Bibliotheca Arnamagnæana - 01.06.1959, Síða 23
9
landic sagas, especially fornaldarsggur, if they came across them, for as
soon as such more or less vague traditions had received literary form, they
became literature, too, even if they probably did not rank as high as the
translated sagas. But to compose a saga based on native traditions had
become a traditional craft with the Icelanders, and as far as we know, the
Norwegians never tried their hånds at the writing of family sagas, any
more than English or French authors did. Oral tales of the lygisaga
variety were well known and much appreciated, even at court, as may be
seen from King Sverrir’s comment that such tales were the most amusing27
sagas, i.e. compared with more historical traditions.
This, then, is the background of the translations of French literature in
Norway in the 13th century: a well established literary language, based
on foreign models and under the influence of the rhetorical rules taught
in the schools, and on the other hånd a flourishing tradition of oral story-
telling. Theoretically, then, the translators would have the choice between
the traditional rhetorical prose of the more recent translations (and the
Ågrip), the more straightforward language of the older homilies and
Saints’ Lives, and the prose of the oral sagas. The development of reli-
gious prose at the end of the 12th century makes it plain that the more
rhetorical prose was fashionable, and it is therefore only what we might
have expected when we find that some of the translations are written in an
extremely rhetorical language. But there are others where the rhetorical
element is much less conspicuous, and some of the translated sagas are
written in a very plain and almost monotonous style. Is this a sign of a
reaction against the artificial prose of e.g. the Strengleikar? It is not im-
possible, but it does not seem likely. The translations were carried out at
the instigation of the King, and the public consisted of the courtiers and
their families. Some of them may, in their heart of hearts, have preferred
the simpler style of the imported Icelandic Kings’ Sagas, but the power of
fashion was just as great in the Middle Ages as it is now, and the general
development of the literary language in Norway in the 13th century was
towards greater complexity. The style of the Clårus saga is far more man-
nered and heavyhanded than that of the Tristrams saga, and at the end of
the century the translators were no longer content with the figurae of
school rhetoric, but began to imitate Latin grammar and syntax as well.
There is no room for any reaction in this development, and when we find
27 Sturlunga saga, ed. Kr. Kålund, Copenhagen & Kria. 1906-11, vol. I p. 22.
Cp. SigurSur Nordal: Litt. hist. p. 229.