(Re)visions of Royal Luck in the Sagas of Óláfr Tryggvason

This article examines the depictions of royal luck in three sagas of Óláfr Tryggvason. In existing scholarship Old Norse concepts of luck defy clear definition, having been read variously as Christian and pagan; abstract and concrete; individual and societal; predetermined and serendipitous; innate and endowed from above. These apparent oppositions need not be mutually incompatible. Rather, the sagas discussed in this article approach these thematic concerns from multiple angles simultaneously. Since the texts are the products of an iterative tradition, notions of luck are shaped diachronically by layers of subjective ideology and idiosyncrasy, arising from multiple stages of authorial, editorial, and critical (re)interpretation.