Chapter 4

Egill's Grave? Archaeology and

Egils Saga at Kirkjuholl, Hrisbru

Jon M. Eriandson, Jesse Byock, and Davide Zori

Located strategically near the mouth of the Mosfell
Valley in southwest Iceland (see Map 1.1), thesites
of Hrisbru and Mosfell are mentioned frequently
in the Icelandic sagas.1 One of the goals of the Mosfell
Archaeological Project (MAP) has been toexplore thepos
sible historicity of the sagas through excavations of archae
ological sites in the Mosfell Valley. Some possible correla
tions between thesagas andarchaeological finds at Hrisbru
have been explored in previous papers.2 Here we explore
another case, where textual sources appear to intersect with
the archaeology of Hrisbru anddescribe ourexcavation of
an empty grave shaft beneath the floor of the conversion
eraChristian church at Kirkjuholl (Church Knoll).
This chapter presents archaeological evidence from
the excavation of the Kirkjuholl church. It documents
convergences between the events described in Egils saga
andthe archaeological record at Hrisbru. Aswe shall see,
the saga bears a striking relationship to a series of MAP
discoveries. The latter include a grave that could have
been the temporary resting place for the bodyof Viking
Age Iceland's iconic warrior-poet Egill Skallagrimsson
(Figure 4.1). In presenting this evidence, we argue that
excavating the church and graveyard at Hrisbru without
1 Byock and others,'AViking-Age Valley in Iceland*.
2 See Walker and others, "The Axed Man of Mosfell', pp.26-43,
andHoick, 'Egill Skallagrimssons gard ogkirke pa Island*.
reference to medieval sources would have resulted in the
loss of significant information.
'Egils saga andthe Archaeology ofHrisbru
Egill Skallagrimsson, who was pagan and had been a
Viking, is said in Egils saga to have spent the end of his
life at Hrisbru. He lived with his niece and step-daugh
ter Thordis, who was married to Grimr Svertingsson, the
chieftain at Mosfell. Grimr was one of Iceland's major
chieftains, and in the years AD 1002-03, he served as
Iceland's lawspeaker. According to the saga, Egill died
around the yearad 990. His bodywasburiedwithin sight
of the farm at Hrisbru in a pagan mound at Tjaldanes,
a spit of land south of the Kaldakvisl stream that runs
through the Mosfell Valley. About ad 1000, Iceland
converted to Christianity, and Grimr built a Christian
church at Hrisbru. Thordis, whom the saga says loved
her step-father, had Egill's remains removed from the
pagan mound at Tjaldanes and re-interred at the new
Hrisbru church. The location of the grave beneath the
altarwas remembered in Egils saga. About a centuryand
a half later, in the mid-twelfth century a second church
was built c. 500 metres to the east of Hrisbru at the farm
now known as Mosfell. Egill's bones were then moved
again to this third resting place in the sanctified ground

Jon M. Eriandson <jerland@uoregon.edu> is Professor of Anthropology and Executive Directorof the Museum of Naturaland Cultural
History, at the University of Oregon.

Jesse Byock <byock@humnet.ucla.edu> is Professor in the Scandinavian Section at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA),
Professor at the UCLACotsenInstituteof Archaeology, and faculty member of the UCLA Centerfor Medieval and Renaissance Studies. He
isAffiliate Professor in the Departmentof History and the Viking and Medieval NorseStudiesProgram at the University of Iceland.

