In part, but only in part, due to Eline's own malice, Kristin and Erlend are responsible for Eline's death. At her wedding, though, she wears the bridal wreath reserved for maidens, despite the fact that she is pregnant, the pinnacle of the deception-entwined affair she has had.

Kristin breaks off her betrothal with Simon, and in the face of family opposition, stubbornly remaining devoted to Erlend she eventually gets her way, and marries Erlend. In particular, he has been excommunicated for cohabitation with another man's wife, Eline, with whom he has a couple of children. She is betrothed to a young man from a respectable local family, Simon Darre, but in the convent she starts up an affair with Erlend Nikkulaussøn, a handsome, dashing, man with a wild past. But it is impossible to shield children entirely from tragedy Kristin's younger sister will be in a serious accident, and Kristin will be the victim of an attempted (but unsuccessful) rape, under conditions potentially harmful to her reputation, with the result that her closest friend dies and she must be sent off to a convent to get her away from the gossip and talk. It is a very good family life, for all that it has the sort of flaws any family life might, as Kristin will later come to realize. Her mother, due to several infant deaths and a few other things, is quite melancholy in temperament, so her closest relations are with her father, an upright and decent man who takes seriously his role in upholding and maintaining the local society.

Kransen (The Wreath): Kristin is born to Ragnfrid and Lavrans, and thus into an excellent family in the Norwegian gentry. Summary: Kristin Lavransdatter is three novels, Kransen, Husfrue, and Korset, so it makes sense to divide the story along those lines.

Before that time they had lived at Skog, Lavrans's manor in the Follo near Oslo, but now they moved to Jørundgaard, high on the open slope at Sil. When the earthly goods of Ivar Gjesling the Younger of Sundbu were divided up in the year 1306, his property at Sil was given to his daughter Ragnfrid and her husband Lavrans Bjørgulfsøn.

Kristin lavransdatter by sigrid undset