Studia Islandica - 01.06.1956, Síða 21

19
The only long period found in ch. 13-16 is in direct
speech (ch. 16), containing 68 syllables, 39 words, di-
vided over 6 phrases, combined by 4 paratactical and
one hypotactical conjunction. Neither the number of
syllables or words — 3 of them place-names, 14 syllables
— nor the construction of the sentence are of any spe-
cial interest. In no way does it correspond with any
inner action or contents.
9. As regards the use of long sentences it seems as if
the choice of them, in direct speech as well as in the
narrative, is not just made at haphazard. On the whole
they occupy important places in the development of the
story.
This of course is what one could expect, and not only
in the sagas.
But at the same time it may, I think, be taken as a
phenomenon of literary style and not as a representative
of naive language or a rendering of directly observed
speech.
Dropl.s.s., which heads the list of the complete sagas
with the highest percentage of parataxis, also shows a
low average of long sentences. Both features seem to be
supporting evidence of this saga being of an archaic
type, at least having been written down at an early stage
of saga-writing, by a man not yet highly skilled in his
art. Still, he reveals the same tendency in his choice.
V.-Gl.s. ch. 13-16 occupy a position of their own.
Reykd.s. in this respect really is an extreme case, the
most bookish of all texts in our material.
We cannot go into the details of every saga, so only
some further brief remarks are made. As an illustrative
example we review the iong sentences in Hrafnkels saga.
10. The contents of Hrafnkéls saga, one of the smaller
masterpieces, are largely an invention of its author. As