Davide Zori <dmzori@gmail.com> isAssistant Professor at Baylor University in theBaylor Interdisciplinary Core.He isField Director of the Mosfell
Archaeological Project and has been StaffResearcher at the CenterforMedieval and Renaissance Studies, University of California, Los Angeles.
Viking Archaeology in Ircl.iml: Mosfell Anh.tcologii.il Project, cd. byDavide Zori andJesse Byock. CURSOR zo (Titrnhout: Brepols. 2014) pp.45-53
I0.1484/M.CURSORHB.1.102211 BREPOLS® PUBLISHERS
46
of the new Mosfell churchyard. The following passage
from Egils saga describes these events:
Grimr or Mosfell was baptized when Christianity was
adopted by law in Iceland; he had a church built there.
And people say that Thordis had Egill moved to the
church, and this is evidenced by the fact that afterwards
when a church was built at Mosfell, and the church that
Grimr had had built at Hrisbru was taken down, then
the old churchyard was dug up. And under the place of
the altar, human bones were found. Men thought that
they knew from the stories told by old people that these
must be the bonesof Egill. At that time Skapti the priest
Thorarinsson, a wise man,was there; he picked up Egill's
skull and placed it on the churchyard wall. The skull was
exceptionally large, and it was even moreremarkable how
heavy it was; the skull wasall rippled on the outside like
a scallop shell. Then Skapti wanted to learn about the
thickness of the skull; he took up a decent-si7.ed hand-
axe and swung it in one hand as hard as he could and used
the back side of the axe-head to break it. But in the place
that it hit, the skull whitened but did not dent or break;
and from this it was clear that the skull would not have-
been easily damaged by the strikes of small men while it
was covered with skin,hair, and flesh. The bonesof Egill
were reburied at the edgeof the churchyard at Mosfell.3
Grimr at Mosfelli var skiror, ba er kristni var i logleidd a
Islandi; harm let barkirkju gera. En bater sogn manna, at
Cordis hafi latit flytja Egil til kirkju, ok er bat til jartegna,
at sidaner kirkja vargor at Mosfelli, en ofan tekinat Hris-
3 Translation by Zori.
Jon M. Eriandson, Jesse Byock, andDavide Zori
Figure 4.1.
Tlie excavated remnants
01 the conversion era
church at Kirkjuholl,
Hrisbru,showing the
location or the empty
grave shaft beneaththe
chancel. The numbers
correspond to grave
features discussed in
this chapter(Mosfell
Archaeological Project).
bru su kirkja, er Grimr hafoigera latit, |)a var pat grafmn
kirkjugaror. En undir altarisstaonum, \>X fundusk man-
nabein; bau varu miklu meiri en annarra manna bein.
tJykkja.sk menu bat vitaaf sogn gamalla manna, at mundi
verithafabein Egils. Parvarba Skapti prestr Porarinsson,
vitr math-; harm tok up hausinn Egils ok setti a kirkju-
gardinn, var haussinn undarliga mikill, en hitt botti
bo meir fra likendum, live bungr var; haussinn var allr
barottr utan sva semhorpuskel. Pi vildiSkapti forvitnask
um bykklcik haussins; tok hann ba handoxi vel mikla ok
reiddi annarri hendi sem hardast ok laust hamrinum a
hausinn ok vildi brjota, en bar sem a kom, hvitnatH hann,
en ekki dalaoM ne sprakk, ok maaf sliku marka, at hauss sa
mundi ekki auSskaddr fyrir hoggum smamennis, medan
svordT ok hold fylg5i. Bein Egils varu logr3 niSr i utan-
verchim kirkjugar5i at Mosfelli.
In 1993, Jesse Byock proposed from Egils saga that Egill
Skallagrimsson may have suffered from Paget's Disease,
an affliction of bone that can cause a dramatic thicken
ing of the skull.5 He also suggested that the issues sur
