Suicide is seen today as a decision made by an unhealthy and troubled mind. Depression and emotional trauma are often factors in the act of committing suicide and the motivations for the action usually follow a mindset that does not take into account the honor and shame that comes with the concept of suicide. In ancient Norse culture, however, honor, shame, and death go hand in hand. The characters in the Viking sagas have motivations that are all very different from those of modern people, as the sagas of Gautrek and Burning Njal demonstrate. Intent on maintaining their status in the proud world of the Vikings, Gautrek and Njal's characters make choices that seem wrong. Although the deaths depicted seem avoidable, Skinflint in Gautrek's saga and Njal decide that death is the only honorable way out of their situation, even if that death comes of their own making. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get the original essay Honor is one of the most valuable assets a Viking can have, surpassing wealth, relationships, and even life itself. To maintain his honor, a Viking man could go to great lengths, taking steps that might exceed the need for self-preservation. In Njal's saga, Njal finds himself trapped in his own house, fire burning all around him; he is surrounded from the attic and from outside each door by flames which quickly consume his home. Although Njal receives an offer from Flosi, one of the men trapping him inside, to escape from this impending doom, he refuses to leave. Leaving, for Njal, means abandoning his home and his sons and putting himself in mortal danger again. Njal is too old to fight if his enemies decide to betray him and even if he escapes unscathed, he would die a shameful death of old age. Gautrek's saga takes a more casual and slightly less heroic approach to the concept of honor when it comes to death. The saga describes a "family cliff" (Gautrek 27) and this cliff is a place where family members will often throw themselves off the edge and pass into the afterlife, going "towards Odin", a notion which would be very bad view. in modern culture (Gautrek 29). For the members of this particular family, death is more honorable than the burden of such things as illness (even minor), starvation, injury, and age. Disease and hunger are painful and pitiful fates that make strong men weak and desperate. The family members within Gautrek's saga seem to preserve their honor in situations where other families might fall. For them, this justifies the use of their cliff. Shame parallels honor and plays a major role in the deaths of Skinflint and Njal. Flosi, one of the men who trapped Njal, says he will allow the women and children to leave the house. After Njal unsuccessfully attempts to offer Flosi "atonement" from his sons for their actions that have brought the saga to this point, Flosi offers Njal a chance to escape from the burning house so that he does not die needlessly (The Story of Burning Njal 1). To leave, not only would Njal abandon his house and its inhabitants, but he would also place himself at the level of women and children, a shameful concept that he refuses to accept. Shame presents itself differently in Gautrek's saga, in the actions of the family patriarch, Skinflint. The "family cliff" in Gautrek's saga is used often and in such a way that it diminishes the seriousness of the acts that family members commit (Gautrek's Saga)..