Also berserkar, -ir; bersark. Cf. BARESARK. [Icel. berserkr acc. berserk, pl. -ir, of disputed etymology; Vigfusson and Fritzner show that it was probably = ‘bear-sark,’ ‘bear-coat.’] A wild Norse warrior of great strength and ferocious courage, who fought on the battle-field with a frenzied fury known as the ‘berserker rage’; often a lawless bravo or freebooter. Also fig. and attrib.
1822. Scott, Pirate, Note B. The berserkars were so called from fighting without armour.
1837. Emerson, Misc., 85. Out of terrible Druids and Berserkers, come at last Alfred and Shakspeare.
1839. Carlyle, Chartism (1858), 19. Let no man awaken it, this same Berserkir rage!
1851. Kingsley, Yeast, i. 16. Yelling, like Berserk fiends, among the frowning tombstones.
1861. Pearson, Early & Mid. Ages Eng., 430. Mere brotherhood in arms … did not distinguish the civilized man from the berserkar.
1879. E. Gosse, Lit. N. Europe, 166. He was a dangerous old literary bersark to the last.
