Gripla - 01.01.1995, Side 138

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GRIPLA
what we know about the redaction in Sth. 3 we owe to Ole Widding’s
edition and discussion of the fragment AM 655 XIV in 1952 as well as
his subsequent collaborative publications with Hans Bekker-Nielsen in
the 1960s. Indeed, commentary on Reykjahólabók in general has relied
on the observations of these two scholars.13 In their seminal article,
„En senmiddelalderlig legendesamling,"14 they presented a first survey
of the 25 narratives in this monumental hagiographic compilation,
which is surpassed only by Sth. 2, and at that by only one legend. In
the article, Widding and Bekker-Nielsen noted that the major portion
of Reykjahólabók is a translation of a Low German source. They iden-
tified the source incorrectly, however, as the Passionael, which they
considered a Low German translation of Jacobus de Voragine’s Le-
genda aurea (p. 111). This is not so. The Passionael is a translation of
the High German Der Heiligen Leben, a compilation from the end of
the fourteenth century, which drew on several sources, including older
German verse legends.15 Although German translations of the Le-
genda aurea existed, Der Heiligen Leben is not one of them.
In a subsequent article, „Low German Influence on Late Icelandic
Hagiography,“16 Widding and Bekker-Nielsen refined their views on
Reykjahólabók and classified the legends in accordance with their
proximity to or deviation from those in the Passionael. They estab-
lished four groups, one of which contains texts that „are chiefly based
on the older sagas [i.e., older Icelandic translations], and nevertheless
the compiler has succeeded in writing these legends in a style which
agrees with the style found in the other stories of the collection“ (p.
251). The greater part of the legend of St. Stephen „is based on the old
saga, but the style has been modernized“ (p. 251). A footnote clarifies
that the reference to the „old saga“ is to the redaction in Sth. 2.
Widding and Bekker-Nielsen had made a similar observation about
Stefanus saga in the earlier article of 1960, where they commented:
13
Cf., for example, Werner Williams-Krapp, Die deutschen und niederlandischen
Legendare des Mittelalters. Sludien zu ihrer Uberlieferungs-, Text- und Wirkungsge-
schichte (Tiibingen: Max Niemeyer, 1986), pp. 303; 310.
14 Maal og Minne (1960), 105-28.
15
Cf., for example, Williams-Krapp, Die deutschen und niederlaitdischen Legendare,
p. 273 and passim; also Maria Höbing. Legendarische Erzahlformen des Wenzelpassio-
nals (Oelde i. Westfalen, 1935).
16 The Germanic Review (1962), 237-62.