INTRODUCTION.
Ibsen himself has told us, in his preface to the second
edition of The Feast at Solhoug, how the reading of
the Icelandic family-sagas suggested to him, in germ,
the theme of The Vikings at Helgeland. What he
first saw, he says, was the contrasted figures of the
two women who ultimately became Hiördis and Dagny,
together with a great banquet-scene at which an interchange
of taunts and gibes should lead to tragic
consequences. So far as one can gather from this
statement, the particular theme which he ultimately
borrowed from the Volsung-Saga had not yet entered
his mind. On the other hand, the conception of the
two women's characters was certainly not new to him,
seeing that a similar contrast presents itself in his
very earliest work, Catilina, between the aptly-named
Furia and the gentle Aurelia; while even in Lady Inger of Ostråt it reappears, somewhat disguised,
in the contrast between Inger Gyldenlöve and her
daughter Eline. While the scheme of The Vikings
was still entirely vague, however, fresh influences,
both of a personal and of a literary nature, intervened,
and, transposing the theme from the purely dramatic
