Njáll in a 19th century manuscript.
Njal's Saga is a thirteenth-century Icelandic saga — arguably the most famous of them all. It covers the fortunes of two families in the generation immediately before and after the Conversion of Iceland in the year 1000.
Njal's Saga covers three major parts.
First is the life of Gunnar Hamundarson, the greatest warrior in Iceland, who hates killing people. If only he wasn't so good at it. The titular Njal is his best friend, and Iceland's greatest lawyer; like and unlike Gunnar, Njal struggles to live up to the medieval Icelandic ideals of masculinity. However, Njal mostly takes a back seat at the beginning of the saga, which focuses on Gunnar, his feuds (at least one of which is officially with Njal's household), and his troubled marriage to Hallgerd Long-legs.
Even the greatest warrior in Iceland can't feud forever, and Gunnar departs the story, leaving his family — and Njal — to struggle with the aftermath. Gunnar's death leaves a power vacuum in the district that his extended family is quick to exploit; while his close friendship with Njal had held things together, with Gunnar dead things are not so easy. His family is torn apart, some siding with Njal's kin, and some decidedly against them. In the mix is the malevolent Mord Valgardsson, a cousin of Gunnar's, whom Njal had previously been able to beat at every turn. But Njal can't be everywhere, and sometimes his sons decide to take things into their own hands as well. This all leads up to the pivotal moment, the one a common English title refers to: the Burning of Njal.
Once again, the survivors are left to pick up the pieces. Kari Salmundarson, Njal's son-in-law, is one of those few, and he hunts down the perpetrators over years and oceans, through law courts and earl's courts. Will the cycle of death and vengeance ever be broken?
Njal's Saga provides examples of the following tropes:
- Arc Words: "Why is your axe bloody?"
- Beastly Bloodsports: Thorgeir Starkadsson and his brothers challenge Gunnar to let their best fighting horse fight against Gunnar's favourite stallion, with the transparent hope of increasing their social prestige by humiliating Gunnar. During the fight, Thorgeir tries to knock Gunnar over by pushing his horse into Gunnar, but Gunnar pushes back and knocks him over. Thorgeir starts a fight and knocks out an eye of Gunnar's stallion, before being knocked out by Gunnar. Raging, Thorgeir swears to avenge himself on Gunnar. Eventually the Starkadssons lay an ambush for Gunnar in which Gunnar's brother Hjort and fourteen attackers are killed.
- Berserk Button: Attacking Njal's masculinity, for Gunnar. At one point, he threatens a group including two kinsmen and his own wife for reciting verses mocking Njal's beardlessness, and frightens them so badly that no one dares mention it again while Gunnar lives.
- Big Prick, Big Problems: At Hrút's departure from Norway, his (now ex-)lover Gunhild curses him to "never be able to enjoy the love of that woman in Iceland on whom [his] heart is set". Back in Iceland, Hrút marries his fiancé Unn, but finds that whenever he is in bed with her he gets an erection so large he cannot have intercourse with her. Unn finally divorces him because of their inability to consummate the marriage. Hrút has no troubles of this kind in his second marriage.
- Black Widow: Hallgerd is a somewhat unwilling one — she never intended to have Glum killed, and while she did contribute to Gunnar's death, she certainly didn't plan it and her role was only nominal.
- Blade Spam: Among the many exceptional martial abilities of Gunnar Hámundarson is that "he could deal blows so swiftly that three swords seemed to flash through the air at the same time."
- Bowdlerise: On account of a curse put on him by an angry ex-lover, Hrut cannot have sex with his wife Unn because every time he is in bed with her, his erection becomes too large for them to have intercourse. English translations from before the 1970s are often extremely vague about the precise nature of the curse; the 1861 translation by George W. Dasent lets Unn say that "she and Hrut could not live together, because he was spell-bound".
