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Sweden [1]. The barbarians of Bleking [2] were
dreaded pirates, by following which trade they
amassed wealth and had abundance of captives. At
the same time the islands of Oeland and Gottland
are already Swedish possessions [3]. Travellers
passed from Scania to Gothland through deep
forests and precipitous hills, and it appeared
doubtful whether the journey by land or the voyage by
water was attended with greater dangers [4]. The
mountainous district bordering upon Gothland,
and considered as forming part of it, was anciently
called Smaland (small land) [5]. Eastern Smaland
stretched to the sea, and sent forth pirate chiefs [6].
Möre is named a part of it so early as the ninth
century [7]. Mention is made betimes of Calmar as
a port [8], and afterwards as a place of trade. The
middle and southern portion of Smaland was
called Verend; it was girt round by the densest
forests, but a fruitful country, abounding in game
and streams peopled with fish, swarming with bees
and honey, adorned with rich fields and meadows [9].
Western Smaland, towards the borders of Halland,
was long called the Finn waste, the Finn weald,
the Finn moor, and also Finland [10]. This Finn
wold appears in old times to have stretched for a
great distance, and to have embraced those wide
forests separating West-Gothland from the present
Bohus-län, and covering Dalsland, which then was
only known by the name of the Marks, that is, the
woods, as far as the present frontier of Norway.
Formerly that country stretched to the Göta-elf.
In the eleventh century it was maintained
that the ancient border [11] had been the Göta from
the sea to Lake Vener; then the Marks [12] to the
forest of Eda; and lastly, the Kölen mountains.
Yet the boundary was disputed, and it could not
be otherwise, when the wilderness was still the
frontier. The Swedish kings extended West-Gothland
to Swinesund along the sea; the Norwegians
on the other side claimed all the land to the
westward of Lake Vener. The borderers, independent
of both parties in their forests and mountains, gave
little heed to these pretensions. The people of the
Mark country, who had come from West-Gothland,
ultimately preferred subjection to Sweden, were
regarded as belonging to West-Gothland, and in
later times were denominated West Goths, west of
the Vener.
The district now bearing the name of Bohus-län
was formerly called Ranrike [13], or Elfwar-fylke [14]
(river-district), Alfhem [15] and Wiken [16]. The wick
and elf-men [17] were, from the very character of
their country, Wikingers, a hardy and stubborn
race, who lived by the sea, and bore no good
reputation. Here in the interior the saga placed
the descendants of the demons (Troll) and elves
(Alfvar), more hateful than all other men. Here
by the Trollhætta, whose cataracts still roared in
solitude, Starkother had fought in the days of old
with the demon champion Hergrim and won Ogn,
daughter of the Elfin, who preferred death to
becoming the property of the victor. Trade joined
with piracy was carried on at an early period along
the coast of Wiken, and the great stream of the
Göta, which pours the water of so many floods
from the Vener into the sea, presented facilities
for both which were not neglected. Of the island
Hisingen which the river forms at its mouth, one
half was in possession of the Swedes, the other in
that of the Norwegians. On the island of Brenn,
which lay somewhat further to the south, and was
formerly a haunt of the sea-chiefs, much dreaded
by trading vessels, or upon the Dana-holms, which
lay near thereto, the boundaries of the three
northern kingdoms met, so that old West-Gothland
reached from the Göta-elf southwards to the
sea. Ships ascended the stream to Konghall [18],
which had its name from the frequent conferences
of kings held there, or even higher, to old Lödöse [19].
The wick-men drew their supplies of corn and
malt from abroad [20]; here were vended salt,
herrings, and wadmal or home-woven woollen cloth [21],
necessaries which were conveyed inland; so that
the West Goths were malcontent, when hostilities
with Norway broke off this intercourse. Falkœping,
of which mention is made thus early [22], and Skara,
probably a place of sacrifice in the heathen time [23],
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