Response to Njal's Saga & Gisli Sursson's Saga

In Njal's Saga there was one specific detail I found interesting, and that was the use of the Christian crucifix as a weapon. When it was first mentioned, "Thangbrand defended himself with a crucifix instead of a sheild, but even so he managed to defreat Thorkel and kill him," I thought it could have been meant more symbolically. Like, with Christ on his side (represented by the crucifix), he was able to defeat Thorkel without a weapon. But the crufix is mentioned again, when Thangbrand, "struck him on the arm with a crucifix and, miraculously, the sword dropped from the brserk's grasp." Here they made it quite obvious that the physical crucifix was being used to do physical harm to an opponent. I tried to look up other uses of crucifix as a weapon and my search came up with only the use of a cross against Count Dracula. This new use of a common Christian symbol stuck me as a fitting combination of the violent, battle-centered ideals of the Icelandic Vikings with the pacifist and peaceful Christian ideals they were beginning to adopt.

Then, in Gisli Sursson's Saga, I decided to focus on the frequent mention of gift giving in the Icelandic society. In the past few stories, especially the Tale of Audun from the West Fjords, there has been a focus on the gifts given and recieved by main characters. In Gisli Sursson's Saga, Gisli and Vestein "give gifts worth more than the price of their share" [508], when they buy a portion of Beard-Bjalfi's ship. Immediatley after, it is noted that they quickly became friends with Bjalfi and they all "gave each other gifts" [508]. Vestein brings bags of gifts for his sister and Gisli, but when Gisli in turn trys to share his gifts with Thorkel, he responds with "I cannot see how they will be repaid" [515]. This led me to wonder if the gifts, which I had previously attributed to a value of generosity within Icelandic society, were more similar to a system of giving and taking. When Gisli makes the statement that "a gift always looks to be repaid," [520] it becamse clear to me: gifts were given with an understanding that the reciever is now in a sort of debt to the giver. It made me reconsider my percerption of the Icelanders. This is a very clever system I think, because it makes them appear very generous, while knowing that because of the understanding they have with one another, they will be repaid later on (and probably with interest...almost like Icelandic banking and loans!).