Gripla - 01.01.1995, Page 186

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GRIPLA
9) the son of a farmer named Herenus is raised from the dead
10) the son of a government official named Eleusinus is raised
from the dead
11) an old woman is healed from an incurable disease
12) a brother and a sister are healed of spastic seizures
The above sequence corresponds to that found in St. Augustine’s De
civitate Dei.36
In AM 655 XXII, on leaf 2r, the miracles also commence with the
cure of the blind woman; then there is a lacuna owing to the frag-
mentary state of the leaf, and on the verso the miracles continue with
the end of nr. 5 above. Presumably the missing portion of the bottom
recto and top verso of the leaf contained nr. 4, which is a compara-
tively long account, and possibly nr. 3. The following miracles do not
have the same sequence, however, as those in Sth. 2/Sth. 15: the cure of
Marcialis is followed by nrs. 10, 9, 7, 6, 2. Given the serial nature of the
miracles, none of which is dependent on another, a change in sequence
is not out of the ordinary. The fragment AM 655 XIV concludes with
the words: „Þa er preiectus byscup for með helg[an]“ (2v40). Thus the
first miracle in this redaction corresponds to that in the sequence listed
above.
Sth. 3 contains yet a third sequence, one which shows that at least in
one redaction of the legend the sequence of the miracles was genera-
ted by their type. As was pointed out above, only Sth. 3 interjects a
transitional sentence between the account of the translation of St. Ste-
phen and the miracles, and it is this sentence which necessarily deter-
mines the sequence of the first six miracle stories. Vis-á-vis the se-
quence in Sth. 15/Sth. 2, the order of miracles in Reykjahólabók is: 3, 6,
7, 8, 9,10,1, 2, 4, 5,11,12. The sequence of miracles is bipartite, consist-
ing of six accounts of persons being raised from the dead, and six relat-
ing cures.
The symmetrical structure of the miracle sequence in Sth. 3 presum-
ably derives from the redaction Björn was copying. The Passionael
does not contain the resurrection miracles, but the reference to St. Au-
gustine suggests that the ultimate source of the German legendary had
36 Bernardvs Dombart and Alphonsvs Kalb, ed. Sancti Avretii Avgvstini: De civitate
Dei, Libri XI-XXII, Avrelii Avgvstini: Opera, XIV, 2, Corpus Christianorum: Ser. Lat.,
48 (Turnhout, 1955), XXII, 8, pp. 821-27.