The motif of «imitation of ancestors» in Saxo Grammaticus's «Deeds of the Danes» as a means of reconstructing the author's idea

Chesta Sergei Olegovich Postgraduate student, Lomonosov Moscow State University, Faculty of History, Department of Medieval history 27 Lomonosovsky Prospekt, building 4, Moscow, 119192, Russia sochesta@yandex.ru

Introduction

The Deeds of the Danes by Saxo Grammaticus is the most important monument of medieval Danish historiography, compiled around 1208 or 1216. Sixteen books of a work made in the genre of origo gentis (Approx.: The belonging of the "Deeds of the Danes" to the genre of origo gentis, whose representatives are the works of Eusebius of Caesarea, Paul the Deacon and Galfrid of Monmouth, is evidenced by the main characteristics common to all these works. These include the use of a typological method implying the correlation of historical characters or events to reveal the secret meaning of what happened (for example, Eusebius of Caesarea likens Constantine the Great to Moses, comparing the battle of the Mulvian Bridge with the crossing of the Red Sea); the perception of the people as a community directed to salvation by divine guidance.) ^{[1, p. 58-71]}, cover the period from the reign of the legendary ancestor of the Danes Dan to the first years of the independent reign of King Knut VI of Denmark (1182-1202). A significant role in the work is played by the propaganda of the ideas of Patron Saxon, Bishop of Roskilde (1158-1191) and Archbishop Absalon of Lund (1177-1201), the direct customer of the "Deeds of the Danes". The issues of text composition and the author's political program remain the subject of heated discussions.

Despite the proximity of Saxo Grammaticus to the ruling circles and the personal friendship of the customer of the historical work with King Valdemar I (1157-1182), which implied the inclusion of certain important installations for the king in the work, the contribution of the "Deeds of the Danes" to the legitimization of the Valdemar dynasty ruling at that time (1157-1241) is not so obvious. Saxon brings his patron to the forefront of the historical narrative. Absalon, being the main character of the longest fourteenth book, is recognized by Saxon as the creator of the diplomatic and military victories of the Danish kingdom ^{[2, p. 685-705]}.

In the "Deeds of the Danes" it is almost impossible to find those ideas that are usually associated with the royal ideology. We are talking about the rule of the king by the "grace of God" ("Dei gratia"), the representation of the ruler as an earthly "image of God" ("imago Dei") and other concepts and complexes of ideas that turn the deity into a direct source of legitimacy of the ruler. Such a picture, excluding other ways of legitimizing power (an appeal to the origin of the royal family; the choice of the king on the ting) and assuming strict hierarchical subordination of the elite to the king, appears to the researcher studying royal diplomas ^{[3, p. 79-101]}. In contrast to this vision of the relationship between the king and the elite, Saxo Grammaticus focuses on the dependence of Waldemar I and his heir, Cnut VI, whose actions are sometimes sharply criticized, on Absalon and the genus Vide, a group of magnates to which the archbishop belonged. Throughout the work, the Danish kings are forced to resort to the help of wise advisers, whose prototypes are Archbishop Absalon and his relatives. Introduced by Saxo Grammaticus, the motive of instructing kings by wise advisers reflects the precariousness of the position of the Vide family at court, its desire to protect its dominant position and develop a consensus with the royal power ^{[4, s. 187-207]}.

Despite the productivity of the interpretation presented above, it has its vulnerabilities. First of all, it does not take into account the change in the political situation, namely the death of Absalon and Cnut VI, during whose lifetime Saxon began work on his work. These deaths, we believe, could have forced the author of the "Deeds of the Danes" to significantly rework the text, change its trends. Saxon dedicated his work to Absalon's kinsman and successor in the archiepiscopal see, Anders Sunesen (1201-1223), and King Valdemar II (1202-1241), brother of the childless Knut VI. It must be assumed that the original composition was intended specifically for Absalon and Knut VI. This is indicated both by the evidence dating back to the beginning of work on the "Deeds of the Danes" in 1188 ^{[5, p. 26]}, and by the compositional feature of the text – the emphasis on the "symphony" of secular and ecclesiastical authorities, manifested in various references to the union of Valdemar I and Absalon, as well as in the dedication of the work to the king and the archbishop ^{[4, s. 197-204]}. Nevertheless, in the sixteenth book, which deals with the reign of Cnut VI, he is represented as a weak ruler, while Absalon appears to the reader as an outstanding statesman, the leader of the Danish army in victorious campaigns against the Slavs (these campaigns, however, are described only by Saxon) ^{[6, pp. 35-70]}, and also a wise advisor ^{[2, p. 693]}.

