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Updated: June 21, 2025
Leaving his six ships where he had stationed them, Earl Erik now rowed the Iron Ram round to the left wing of Olaf Triggvison's array. Four of his best longships followed him. He passed astern of the king's fleet.
There were seventy war galleys in all, and each vessel was well manned and fully prepared for battle. The larger number belonged to King Sweyn; but the longships of Earl Erik were in all respects superior to those of either Denmark or Sweden. Earl Erik himself, too, was the most valiant warrior.
Meanwhile, Jarl Rongvold, go thou with Rolf, and bring round the Dragon and the other longships to the fiord, for I mistrust the men of this district, and will fare to the Springs by sea." In accordance with these instructions the jarl brought the King's fleet round without delay. On the following morning they embarked, and set sail for the appointed place of meeting.
Two miles off Land's End, on a mass of rocks which rise some seventy feet above the surface at low water, stands the Longships Lighthouse, the summit of which is fifty-six feet above the rock. The tower is divided into three stories. In the lower is kept provisions, with water and coal; the second is a cooking-room and oil-store: while the third is a sleeping-room.
Now, by this short absence, Earl Erik had weakened the southern wing, and, when he came back to defend his ships, he found that Vagn Akison and Olaf Triggvison had broken through the line and made great havoc. Erik was a brave warrior, however, and he did not hesitate to make a bold attack upon the ships of these two champions. He encountered them with four of his best longships against their two.
"The bird that told me these matters was but a poor fisherman," said Olaf. "Yesternight I met him on the shore, and, seeing that he was a Dane, I had speech with him, and he said that King Sweyn, with two or three longships, had been seen bearing southward to Wendland." Earl Sigvaldi breathed a deep breath of relief. There was still great hope of his scheme succeeding.
I mentioned the matter twice to peasants whom I met upon the road. One, a tallish man with a freckled face, sidled past me and ran swiftly towards the station. The other, a smaller and older man, stood entranced while I recited to him that passage of the Saxon Chronicle which begins, "Then came Leija with longships forty-four, and the fyrd went out against him."
His longships were crowded with picked men, and war vessels of all sizes from little boats to dragons with thirty banks of rowers augmented his fleet. At length he sailed from Drontheim with perhaps the strongest armament that had ever swept over the northern sea. The scene is changed. It is night; yet how different from night in most other inhabited parts of the earth!
And those who do not win it will yet be none the worse for trying." Then Jarl Swend laughed as he looked at Sigurd, and said, "Truly, it is not for nothing that men call thee Sigurd the Wise; now I see why the young men who sail their longships from your vik are luckier than other men." And Sigurd was satisfied.
Sometimes they rigged what was called a top-arming, or top armour, a strip of cloth like the "war girdle" of the Norse longships, across the unprotected space. It gave no protection against shot, but it prevented the enemy's gunners from taking aim at the deck, or from playing upon the hatchways with their murderers and pateraroes.
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