rounding Egill's burial would be a significant test of saga
reliability. Fortunately the farmer at Hrisbru, Olahir
Ingimundarson, had protected an area that contained
a small mound known as Kirkjuholl, or Church Knoll.
Based on the name of this knoll, Olafur suggested in
4 Egils saga Skalla-Grn/issonar, ed.bySigurchir Nordal.
5 Byock, "The Skull and Bones in Egils Saga'. See also Byock,
'Egil's Bones'. Foran earlier suggestion that Egill's symptoms could
be attributed to the progression of an illness, see f>6rchir HarcWson,
'Sjukdomur Egil's Skallagrimssonar'.
egill's grave? archaeology and egils saga at kirkjuholl, hrisbru
Figure 4.2. A 1983 mudflow at Hrisbru
swept offthesouth-facing slopes of
Mosfell Mountain into the fields of
farmer Olafur Ingimundarsson, seen
here at right with hisson Andres
Olafsson (Photo: Morgtuibladid news
paper, 12 August 1983, Courtesy of
Morgunblai'iS).
1994 that it would be a good place to look for the old
church at Hrisbru, the one mentioned in the sagas.
In 1999, geophysical and subsurface survey work con
ducted at Hrisbru by MAP members provided valuable
background information on the soils, stratigraphy, and
structure of natural and archaeological features across
the broader farm area.6 Although the 1999 geophysical
work and a backhoc trench excavated in the Kirkjuholl
area were inconclusive, Byock and Walker decided to
focus work in this area beginningin 2001.7
In excavations from 2001 to 2005 MAP members
unearthed the well-preserved foundations of a church at
Kirkjuholl. The church was surrounded by a grave field
(see Figure 4.1 and Plate 4). Radiocarbon dates, burial
practices, and artefacts demonstrate that the church and
cemetery were used in the tenth and eleventh centuries,
the time described in Egils saga* The stone foundations
of the church were intact, along withremnants ofwooden
sill beams and posts (Figure 4.1). The small church at
Hrisbru was 6.8 m long, with two connected rooms. The
interior of the western and larger room, the nave, meas
ured 4.3 m long and 3.2 m wide. The nave was entered
through an exterior door in its western wall. The smaller
eastern room had an interior area measuring about 2 x
2 m andserved asthe chancel, the place of the altar. Altars
in such early Scandinavian churches often consisted of
6 Steinberg and Byock, High Risk Exploratory Research.
7 Byock and others, I'iking Age Graves in the Mosfell Valley.
8 Byock and others, 'A Viking-Age Valley in Iceland'; Eriandson
and others, Life and Death in Viking Iceland.
47
a wooden platform topped by a small altar stone. In the
early period in Scandinavian Christianity examples of
these stones are small, distinct, and imported. Christian
law dictated that these altar stones should be consecrated
by a bishop or an abbot.9 The chancel had a gravel floor,
which was raised slightly above the floor of the nave, ele
vating the priest and altarabove the congregation.
Egill's Grave?
In 2001 and 2002, early in our excavations at Kirkjuholl,
we had limited knowledge of the overall structure of the
church and its surroundinggrave field. Exploratory exca
vations in 2001 focused outside the east wall of the chan
cel. These test excavations identified a gravel lens, which
we initially interpreted as part of a possible landslide or
mudflow coming off the slopes of Mosfell Mountain,
which rise steeply just north of the site. In this initial
interpretation, we were influenced by knowledge of a
1983 mudflow, a photo of which led us to speculate that
a similar landslide might have destroyed the church at
