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his Aldarfarsbók.50 one of the very few similarly structured annals is, to
my knowledge, the Djáknaannáll by tómas tómasson (1756–1811) from
stóra-Ásgeirsá in Víðidalur. Here there are headings, too, which structure
the contents of the yearly entries.51 In general, the geographical horizon
in Gunnlaugur’s annals is quite broad. Although the focus is on the north
and especially skagafjörður, Gunnlaugur includes a great deal of inform-
ation from the other districts and quarters of Iceland. there is, however,
no real critical reflection on the information or source criticism detectable;
something that Gunnlaugur has in common with other lay historians such
as Gísli konráðsson and sighvatur Borgfirðingur.52
the Aldarfarsbók is contained in two manuscripts: Lbs 1273 8vo and
Lbs 1301 4to. the former, written solely by Gunnlaugur and dated in the
catalogue to c. 1840–46 but which he might have started earlier than that,53
covers the years 1801–46 and was the exemplar or source of the latter.
this manuscript was written by Gunnlaugur and his nephew sigmundur
Pálsson (1823–1905) from Ljótsstaðir, probably between c. 1848 and 1866.54
It covers the years 1801–66 and divides entries of deceased from 1817
onwards into merkis folks lát ‘deceased notables’ and bænda og alþýðu folks
lát ‘deceased farmers and common people’, whereas Lbs 1273 8vo has only
one, overall category of deceased. some entries which are crossed out in
Lbs 1273 8vo are not included in Lbs 1301 4to. Lbs 1273 8vo is in general
50 Gunnlaugur applied the same structure even to his other annals, albeit without headings,
and to his diary.
51 see Guðrún Ása Grímsdóttir, ed., Annálar 1400–1800 (Reykjavík: Hið íslenzka bók-
mennta félag, 1987), 7:35–330. the structuring and headings are similar to Gunnlaugur’s,
though not the same. the Djáknaannáll combines, for example, information about the
weather and catch under one heading, whereas Gunnlaugur divides the information into
two paragraphs with separate headings.
52 see Magnús Hauksson, “die Laienhistoriker in Island,” 34.
53 see Páll eggert ólason, Skrá um handritasöfn Landsbókasafns, 2:247 and above.
54 As the entries contain some forms of a capital H with a broken bar, it seems likely that
Gunnlaugur wrote the manuscript after c. 1848. According to information about the verso-
side of the fly-leaf, Gunnlaugur covered the years 1801–60 on pp. 1–251, where sigmundur
took over and wrote pp. 251–320. As previously mentioned, Gunnlaugur was apparently
blind for the last twelve years of his life, which would mean that he could not have written
the entries for 1854/55–60; these entries are indeed very clearly written and differ from
his usual hand. the script is still more similar to Gunnlaugur’s hand than to sigmundur’s,
though, and I therefore believe that Gunnlaugur wrote the entries until 1860. the cata-
logue dates the manuscript to c. 1840–66, see Páll eggert ólason, Skrá um handritasöfn
Landsbókasafns, 1:493.
GunnLAuGuR jónsson fRoM skuGGABjÖRG