Gripla - 01.01.1977, Page 82

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GRIPLA
Brother Robert may have been translated during the sarne period in a very similar
cultural milieu. On the other hand the investigations of Hallberg and Schach may
show that some part of the typical traditional vocabulary and stylistic features did
survive unchanged in the late Icelandic copies.
8
Recently two scholars, Th. Damsgaard-Olsen and M. Tveitane have cast some
doubt on the reliability of the information in the Tristrams Saga passage. On the
basis of the MSS researches of Schach and a comparison of the two extant paper
MSS of Tristrams Saga with the vellum fragment AM 567 4to (15th c.), it is clear
that this passage was in the common source for IB 51 fol. and AM 543 4to, and
is not directly derived from AM 567 4to. There are two possibilities:
1) AM 567 Reeves Fragment (15th c.)
2) AM 567_____X Reeves Fragment
51
/Y/
543
This common source for 51 and 543 need not be older than from the 17th
century.
In this last section the author discusses both the use of apparent loanwords such
as befalning and compares the passage with mediaeval Old Norwegian-Icelandic
colophons. The result shows that the passage is probably originally a colophon
which the 16th or 17th century copist has modernised in the fasion of booktitles
of his times. This is shown by comparison with titles from well known 16th and
17th century printed books. The following features are shown to be from medi-
aeval tirnes: the name of the translator, the naming of the patron, the description
of the translator’s language and possibly the date. It is also stressed that it is un-
thinkable that the copist invented these features. It is also thought possible that
these features could have derived from a preface (from the rhetorical devices of
ab nostra, ab iudicum persona).
The passage preceding Tristrams Saga should be regarded as a title. It is hardly
possible to cast any doubt on it as valid source for literary history; Tristrams Saga
was originally translated during the reign of Hákon Hákonarson the Old. But
from this fact it does not necessarily follow that the existing Tristrams Saga should
be regarded as a 13th century Norwegian prose-romance.