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sometimes in a boat over great lakes, which the
narrative likens to the sea, until with his
companions he reached Birca, a haven, or as it is also
called, a staple and village upon the Mælar lake,
where rich merchants resided. Here he was welcomed
by king Biörn, and found the statements of
the messengers confirmed. For many Christian
captives lived in these regions who longed eagerly
for teachers, and these had imparted the knowledge
of Christianity to others also who desired instruction
and baptism. Among them was a chief man of the
place and the king’s councillor, Hergeir, a zealous
disciple of the gospel, who erected the first church.
This first journey of Anskar to Sweden was made
in the autumn of 829; and the following year,
which he passed there, was the first of his
Christian labours among the Swedes.
This king Biörn, to whom Anskar came, is
without doubt the same called Biörn of the Hill (at
Haugi) by the Icelanders, who have indeed
preserved only his name, with the addition that one of
the most famous heathen Scalds, Brage the Aged,
dwelt in his court. They assign him a colleague
in his office, Edmund, of whom we shall have more
to say. Returning from Sweden, Anskar was
inducted into the archbishopric lately erected in
Hamburg for the conversion of the north, but
found this new dignity more fertile in danger than
profit. Hamburg, at first only a village, with a
castle founded by Charles the Great, among the
forests on the bank of the Elbe, was surprised by
the Northern sea-kings and destroyed; the archbishop
was obliged to abandon his charge. Gautbert,
who had been despatched to Sweden as a
missionary, was at the same time expelled; Nithard
his nephew was killed, and the Christians were
persecuted by the above-mentioned king Edmund,
who having been restored from exile by Danish
assistance, had eventually reconciled himself to his
countrymen. From his new archiepiscopal seat of
Bremen Anskar continued the work he had begun,
and when no one else would undertake the perilous
adventure, revisited Sweden himself in the year
853. There was now another king in Birca, who
was called Olof, and the Swedes, assembled in their
diet (ting), had resolved to adopt one of their
former rulers, named Erie, among the gods of their
country. Anskar’s ancient friends advised him to
save his life by flight; he succeeded however,
using even gifts, in winning the king’s favour,
who promised to lay his petition before the people;
“for such is their custom,” says the biographer
and follower of Anskar, who accompanied him in
this journey [1], that all public affairs hinge more
upon the concordant will of the people than upon
the power of the sovereign [2]”. It was determined
in the diet that by means of the sacred lots (a sort
of oracle which Tacitus mentions), the old gods
should be consulted respecting the new faith. The
answer is said to have turned out favourably to the
request of the Christian teachers, and in the diet
an old man stood up, and spoke to this effect:
“Hear me, king and people. Of this God it is not
unknown, that he helps those who put their trust
in him, a thing which many of us in the dangers of
the sea and other perils have proved. Wherefore
then should we reject what is needful and profitable
for us, or seek afar off that which is offered to
us at home? For some of our people, for the
sake of this faith, have journeyed even to Dorstad [3].
Therefore do I advise that we should receive
among us the servants of this God, who is mighty
above all, and whose grace will stand us in good
stead, if our own gods should prove unfavourable to
us.” When the people had given their consent, the
king expressed his concurrence, yet with the
condition that in the other part of his dominion
(probably the Goths), the matter should be proposed
and approved by an assembled diet; which was
accordingly done, and the Christian teachers were
permitted by a decree to reside and give instruction
in the country. A church was founded whilst
Anskar remained, and after he had finally departed,
he continued, as long as he lived, to make provision
for the supply of instructors to the Swedes. He
inculcated on them the maxim, to ask of no man’s
goods, but to labour with their own hands for
support, and he himself used to twist nets [4]. Though
simple and meek of heart, he was a man of lofty
courage. His revenues he employed in the support
of the indigent and the ransom of captives,
and he was generally surrounded by youth whom
he had redeemed from slavery, and was instructing.
He brought back with him from Sweden persons
who had been thus dragged from their homes into
thraldom, and his biographer mentions the emotion
with which he restored to a mother the son of
whom she had been robbed by Swedish freebooters.
Among the neighbouring Saxons north of the
Elbe [5], he abolished the shameful traffic in men,
with which those so-called Christians defiled
themselves. He regarded his dreams as prophetic, was
full of reverence for the miracles of the saints,
and was himself after death venerated as a saint;
but it was said of him while he lived, that “so good
a man had never been seen on earth.” That his
own labours in Sweden were not barren of fruit, is
proved by such examples as those of Hergeir and
Fridburg [6], and in all likelihood the sparks kindled
by him were never entirely extinguished, although
a century and a half elapsed before Sweden
received a Christian king, and another period of the
same duration passed away in the contest between
Paganism and Christianity.
After the death of Anskar in 865, no Christian
teacher, his immediate successor Rimbert excepted,
ventured during seventy years to Sweden; and
when after the expiring of this period Unne
archbishop of Bremen came to Birca, where he
died, the people seem to have relapsed into
heathenism. At this time the king of Sweden is said to
have been called Ring, who to the Icelanders is as
little known as the Olave already mentioned; yet
the latter was powerful enough to win by arms a
kingdom in Denmark for himself, and to transmit
it to his sons [7]. This is the same Olave of whom
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