Bibliotheca Arnamagnæana - 01.06.1943, Page 82

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demonstrate that the so-called horn of the unicom was in reality
the tooth of a narwhale1. In 1646 Bishop borlåkur writes to Worm
that a narwhale had drifted ashore the preceding winter. This time,
too, he sent the tooth to the king and Worm received the skuli a
couple of years later2. It is therefore somewhat astonishing to leam
from Bishop borlåkur (1313) that a narwhale had only once drifted
ashore in his life-time.
P. is2e. The description of the narwhale occurs on p. 36 of
Konungs skuggsjå (1920). As it is here stated that the flesh of the
narwhale is poisonous, Bishop borlåkur thinks that whales which
have drifted ashore in his time and actually have been eaten cannot
have been of the same species, but more probably akin to the unicorn.
— J229-34. The whole of this account is found in Gottskålk’s
annåll under the year 1393 (see Storm, Islandske Annaler, p. 368),
only with the difference that the species is not stated. Bishop borlåkur
has himself added the conclusion that it must have been a narwhale.
— 132. inferiore, an error for superiore (= i efra gomi, Konungs
skuggsjå p. 36").
— 1310'11. Besides the widespread belief in the healing effects
of the horn of the unicom on poison etc., there is reason to mention
Jon GuSmundsson’s almost contemporaneous statement about the
many good qualities of the tooth of the narwhale, see Islandica XV
p. 9 (cf. below, the note to p. 3024'35).
— 1335. Stautqvalur (= 312 Stantus Valur) is evidently an
erroneous reading of Stautusvalur in Hondius (which is again a
misreading of the Skautuhvalur of Ortelius) in RS q is clearly a
misreading of the abbreviation for -us. HR interprets the word rightly
as skotuhvalur, but RS takes it to be the fabulous animal skotumåSir.
This name appears here for the first time; the animal itself is men-
tioned by Bishop Gisli Oddsson in his Annalium farrago under the
year 16033. RS reports similar things about skotumåSir as those
known from later sources of Icelandic popular belief4 * *.
1 See Worm’s letters on the subject to Thomas Bartholin and I. Peyrére
(Wormii Epp. II 698-99 and 923-25), as also Museum Wormianum pp. 282-87.
2 Wormii Epp. I 113-15 and 117-18.
3 Islandica X p. 8.
* See J6n Åmason, Islenzkar JajoGsogur I, 1862, p. 634; 0. DaviGsson in
Timarit hins lsl. bokmenntafélags 23 (1902), pp. 40-41 ; Einar 01. Sveinsson,
Islenzkar pjoGsogur, 1940, p. 137.