Kirkjuholl (Figure 4.2). Later excavations demonstrated
that thegravel lens did not extend north of Kirkjuholl as
expected if it was part of a landslide. Instead gravel was
used as a building material for the floor of the chancel.
9 See Magnus Mar Larusson, 'Altar, altarstenar', pp. 114-15.
For an example of a porphyry altar stone recovered from an early
Christian timber church at E>6rarinsstaciir in East Iceland, see
Stcinunn Kristjansdottir, Lazzeri, and Macchioni, 'An Icelandic
Medieval Stave Church', p. 99. The altar stone from Porarinsstadir
appears to be imported from the eastern Mediterranean.
48
The foundations of the chancel were well preserved.
The south wall foundations consisted of two parallel
east-west running rows of basalt stones between 10 cm
and 40 cm in diameter. The two rows of cobbles were
separated by 20-30 cm of gravel. Originally the rows of
stones held a sill beam in place and were found to con
tain small fragments of decomposed, straight-grained
wood, which were shown to be birch. The foundation of
the north wall was constructed in the same way as the
south wall. The internal gravel was in place but only a
single row of basalt cobbles remained. The 20-30 cm
wide gravel trench in both the north and the south wall,
raised the wooden sill beam from the earth, protecting
it from water damage.10 The foundation of the chancel's
east wall, in contrast,was built with two large flat basalt
stones. These two flat stones were laid end-to-end with
some small cobbles at eitherend (Figures 4.1 and 4.3)."
On its western side, the chancel opened into the nave.
Here the chancel and nave shared a common foundation
consisting of a sill beam placed atop a row of foundation
stones running between the nave's northeast and south
east corner posts.
10 Byock and others, T/je Kirkjuholl and Hulduholl Excavations
at Hrisbru, 2003.
1' Byock and others, V)e Kirkjuholl and Hulduholl Excavations
at Hrisbru, 2003.
Jon M. Eriandson, Jesse Byock, andDavide Zori
Figure 4.3.Jesse Byockand
Shawna Rider beginning the
excavation of the grave shaft
under the floor of the chancel
(Mosfell Archaeological
Project).
The floor of the chancel, composed of a mixture of
fine gravel and greasy black sediment, was fully exposed
duringour 2003 and 2004 field seasons.12 By 2004,when
the landslide hypothesis had been disproven, and, the
entire chancel floor exposed, we recognized a hole in
the gravel floor in the southeast quadrant of the chancel,
located adjacent to the southern of the two large flat-
topped stones set side-by-side into the east wall founda
tion. The gravel floor of the chancel was missing along
the southern wall where the hole, elongated in the E-W
direction, had been dug through the gravel. The hole in
the gravel floor of the chancel was filled with mixed cul
tural and natural soil. The location under the place of
the altarcorresponded to where Egils saga states that the
medieval residents dug up Egill's bones to move them
from Hrisbru to the new church built at Mosfell in the
twelfth century. Discussions with the larger MAP team
led to a testable hypothesis about the hole in the floor of
the chancel: if the archaeology were to correspond with
the events described in Egils saga, an emptiedgrave shaft
should be found stratigraphically below the hole in the
gravel floor.
In 2005, we pursued this hypothesis by carefully
excavating the hole in the chancel's gravel floor. In this
12 Byock and others. The Kirkjuholl and Hulduholl Excavations
at Hrisbru, 2003.
EGILL'S GRAVE? ARCHAEOLOGY AND EGILS SAGA AT KIRKJUHOLL, HRISBRU 49

