Gripla - 20.12.2009, Page 17

jó HAnn PÁLL ÁRnASon
A MutAtInG PeRIPHeRy:
MeDIevAL enCounteRS
In tHe fAR noRtH
Her gælder det i hvert fald, at vi ikke
kan vide noget med sikkerhed… Det
betyder ikke, at der ikke er plads for
hypoteser eller fortolkning, men at
disse er noget andet, der går videre
end det objektive.
(Meulengracht Sørensen 1991, 222, 226)
in a paper on “Icelandic uniqueness or common european culture?”,
published a decade ago, Sverre Bagge suggested that a swing of the pendu­
lum was apparent in recent scholarship on medieval Nordic culture in
general and its Icelandic branch in particular: after a phase dominated by
those who saw the region as “part of the common culture of Western
Christendom”, earlier views on the importance of pre-Christian traditions
and on inventive uses of their legacy were back in favour (Bagge 1997, 418).
Although it would be going too far to claim a new consensus on this point,
the trend appears to have strengthened, and the following discussion will
be based on that assumption. But the ongoing reappraisal of the pre­Chris­
tian background and its influence on cultural developments after conver­
sion does not lead to a complete rehabilitation of the older approaches
mentioned at the beginning of Bagge’s paper; the formerly dominant para­
digm was too obviously dependent on uncritical attitudes to sources to be
reclaimable. The swing of the pendulum is, of necessity, accompanied by
attempts to redefine the terms of reference for exploration of the pre­
Christian past.
This approach could begin with general considerations of plausibility.
In view of what comparative history tells us about the dynamics and con­
sequences of civilizational expansion into regions with distinctive tradi­
tions, the notion of a completely and unilaterally Christianized north
Gripla XX (2009): 17–47.