hem; to him was the victory and there were the vikings slain. Thus
saith the Banda lay:

'The steerer of the prow-steed
Let lie at Staur the heads of fallen warriors,
Thereafter joy of battle inflamed the Earl.
At the corses of the viking the ravens tore
After that dire meeting of swords
Nigh the sands of the shore.'

|| Sailed thence Earl Eirik back to Sweden in the autumn and abode there
a second winter; but in the spring made he ready his host and thereafter
sailed eastward; & when he was come to the realm of King Valdamar fell
he to plundering & slaying folk, burning whithersoever he went, and
laying bare the land. Then coming to AldeigiaborgSec. laid he siege unto it
even until he had taken it, and then put he there many folk to the sword
and utterly destroyed the town, and thereafter spread he war far and
wide in Garda. Thus saith the Banda lay:

'The chieftain fared forth to devastate with fire,
Yea and with sword (so waxed the sword-storm),
The lands of Valdamar.
Aldeigia brok'st thou, lord, when east thou cam'st to Garda
Well wot we how grim was the fight twixt the hosts.'

|| For five summers together waged Earl Eirik this warfare, and when he
left the realm of Garda he went fighting over the whole of Adalsysla &
Eysysla;Sec. there took he four viking boats from Danish men and slew all
that were on the ships. It is thus spoken of in the Banda lay:

'I heard where the swinger of the sword did battle
Once more in the isle-sound.
Eirik wins the land;
The bounteous lord four viking boats from Dane-folk took
Doughty and peacemaking.
There where warriors hied to town,
hadst thou, war-hero! strife with Goths.
Joy of battle filled the Earl thereafter.
The battle-shield he bore aloft to all the lands,
And gently fared he not, over the country he rules.'

|| Then Eirik the Earl fared to Denmark when he had abode one winter in
Sweden, and coming unto the Danish King Svein Two-beard, wooed he his
daughter Gyda and this marriage was agreed upon. Accordingly Eirik took
Gyda to wife and one winter later a son was born to them whom they
called Hakon.

Mainly abode Eirik the winters through in Denmark, but whiles also in
Sweden, but in the summers sailed he the seas over even as became a
viking.

|| Svein Two-beard, the Danish King, had Gunnhild, the daughter of the
Wendish King Burizlaf, to wife; and in the days whereof now is the
record writ happed it that