Sutherland and Caithness in Saga-Time; or, The Jarls and The FreskynsGray, James
History
Sutherland and Caithness in Saga-Time; or, The Jarls and The Freskyns
Gray, James
Caithness (Scotland) -- History; Freskin family; Sutherland (Scotland) -- History
Jarl Hakon was succeeded by his sons, Harald the Glib (Slettmali) and
Paul the Silent (Umalgi). Jarl Paul lived mainly in Orkney, while Jarl
Harald "was seated in Sutherland, and held Caithness from the Scot
king" David I, who was crowned in 1124.[1] All Harald's sympathies
seem to have been Scottish, and he was born, bred, and brought up
among Scotsmen, or Picts, probably in North Kildonan. He was always
there with Frakark, daughter of Moddan in Dale, then a widow, her
husband Liot Nidingr or the Dastard being dead; and Frakark and her
sister Helga, Jarl Hakon's mistress, "had a great share in ruling the
land"; while Audhild, daughter of Thorleif, Frakark's sister, also
lived with Frakark,[2] and was the mistress at this time of one of
the strangest characters in the Saga, Sigurd Slembi-diakn, or
the Sham-deacon. Hakon's son Paul being, as appears certain, by a
different mother not of the Moddan line, Frakark and Helga aimed at
obtaining the whole jarldom of Orkney for Harald, Helga's son by Earl
Hakon. With the object of getting rid of Paul, they went over with
Sigurd Slembi-diakn to Orphir in Orkney; and we have the story of
the poisoned shirt,[3] made there by Frakark and Helga, and by them
intended for Paul, but put on, in spite of their expostulations and
entreaties, by Harald, who died of its poison, leaving, however, one
son, Erlend, then an infant.
After this, Jarl Paul banished these ladies from Orkney about 1127,
and they "fared away with all their kith and kin, first to Caithness,
and then up into Sutherland to those homesteads which Frakark owned
there,"[4] and tradition[5] locates her residence at Shenachu or Carn
Shuin, on the east side of the River Helmsdale near Kinbrace above the
road. Possibly, however, they lived at Borrobol, the "Castle Farm";[6]
and there "there were brought up by Frakark Margret, Earl Hakon's
daughter, and Helga, Moddan's daughter," and also Eric Stagbrellir,
Frakark's grandnephew, and son of her niece Audhild by Eric Streita,
a Norseman, as well as Olvir Rosta and Thorbiorn Klerk, both Frakark's
grandsons, all of whom come prominently into our story. Audhild's son,
Eric Stagbrellir, in the end was the survivor of these, as well as of
all males of the Moddan line, and ultimately we hear of no descendants
in Cat of any of them save of Eric, and Eric's marriage with Ingigerd,
St. Ragnvald Jarl's only child, is the link between the line of Erlend
and that of Moddan, which united the Erlend and Moddan estates.
Of the line of Thorfinn we already know the royal origin and descent
from Malcolm II's third daughter.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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