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By Root 1953 0

of this contest was a sailor by the name of Egil Halldorsson. The second contest involved how long a man could hold his breath under water. In this game, a man would be held down by two other men while two judges counted the time, and when the man began fighting and flailing he would be let up for breath. Each man got three chances, and the winner of this contest was the young son of Thord and Kristin of Siglufjord, whose name was Ingvi Thordarson. After these contests, the benches were set up outside the booths, and everyone ate with much appetite. When the benches were taken away, the sailors began to chant a number of their songs and to dance in a circle. These songs were bawdy, but tuneful and pleasant. After this, a man named Steinthor, who had traveled to the feast from Isafjord, brought out a flute he had carved from a narwhal tusk, and played it for a while. Other Greenlanders sang their Greenlandic songs, and Gunnar Asgeirsson and Axel Njalsson each told a tale. Kollbein Sigurdsson declared that this was good entertainment for a place so lacking in beer and other joy-inducing refreshments.

On the second day, participants in the contests had to dive, first for a heavy marked stone, which they were to bring up, and then for a small soapstone weight, which they were to find and bring up. Many participated in these contests, and so many were able to bring up the great stone that the game had to be repeated three times, each time with a bulkier and more awkward weight. This contest was also won by Egil Halldorsson, for he was the most accomplished of the sailors in these sorts of sports. Another sailor, named Olaf Bogulfsson, won the test of finding the small loomweight. After this six rowboats made a race from one farmer’s jetty across the fjord and back. This race was won by a Greenlandic boat. After these events there was feasting, as well, and the talk turned to past feasts, especially to the great feast at Gunnars Stead, where all, even the women, had gotten much intoxicated with Asgeir’s mead, and the result had been the rape of Sigrun Ketilsdottir and all that followed it. The Norwegians spoke with longing of feasts in their own home districts, and with such conversation the evening ended.

Now on the third day there was but a single contest, but it took all day. All those participating were to go together into the spring and attempt to hold each other under the water until the wiliest man with the strongest lungs was the last one left. If this ended up to be Egil Halldorsson, then he would win the prize, but if another man should be strongest, then he and Egil would at once, without resting, run a foot race between two designated points, and that would show the strongest man. It so happened that Kollbein Sigurdsson insisted on participating in this contest, much against the advice of his English accountant, Martin of Chester, and his other friends, both Greenlanders and Norwegians.

The spring chosen was large and deep, but not so warm as the others. In spots it was so deep that no one had ever touched the bottom, and everywhere it was deep enough so that no man could be weighed down or pinned against the bottom by another. At a signal from one of Kollbein’s party, all of the men leaped into the water, which at once began to seethe with the jumping, diving, and arm swinging of the contestants. For a while, everyone struggled with great spirit, and no one raised his hand to show that he was ready to come out, for this was the rule, that each man was the best judge of his own strength and wind. Certain strong older men, who were not competing, stood around the edge of the pool to gather up those who might be rendered senseless during the contest. Folk always consider such a game to be amusing, and there was not a little shouting and calling out from the spectators. After a certain while, hands began going up, and men started being pulled, sputtering and spitting water, from the pool. Soon there were four men where there had been thirty, and these were Egil Halldorsson, two other sailors, and a big man from Siglufjord