process, we were aided by our experience during several

excavation seasons at Hrisbru, particularly in the grave
field surrounding the church. By this time, wewere prac
ticed at identifying the mottled soils characteristic ofthe
disturbance and stratigraphic mixing found in the shal
low grave shafts at Hrisbru, as well as the remnants of
coffin stains, nails, and other evidence of early Christian
burial practices. We were also aided by the presence of
the distinctive prehistoric soil layers (including a tephra
~3500 years old) normally found stratigraphically below
the Viking Age and Medieval Period occupations at
Hrisbru, but through which some graves shafts had been
cut. We knew by this time that the cemetery surround
ing the church at Kirkjuholl contained several primary
Christian burials, as well as secondary 'bundle' reburials
where skeletons from whatappear to be pagan graves had
been moved to the sanctified ground of the Christian
church at Kirkjuholl.13 The latter included the remains
of two male skeletons - one with a carved whale bone
amulet - reburied in similar locations immediately out
side the south and north walls of the chancel (Features Figure 4.4. Jon Eriandson excavating thegrave shaft beneath the
4 and 46 in Figure 4.1). These reburials confirmed the chancel floor. One of the chancel's foundation stones has been

general practice of moving pagan skeletons and rebury-
ing them in Christian contexts described in Egils saga.
But to confirm - or further corroborate - the events
described inEgils saga, we had to explore the hole in the
chancel's gravel floor.
During the 2005 season, we carefully cleaned,
scraped, and mapped the southern part of the chancel
before excavating the fill of the hole in the gravel floor.
The soil of the fill was mottled, with chunks of differ
ent strata mixed together, typical of other previously dis
turbed soils, such as the grave shafts around the Hrisbru
church. Initially, we excavated a 50 x 50 cm wide test
unit in the southeast corner of the chancel, in which we
encountered a clearly-defined 43 cm wide shaft dug into
the undisturbed prehistoric soil. The shaft was clearly
discernible because the fill of the grave shaft contrasted
with the undisturbed and unmottled soils around it.
Next, we expanded our excavation to the west inside the
chancel by following the bottom and walls of the shaft
for a distance of one metre as it sloped deeper into the
prehistoric soil. The west end of the shaft terminated
inside the southwest corner of the chancel, but the cast
end extended beneath the southern flat-topped founda
tion stone in the eastern wall of the chancel. This indi
cated that the foundation of the chancel was constructed
after the grave was dug.
13 Byock and others, 'A Viking-Age Valley in Iceland'.
removed (at lower right, withhandon it) to excavate the full grave-
shaft (Mosfell Archaeological Project).
The size and depth of the grave shaft was consistent with
the size of the earlyChristian graves in the surrounding
cemetery, some of which produced the poorly preserved
remnants of wood planks, nails, and clench bolts. Along
the northern edge of the grave shaft, a thin (2-3 mm)
piece of moist, carbonized wood extended for about
25 cm and was located about 10 cm above the floor of
the grave shaft. This wood was probably associated with
the pre-church occupation of Kirkjuholl that was trun
cated by the grave shaft, and showed that wood, had
there been any in the emptyshaft, would have preserved.
Also found nearby (c. 10 cm south at roughly the same
level) was a small piece of corroded iron.
We first tried to delineatethe boundaries of this grave
feature without removing the eastern chancel wall by
excavating another test unit just outside the east wall
of the chancel. This 50 x 100 cm unit, oriented north-
south, lay outside the chancel, immediately east of the
foundation stones. We excavated down until we encoun
tered a horizontal hay/dung layer that spreads across
much of Kirkjuholl.This hay layer,' 'C dated to c. ad 990
(Beta-175675; calibrated range isad 890-1020), ispart
of the occupation of the farm that pre-dates the con
struction of the church. A clear cut that lined up with
the grave shaft inside the chancel had been dug through
50
the haylayer. Thiscut, the eastern end of the grave shaft,
was on average 45 cm wide (N-S), and it extended c. 28
cm east of the chancel wall. We completed the exposure
of the grave shaftbyremoving the southern large founda
tion stone in the chancel's east wall, and then excavating
the underlying soil (Figure 4.4). Here we found that the
shaft went cleanly through the older hay layer (Figure
4.5), in the same manner as the grave cuts of a line of
early Christian burials found just to the east.
Sieving of the fill within the emptied shaft with a
'/4-inch mesh screen produced a few small, calcined ani
mal bone fragments typical of the mixed cultural soils
found throughout the site. Approximately at the level of
the hay layer, within the grave shaft under the founda
Jon M. Eriandson, Jesse Byock, andDavide Zori
Figure 4.5.
The grave shaft underthe chancel, looking
west. The tapering shape of the grave-
shaft can be seen as it descends into the
undisturbed prehistoric soil. Thecast
end of the grave isyet to be excavated in
thispicture. Davide Zori isstanding in
the northeast corner of the church nave
(Mosfell Archaeological Project).
tion stone, we found a fragment of very poorly preserved
bone that appears to be human. The bone fragment, less
than 3 cm in diameter, was unburned and delaminated
with a thin veneer of wet, paper-like cortical bone and
