Studia Islandica - 01.06.1956, Qupperneq 48

46
And, what is important: he worked from a written
text.
9.2. Here we have to remark on an observation made by
Lotspeich p. 36. „Ganz auffallend ist die Verwendung
des Personalpronomens der 3. Person in diesem Ab-
schnitte. Das Reflexivpronomen der 3. Person kommt
in diesem Kapitel der Reykdœla gar nicht vor; dagegen
in der Glúma viermal". Then he adduces four parallels
from R. and M. To these we add the instances in V.
R.
biör hann dugnaðar
samnar liði
leitar nú ráðs
at mælt er yfir honum
M
bað sér viðtQku
samnar sér liði
leitar sér ráðs
heyrir hann mál yfir sik
V
missing
safnar mQnnum
omits
upp yfir sik
Lotspeich wants to explain the difference between R.
and M, in the light of his hypothesis, by assuming a
common source in which sér did not occur. R., then,
would have taken over the phrases from its source as
they stood, the author of V. Gl. would have introduced
sér where he felt it as being idiomatic.
Again, V introduces sér twice where neither M or R.
have it, in one period, 99, 18: ... Glúmr ... steypir hann
sér þar ofan fyrir gljúfrin, en Skúta leitar sér ofan at
fara.
We admit: at first glance something is to be said in
favour of Lotspeich’s view. Yet: sér occurs in R. in one
passage: ‘Hann hafði vesl yfir sér tvískift’; M has
exactly the same; in V we read: Skúta hafði vesl yfir
klœðunum útan. Of the above-mentioned four instances
only the last could be of some value as an argumer*
the other three may well be no more than stylistic
variations, like safnar mgnnum in F as compared with
R. M.
In any case: we are not justified in looking for another