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appeared to have, is not reflected in the ecclesiastical sphere. It is likely
that the rising number of historiated illuminations depicting St Olav (of
Niðaróss) may also be best seen in this light. Nevertheless, the lack of
external influences on both style and iconography is surprising, since
“Enska öldin” actually brought an increased interest in English art such as
alabaster works,81 and the rising interest in iconographic depictions as seen
in vernacular English law manuscripts from the fifteenth century would
perhaps have provided Icelandic illuminators with new model books from
the continent as well.82 Overall, however, with changing Scandinavian
politics in the late fourteenth century, Icelandic law manuscripts were first
and foremost written for, and inspired by, domestic productions. With
the second wave of the Black Death in Iceland at the end of the fifteenth
century and, somewhat simultaneously, the arrival of “Þýska öldin,”83 and
economic as well as cultural relations with German merchants and related
products, Icelandic law manuscript production in the sixteenth century
once again enjoyed new impulses from mainland Europe for the ongoing
production of vernacular laws.84
81 Bera Nordal, “Skrá um enskar alabastursmyndir frá miðöldum sem varðveist hafa á Íslandi,”
Árbók hins íslenzka fornleifafélags (1985): 86–128.
82 For these, see Anthony Musson, “Ruling ‘Virtually’? Royal Images in Medieval English
Law Books,” Every Inch a King. Comparative Studies on Kings and Kingship in the Ancient and
Medieval Worlds, eds. Lynette Mitchell and Charles Melville (Leiden: Brill, 2013), 151–71,
and for the mise en pages, Ruth Carroll, Matti Peikola, Hanna Salmi, Mari-Liis Varila,
Janne Skaffari, and Risto Hiltunen, “Pragmatics on the Page: Visual Text in Late Medieval
English Books,” European Journal of English Studies 17/1 (2013): 54–71.
83 For “Þýska öldin,” see Björn Þorsteinsson and Bergsteinn Jónsson, Íslandssaga til okkar daga
(Reykjavík: Sögufélag, 1991), 174–75.
84 For examples, see Halldór Hermannsson, “Introduction,” Illuminated Manuscripts of the
Jónsbók, 15–18, and Friederike Richter, “Das Buch im Buch: Artefactual Philology in zwei
sich überlagernden Schichten,” 67–82.
LAW MANUSCRIPTS