Sigrid the Haughty

Sigrid the Haughty (; ) is a Scandinavian queen appearing in Norse sagas. Sigrid is named in several late and sometimes contradictory Icelandic sagas composed generations after the events the stories describe, but there is no reliable, historical evidence attesting to the veracity of her depiction in those tales. She is reported by Heimskringla to have been the wife of Eric the Victorious of Sweden, as being sought after by Olaf Tryggvasson, and then married to Sweyn Forkbeard of Denmark. Snorri Sturluson, however, says that Sweyn was married not to Sigrid but to a different woman.

It is unclear if the figure of Sigrid the Haughty was a real historical person. She appears primarily in late Icelandic sagas composed generations after the events. Scholars such as Birgitta Fritz consider her largely apocryphal, with saga accounts possibly drawing on folk motifs or conflating multiple women.

Some recent revisionist modern historians have hypothesized an identification with an unnamed Polish princess (later reconstructed by some as Świętosława) mentioned by medieval German chroniclers as a wife of Sweyn Forkbeard and possibly mother of Cnut the Great and Harald II. However, this remains a tentative and highly disputed theory. The potential husbands attributed to Sigrid in the sagas lived across a wide date range, and the identification relies on reconciling contradictory Norse and Continental sources. Gwyn Jones described her as "non-existent".

Mainstream Scandinavian and Anglo-Saxon scholarship, including works by Birgit Sawyer and other Northern European historians, tends to view Sigrid as a composite literary figure or semi-legendary construct rather than a single verifiable queen, but of possible Scandinavian origin. Recent Contemporary or near-contemporary sources like Thietmar of Merseburg mention a Polish or Wendish royal woman in Danish alliances but provide no support for the dramatic "haughty" traits or full saga biography. The maternal-link hypothesis is often criticized as speculative overreach, with no strong paternal-line or archaeological backing to elevate it beyond the idea of diplomatic marriage conjecture common in the Baltic region.

Early accounts Sigrid appears in the 12th-century saga Yngvars saga víðförla, which when speaking of Swedish King Eric the Victorious says:

She also receives brief mention in the genealogical appendix to , which likewise when discussing Eric states "He married Sigrith the Ambitious" (''). This appendix is not found in the earliest-surviving manuscripts of the saga, rendering its dating uncertain.

Accounts given in the Heimskringla and Separate Saga Using earlier sagas as his sources, Snorri Sturluson gives a much more detailed account of Sigrid in several sagas within his 13th-century compilation, the Heimskringla. He first introduces her in Haralds saga gráfeldar, where he describes the upbringing of the Norwegian prince Harald Grenske, who fled to Sweden and there joined the raiding band of Skoglar Toste, described as the richest and most distinguished untitled man in the country, and staying with him the following winter. The saga then relates that Toste had a daughter Sigríd, who was young, fair and very haughty, and who later would marry Swedish king Eric the Victorious and become mother of King Olaf the Swede. Snorri returns to Harald and Sigrid in the next saga in the Hemskringla, Óláfs saga Tryggvasonar. Now a wealthy queen dowager and mother of King Olaf, and described by Snorri as "the wisest of women and prophetic about many things", she learns that her foster-brother Harald is nearby on his way to raid in the Baltic Sea, and she invites him to a banquet, and afterwards personally serves him in his chamber. However, Harald took offence the next day when she favorably compared her own possessions and power in Sweden to his in Norway, leaving Harald sullen in spite of the great gifts she gave him. After stewing over this for a season, Harald again raided the Baltic and visited Sweden on his return. Sending for Sigrid, he proposed that they marry. She dismissed this, pointing out that he already had a wife, Asta, who seemed compatible with him, but he insisted Asta, though noble and good, was not as high-born as he. After a few further cursory words, Sigrid rode away, and Harald again turned sullen before deciding to ride to her home to press his case. Taking a large body of men, he arrived to find another suitor also present, a king called Vissavaldr from Garðaríki. Both were housed in the same quarters, and served large quantities of drink, and then in the night she had her people set fire to the structure and kill anyone who made it out, declaring that this should prevent other petty kings from coming to her country to seek her hand. Snorri says that from thenceforth she was called Sigríðr in stórráða, "Sigrid of the Great Undertakings". Sigrid makes one further brief appearance in the Heimskringla, in Magnúss saga ins góða. There she is described as mother of Estrid Svendsdatter, the paternal (half-)sister of Cnut the Great and maternal half-sister of Swedish king Olaf.

Other appearances The Danish historian Saxo Grammaticus has similar information as the Heimkringla, writing that Eric the Victorious' widow Syritha had married Sweyn Forkbeard after having spurned Olaf Trygvasson. married Sweyn, and by him was mother of Harald and Cnut, while writing slightly later Adam of Bremen reported that this same Polish princess had earlier married Eric, having Olaf by him. Sigrid could be either a contemporary name adopted by the Princess to conform to her new linguistic context, or else simply a name invented by saga writers who did not know or could not comprehend her Slavic name. This solution may further make her identical to the woman that the same saga gives as Sweyn's first queen, 'Gunhild', daughter of 'Burislav', suggested to be a confused rendering of the same historical marriage to the sister of Boleslav of Poland. This is not certain: the attributed Polish marriages of Sweyn and Eric may have been to different women, with Gunhild being the daughter of Mieszko, while Eric's widow, a distinct princess, may simply have been the dramatic model for Sigrid.

Finally, some consider Sigrid to be a fictional character created by Scandinavian saga writers.

Suggested resting places

Further confusion has been introduced by outdated interpretations of an archaeological discovery. In 1835, the Haraldskær Woman was discovered in a peat bog in Jutland. When originally found in the nineteenth century, this female body was dated to the 11th century, and it was identified as Sigrid (or Gunhild). Radiocarbon dating later proved this was incorrect, however, showing the remains are much older and probably not those of Sigrid. Despite this, the erroneous dating became intertwined with numerous episodes of Scandinavian intrigue, as the theory was elaborated to serve a variety of agendas of kings and nobles prior to its redating.

Another legend states that Sigrid is buried at the Puke Stone (Swedish: Pjukesten) along the hiking trail. Near the half-way point of the twelfth stage of that trail lies an ancient monumental stone just off the path in the forest. It is said to be the burial place of Queen Sigrid, erected by her son.

In literature Henry Wadsworth Longfellow composed a poem with the title "Queen Sigrid the Haughty" of which this is the first verse:

Queen Sigrid the Haughty sat proud and aloft In her chamber, that looked over meadow and croft. Heart's dearest, Why dost thou sorrow so?

Karen Blixen, in the short story "The Deluge at Norderney" in Seven Gothic Tales, refers to Sigrid, claiming that she invited all her suitors to her house and burned them in order to discourage other suitors.

The story of Sigrid's life, loosely based on the Saga materials, is the focus of two novels by the Swedish writer and journalist, Johanne Hildebrandt: Sigrid (2014) and its sequel Estrid (2016).

There are three novels about the life and times of Sigrid the Haughty (treating her as identical to Świętosława): Elżbieta Cherezińska "Harda" (2016) ("The Haughty") and "Królowa" (2016) ("The Queen"), Maria Rawska-Mrożkiewicz "Świętosława: Córka Mieszka I, żona, matka skandynawskich Konungów" (1987) ("Świętosława: Daughter of Mieszko I, Wife, Mother of Scandinavian Kings")