Actual Translation

That same night, Eirek went
into the temple of Odin, and offered
himself up to him for victory. He
asked for a delay of ten years before
his death, for the many sacrifices
that he had made before, because
matters seemed hopeless to him. A
little while later, he saw a tall man
in a long hood. The man handed
him a reed stem and ordered him
to throw it over Styrbjorn’s forces,
and he had to pronounce these
words: “Odin has you all.” And
when he had thrown it, a javelin
appeared to him in the air, and it
flew over Styrbjorn’s ranks. At once
it struck Styrbjorn’s men blind, and
then Styrbjorn himself. After that,
there came such a great wonder:
a landslide broke loose up on the
mountain and rushed down from
above onto Styrbjorn’s men, and all
of his folk were killed.

When King Harald realized
what was happening, he and all the
Danes took to flight. They regained
their own eyesight as soon as they
got away from the place where the
spear had flown over them. They
returned to Denmark. Styrbjorn or-
dered his men to plant their banner-
staffs down in the ground and not
flee anywhere. There fell Styrbjorn
and all his men.

Later, Eirek was at Uppsala,
on the slopes where the Thing
assembled, and he asked anyone
who could to make a poem, and he
named a reward for it.


- The Tale of Styrbjörn the Swedish Champion (Styrbjarnar þáttr Svíakappa), Chapter 2 (Ben Waggoner translation, from Idunna Issue #81)