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that of the Latin in the early printed editions of ferrer’s sermons, and
these two texts also share numerous similarities in wording not found in
the other versions, e.g. “sem eg sagda” ≈ “ut dixi,” “maria hafde oll aunnur
teíkn” ≈ “Maria habuit alia signa,” etc. finally, there is the fact that Latin
manuscripts like those of Perugia and Valencia — which represent an early
stage in the transmission of ferrer’s sermons that is closer to the original
reportationes — seem to have been primarily local productions, and it is very
unlikely that any of ferrer’s sermons would have reached Iceland except in
the kind of standardized version represented by the early imprints. In fact,
inventories of the book holdings of the cathedral of Skálholt record that
the library possessed two imprints of ferrer’s sermons, a 1488 Strasbourg
edition and a 1518 Lyon edition.39 ferrer’s writings would have been of
no interest to the later Protestant bishops of Skálholt, so both of these
imprints must have been acquired before the diocese became Lutheran
around 1540.
In light of the East norse loanwords in aM 696 VIII and IX 4to, one
more possibility must be ruled out before we can conclude that the sermon
was based on the Latin text found in the early printed editions of Vincent
ferrer’s sermons. this is the possibility of a Danish intermediary, namely
the sermon cycle known as Jærtegnspostil, completed in 1515 by Christiern
Pedersen (d. 1554), canon of Lund.40 Icelandic translations of parts of
Jærtegnspostil are found in two sixteenth-century Icelandic manuscript
fragments, aM 238 XXIX fol. and aM 696 XVII 4to (both 1520–40).41
Pedersen based one of his Christmas sermons on the same sermon by
ferrer on which most of the Icelandic text depends.42 However, a com-
parison of the two vernacular texts with the Latin makes it clear that the
FRAGMENTS OF AN ICELANDIC CHRISTMAS SERMON
39 See Kalinke (who mistakenly identifies the 1518 edition as a London production), The Book
of Reykjahólar, 34–35, 263. these volumes are recorded in several seventeenth- and early-
eighteenth-century inventories; see Hörður Ágústsson, “Bækur,” 294, 298, 299, 300, 304,
319–20. a 1525 book-list from Hólar records “ein stor sermons bok er heiter vincencius”
(presumably containing at least part of ferrer’s sermones de tempore), as well as “sermones
vincencii de sanctis  einne litille bok” (DI IX, 298).
40 on Pedersen and his works see anne riising, Danmarks middelalderlige prædiken
(Copenhagen: Gad, 1969), 60–3.
41 Stefán Karlsson, “Brudstykker af Christiern Pedersens Jærtegnspostil i islandsk
oversættelse,” Opuscula 4 (1970): 211–56.
42 Riising, Danmarks middelalderlige prædiken, 483; see also 61–2.