Does such a vision reflect the will of the prelate himself? In any case, if Absalon planned to present the king with a historical work exposing the monarch in an unsightly light, it can be assumed that such a gift would have affected the fate of the archbishop in the most deplorable way. Addressing Absalon's successor and kinsman, Anders Sunesen, in the prologue, Saxon emphasized the achievements of the new archbishop: his election was gladly supported by the people of Skåne, although Anders himself came from Zealand. In addition, the prelate finally managed to introduce tithing ^{[7, s. 2-4]}.

Apparently, the author of the "Deeds of the Danes" hinted that the new archbishop managed to surpass his predecessor in this matter and avoid his mistakes, that is, like Absalon, not to cause indignation among the Danes, which almost turned into a peasant war in 1180-1182. That is why Absalon was forced to abandon the collection of tithes ^{[7, s. 1454-1476]}.

Hypothetically, the allusion to the uprisings, placed in the prologue many years after the events themselves, may mean that strained relations with the Russian bonds remained a potential threat to Absalon throughout his pontificate. Then Absalon had to seek the support of the king rather than test the ruler's patience by offering him a version of history that was questionable from the point of view of loyalty ^{[2, p. 704]}. In addition, the motive of subordination of rulers to mentors, the motive with which the image of Absalon is in full agreement, is expressed differently in different books. To a greater extent, it is developed in the first, "mythological" part of the "Deeds of the Danes", which was probably written after the death of the customer of the work (Note: The first eight books, occupying about forty–five percent of the entire text, are "mythological", devoted to the legendary history of the Danish sovereigns, the second eight – "historical", dedicated to the period of Danish history, concerning which Saxon had reliable written sources.) ^{[8, p. 105-175]}. This suggests that Saxon did not immediately come to the decision to include this motif in his narrative ^{[8, p. 50]}. It should also be noted that the most important narrative sources dealing with the topic of the Danish Kingdom's foreign policy in the late XII – early XIII centuries, the Knutling Saga (XIII century) and the Slavic Chronicle by Arnold Lubecksky (early XIII century), do not know anything about the special influence of the Archbishop of Lund on Knut VI, considering the activities of this the king as completely independent ^{[7, s. 1494-1495, n. 1]}.

The above, in our opinion, testifies in favor of the presence of obvious contradictions in the text of the "Acts of the Danes", posing the following questions to the researcher:

1). To what extent is the work of Saxo Grammaticus in the form in which it is known to us, the result of the direct influence of Absalon and reflects the interests of the Archbishop of Lund?

2). To what extent can the "Deeds of the Danes" be considered as a source reflecting the royal ideology? Or, in other words, to what extent was the work of Saxo Grammaticus used by the ruling dynasty to legitimize power?

It is possible to outline a solution to these issues by resorting to the method of typological parallels, that is, to search in the text array for a number of images resembling each other characters, revealing the idea laid down by the author in a series of repeated examples ^{[9, p. 74-75]}; ^{[10, s. 289-318]}. Since one of the organizing structures of the narrative is the consistent rule of Danish kings belonging to the same family, this method seems promising for finding connections between the image of Cnut VI and the images of his ancestors mentioned in the "Deeds of the Danes". The disclosure of such connections would allow us to penetrate the political pragmatics of the text. However, in order to compare the images of Danish rulers presented in the "Deeds of the Danes", a clear criterion is needed. We believe that the eponymous nature of the rulers should be considered as such.

The motif of "imitation of the ancestors" in the "Deeds of the Danes"

The tenth book of the Acts of the Danes contains a story about Cnut the Mighty (1015-1035), the king who united England, Denmark and Norway under his rule at the beginning of the XI century. In Saxon's vision, Cnut is the ideal ruler, warrior, legislator and patron of the church. The conquest of the weakest kingdoms of Sclavia and Sembia, the only one that Saxon particularly highlights ^{[7, s. 728-730]}, marks future political success and characterizes Cnut as a king destined to rule, who is able to restore to the Danes the lost domination over England and Norway. Saxon's descriptions of punitive expeditions against Italy ^{[7, s. 748]} and Normandy ^{[7, s. 768-772]}, undertaken to protect the interests of Cnut's relatives, make it clear that the historian wants to present the Danish state as a powerful state among other European countries. The author of the "Deeds of the Danes" associates the preservation of the memory of the king's military exploits with the activity of Cnut the Mighty as a curator, patron of clerics and monks ^{[7, s. 772]}. And his representation in the hypostasis of the "king-legislator" is intended to show the idealized relationship between the king and the hierarchically organized squad, reflected in the charter that Knut worked out for his vassals ^{[11, pp. 131-132]}.

Nevertheless, in the story of Saxo Grammaticus about Cnut the Mighty, there was no place for a lengthy narrative about the establishment of Danish domination over countries and peoples. Instead, the author of "The Deeds of the Danes" focuses his efforts on depicting the moral confrontation unfolding in historical settings between the ruler and his opponents, the Norwegian king Olav the Holy (d. 1030) and Jarl Ulv (d. c. 1026), the father of the Danish king Sven Estridsen (1047-1076), who gained power after the suppression of the Whip line. The victory over these opponents is brought to Cnut the Mighty by personal qualities inherited from his ancestors ^{[11, s. 212-215]}: valor (virtus) ^{[7, s. 740-743]}, courage (fortitudo), piety (sanctitas), diligence (industria) ^{[7, s. 770-772]}.

