Bibliotheca Arnamagnæana - 01.06.1968, Page 258
6TH MAY. DE S. IOHANNE AD PORTAM LATINAM - 15TH MAY. DE S. HALLVARDO
xit ab y- do- la- trl-a
ad vir- tu- tum stu-dl- a.
quan-ta scl-en-cl- a.
(11a) Sa- xa gem-mas au- rum vlr-gas su- a per lm-pe- rl-
(b) Itu- ta-
LUX ILLUXIT ... LUX EST NOBIS
MS: f. Fac. 188, 1. 11 — fac. 189, the recto and verso of a leaf.
There is a lacuna where the verso should begin because the top of
the leaf is cut off, and another, the length of which can not be
determined, after the end of the verso, as the following leaf is lost.
The sequence is composed in honour of St. Hallvard, who was
venerated in the Norwegian Church Province in the Middle Ages.
He was said to have been a nephew of St. Olaf and to have been
martyred in 1043. No doubt the sequence was composed in Norway,
perhaps by a divine at St. Hallvard’s Church in Oslo, but it is
found only in the above-mentioned manuscript from Iceland.
The parts of the sequence that are preserved have been published
twice: by the Icelandic folk music collector Bjarni Porsteinsson in
his book “Islenzk PjoSlog”, 1906-1909, and by Dr. Georg Reiss in
his dissertation on the music of the Scandinavian cult of St. Olaf,
where the recto of the MS. is reproduced. The following transcription
is in accordance with that of the latter author.
As Dr. Reiss remarks, this sequence is an imitation of the great
Olavus-sequence “Lux illuxit letabunda, lux illustris, lux iocunda”, not
so much in the words — indeed, scarcely more than the first two
lines of verse betray a direct loan1 — as in the music. Here the
material of the Olavus-sequence has been extensively used, so that the
1. Curiously enough, the expression “felici commercio” (v. 3b) which in the Olavus-
sequence is used as a metaphor, meaning “through a happy alteration or change”,
appears here in the literal meaning, “in his laudable trade or business”; Hallvard
was a merchant by occupation.
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