Studia Islandica - 01.07.1966, Page 71

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RauSúlfs þáttr is found not only in some of these “interpo-
lated” manuscripts, but also in some manuscripts that other-
wise preserve a relatively pure text of Snorri’s saga. It is
therefore the most frequently found interpolation, and evi-
dently enjoyed great popularity in the thirteenth and four-
teenth centuries.1
Of the manuscripts of Snorri’s separate Óláfs saga that
have independent value for the purpose of textual criticism,
only eleven still contain the relevant part of the saga (the
rest are defective). These are divided by the editors into
three groups according to the relationships between the texts
of Óláfs saga they preserve.2 Some manuscripts belong to
different classes in different parts of the saga, hut in the part
where the story of Rauðúlfr is found they are classified as
follows:
Class A: St. 2 (St. perg. 4to nr. 2).3
Bœjarbók (AM 73 b, fol.).4
75 a (AM 75 a, fol.).5
Class B: 68 (AM68, fol.).
1 As well as in later tixnes, see ÖH 1130—31. The story of Rauðúlfr
was made into a set of rímur, probably in the early 16th century (Rímna-
safn, ed. Finnur Jónsson, Kobenhavn 1905—22, I 215—221); see Björn
K. Þórólfsson, Rímur fyrir 1600, Safn Fræðafjelagsins IX (Kaupmanna-
höfn 1934), pp. 464—465. Only a fragment of the heginning of these
rímur survives, and it is difficult to see what they were like, but the use
of both the names Rauðr and Rauðúlfr implies that the poem was based
on one of the longer versions of the story, not Snorri’s where only the
name Rauðr is used.
2 ÓH 1091—1114. Full descriptions of all these manuscripts are
given in ÓH 879 ff.
3 Facsimile in Corpus Codicum Islandicorum Medii Aevi XV (Co-
penhagen 1942).
4 This manuscript is fragmentary, but its text can be reconstructed
from paper manuscripts derived from it when it was in a more complete
state than it is in now, see ÖH 978 ff.
5 This manuscript is fragmentary, but the text of the lacunae can be
supplied from the seventeenth century copy in 321 (AM 321, 4to), see
ÓH 898 ff.