This set of values goes back to ancient ideas about the virtues of the ruler. Saxo Grammaticus introduces as one of the main compositional techniques the organization of narrative and, consequently, the construction of images of Danish kings in accordance with the scheme of "cardinal virtues" ^{[12, p. 95-104]}, borrowed by medieval Christian theology from antiquity, which cannot surprise the researcher, since the author of "The Deeds of the Danes" generally relies on narrative models, gleaned from ancient authors, especially from Valerius Maximus, Curtius Rufus and Justin ^{[13, p. xl–xlvi.]}.

However, I would like to emphasize in particular that these virtues, and in general, personal qualities, in the narrative space are inherited by rulers from their ancestors, who often have the same names. Fragments of the "Deeds of the Danes", which reveal this technique, which we call the motif of "imitation of ancestors", testify to the refraction and complex interaction of Christian and pre-Christian traditions. Such episodes reflect the interweaving of the author's orientation towards ancient narrative practices, typological parallelism characteristic of medieval historiography and pagan ideas about the "repetition" of essential qualities of an ancestor in a descendant with the same name, originally associated with the belief in the transmigration of souls ^{[14, pp. 199-222]}; ^{[15, pp. 26-33]}. These ideas were also used by the Scandinavian royal dynasties in the Christian era as a means of legitimizing power through the actualization of ancestral heritage ^[16]. Turning to the motif of "imitation of ancestors", Saxo Grammaticus shows that belonging to the royal family, emphasized by the dynastic name, determines the behavior and political fate of the ruler.

Thus, the image of Cnut the Mighty turns out to be important for the story of the author of "The Deeds of the Danes" about another famous Danish king, Cnut IV the Saint (1080-1086). It is the similarity of the Saint's Whip to his ancestor, manifested in the possession of the same name, as well as in the extraordinary belligerence of these two kings, that allows the "younger" ruler to come to power. In Saxon's narrative, Cnut the Mighty stands for his descendant as a model sovereign worthy of imitation: "[The Holy Cnut] strengthened [his] young body by constantly participating in wars and steadfastly withstanding continuous battles; his military glory became so famous that he seemed to be the resurrected soul and fate of the Great Cnut, having at the same time a common [with his] name; thus, no one doubted that he would inherit power over his father's kingdom" ("Quin etiam iuvenile corpus continuo usu ad bella impigre conficienda armaque viriliter sustinenda firmabat, famaque eius bellica in tantum claritatis excessit, ut redivivum magni Kanuti spiritum fortunamque simul cum nominis videretur communione sortitus, adeo ut nullus eum paterni regni successione potiturum ambigeret".) ^{[7, s. 818]} (Note: hereafter our translation is S. Ch.).

The "repetition" of the personal qualities of an ancestor in a descendant-namesake occurs more than once in the work of Saxo Grammaticus. In the sixth book of the Acts of the Danes, the mythical king Frodo inherits along with his grandfather's name and his happiness (felicitas), which causes the universal love of his subjects for him ^{[17, pp. 237-238]}. It is legitimate to ask what function this motif performs in the composition of Saxo Grammaticus, what forms it takes, whether it has any political content.

Comparison of Cnut VI with Cnut IV the Saint in the Acts of the Danes

The association of the modern Saxon sovereign with his namesake ancestor can be traced in the message of the Danish historian about the unsuccessful campaign of Absalon and Cnut VI against the Slavs. The latter did not rule alone at that time – the leadership of the military expedition was entrusted to him by his father, King Valdemar I. According to the author of the "Acts of the Danes", in addition to the archbishop, who shared the functions of supreme leader with the heir to the throne (... filio pontificique contradita belli summa ...), other representatives of the Vide clan participated in the campaign, namely Absalon's elder brother Esbern, as well as their cousin, Suno. Faced with a mutiny during the preparation of a military action caused by the prolonged downtime of the fleet and a shortage of supplies, these "patricians" (patres), as Saxon calls them, advised the king to disband the army, motivating their decision as follows: "... if [the people], when returning ahead of time, of their own free will, prefer rebellion to the power of the leader, they can what is said to have happened to Saint Cnut, who exacted punishment from his homeland for the dissolution of the fleet, will happen." Further explanation is more like a threat: "therefore, if illness takes away his father, who is already seized with fever, Cnut may lose the kingdom" ("... quae si in praeripiendo reditu propriae voluntatis motum ducis arbitrio praetulisset, evenire posse, quod divo Kanuto solutae classis poenas a patria exigenti contigisse prodatur; quam rem Kanuto, si patrem eius iam febri implicatum praesens morbus absumeret, regni successionem adimere posse".) ^{[7, s. 1488]}. Following the advice of the magnates, Knut cancels the campaign and, together with Absalon, Esbern and Suno, returns to his father ^{[7, s. 1488]}.

