Gripla - 20.12.2016, Qupperneq 106

GRIPLA106
ustworthy and careless. there was a man named Þórhallur. He
lived at Miklabær in Óslandshlíð. His wife was named Ólöf. She
was a kind woman and the boldest. Þórhallur was financially well
off, but far from being a champion, rather fearful and in every way
an unremarkable man. He was boastful and a great exaggerator and
thought he knew what was best. Ólöf, his wife, was the daughter of
Hrolleif who had claimed Hrolleifsdalur up to Slettahlíð. She was
more remarkable than he in every way. She had been married to
him for his money. She was young, but he was old. She was a good
healer. there was a certain farmer in Hjaltadalur named Kálfur. He
lived at Kálfsstaðir. He was a well-respected farmer.49]
for some readers, i.e. those used to reading for plot and unfamiliar with
the landscape, the details about farm names are easily skipped over in
favor of the character traits and the premonition of a showdown between
Þórður and Özurr. But for anyone familiar with the geography of northern
Iceland, the list of place names also serves as a mental map, akin to a “goog-
le fly over”. the characters are mentioned in an orderly progression across
the landscape, from southwest to northeast, the order in which they would
be seen if one were standing at the western entrance to Skagafjörður,
arnastapi, a site mentioned later in the text. the place-names encourage
the reader’s mind to start in the middle of Skagafjörður at Grund, and
then look to the north, a mental effort especially encouraged by reference
to the full expanse of the land claims, which pushes the audience’s mind
northeast. although serving as a foreshadowing of a chronological plot,
this chapter also invites the audience to elicit their knowledge of place
and landscape, and to fix the characters within that landscape. Özurr is
mentioned before Ólöf, even though Þórður will meet her first, not only
because he is the primary antagonist of the upcoming part of the saga, but
also because his farm is in the middle of the valley. the other characters are
listed from that central place.
Moreover, the original recipient audience may well have noted the
Christian bias in the locations of these characters. the “google fly over”
pulls the audience’s mental eye from the middle of Skagafjörður towards
Hjaltadalur in the northeast, which is where the northern bishopric of
49 all translations of excerpts from the saga are by the author of this paper.