Studia Islandica - 01.06.1956, Page 19

17
Phrases with an average length of less than 7.25
syllables are found ten times only.
These occur in the following instances:
Number of
Ch. Periods periods Phrases
Droplaugarsona saga . 2. 12.8 51
9. 14.9 59
14. 14.8 44
Egils saga 66. 12.9 17
Fóstbrœðra saga 4. 6.7
Gísla saga 32. 13.3 26
15. 30 6.7
36. 15 6.9
Heiðarvíga saga 24. 14.8 4
26. 23 7.2
36. 14.4 20
Hrafnkels saga 12. 11.4 5 7.1
18. 12.7 51
Njáls saga 37. 12.8 38
38. 14.- 42 7.1
Víga-Glúms saga .... 13. 11.5 38 7.1
14. 14.3 41 7.2
15. 12.7 7 6.4
16. 49 6.8
The four chapters in V.-GI.S., 13-16, have as a group
no parallel in the material investigated. In any case this
group occupies a unique position. It is only in Njdlss.
that a group of three successive chapters is found com-
parable to the one in V.-GI.S.; they are ch. 36-38.
When comparing the two oldest sagas, Droplaugarsona
saga and HeiÖarvíga saga, a remarkable difference in
the use of long periods comes to light. In the edition of
Islenzk fomrit the first is printed in 990 lines, the se-
cond in 1260.
Periods of 50 syllables or more occur in Dropl.s.s. 17
times, an average of 17 in 1000 lines. In Heiðarv.s. we
find 42 of them, which comes to an average of 33 per
1000 lines.
The average number of syllables per period in Drop-
l.s.s. is 59, in HeiÖarv.s. 69. Of the 42 periods in this