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78 II. CONVERSION OF SWEDEN (A.D. 8301130).
first part of which he took the side of St. Olaf against Knut,
but not very vigorously. During his reign Christianity
was widely diffused throughout the country (I.e. ch. 107).
He continued his father s friendly relations with the see
of Hamburg, and received from Libentius II. (1029 A.D.
1032 A.D.) Gotescalk,
22
as second Bishop of Skara, in suc
cession to Thurgot, about the year 1030 A.D. Sigfrid was
apparently present on the occasion of Gotescalk s consecra
tion, and is now described as coming from Sweden, prob
ably from Smaland (I.e. ch. 98). Anund Jakob was only
about forty-five years old at the time of his death. His
coins are more developed than his father s, but, after
his time, no money was coined in Sweden for 100 years
an evidence of the disturbed state of the country.
He was succeeded about 1050 A.D. by his elder half-
brother, Emund, called
{i
the old
"
son of theVendish lady
who had been a captive in Olof Skotkonung s household,
who was also mother of Astrid, the Queen of Olaf the
Saint. Such children, as we have seen, were brought up
in the family, and recognized as belonging to it, though
without quite so high a position as those of legitimate
origin. Many of the mothers were ladies of good birth
taken prisoners in war. Magnus, son of Alfhild and Olaf
the Saint, of whose birth and baptism there is a quaint tale
in the Saga (St. O. S., ch. 131), was afterwards king of both
Norway and Denmark, which he ruled from 1042 A.D. to
1047 A.D.
The most remarkable events, from our special point of
view, in Emund s reign are the efforts which he made to
be independent of the see of Hamburg, and the attempt
made by Archbishop Adalbert to hold a general council
of the northern nations nominally subject to his rule.
Adalbert, who sat for a long period of twenty-seven years
(1045 A.D. 1072 A.D.), was an able, ambitious and magni
ficent person, of high rank, and possessed of great wealth
and wide influence in Church and State. He endeavoured
to establish a patriarchate in the north, to embrace North
22
He also is not named in the early lists.
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