Sigurd I (Norway)

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Sigurd and Queen Malmfrid (scene of the National Theater, 1932)
Sigurd meets King Baldwin of Jerusalem on the Jordan.
Sigurd's “Norwegian Crusade” 1107–10: outward journey red, return journey green

Sigurd I , called the Jerusalem driver ( old west north. Sigurðr Jórsalafari , * around 1090 ; † March 26, 1130 in Oslo ) was King of Norway and the Isle of Man .

Life

Sigurd was the son of Magnus Barfot (barefoot) . He and his brothers, the elder Øystein and the only four-year-old Olaf , became king in 1103 after their father had fallen in Ireland . He had previously been installed by his father as Jarl of Orkney around 1098 , which he returned to the legitimate heirs in 1103.

In 1107, the then 17-year-old king set sail with a large fleet (allegedly 60 ships) to be the first king to take part in the second part of the First Crusade . It took him three years to travel, wintering in England, Galicia and Sicily . On the way he fought against the Andalusian Moors . In 1110 he arrived in Acre . In Palestine he was received by King Baldwin , bathed in the Jordan , visited the holy places and took part in the siege and conquest of Sidon . From Jerusalem he brought a splinter of the Holy Cross , a gift from the King of Jerusalem. On the way back he visited Constantinople in 1111 , from where he returned home by land.

Øystein reluctantly gave up the independence it enjoyed from 1107 to 1111, but shared the government with Sigurd in the following years. Olaf, the youngest, died at the age of 17, probably without ever having been part of the government. Since the death of his brother Øystein in 1123, Sigurd was sole ruler of Norway. He devoted himself to the consolidation of the church, introduced the church tithe in his countries and founded a. a. the Diocese of Garðar for Greenland . After the Heimskringla he subjugated Småland in 1123 .

During the last years of the reign, Sigurd Jorsalafari suffered from a mental illness that made him restless and violent.

Shortly before his death, Harald Gille appeared from Ireland and claimed to be a son of Magnus Barfot and a brother of Sigurd. In 1129 he successfully passed the iron test as evidence. Sigurd recognized Harald as a brother and ordered that the people should also pay homage to him. However, Harald had to vow not to claim the throne during the lifetime of Sigurd and his son Magnus . After his death, the dispute over the throne broke out between Harald and Magnus, which resulted in a protracted civil war.

Sigurd died in Oslo on March 26, 1130 and was buried in the south wall of the newly built Hallvard Church.

Marriages and offspring

In 1102, at the age of nine, Sigurd was betrothed to five-year-old Biadmunia, daughter of the High King of Ireland Muirchertach MacToirdelbach. The marriage vows lapsed after Magnus' death in 1103 and was revoked.

Around 1117 he married Malmfred, the daughter of Mstislav I of Novgorod and Kristina Ingesdotter from Sweden. With her he had a daughter:

Malmfred was ostracized by Sigurd in 1128. In the same year he married for the second time and against the protests of the bishops of Bergen and Stavanger Cäcilia, the daughter of an influential nobleman.

His only son and successor, Magnus , born around 1115 , came from an extramarital relationship with Borghild Olavsdatter, the daughter of a wealthy free farmer.

Artistic reception

Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson wrote a play Sigurd Jorsalfar in 1872 , for which Edvard Grieg composed the incidental music op.

literature

  • Sverre Bagge: Sigurd Jórsalfari . In: Lexicon of the Middle Ages (LexMA). Volume 7, LexMA-Verlag, Munich 1995, ISBN 3-7608-8907-7 , Sp. 1896 f.
  • Gary B. Doxey: Norwegian Crusaders and the Balearic Islands. In: Scandinavian Studies , No. 68/2 (1996), pp. 139-160, JSTOR 40919854 .
  • M. Gerhardt: Norwegian history . revised W. Hubatsch, 1963, p. 90 ff.
  • Comte Paul de Riant : Expéditions et pèlerinages des Scandinaves en Terre Sainte au temps des croisades. Paris 1869, pp. 185–205 (on Sigurd's crusade). Digitized

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ William of Malmesbury: Gesta regum Anglorum. Edited by William Stubbs , London 1889 (= Rolls Series , 90/2), V § 410, p. 485 f.
predecessor Office successor
Magnus Barfot King of Norway
1103–1130 		Magnus IV.
Harald IV.
Lagman King of the Isle of Man
1104–1130 		Domnall Mc Teige
Paul Thorfinnsson
Erlend Thorfinnsson		 Jarl of Orkney
1098-1103 		Haakon Paulsson
personal data
SURNAME Sigurd I.
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Sigurd Jorsalfari; Sigurd Magnusson
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Norwegian (co-) king
DATE OF BIRTH around 1090
DATE OF DEATH March 26, 1130
Place of death Oslo