A study of a remarkable medieval skeleton found in a well at a castle in Norway has helped to corroborate events detailed in an 800-year-old Norse saga.
In the study, published in the journal iScience, a team of researchers analyzed the human remains originally discovered at Sverresborg Castle outside Trondheim in 1938. They determined that the timing of the individual's death and other contextual information matched "very well" with a story documented in a historical text known as the Sverris Saga.
Michael Martin, one of the authors of the study with the University Museum, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, told Newsweek the skeleton is "extraordinary" given that the Sverris Saga, which is thought to have been written more than 800 years ago, provides an account of how it came to rest at the bottom of the castle well.
The Old Norse sagas are narrative prose works written in a former North Germanic language spoken during the medieval period. They tell stories of historical figures and legendary heroes, often mixing history, legend, and mythology, making them a fascinating blend of fact and fiction.
They were largely composed by Icelandic scholars, although their stories sometimes extend beyond Iceland, depicting events in Norway, Greenland, the British Isles, and even locations farther afield, such as North America. The sagas were often written centuries later than the described events, likely building on oral traditions and earlier lost manuscripts.
The Sverris Saga details the life and reign of Norwegian king Sverre Sigurdsson (1151–1202), describing his ambitious rise to power as sovereign over Norway in the second half of the 12th century.
"Much of Norway's early history is known from this single text, which depicts a period of political instability characterized by conflicts and civil wars lasting more than a century," the study authors wrote.
It is widely believed that most of the saga text was written around the same time as the events it describes, making it somewhat unusual among the Old Norse sagas. The author is thought to have been someone close to the king, possibly the Icelandic abbot Karl Jónsson.
"The text, clearly in favor of Sverre, is rich in names, places, and events, spanning an impressive 182 verses, and is unique in its detailed depiction of the many battles, and recounting a large cast of individuals, military strategic considerations, and the many speeches made by Sverre," the authors wrote.
Despite the author's apparent close connection to the events, the Sverris Saga is not purely historical. It still contains literary embellishments and political biases, especially since it seeks to legitimize Sverre's controversial claim to the throne. As a result, while it's an invaluable near-contemporary source, it also requires careful interpretation.
One passage in the Sverris Saga describes a military raid on Sverresborg Castle in A.D. 1197. During the event, a body was thrown into a well, possibly in an attempt to poison the main water source for the local inhabitants.
Radiocarbon dating work conducted by the authors of the latest study supports the view that the individual found in a well at the castle in 1938 is the person documented in the Sverris saga. The radiocarbon data agree well with the expected dates of the castle raid.
Previous research had indicated that the human remains in the well belonged to a male who was between 30 and 40 years old at the time of death. The authors wanted to shed new light on the "well-man," so they also sequenced his genome.
"We sequenced the genome of this person and used that information to confirm that he was a man and to deduce that he likely had blonde hair, blue eyes, and an intermediate skin tone," Martin told Newsweek.
"We also used databases of reference human genetic data to determine that the man's ancestry does not trace back to the local area but to a specific county in southern Norway. That was a big surprise to us given that the attacking army came from southern Norway, and we would not have expected them to disrespect one of their own dead by throwing him in the well."
According to the authors, when knowledge of the past is primarily based on historical texts such as the Sverris Saga, it is valuable to have independent sources of information that can verify or add to our understanding of protagonists and events.
"What we highlight in our study is that genetic information from ancient human remains can be used in some cases to separate fact from fiction—this event did happen and is corroborated by our study—and even to sketch out physical descriptions and life stories of otherwise anonymous side characters in these texts," Martin said.
Do you have a tip on a science story that Newsweek should be covering? Do you have a question about archaeology? Let us know via science@newsweek.com.
Disclaimer: The copyright of this article belongs to the original author. Reposting this article is solely for the purpose of information dissemination and does not constitute any investment advice. If there is any infringement, please contact us immediately. We will make corrections or deletions as necessary. Thank you.
