Bibliotheca Arnamagnæana - 01.06.1959, Qupperneq 50
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leaves written by an Icelander14, who, according to Finnur Jonsson15, was
the person who wrote the Codex Wormianus of Snorra Edda. The frag-
ment contains parts of branches IV, VI, and VII.
Fr3, written “just before the middle of the 14th century”16, consists
of four fairly large pieces, written by an Icelander. It contains parts of
branch VII.
These fragments have all been used as bindings for tax registers, rentals,
and other papers sent by Iocal officials to the offices of the central admin-
istration at Bergen and Oslo between 1610 and 1626. The binding was
probably done in Oslo and Bergen17, before the papers were sent on to the
government offices in Copenhagen. Fri and Fr3 come from Western Nor-
way, Fr2 from the East, so that at the beginning of the 17th century, two
MSS of the Kms were still preserved in Bergen, and one in Oslo. The
Icelandic MSS may have been brought to Norway in the later Middle
Ages1S.
Fr4 is preserved in the Icelandic Pjodtninjasafn, and was published in
1952 by Jakob Benediktsson19. It consists of one leaf from a MS of the
last part of the 14th century, which had also been used as material for
binding. The fragment corresponds to a part of branch IV, in the version
known from B and b (Unger’s ed. p. 2292 8—2314).
A fifth fragment, also dating from the Middle Ages, and preserved in
the same place, has not yet been published. It has been used for binding,
and is very difficult to read, but Dr. Jakob Benediktsson has informed me
that it contains a part of branch IV, the Aa version.
The paper MS 180 e, fol. in the Arnamagnæan Collection is said in the
catalogue to contain parts of Kms (branches VI and VII). The MS was
written about 1700, and contains a translation into Icelandic of parts of
the Danish Karl Magnus Krønike (vide below), and it is consequently of
14 Unger, pp. xl-xli.
15 Den oldnorske og oldislandske litteraturs historie, 2nd. ed. vol. II p. 962. F. J.
probably never saw more of the fragment than the short facsimile in Unger’s ed.,
and the identification cannot be taken as final.
16 Unger, p. xli.
17 Gustav Storm, in the introduction to Otte Brudstykker af den ældste Saga om
Olav den Hellige (Chria. 1893), pp. 2-3, but cp. O. A. Johnsen in Afhandl, viede
Sophus Bugges Minde (Kria. 1908), p. 96, note.
18 O. A. Johnsen, ibidem, p. 75.
18 In Skirnir 1952, pp. 210-12.