Heimskringla; Or, The Chronicle of the Kings of Norway

4. DEATH OF ASBJORN AND OF NEREID.

King Harald came to Konungahella with the men who had followed him from Denmark. The lendermen and town's burgesses collected a force against him, which they drew up in a thick array above the town. King Harald landed from his ships, and sent a message to the bondes, desiring that they would not deny him his land, as he wanted no more than what of right belonged to him. Then mediators went between them; and it came to this, that the bondes dismissed their troops, and submitted to him. Thereupon he bestowed fiefs and property on the lendermen, that they might stand by him, and paid the bondes who joined him the lawful mulcts for what they had lost. A great body of men attached themselves, therefore, to King Harald; and he proceeded westwards to Viken, where he gave peace to all men, except to King Magnus's people, whom he plundered and killed wherever he found them. And when he came west to Sarpsborg he took prisoners two of King Magnus s lendermen, Asbjorn and his brother Nereid; and gave them the choice that one should be hanged, and the other thrown into the Sarpsborg waterfall, and they might choose as they pleased. Asbjorn chose to be thrown into the cataract, for he was the elder of the two, and this death appeared the most dreadful; and so it was done. Halder Skvaldre tells of this:—

     "Asbjorn, who opposed the king,
     O'er the wild cataract they fling:
     Nereid, who opposed the king,
     Must on Hagbard's high tree swing.
     The king given food in many a way
     To foul-mouthed beasts and birds of prey:
     The generous men who dare oppose
     Are treated as the worst of foes."

Thereafter King Harald proceeded north to Tunsberg, where he was well received, and a large force gathered to him.