> Surely a Humakti would simply be content with a life as a Huscarl
> in the service of his chief or king? What's the point of giving them
> land if they are going to be utterly useless at working it?
It is a good way to get rid of a formerly successful, but now growing elderly huscarl who is devoted to honourable combat rather than death-wish. I know, an old Humakti is regarded as a failure by quite a few Glorantha-fans, but Humakti are humans, and some of them may grow too old or invalid to remain effective huscarls. This doesn't ban them from remaining Humakti, though...
There is only so much weapon-training a clan needs, and only so much crafting you can perform with a maimed arm (I suppose a fairly common source of invalidity among fighters, discounting the Gimpy-variations). There is nothing to prevent you from managing and overseeing work on a stead, though. Especially if you are aided by a widow (perhaps your own, given the peculiar burial rites for Greydog Humakti) in managing the stead.
If the Orlanthi resemble the Vikings in any way, a lot of the work on the stead is done by the women and by people other than the steadholder himself. Since thralls aren't omnipresent, there has to be some key how work is distributed between the inhabitants of a stead, i.e. the extended family of the carl "owning" the stead.
Probably one of the easiest accessible sources for life on an Orlanthi stead for long-time RuneQuest players is the "Designing Your Own Campaign" chapter in the Vikings Box scenario book, although the terminology needs reinterpretation (like replacing "cottar" for "carl" in the Thing case "Murder in a Pasture", or making sure that the Ulfstead "clan" really is but a sub-portion of an Orlanthi clan).
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