Note (return) — Chapter III

Meantime, since 875, a succession of jarls had endeavoured to hold, for the kings of Norway, Orkney and Shetland, as well as Cat, which then included Ness, Strathnavern, and Sudrland.13 The history of these early jarls is not told in detail in any surviving contemporary record, for the Sagas of the jarls as individuals have perished; but there is a brief account of them in the beginning of the Orkneyinga Saga, another in chapters 99 and 100 of the St. Olaf's Saga, and a fuller one in chapters 179 to 187 of the Saga of Olaf Tryggvi's Son, contained in the Flatey Book.14 From these the following story may be gathered.