Gripla - 01.01.1993, Page 187

MARGARET J. CORMACK
SAINTS AND SINNERS'
Reflections on death in some Icelandic sagas
While it was once the fashion to use the literature of medieval Iceland
as evidence for pagan Germanic ideology, scholarship of the past cen-
tury has laid increasing emphasis on its incorporation of Christian
learning. The importance of saints’ lives as models has been pointed
out, and numerous episodes have been traced to Latin sources.1 2 The
function of the borrowed material in its new context, however, has
been the subject of far less attention. Does the presence of Christian
motifs represent purely literary imitation, or were parallels with the
writings of the Church meant to be recognized? If the latter is the case,
what was the significance of the borrowing? The answers to these
questions will differ from saga to saga, and each example must be ana-
lyzed in context. It may be useful, however, to compare the treatment
of a particular situation in a number of works, to see whether they
share common elements which may facilitate our interpretation. In the
following, I have examined descriptions of deaths which contain either
overt demonstrations of religion or hagiographic motifs. For the most
part I have restricted myself to sagas whose protagonists were Christian,
i.e. sagas of the later Norwegian kings and the sagas of contemporaries,
although some relevant passages from sagas of the Icelanders have also
been included. It should be noted at the outset that I am considering the
material from a literary point of view, and am not concerned with its
historical accuracy. The extent to which fact has been embroidered
with fiction, or life imitated art, is beyond the scope of this study.
1 This article is based on a paper read at the Sixth International Saga Conference
held in Helsingpr, Denmark, July 28-August 2,1985.
2 See G. Turville-Petre, Origins oflcelandic Literature, Oxford, 1953, reprinted 1967;
Jónas Kristjánsson, ‘Sagas and Saints’ Lives,’ Workshop Papers ofthe Sixth International
Saga Conference, 28/7 - 2/8 1985, vol. 1, Copenhagen, 1985, pp. 551-71, also in Cultura
classica e cultura germanica settentrionale, Macerata 1988, pp. 125-143.