The chieftains began to speak at once: “It is a good pledge, King Olaf, and will keep strong our fealty. Do thou give thy sister to our young chief, Erling of Sole, as a blood bond between him and thee and between thee and thy earl-folk of the South Hordaland.”
“It shall be done!” cried King Olaf, heartily. Then reaching out his hand to the young chief, “Thou shalt be my brother. Thy kinsmen shall be all my brethren.”
All the earl-folk rose up and the horns were lifted. “A wassail to the bride of our brave Erling!”
“A wassail to our Christian Norraway!” cried out the king, and this pledge too was eagerly drank.
When the arrangements for his sister’s marriage with Erling had been completed, King Olaf returned to the Trondelag and established himself at Nidaros.
In the spring of the year 996 he began to build his palace, and Nidaros, or Drontheim, as it was afterwards called, became the royal city of Norway.
One thing that disappointed Olaf in the Tronders was their slowness to accept the Christian faith. The earl-folk and the chieftains were arrayed against the king in a stubborn resolution to preserve the Asa faith. In the face of the king’s earnest endeavors to convert them, they continued to offer sacrifices in their magnificent temples, and were threatening to make the king’s participation in their heathen rites a condition of their acceptance of him as their overlord. The
