Kin-Work and King Harald's Saga: A Feminist Analysis

and at the very hour that her father had been killed" (p.159). Matilda too was allegedly killed by her husband William of Normandy for the kinship that she'd extended to Harold Godwinsson, who had betrayed him on two counts - in marriage and in politics (p.155). One tale, however, inverts this structure and portrays the female figure as responsible for the maintenance of beneficial social relationships. In this, a Danish duke, anti-social in that he was both "evil and envious," is blinded by his rejection of Saint Olaf and his refusal to observe the Saint's feast-day. The duke commanded his concubine to bake a loaf of bread, an object of selfishness and asocial cynicism, which turned to stone (like his eyes) at the woman's request for vengeance (pp.104-105).

King Harald's Saga is clearly more than a story about King Harald and his adventures. Di Leonardo's concept of kin work reveals a great deal about the things left unsaid, obscured, and underemphasized. To think that women did not participate in Viking society would be absurd. So too is to imagine that they took no part in politically charged matters of kinship. Genealogical competence, rather, and the ability to assert themselves in political/kin tensions became the mechanisms through which women exerted influence in Viking culture.

References

di Leonardo, Micaela. 1987. The female world of cards and holidays: Women, families, and the work of kinship. Signs 12, no. 3: 340-350.

Dommasnes, Liv Helga.1991. Women, kinship, and the basis of power in the Norwegian Viking age. In Social Approaches to Viking Studies, ed. Ross Samson, 65-73. Glasgow: Cruithne Press.

Rosaldo, Michelle Zimbalist. (1974). Woman, culture, and society: A theoretical overview. In Woman, Culture, and Society, eds. Michelle Zimbalist Rosaldo and Louise Lamphere, 17-42. Stanford:Stanford University Press.

Sturluson, Snorri. (1966). King Harald's Saga, Harald Hardradi of Norway. Translated by Magnus Magnusson and Hermann Pálsson. London: Penguin.

All references to page numbers will be for Sturluson (1966) unless otherwise specified.

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