- Cassandra Truth: Njal has a touch of the second sight, and people do listen to him — but never when it matters most. Gunnar followed his advice on everything, right up until the moment he chose to ignore the terms of the settlement with Thorgeir Otkelsson's family, which Njal had been warning him about for years. His sons always followed his lead, until they killed Hoskuld Thrainsson,which he had been working hard to avert for at least a decade.
- Catch and Return:
- In Gunnar's and Hallvard's clash with a band of vikings, Gunnar catches a spear hurled by the viking Karl with his left hand and throws it back towards Karl's ship, killing one of Karl's men.
- In Gunnar's fight with Otkel and his companions, Gunnar catches a spear thrown by the Norwegian Audólf and hurls it back at him, piercing his shield and also Audólf himself.
- At the battle at the Althing Hólmstein, a supporter of Flosi, hurls a spear at Kári Solmundarson "but [Kári] caught it in mid-air and hurled it back, and it brought death to a man in Flosi's following."
- In Kári's second fight with the sons of Sigfús and their allies, Kári catches a spear thrown by Grani Gunnarsson with his left hand, then hurls it back so that it pierces both Grani's shield and his thigh.
- Dangerous Backswing: When Kári and Thorgeir Skorargeir attack the sons of Sigfús, Thorgeir rushes at Thorkel Sigfússon just as one of Thorkel's companions runs up at Thorgeir from behind. Before the man can strike at Thorgeir, Thorgeir swings his battle-axe with both hands and "drove the axe-hammer into the head of this man who stood behind him, so that his skull was shattered to bits." Then Thorgeir lets the axe come down forward on Thorkel and cuts off Thorkel's arm.
- Deconstruction: A rare contemporary example for medieval gender roles. Both Njal, who doesn't conform to society's strict gender expectations, and Gunnar who does at least outwardly, struggle with the position this places them in and the decisions it drives them towards. Meanwhile, the women (most notably Bergthora and Hallgerd, but most named female characters at some point) cause as much or more bloodshed indirectly than the men do directly, as they are cut off from even the flawed formal channels of conflict resolution.
- Even Evil Has Standards: During the attack on Gunnar's farm at Hlidarendi, Gizur and Geir react with disgust at the idea of burning the farmhouse down with Gunnar and his family inside.
- Femme Fatale: Hallgerd — although, unusually, the author carefully does her point of view justice as well. She's certainly a dangerous lover to have, even admitting as much to Gunnar before their marriage, but all of her actions are preceded by at least some provocation. Her notorious husband murders were provoked by Domestic Abuse, and the feuds were sparked by insults.
- For the Evulz: Mord's motivations for destroying Njal and Gunnar are opaque at best. It is to be noted that he is the local godi, and these powerful and independent families indirectly threaten his authority in the district - however, that doesn't explain his intense personal hatred and brutal, coldly-calculated long-term plans for their destruction.
- Hairof Gold Heartof Gold: Gunnar
- Heroic Ambidexterity:
- Among the many exceptional martial abilities of Gunnar of Hlidarendi is that "[h]e could wield the sword and shoot equally well with either hand".
- In Gunnar's and Hallvard's fight with a band of vikings, Gunnar catches a spear thrown by the viking Karl with his left hand and hurls it back towards Karl's ship, killing one of Karl's men.
- In Kári's second fight with the sons of Sigfús and their allies, he catches a spear thrown by Grani Gunnarsson with his left hand, then hurls it back at Grani and hits Grani's thigh, still with his left hand.
- Horny Vikings: Are usually the baddies — like all sagas, Njal's Saga was written well after conversion to Christianity. Heroes usually get their loot by fighting more standard Horny Vikings. Hrut makes his name in Norway fighting the disgraced jarl's son Atli, while Gunnar and Kolskegg kill Swedish river pirates Karl and Vandil.
- Losing Your Head: Kari, intent on revenge for the death of his son in the Burning of Njal, pursues the Burners on their voyage to Rome and catches up with them in Wales. He spots Kol Thorsteinsson, one of the Burners, selling goods at a market; Kari strikes at him just as Kol is counting silver, and "Kol kept on counting the silver, and his head counted 'ten' as it flew from the trunk."
