declare this níð at the land-spirits there, and the land itself, so that all will fare astray, not to hold nor find their places, not until they wreak King Eiríkr and Gunnhildr from the land." He set up the pole of níð in the cliff-face and left it standing; he faced the horse's eyes on the land, and he carved runes upon the pole, and said all the formal words of the curse. (ch. 57). Both the King and Queen spent the remainder of their lives trying to take vengeance. Gunnhildr also put a spell on Egill, cursing him to feel restless and depressed until they meet again. Soon afterwards, Eiríkr and Gunnhildr were defeated and overthrown by King Haakon the Good and were forced to flee to the Kingdom of Northumbria, in Saxon England. Eiríkr and Gunnhildr became King and Queen of Northumbria in rivalry with King Athelstan of England. In time, Egill was shipwrecked in Northumbria and came to know who ruled the land. Egill sought out the house of his good friend Arinbjörn, where they armed themselves and marched to Eiríkr's court. Arinbjörn tells Egill "Now you must go and offer the king your head and embrace his foot. I will present your case to him." Arinbjörn presents Egill's case and Egill composes a short drápa, reciting it with Eiríkr's foot in his hand, but Eiríkr was not impressed. He explained that Egill's many insults could not be forgiven and that Egill must lose his head. Gunnhildr also called for the immediate execution of Egill, but Arinbjörn convinced the king to wait until the morning. Arinbjörn tells Egill that he should stay up all night and compose a mighty drápa, a poem in praise of his mortal enemy. In the morning Egill went again before King Eiríkr and recited the twenty-stanza long drápa Höfuðlausn, or "Head Ransom", which praises Eirkr's many victories in battle and appears in the full in Chapter 63 of Egils saga. Eiríkr was so impressed by the poem that he decided to grant Egill his life, even though Egill had killed Eiríkr's own son. The Battle of Ethandune G.K. Chesterton's 1911 poem The Ballad of the White Horse retells the story of the Battle of Ethandune, in which an army from the Anglo-Saxon Kingdom of Wessex led by King Alfred the Great defeated the Great Heathen Army led by King Guthrum of East-Anglia