Obviously, in this fragment there is an example of the correlation of two kings of the same name, an ancestor and a descendant, brought together by the overlapping facts of their biographies (Note: The circumstances of the death of the Saint's Whip vary from source to source. Saxon narrates the story of these events as follows. The army assembled to attack England is disintegrating due to the machinations of the nobility. Then Knut decides to take advantage of the situation and establish tithing in Denmark as punishment. However, the people only agree to a one-time tax. The tax collectors overly oppress the people, which leads to an uprising, during which Cnut IV receives a martyr's death.) ^{[18, p. 107-112]}; ^{[7, s. 846-862]}. In this sense, this example is comparable to a similar technique of Saxon, when with his victories the Holy Whip "reproduces" the exploits of Cnut the Mighty, as well as with the previously discovered implicit comparison of Cnut VI with Cnut the Mighty in reports on the Italian and Norman campaigns of the latter ^{[19, pp. 30-47]}. At the same time, this fragment, where the motif of "imitation of ancestors" sounds, differs from all other similar places in the text in a number of parameters.

Firstly, the ancestor with whom the comparison is made is not the Mighty Whip. Secondly, the reader cannot hide the fact that the task of correlating the names in this case is completely opposite – the fate of the ancestor is not considered as a model to follow, but as a warning. Thirdly, in the narrative space, kings are compared by senior representatives of the genus Vide. It seems that the "patricians" are having a conversation with Knut alone, so the comparison is emphatically informal and has ironic overtones. Fourthly, the correlation with the Holy Whip in this context and the dissolution of the fleet are equally humiliating for Cnut VI. The comparison with the saint, which in other circumstances could be considered flattering, here foreshadows death and casts a shadow on the figure of the ancestor, reproaching the saint for shortsightedness. In turn, the refusal to imitate the Holy Whip saves the heir to the throne's life, but shows his own impotence. This example seems to negate the similarity of the Mighty Whip with Cnut VI and the glorification of the latter, due to such a similarity ^{[19, pp. 30-47]}.

In addition to the story of St. Cnut, the passage in question refers to another parallel passage from the previous narrative of the "Acts of the Danes", which is not far from the considered example of the comparison of kings in the text. Concluding the description of the first uprising against Waldemar I, which took place in Scone (1180) ^{[7, s. 1454-1476]}, Saxon reports that the rebels, after their defeat, laid down their arms, agreeing to all the conditions of the king and the archbishop, except for the introduction of tithes. Persuading Absalon to refuse to collect it, Waldemar I hinted that if the archbishop continued to persist, he might suffer the fate of the Saint's Whip, who before becoming a martyr also tried to introduce tithing: "Nothing bothered the king more than to encourage Absalon to refuse [tithing], in every possible way appealing to [his] caution, to avoid what happened to him before with Cnut of Odense, who sought to spread the right of tithing" ("Nihil magis regi quam ad earum remissionem Absalonem adducere curatum est, summopere cavendum dicenti, ne sibi forte, quod olim Kanuto Othoniensi decimarum iura propagare nitenti acciderat, eveniret") ^{[7, s. 1476]}. On the advice of the king, Absalon (albeit reluctantly) agreed to postpone the collection of a new tax for the Sconians indefinitely, the uprising stopped ^{[7, s. 1476]}.

The connection between the above fragments of the fifteenth book of the Acts of the Danes is obvious. In both cases, the comparison with the Whip of the Saint is used in private conversation, concludes the irony and insult of the addressee. Absalon is forced to meet the demands of the rebels under pressure from the king. In the face of the rebellion that broke out in the army, Cnut VI has to act in the same spirit, but already on the instructions of the archbishop himself and his relatives. There is a feeling that the words of Valdemar I, designed to subordinate the prelate to the royal will, turn against the king in the future. The comparison of Cnut VI with Cnut the Saint demonstrates the dependence of the dynasty on the support of the Vide clan, as it makes it clear that sometimes the power of the king turns out to be illusory. In such circumstances, in order to retain the reins of government, the sovereign should listen to the advice of his closest confidants. The message embedded in the comparison of Cnut VI with the Holy Whip looks convincing also because it has a great right to life. Although the variant of Valdemar I did not arise from scratch (Absalon's maternal grandmother was Knut the Holy daughter) ^{[7, s. 858]}, he did not take into account the disparity of the archbishop and the holy king. Saxon also shows that they correlated kings primarily by name (in the text, the names of the holy king and the heir to the throne are adjacent within a line and are represented by one case form).