 6, c. 16. The Orkneyinga Saga says that Thorfin was still alive but died soon afterwards. His death must have occurred about the year 978. [100] _Ork. Saga in Col. de. Reb. Alb._, p. 339. [101] All these events must have occurred between 978 and 994, for the battle of Dungal’s Nœp was fought in or before the latter year. Kari Solmundason, and the son of Nial, were present at this engagement, and after remaining two winters and a summer with Sigurd, departed for Norway in the following summer, _i.e._, two years after the battle, with the tribute for Jarl Hakon, and as the Jarl’s death occurred in 996, the battle must have been fought at least two years before that date. It probably occurred a few years earlier, as the same Saga alludes to the defeat of Godred of Man, whose reign extended from the death of his brother Magnus, about 977 to 989. _An. Inisf._ 977. _Tigh._ 989. _Niala Saga, Col. de Reb. Alb._, p. 334, 338. The Hundi of the Sagas seems to have been Crinan. The account of these transactions is taken from the _Heimskringla Saga_ 3, c. 27 to 32; _Saga_ 4, c. 3, 4, 5; _Saga_ 7, c. 99; and the _Olaf Tryggvessonar Niala_ and _Orkneyinga Sagas_ in _Col. de Reb. Alb._, p. 327, etc. [102] _Heimsk. Saga_ 6, c. 52; _Saga_ 7, c. 99. [103] The Isla and the Dee are the boundaries assigned to one of the old Pictish kingdoms in the description of Andrew, bishop of Caithness, in _Innes_, Ap. 2. [104] Such is the account of _Wynton_, bk. 6, c. 10, and _Reg. St. And., Innes_, Ap. 5, with which _Fordun_, l. 4, c. 15, agrees. Boece of course is able to supply every deficiency in his own peculiar way.