Note 491 — Chapter VII · THE KINGDOM OF ALBAN.

Einar appears to have died about the same time as King Harald Haarfagr, who died in 936. The Ynglinga Saga, the Landnamabok, and the Orkneyinga Saga in the Flateybok, conjoin the expeditions of Thorstein the Red and Sigurd, and make them conquer these districts together; but it is hardly possible to place Sigurd so early, and the Laxdaela Saga makes Thorstein conquer them alone, without any mention of Sigurd. Now Thorstein died in 875, and if Sigurd died in the same year, Einar became earl two years after, which would make him rule from 876 to 936, a period of fifty-nine years, which is hardly credible. Harald Haarfagr succeeded his father in 863, when only ten years old, and his mother’s brother acts as regent. He then, after attaining puberty at least, commences a war with the petty kings of Norway, and finally subdues them all, and after a great battle at Hafursfiord becomes king of all Norway, which, as we have seen, took place in 883. The Northmen then fly from his power and take possession of Orkney and Shetland. They winter there, and in summer maraud in Norway. Harald goes every summer to the Isles, and the Vikings fly before him. At last one summer he makes a great expedition, and sweeps the Shetlands, Orkneys, and Western Isles as far as Man, of the Vikings, and plunders in Scotland. In this expedition he gives Orkney to Earl Rognwald, who transfers it to Sigurd, who becomes rich and powerful, conquers these districts in Scotland, and dies. Now all this could not have taken place between 873 and 875. Harald is said to have been about forty when Einar became earl of Orkney, which would place the commencement of his rule in 893, and make him earl for forty-three years, which is much more probable; and this brings Sigurd’s conquest and death to the first years of Donald’s reign, when, the Pictish Chronicle tells us, ‘Normanni tunc vastaverunt Pictaviam.’