Bibliotheca Arnamagnæana - 01.06.1959, Side 289
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O (2759 of V4), there correspond in the saga the translation of 1617 O
verses + 220 additional V4-version rimée verses, + about 50 k verses =
1887 verses in all. The original translation probably contained some more
verses, which have been lost in all the existing Icelandic MSS and in the
Swedish and Danish extracts.
It is more difficult to estimate how many French verses have been trans-
lated in the last chapters of the påttr, the Roncevaux episode, the punish-
ment of Ganeion, and the episodes of Alde and the War in Libya. The
saga text occupies 111 lines in Unger’s edition (pp. 52721—5318), which
at the beginning of the pattr corresponds to about 160 O verses (pp. 48411
-4888). The text of the Alde and Libya episodes must have corresponded
to at least 40 verses in the French source. The original Runzivals j>åttr
must then have contained the translation of at least some 2100 French
verses, and the French source was certainly considerably longer.
The Norwegian fragment of the Runzivals frattr is assigned on pale-
graphic evidence to the second half of the thirteenth century (above, p.
35), and the language of the frattr points to the reign of Håkon Hå-
konarson as the time when it was translated: at any rate there is no sign
in the påttr of the tendency towards a more complex syntax that is one of
the typical features of the “Late Prose” which became fashionable during
the last quarter of the century, during the reigns of King Håkon’s son
and grandsons1.
The only translator of romantic sagas of whom we know anything is
Bishop Brandr; even Robert the Abbot is just a name. The translator of
Runzivals fråttr is anonymous, and we do not know if he was an Icelander
or a Norwegian, a layman or a cleric. An examination of the [>attr may
possibly yield some information about the identity and the nationality of
the translator. Apart from such general considerations as the faet that
there were certainly more Norwegians than Icelanders who knew enough
French to undertake the task, and the lack of skili in the handling of the
theme, there are certain features of the voeahulary which seem to suggest
that the frattr was translated by a Norwegian. Such terms as skera upp
1 Håkon Håkonarson, called the Old (1217-63), is Håkon IV. When M. Aebischer
(e.g. Rol. Bor. p. 277) calls him Håkon V, it is because the non-Scandinavian
scholars of last century assigned the wrong number to King Håkon, while the Scan-
dinavians always allude to this prince as Håkon Håkonarson. The real Håkon V
was the grandson of Håkon the Old.
18*