- Man on Fire: Kari the Singed gets his nickname from his escape from the burning farmhouse.
- The Missionary: Thangbrand, who comes to Iceland with the sole mission of converting everyone to Christianity. His large crucifix doubles as a weapon.
- Murder by Cremation: How Njal and his family — though the title should be a giveaway go out. House-burnings are this, on a large scale. However, most of the bodies are recoverable as they die of smoke inhalation.
- Off on a Technicality: After Njál and his household have been burnt in their farmstead, Njál's friends and relations sue the Burners at the Althing with the purpose of getting them outlawed. Two times a jury passes judgment against the Burners and their leader Flosi, and two times their legal adviser Eyjólf Bolverksson succeeds in declaring the verdict invalid for technical reasons: At the end of the first suit in the Court of the Eastern Quarter, Eyjólf reveals that Flosi has secretly declared himself a thingman (client) of a goði from the Northern Quarter, and so should have been cited before the Court of the Northern Quarter, making the verdict of the Eastern Quarter Court invalid. This leads to another suit before the Fifth Court (the Icelandic court of appeal), in which Flosi (advised by Eyjólf) waives his right to exclude six judges of his choice from the jury; this later allows him to declare the jury`s verdict invalid because the jury contained more than the allowed number of judges.
- Pre-Mortem One-Liner: Bergthóra's hitman Atli finds his target Kol tying packsaddle, and asks him how his work his getting on. Kol predictably retorts that it's none of his business. Atli then informs him that "The hardest job is ahead of you, and that is, to die!"With that Atli hurled his spear at him and pierced him through the middle.
- Pretty Boy: Gunnar is said to the "the most beautiful man in the world" and is described as a tall man with long blonde hair, blue eyes, and rosy complexion.
- Rated M for Manly: The medieval Icelandic standards for masculinity are rigid and all-encompassing, and the characters all hold this as an ideal. However, rather than a stereotypical saga glorifying the male Viking ideal, Njal's Saga questions and deconstructs the value of this. Men are supposed to be beard-growing stoical killers — but following that description to a tee doesn't work out too well for Gunnar, or for that matter Thrain, or even Kari. Meanwhile Njal, while a good man, is none of those. His family fights an uphill battle due to this expectation.
- Spoiler Title: Commonly titled "Burned Njal's Saga" or "The Saga of Burned Njal" in English, a translation of "Brennu-Njáls Saga."
- Roaring Rampage of Revenge: Kari's section of the saga, which is mostly taken up by his vengeance on the burners, one by one.
- Throwing Off the Disability: During the lawsuit against the Burners of Njál and his household, Njál's foster-son Thórhall Ásgrimsson must stay in his booth because he suffers from a large and painful boil on his foot, which forces him to limp and to walk only with a cane. After an intense legal battle the Burners finally exploit the fact that the jury which passed verdict contained more than the allowed number of judges to declare the entire suit invalid at the last moment. When Thórhall hears this, he is so furious that he jumps up from his bed, grabs a spear and drives it through the boil on his foot so that blood and pus pours out "like a brook"; then rushes to the law court without his cane and without limping and "so fast that the messenger could not keep pace with him", and kills the first man of the Burners' party he meets.
- Use Their Own Weapon Against Them: Gunnar repels Gizur and his allies attacking his farm with his masterful use of bow and arrow, until the attackers consider giving up. Meanwhile Gunnar grabs an arrow shot by the attackers to shoot it back at them, because "it will be a disgrace to them to fall by their own weapons". Ironically Gizur sees it and deduces that Gunnar must be running out of arrows, and thus persuades his allies to attempt another assault. The latter results in Gunnar's death.
- The Weird Sisters: On the day of the Battle of Clontarf, a Scottish clairvoyant watches twelve (i.e. four times three) valkyries weaving on a loom made of weapons and human body parts, singing a song that predicts the outcome of the battle.
