Gripla - 20.12.2017, Side 180

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ornamented initials and figural paintings stem from the same workshop,
she suggests, but were possibly executed by different artists.26 A similar
situation applies to nra 78, though here in relation to a scribe rather than
an illuminator. as mentioned above, the text of nra 78 was written by
H Kri 5, a hand closely related to the main scribe of the previously dis-
cussed Kringla group (H Kri 1). However, the large initial in the fragment
closely refers to the book painting of one of the earlier manuscripts of
the Barðastrandarsýsla group, the Heimskringla codex aM 45 fol. (Codex
frisianus) (see figs. 7–8). the two initials share a similar use of colours,
related form and colour with regard to the embellished letter itself, and
finally, closely related red palmette filling of the initial. the initial is clearly
related to the thick spiralling leafy terminals and red shoots typical of the
Barðastrandarsýsla group, as described by Liepe.27 The slightly larger form
of the initial in NRA 78 might not be due to the earlier date, but rather to
the different textual content: the text in the fragment (Maríu saga) might
have been considered to be more important than the start of Magnúss saga
berfætts in aM 45 fol. otherwise, the close stylistic links between the two
initials signal the presence of the same illuminator, A Bar 1.
the style of the initial in aM 45 fol. is specific to this group and does
not appear again in any of the initials made by a Kri 1 in the Kringla
group. although the style of a Kri 1 in the first section of aM 334 fol.
exhibits a similarly restricted use of colour patterns with related carved or-
nament fillings and a shared use of thick spiralling symmetric and enrolled
acanthus terminals (fig. 4, fig. 8), other major initials painted by a Kri 1 in
the Kringla group show no stylistic similarities with the Barðastrandarsýsla
group. the limited artistic contact between these two groups was possibly
due to the time that passed between the production of manuscripts in
the first group and those in the second, around thirty years. the limited
contact is also evident in the fact that despite the textual redaction of Lbs
fragm 82 in the Kringla group appearing to belong to the same recension as
the textual exemplar used for aM 45 fol., they are not copies of the same
textual model. rather, they point towards a similar, now-lost archetype
26 Lena Liepe, Studies, 235–38. apart from aM 241 a I fol., which features an illuminated
Hours of the Passion, and add. 1 fol. (Ártíðaskrá Vestfirðinga), which includes a miniature
of the Calvary group, none of the manuscripts features any historiated content.
27 Lena Liepe, Studies, 235–38.