some amorphous cancellous bone.
The fully uncovered grave shaft underlying the hole-
in the gravel floor of the chancel was about two metres
(6 feet, 4 inches) long (Figure 4.5). The floor of the
eastern end of the grave shaft sloped up gradually, while
the shaft floor in the western end rose more abruptly.
Stratigraphically, the grave shaft post-dates the hay floor
and pre-dates the construction of the chancel. Thestrati-
graphic position of the shaft is consistent with the saga
description of an emptied grave beneath the place of
EGILL'S GRAVE? ARCHAEOLOGY AND EGILS SAGA AT KIRKJUHOLL, HRISBRU
the altar in the church at Kirkjuholl. As we have seen,
the hole in the gravel floor of the chancel is consistent
with medieval excavation of thisgrave at the time of the
twelfth century abandonment of the church. The lack of
bone inthe grave is also consistent with the saga descrip
tion of the removal of skeletal elements to another loca
tion after the church at Hrisbru was abandoned and
desanctified.
Discussion
There clearly was a grave beneath the altar area in the
chancel ofthe churchat Hrisbru.Just asclearly, thegravel
floor ofthechancel was disturbed bythe digging ofahole
that led into the grave. The contents of the grave under
the chancel appear to have been emptied, as appears to
have occurred with several other early Christian burials
at Kirkjuholl.14 Could the skeleton and the contents of
the grave under the chancel have decomposed and thus
never have been emptied through the hole leading into
the grave? This seems unlikely since graves with relatively
well-preserved skeletons were uncovered in similar sedi
ments just a metre orsoto thesouth andeast ofthegrave
in the chancel (see Figure 4.1 and Plate 4). A reburied
skeleton, Burial Feature 4, located about a metre to the
south just outside thechancel's south wall was among the
best preserved skeletons found at Hrisbru.
Why does the grave predate the construction of the
chancel? One possibility is that the grave was dug just
before the church was built and in anticipation of the
location of the altar place. This occurrence, shortly after
the conversion to Christianity, linked the newly con
verted community to their past by the reburial of an
honoured ancestor in a founder's grave. A more nuanced
explanation lies in the phasing of church's architecture.
The architecture indicates two phases of construction,
with the nave and chancel built in two different styles
(for adrawing of thechurch in each of its two phases see
Figure 1.10). The first phase saw theconstruction of the
rectangular nave. This part of the church, which formed
anenclosed self-standing building, was constructed with
large corner posts dug into the earth and supported by
stone packing within the post holes. The four corner
posts were connected by sill beams into which vertical
wall planks or staves were set. The grave in question was
interred outside the eastern end of this original single
room building, closest to the altarwithin the first phase
14 Byock and others,'AViking-Age Valley in Iceland*.
51
of the church. Subsequently, a small square chancel was
added to the eastern end of the nave. The chancel was
built in a different architectural style from the nave. Its
southern and northern wall foundations utilized gravel
trenches lined by vertically set stones. This arrangement
held the sill beams in place. Unlike the nave, the chan
celwas constructedwithout earth-dugcorner posts. The
addition of the chancel extended the church to the east,
moving the place of the altar on top of the underlying
grave. And there it lay until the church was taken down
and the grave under the altarexhumed.
Finally, [(Egils saga accurately describes the reburial
of Egill's remains under the altar at Kirkjuholl, why was
a full-sized grave shaft needed rather than a small hole
for a bundle or box of bones similar to those reburied
on either side of the chancel? One explanation is that
Egill's status - as well as that of his daughter andGrimr s
family - may have called for a full burial. We also note,
however, that not all the reburials at Kirkjuholl appear
to have been placed in bundles. Burial Feature 49 (Figure
4.1), for instance, appears to have been a skeletonized
reburial placed in a full-sized grave.15 Within the grave,
smaller skeletal elements were displaced - metatarsals
found along the lower and upper leg, a cervical verte
bra in the femoral region, and a patella near the man
dible. Such displacements can result from ground water
effects inside coffins after soft-tissue decomposition. In
this case, however, the left humerus was upside-down
(rotated 180 degrees from anatomical position) with the
distal end facing the shoulder joint, a displacement that
seems unlikely in the narrow confines of a coffin without
human agency. The Feature 49 burial could have been
disturbed when other burials were interred nearby, but
it ismorelikely that Feature 49 is a reburial whose bones
were placed in a full grave roughly in anatomical posi
tion when reburied in the graveyard at Kirkjuholl.
Conclusions
Consistent with theEgils saga description of the site, we
have unearthed an early Christian church and surround
inggrave field at Hrisbru. Beneath the altar and chancel
at the Hrisbru church we found archaeological evidence
consistent with the remains of a single individual placed
in a Christian-style grave. The archaeology revealed a
hole dug through the gravel floor of the chancel. The
15 See Chapter6 byHoickand Chapter7 byEngin thisvolume
for more information on Burial Feature 49.
52 JonM. Eriandson,Jesse Byock, andDavide Zori

