Bibliotheca Arnamagnæana - 01.06.1961, Qupperneq 96

The Virgin bares her Breast
An Icelandic Version of a Miracle of the Blessed Virgin
By Ole Widding and Hans Bekker-Nielsen
In the catalogue of the Arnamagnean Collection of Manuscripts,
Copenhagen, compiled by Kristian Kålund, AM 180d,fol. (on
paper c. 1700) is said to be a MS of the Karlamagnus saga. How-
ever, Kålund’s statement needs a modification. It is true that fol.
1-296 contain a version of the Old Norse saga of Charlemagne, but
it must be added that the last twelve pages (fol. 297-302) contain
an anecdote which has no connection with the saga, and is in faet
a miracle of the Blessed Virgin.
We need not be surprised that the appendix to the main part of
AM 180d,fol. remained unidentified by Kålund and his assistants,
for our twelve pages have a short introduction which States er-
roneously:
besse capitule er her stendr epter er um framfaur Karlla-
magnus keisara efter J)ui sem almattigr gud syndez i andar
syn Turpin erchibyskupe.
These words have nothing to do with the miracle, and refer to
the Turpinus chapters of the Karlamagnus saga, which in our MS
are found fol. 134. The confusion in the last part of AM 180d,fol.
is by no means unique, in his edition of the saga (Chria. 1860)
C. R. Unger mentions other examples from the same MS.
The miracle can be identified as a variant of an anecdote known
from the Mariu saga (ed. C. R. Unger, Chria. 1871) pp. 789-800.
This version has not so far been studied in relation to the other
versions of the same anecdote. The following remarks intend to
demonstrate how popular the anecdote must have been in the
Icelandic tradition of the later Middle Ages. It is interesting to
speculate on how it found its way to Iceland, since it is not one