Editing Sweyn Forkbeard (section)

==Issue==
The ''[[Thietmar of Merseburg#Thietmar's Chronicle|Chronicon]]'' of [[Thietmar of Merseburg]] and the ''[[Encomium Emmae Reginae|Encomium Emmae]]'' report Cnut's mother as having been [[Świętosława]], a daughter of [[Mieszko I of Poland]]. [[Old Norse literature|Norse]] sources of the [[High Middle Ages]], most prominently ''[[Heimskringla]]'' by [[Snorri Sturluson]], also give a Polish princess as Cnut's mother, whom they call [[Gunhild of Wenden|Gunhild]] and a daughter of [[Burislav]], the king of [[Wends|Vindland]]. Since in the Norse [[saga]]s the king of Vindland is always Burislav, this is reconcilable with the assumption that her father was Mieszko (not his son [[Bolesław I the Brave|Bolesław]]). Adam of Bremen in ''[[Gesta Hammaburgensis ecclesiae pontificum]]'' is unique in equating Cnut's mother (for whom he also produced no name) with the former queen of [[Sweden]], wife of [[Eric the Victorious]] and by this marriage mother of [[Olof Skötkonung]]. To complicate the matter, Heimskringla and other sagas also have Sweyn marrying Eric's widow, but she is distinctly another person in these texts, named [[Sigrid the Haughty]], whom Sweyn married only after Gunhild, the Slavic princess who bore Cnut, had died. Different theories regarding the number and ancestry of Sweyn's wives (or wife) have been advanced (see [[Sigrid the Haughty]] and [[Gunhild of Wenden|Gunhild]]). But since Adam is the only source to equate the identity of Cnut's and Olof Skötkonung's mother, this is often seen as an error on Adam's part, and it is often assumed that Sweyn had two wives, the first being Cnut's mother, and the second being the former Queen of Sweden. Cnut's brother [[Harald II of Denmark|Harald]] was the younger of the two brothers, according to ''Encomium Emmae.''

Sweyn had seven children with [[Sigrid the Haughty]] and [[Gunhild of Wenden]]:<ref name="weir" />
*[[Harald II of Denmark]]<ref name="weir" />
*[[Cnut the Great]]<ref name="weir" />
*[[Estrid Svendsdatter]]<ref name="weir" />
*[[Gytha (princess)|Gytha]]
*Gunnhild
*Santslaue
*Thyra