-

Conclusion. After this dismemberment of the dominions of Charlemagne the annals of the different branches of the Carolingian family become intricate, wearisome, and uninstructive. A fate as dark and woeful as that which, according to Grecian story, overhung the house of Labdacus, seemed to brood over the house of Charlemagne. In all its different lines a strange and adverse destiny awaited the lineage of the great king. The tenth century witnessed the extinction of the family. "The old and the young, the ripe and the immature," says Palgrave, "were all swept away: some, according to the ordinary course of human life, but many more by strange diseases, by mean, trivial, or household accidents, by unexpected, and as one might say, unreasonable contingencies."

In France the Carolingians finally gave place to the Capetians (987), with which line of kings the history of France proper begins. By this time the Romano-Celtic element had completely triumphed over the Teutonic, had absorbed and assimilated it or thrown it off, — had averted what seemed inevitable in the days of the first Carolingians, namely, that the intruding German element would so impress itself upon the Latinized Gauls that their country would become simply an extension of Germany.

CHAPTER VII.

THE NORTHMEN.

I. INTRODUCTORY.

The People and the Northern Lands. Northmen, Norsemen, Scandinavians, are different names applied in a general way to the early inhabitants of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden. For the reason that those making settlements in England came for the most part from Denmark, the term Danes is often used with the same wide application by the English writers.

These people were very near kin to those tribes- Angles, Saxons, Franks, Burgundians, and Goths that spread themselves over the western provinces of the Roman Empire. They were Teutons in language, religion, habits, and spirit. We cannot be certain when they took possession of the northern peninsulas, but it is probable that they had entered those countries long before Cæsar invaded Gaul.

If we think it strange that any of the Teutonic tribes should have chosen homes in those dreary regions, where the mid-winter sun scarcely appears above the southern horizon and the land and water are locked in frost and ice for a large portion of the year, we must call to mind that these peoples when they entered Europe were still shepherds and hunters; and that of all the European countries the Scandinavian peninsula, rough with mountains and indented with numerous fiords, affords one of the best hunting and fishing districts of Europe-a region which even now invites each summer the sportsman from England and other lands. Besides, the country abounds in iron and copper, which metals these German warriors had learned to employ in

THE NORTHMEN AS PIRATES AND COLONIZERS. 119

the manufacture of their arms; and this was an additional attraction to the barbarians.

The Northmen as Pirates and Colonizers. For the first eight centuries of our era the Norsemen are hidden from our view in their remote northern home; but with the opening of the ninth century their black piratical crafts are to be seen creeping along all the coasts of Germany, Gaul, and the British Isles, and even venturing far up their inlets and creeks.

Every summer these dreaded sea-rovers made swift descents upon the exposed shores of these countries, plundered, burned, murdered; and then upon the approach of the stormy season, they returned to winter in the sheltered fiords of the northern peninsula. After a time the bold corsairs began to winter in the lands they had harried during the summer; and soon all the shores of the countries visited were dotted with their stations or settlements. With a foothold once secured, fresh bands came from the crowded lands of the north; the winter stations grew into permanent colonies; the surrounding country was gradually wrested from the natives; and in course of time the settlements coalesced into a real kingdom.

Thus Northern Gaul fell at last so completely into the hands of the Northmen as to take from them the name of Normandy; while Eastern England, crowded with settlers from Denmark and surrendered to Danish law, became known as the Danelagh. From Normandy, as a new base of operations, fresh colonies went out, and made conquests and settlements in England, Sicily, and Southern Italy. While these things were going on in Europe, other bands of Northmen were pushing out into the western seas and colonizing Iceland and Greenland, and probably visiting the shores of the American continent.

Commencing in the latter part of the eighth century, these marauding expeditions and colonizing enterprises did not cease until the eleventh century was far advanced. The consequences of this wonderful outpouring of the Scandinavian peoples were so important and lasting that the movement may well be compared.

as it has been, to the great migration of their German kinsmen in the fifth and sixth centuries. Europe is a second time inundated by the Teutonic barbarians.

The most noteworthy characteristic of these Northmen is the readiness with which they laid aside their own manners, habits, ideas, and institutions, and adopted those of the country in which they established themselves. "In Russia they became Russians; in France, Frenchmen; in England, Englishmen."

Causes of the Migration. The causes which induced what we may call the Scandinavian Migration were, (1) the Norseman's love for wild adventure; (2) the overcrowding of population; (3) the establishment in Denmark and Norway of great kingdoms, the tyranny of whose rulers led many to seek in other lands that freedom which was denied them at home; and (4) the existence of a rule of primogeniture, which gave everything to the eldest son, leaving only the kingdom of the seas to the younger members of the family.

The last-mentioned cause gave leaders to the bands that went out, their chiefs usually being portionless sons of the ruling or royal families. Because of their royal birth these princes, just as soon as they headed an expedition, were given the title of King, and so very naturally came to be called Sea-Kings. The term Viking, from vic, meaning a fiord or arm of the sea, is more properly used to designate those piratical chieftains of humbler origin who could lay no claim to royal distinction.

Settlements in Scotland, Ireland, and the Western Isles. As early as the beginning of the ninth century, a short time after the appearance of the Danes in England, the Northmen took possession of the Orkney and Shetland Islands, and of the Hebrides. Before a century had elapsed, the latter isles, in connection with the western coast of Scotland and the eastern shore of Ireland, formed a sort of Scandinavian maritime kingdom, the rulers of which often disputed with the Celtic chiefs of Scotland and Ireland the possession of their lands, just as the Danes disputed with the English the possession of England. These Northmen