Gripla - 01.01.1975, Qupperneq 170

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us say Gautreks Saga not to speak of Örvar-Odds Saga. How this
movement began is not so hard to retrace: in all fields, the Icelanders
of the Xllth and XlIIth centuries undertook to gather, organize and
then commit to writing, using foreign patterns and often distant mem-
ories, first their laws, then their general and particular history, and
thus the distinctive quality of their earlier society, mentality, mytho-
logy and religion. Even though, not unfrequently, their ultimate source
may be oral, their sagas and first of all their samtíðarsögur show,
especially as regards the so-called pagan survivals, a deep literary im-
pregnation.
This is a society which gives us the impression of possessing a
strong desire to record for posterity an image of its personality, in
terms which will be comprehensible also to contemporaries and the
contemporary world. This means that, in my opinion, the true value
of these masterpieces is not so much their content, but the way in
which they are written. But that is quite another story!
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE
The following works which have been freely used in the above study should be
added to the bibliographical indications given in footnotes:
Almqvist Bo: Norrön niddiktning. Traditionshistoriska studier i versmagi I, Stock-
holm, 1965.
Andersson Theodore M.: The Problem of Icelandic Saga Origins. A Historical
Survey, New Haven & London, 1964.
Baetke W.: Das heilige im Germanischen, Tiibingen, 1942.
Bekker-Nielsen H., Olsen Th. D., Widding O.: Norrfm Fortcellekunst, K0benhavn,
1965.
Gad Tue: Legenden i dansk middelalder, Kpbenhavn, 1961.
Hallberg Peter: Den fornislandska poesien, Stockholm, 1962.
Jóhannesson J.: íslendinga saga I, Reykjavík, 1956.
Ker W. P.: Collected Essays, London, 1925.
Ljungberg H.: Den nordiska reiigionen och kristendomen. Studier över det nor-
diska religionsskiftet under vikingatiden, Uppsala, 1938.
Olsen Olaf: Hprg, hov og kirke. Historiske og arkœologiske vikingetidsstudier, in
ÁNOH, 1965.
Pálsson Hermann: Sagnaskemmtun íslendinga, Reykjavík, 1962.