2i2 NORDIC BALLADS

arid his history is episodic. Under other circumstances he might
have been immortalized by a ballad.

Arnid all this which is old, there are suggestions in Saxo of a new
spirit at work. He tells us that a Saxon singer, wishing to warn
Knut Lavard that treachery was being prepared against him
(Haraldstad, 1131), 'quod Canutum Saxonici et ritus et nominis
amantissimum scisset', sang him the famous song of Grimhild's
treachery towards her brothers. It is the matter of the Nibelungen-
lied in some older form, and also of the Vise' Grimhild's Vengeance
(DGF 5), Somewhat later, in 1157, a German singer composed a
partisan poem against King Svend Grade, full of abuse. It is
clearly different from the extant ballad of Svend Grade (DGF 118),
which sang of the murder of Knut Magnuss0n by King Svend.
Scarcely two months later, at the battle of Gradehede, a singer rode
between the lines to kindle the enthusiasm of Valdemar's troops
by singing *parricidalem Svenonis perfidiam famoso carmine'. The
song can hardly have been other than the 'vise', recovered from a
seventeenth-century manuscript. To achieve its effect the song
. must have been in Danish.

We are thus brought to the evidence of the historical ballads
themselves. They form a well-nourished group among the 'viser',
and thanks to their uniformity of style and sentiment they are the
cement of the whole collection. The oldest belong to the era of
nation-building under the two Valdemars (1157-82, 1202-41).
There is a new doctrine of royalty implied by an ancient lyric
embedded in one of the Diderik ballads:

The King he rules the city,

he rules over all the land,

and over so many bold heroes

with naked sword in hand.
But the King he rules the city.

Let the bonder rule his dwelling,
let the courtier rule his horse;
the King, the King of Denmark
he rules both city and force!
But the King he rules the city. (DGF 8.)

Such a king is no longer a distributor of gold rings to a retinue of
purely personal followers. The heroic hall has ceased to be the
place of first importance; its place has been taken by the boroughs,
backed by the farmers, whose defence is the duty of the military