Gripla - 20.12.2013, Síða 57

57
id est oratio, biðja sér líkna[r]… (fol.
1v, l. 9)
mendica id est re[*]38… (fol. 1v, l. 17)
Podiciciea id est sc… þat augum er
þik G… (fol. 1v, ll. 18–19)
It is, of course, difficult to imagine the circumstances behind this old
norse adaptation of De sex alis cherubim when the only witness to the ad-
aptation survives in such a fragmentary state. nevertheless, the apparent
deterioration of the Latin quotations in the norse text may provide some
evidence of its relative date. some of these, such as “mendica” for “mundi-
tia,” are so severely garbled that their original meanings would scarcely be
recoverable without a knowledge of their source.39 such errors prove that
the scribe of AM 655 XXVII 4to could not himself have been translating
from De sex alis cherubim and suggest that this text was at least one or two
copies removed from the original old norse adaptation of the work. since
our manuscript has been dated to ca. 1300, we can assume that De sex alis
cherubim was probably known and used in Iceland no later than the mid-
thirteenth century. Given the dates of its surviving manuscripts, many of
which are from the thirteenth century,40 De sex alis cherubim seems to have
been at the height of its popularity around this time. Indeed, around the
middle of the century Matthew Paris (ca. 1200–1259) was borrowing from
the Latin treatise in his Chronica maiora.41 the old norse adaptation of
De sex alis cherubim in AM 655 XXVII 4to, therefore, suggests a greater re-
38 Probably to be read “(h)reinlífi.”
39 see also “alas” (fol. 2r, l. 7) for “ala” and the bizarre spelling “Podiciciea” (fol. 1v, l. 18) for
“pudicitia.”
40 of the four manuscripts of the text in the library of Cambridge, Corpus Christi College,
for example, three (CCCC 356, 459, and 481) are securely dated to the thirteenth century.
the remaining manuscript, CCCC 66, is from either the twelfth or the thirteenth century.
for descriptions and images, see the Parker Library on the Web project, accessed july 11,
2013, http://parkerweb.stanford.edu.
41 Matthæi Parisiensis, monachi Sancti Albani, Chronica majora, ed. Henry Richards Luard, vol.
3 (London: Longman, 1876), 134. see also Lewis, The Art of Matthew Paris in the Chronica
Majora, 316–19. on Paris’s life, see simon Lloyd and Rebecca Reader, “Paris, Matthew (c.
1200–1259),” in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (oxford: oxford university Press,
2004–), accessed july 11, 2013, doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/21268.
tWeLftH-CentuRy souRCes foR oLd noRse HoMILIes
Quinta penna est orationis devotio.
(PL 210, col. 276d)
tertia ala est carnis munditia. (PL
210, col. 276d)
Hujus alæ penna prima est, visus pu-
dicitia. (PL 210, col. 276d)