Gripla - 20.12.2014, Síða 68

GRIPLA68
2. Historiography in the Seventeenth Century
the seventeenth century in Denmark was a good time to be a trained
historian. the Danish king Christian IV was keen to support histori-
cal research and publishing on Danish history, not least to counter rival
Sweden’s claims to a heroic past.14 He supported several historians with
salaries to complete the task of writing a history of Denmark up to his
own time and also supported the collection of undiscovered documents
and narratives.15
Some sources came into scholarly or royal hands with the dissolution of
the monasteries during the reformation (when much was also destroyed
or lost),16 but Danish antiquarians and officials were just beginning to be-
come aware of the material preserved in Icelandic manuscripts, and in the
Old Norse-Icelandic language.
3. Ole Worm and Arngrímur jónsson
one of the first Danish scholars to seek Icelandic sources was ole Worm.
A medical doctor by training, Worm was also passionate about Danish
antiquities, especially runic inscriptions, and natural history. He published
several books, kept a Wunderkammer of natural phenomena, and corre-
sponded with a wide circle of scholars in several countries.17 Worm himself
never mastered either contemporary Icelandic or the language in which the
runes that so intrigued him were written ― although this deficit did not
prevent him from publishing several books on the subject.18 His curiosity
surpassed the technical skills he had to satisfy it. this was especially true
for rune stones and runic inscriptions. He struggled with the language and
the deciphering of runic scripts, never mastering either.
14 skovgaard-Petersen, Historiography at the Court, 9, 28.
15 often through orders put into effect by his chancellor, Christian friis, who was personally
interested in the subject. Ole Worm’s Correspondence, xv–xvii; Skovgaard-Petersen,
Historiography at the Court, 25.
16 Jørgensen, Historieforskning og historieskrivning, 65–66.
17 Much of this correspondence is still preserved either in Worm’s copy book or the original
letters, cf. Ole Worm’s Correspondence, xi–xxxv. All of Worm’s surviving works and letters
are in Latin, the language of humanist scholarship during the seventeenth century. Worm
was, however, the editor of a Danish translation of Heimskringla by Peder Claussøn.
18 Ole Worm’s Correspondence, xvii–xxiii.