Þórvaldr Hjaltason (

Old Norse Old Norse, Old Nordic, or Old Scandinavian, is a stage of development of North Germanic languages, North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants of Scandinavia and t ...

: ;

Modern Icelandic Icelandic (; is, íslenska, link=no ) is a North Germanic languages, North Germanic language spoken by about 314,000 people, the vast majority of whom live in Iceland, where it is the national language. Due to being a West Scandinavian langua ...

: ) was a late 10th-century Icelandic

skald A skald, or skáld (Old Norse: , later ; , meaning "poet"), is one of the often named poets who composed skaldic poetry, one of the two kinds of Old Norse poetry, the other being Eddic poetry, which is anonymous. Skaldic poems were traditionall ...

in the service of the Swedish king

Eric the Victorious Eric the Victorious (Old Norse: ''Eiríkr inn sigrsæli'', Modern Swedish: ''Erik Segersäll''; c. 945 – c. 995) was a Swedish monarch as of around 970. Although there were earlier Swedish kings, he is the first Swedish king in a consecutive reg ...

. He is listed in '' Skáldatal'' as in Eric's service. ''

Styrbjarnar þáttr Svíakappa ''Styrbjarnar þáttr Svíakappa'' (''The Tale of Styrbjörn the Swedish Champion'') is a short story, a '' þáttr'' on the Swedish claimant and Jomsviking Styrbjörn the Strong preserved in the '' Flatey Book'' (GKS 1005 fol 342-344, ca 1387-13 ...

'' recounts that he took part in the Battle of the Fýrisvellir against

Styrbjörn the Strong Styrbjörn the Strong ( non, Styrbjǫrn Sterki ; died about 985) according to late Norse sagas was a son of the Swedish king Olof, and a nephew of Olof's co-ruler and successor Eric the Victorious, who defeated and killed Styrbjörn at the Battl ...

and in response to the king's call for verses commemorating the victory, composed in '' dróttkvætt'' the following two '' lausavísur'': These are the only verses attributed to him; the tale says that he received a ring worth half a mark for each verse, and that he is not known to have composed any other verses, either before or after. He may have brought the news of the battle back to Iceland. He may be the same person as the Þorvaldr Hjaltason who is mentioned with his brother Þórðr in '' Landnamabók'' and a number of

Sagas of Icelanders The sagas of Icelanders ( is, Íslendingasögur, ), also known as family sagas, are one genre of Icelandic sagas. They are prose narratives mostly based on historical events that mostly took place in Iceland in the ninth, tenth, and early e ...

, but that Þorvaldr is not said to be a skald.Diana Whaley
"Þorvaldr Hjaltason"

Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages is a project which is editing the corpus of Old Norse-Icelandic skaldic poetry., along with all poetry written down in runes. The project will publish nine volumes and is supported by a website. The co ...

, retrieved 7 April 2021.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Thorvaldr Hjaltason 10th-century Icelandic poets