hole through the floor was duginto a pre-existing grave Acknowledgments

shaft, in a location that matched precisely the siteof the
only grave within the chancel. Our excavations at Hrisbru were supported by grants
Was the empty grave beneath the altar of the from theTown ofMosfellsbaer, theNational Geographic
church at Hrisbru the temporary resting place of Egill Society, IcelandAir, our home institutions, and other
Skallagrimsson's bones? The best we can say is that supporters. This chapter is written in memory of our
there are a series of extraordinary correlations between partner and friend Phillip Walker. We are grateful to
the archaeological evidence and the saga account. First, Dagfinn Skre and Mark Tveskov for help in defining
there was a conversion-era church at Hrisbru as specified the structure of the church, Per Hoick for excavation
in Egils saga. Second there was a grave shaft beneath the assistance, and Shawna Rider, Jacqueline Eng, Erik
place of the altar of this church. Third, this grave was Eriandson, Kaethin Prizer, Melissa Reid, and other crew
empty. Fourth, the grave had been emptied after or dur members for their help in excavating Kirkjuholl. We are
ing the abandonment of the church. Preservation con also deeply indebted to Olafur Ingimundarson and his
ditions surrounding the grave appear to preclude the family for their longstanding support and tolerance in
natural deterioration of the skeletal remains. Fifth, the allowing us to work on their farm at Hrisbru, and espe
location of this grave under the altar of the Viking Age cially to Olafurfor suggesting that weexcavate a lowand
church at Hrisbru is consistent with that of a venerated inconspicuous mound he correctly identified asthe loca
ancestor such asEgill Skallagrimsson. tion of Kirkjuholl.
Even without Egils saga, the archaeology speaks for
the burial - and later disturbance - of an important per
son in a prestigious location below the altar. This may be
a case, rarely dealt to studentsof the Early Middle Ages,
where a specific account of a specific person in a story
that has long been believed to be fiction corresponds to
a verifiable historical occurrence. If so, it may be time to
take a closer and a fresher look at the Icelandic sagas as
documents with significant historical foundations.
Weare not proposingthat everything - or even most
of what is - reported in the sagas can be correlated with
historicalevents, only that medieval Icelandic oral tradi
tions sometimes maintained earlymedieval localhistory
that may richly illuminate our understanding of Viking
Age Iceland. Finally, while a variety of anthropological
theories can help archaeologists better understand the
development of societies in Viking and medieval times,
our work at Hrisbru demonstrates that ignoring the rich
historical records found in the sagas and other early
sources would be folly.
EGILLS GRAVE? ARCHAEOLOGY AND EGILS SAGA AT KIRKJUHOLL, HRISBRU 53

Bibliography
Primary Sources
Egils saga Skalla-Grimssonar, ed. by SigurSur Nordal, Islenzk fornrit, II (Reykjavik: Hi3 islenzka fornritafelag, 1933)

SecondaryStudies
Byock, Jesse, 'Egils Bones: AViking Warrior and Paget's Disease', Scientific American, 272 (1995), 82-87
,'Hauskiipan og beinin iEgils sogu', Skirnir: Timarithins islenska bokmenntafelags (1994), 73-109
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