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his followers, settled on Snæfellsnes and subsequently – iron-pointed staff
in hand – disappeared up into the glacier, after which he became known as
‘Snæfellsáss’ (from *Snjófellsalfr).43
as rory Mcturk noted in his review of the Íslenzk fornrit volume,
Þórhallur’s observations on the role that place-names and the landscape
may have played in inspiring the written creation of Bárðar saga amounts,
essentially, to a theory of saga origins, albeit not presented explicitly as
such.44 though “by no means all Icelandic sagas can have originated in
the way that Bárðar saga … may have done”, comments Mcturk, of all
of the Íslendingasögur, Bárðar saga is one of those that best illustrates the
potential of this theory, which “would not necessarily supplant the Book
prose theory, with which the Íslenzk fornrit series has long been deservedly
associated … [rather] it would add an interesting dimension to the study of
the complex question of how the sagas came into being”.45
The rootedness of the Íslendingasögur in their landscape settings, and
the matter-of-fact presentation of and movement through places, is one
characteristic that contributes to these narratives’ famous impression of
verisimilitude.46 Discussion of place-names and saga topography is found
in every introduction to Íslenzk fornrit editions of the Íslendingasögur47
but Þórhallur’s discussion and presentation of these ideas in the introduc-
tion to Íslenzk fornrit volume 13 distinguishes itself from commentary on
place-names in Íslendingasögur in other Íslenzk fornrit volumes, however,
by going much further. In older Íslenzk fornrit editions, the emphasis
tends to be on the degree of ‘fit’ between descriptions of landscape in the
saga texts and their modern-day equivalents. the perceived topographical
‘accuracy’ which any single posited saga author demonstrated, with the
area he was writing about was used as an index for the saga’s ‘truthfulness’
and sometimes also marshalled as evidence for arguments concerning the
location of any single saga’s composition.
the broader context for this approach is the compulsive ‘search for the
43 Introduction, lxxxv–xci.
44 review of Harðar saga. Bárðar saga. Þorksfirðinga saga. Flóamanna saga, ed. Þórhallur
Vilmundarson and Bjarni Vilhjálmsson, Saga-Book of the Viking Society 24 (1995): 166–70.
45 review of Harðar saga, 170.
46 See, e.g., Schach, ‘the anticipatory Literary Setting’.
47 Discussion is also found in local history journals such as Múlaþing, and in the yearbook of
the Icelandic touring association (Árbók Ferðafélags Ísland).
THE ICELANDIC SAGAS AND SAGA LANDSCAPES