ergiinmiddleearth:

The thing that baffles me the most about all these terrible tales about Sigyn is that Gaiman, Riordan and Co. don’t seem to know how DIVORCE WORKED in Norse society. Or the STIFF PENALTIES for mistreating a freewoman. They also don’t seem to realise that the women in the Sagas were not wilting violets. I don’t mean to suggest that abuse didn’t exist in the Viking Age or that it was a Human Rights paradise, because oh mercy no it wasn’t.  But I find it irritating when a goddess’ agency (they’re deities for fucksakes…MIGHTY AND POWERFUL GODS) and a historic legal system -that in some ways is more progressive than many modern ones about domestic violence- is erased for some Good Guy™

author circlejerk. 

Some documented reasons for divorce:

• If the couple gave each other “large wounds" 
• If one spouse with little or no money of his- or her own was suddenly charged with the support of poor relatives.
• If a husband tried to take his wife out of the country against her will

• One spouse failing to treat the family of the other “with due consideration”.
• Because the other partner made mocking verses about him or her. 
• Excessive anger or jealousy displayed by one spouse.  
• Slapping. (If a man struck his wife in front of witnesses, she could not only claim monetary compensation for the blows equal to what he would have received had another man struck him, the wife had the right to divorce the husband on top of the fine after the third slap –

  Gulaþing Law of Norway)

• If a husband wore effeminate clothing, especially low-necked shirts exposing his chest, his wife could then divorce him, and if a woman appeared dressed in men’s trousers, her husband could then divorce her.

• General dislike.
• Erectile dysfunction.

Courtship, Love and Marriage in Viking Scandinavia on Viking Answer Lady

Sex, Love, and Beauty in Viking Age Culture on Huginn’s Heathen Hof
Women in the Viking Age on the National Museum of Denmark
The Role of Women in Viking Society on Hurstwic