FEMALE SUICIDE IN THIRTEENTH-CENTURY ICELAND: THE CASE OF BRYNHILDR IN VÖLSUNGA SAGA Kirsi Kanerva  Abstract: The article examines thirteenth-century Icelandic conceptions of female suicide and ideas about their causes and motives by conducting a case study of a saga figure called Brynhildr, who commits suicide. The story of Brynhildr is told in several medieval Icelandic sources: in the mytho-heroic legendary saga (fornaldarsaga) Völsunga saga, Snorri Sturluson’s Prose Edda and the Poetic Edda. The story of Brynhildr in these sources offers fruitful material for the study of the history of suicide, since the northern version in question differs from the southern version of the Brynhildr legend that was known especially in medieval Germany, in which Brynhildr does not kill herself. In this study, the causes and background factors of Brynhildr’s suicide and her motives for her deed, which are described and mentioned in the sources, represent possibilities for female behavior that were part of the mental toolbox of medieval Icelanders. It is argued that the Icelandic audience believed some women committed suicide to protect or restore their honor, or to take revenge, and that such an act required determination, capability to make rational choices, and sense of responsibility. The act could also be seen as a manifestation of power and authority: the woman decided herself when her life would end. However, Brynhildr’s death represents only one possible type of female suicide, and not all were expected to be the same. Committing such a preconceived self-killing as Brynhildr’s required an especially strong will. Most women, who were usually maintained by men, were thought not to possess such might and strength. Keywords: history of suicide, gender, medieval history, medieval Iceland, Old Norse-Icelandic saga literature, legend of Brynhildr. The present article examines thirteenth-century Icelandic conceptions of female suicide: who (i.e. what kind of women) committed suicide, what were perceived as the causes of female suicide, and what was thought to motivate some women to commit suicide. These questions are relevant for understanding medieval Icelandic views of suicide, a subject which until recently has remained understudied, 1 bearing in mind that conceptions of suicide have varied from one cultural and historical context to another. Whereas in the modern era views of suicide have become secularized and medicalized, and mental illness or emotional disturbances are seen as the most likely causes of suicide, 2 in medieval Christian Europe in general the causes of suicide could be linked to both everyday hardships and spiritual concerns. Based on studies of English and continental sources, despair, hopelessness, misfortune and various kinds of misery, godlessness and a sinful life, old age and infirmity have all been considered  School of History, Culture and Arts studies, University of Turku, kirsi.kanerva@gmail.com. I wish to express my deepest gratitude to the Ella and Georg Ehrnrooth Foundation for the grant that has enabled my work on this article. I discussed some parts of this article in my paper at the Folklore and Old Norse Mythology conference in Helsinki, November 27–28, 2017. I am very grateful for all the helpful comments I received at the conference—I wish to thank especially John McKinnell, Leszek Gardela, Else Mundal, Judy Quinn and Frog. Special thanks also to the anonymous reviewers of Viator journal for their extremely helpful and valuable comments, which helped me greatly to improve my article, and to Philip Line, who proofread the article and corrected my English, and offered useful comments. Any omissions or errors that remain are entirely my own responsibility. 1 Suicide is not a common motif in sagas but does appear every now and then. Although no comprehensive study of the cases of self-killing in different saga genres has yet been conducted, some of the saga suicides have been listed and discussed in Gilbert Trathnigg, “Über Selbstmord bei den Germanen,” Zeitschrift für deutsches Altertum 73 (1936) 98–102; Alfred Dieck, “Selbsttötung bei den Germanen,” Archiv für Religionswissenschaft 36 (1939) 391–397; Roy Engfield, “Der Selbstmord in der germanischen Zeit.” Seminar 8 (1972) 1–14; Terry Gunnell, “Suicide and the Sagas,” (forthcoming). I thank Terry Gunnell for letting me read the manuscript of his forthcoming article on the subject. 2 See e.g. Kathleen M. Brian, “The Weight of Perhaps Ten or a Dozen Human Lives: Suicide, Accountability, and the Life-Saving Technologies of the Asylum,” Bulletin of the History of Medicine 90.4 (2016) 583–610.