Bibliotheca Arnamagnæana - 01.06.1959, Side 153
Chapter 5
THE NORSE TRANSLATOR AND HIS SOURCE
I
Introduction
The additions, omissions and changes dealt with in the previous chapter
are probably mostly due to the translator, but even if some of them belong
to the French source, they are of little importance to a discussion of the
relationship between the saga and its source, because any translator, and
to a certain extent, any scribe, Norse or French, might have omitted or
changed these verses without materially altering the tale and the structure
of the poem. Of the 2570 verses of the Oxford version which deal with
the events up to the beginning of the Baligant episode, 504 verses have
been classed as “Unimportant omissions”, and about 400 verses (includ-
ing about 50 verses which have been misunderstood by the translator)
come under the heading of “Unimportant changes”.
Our next task will be to examine the remaining differences between
Kms and the other versions, and to try to decide whether they are due to
the Norse translator or to the author of the particular French version on
which the saga is based. Every detail will have to be discussed in the light
of what we already know about the translator, his methods and his aim,
and, most important of all, his knowledge of French language and culture.
Even this may not lead to decisive results in every case, but it is the only
possible method if we wish to distinguish between Norse and French in-
novations. Storm in his Sagnkredsene has approached the problem from
this angle, but his examination of the evidence is too short. M. Aebischer
devotes two chapters of his Rolandiana Borealia1 to this question, and
many of his conclusions are valid. But his lack of familiarity with Icelandic
texts frequently leads him astray. Thus, although he is well aware of the
deficiencies of the translation, he suggests that since v. 1816
1 La succession des episodes seion le texte norrois, and Les relations du texte nor-
rois avec les plus importantes versions fran^aises, pp. 253-73.