Bibliotheca Arnamagnæana - 01.06.1981, Side 77
point regarding the Icelandic manuscript tradition on which most of our
knowledge of the Arthurian riddarasogur is based. Some years prior to
the publication of the vellum fragment, AM 567, Schach had discussed
corruptions in manuscript readings of Tristrams saga and had selected
this very passage, among others, to demonstrate that IB 51 fol., a paper
manuscript from 1688 with many scribal interpolations, contains some
readings that are doser to the vellum text - and by extension also to the
original translation - than the other prime manuscript, AM 543 4to, that
is the basis of the three editions of the saga. Although the text is corrupt
in IB 51, the paper manuscript nonetheless retains the alliteration and the
rhythm of the passage, albeit imperfectly: Huggun min ok herra, hugarrd
mins hjarta, åst min ok yndi.21 The various readings of this one passage in
Tristrams saga show the importance of taking into consideration all man-
uscript evidence, not only early fragments but even those manuscripts
which emend and interpolate, and that were transcribed centuries after
the translation was produced in Norway.
A similar case for the significance of late Icelandic paper manuscripts
can be made on the basis of evidence provided by Ivens saga. The text of
the saga as we know it from Kolbing’s editions (based on the vellums
Stockholm 6 [H6] and AM 489) reflects the translator’s work only imper-
fectly. This becomes clear if one considers a third primary manuscript,
Stockholm 46 [H46], which Kolbing dismissed as containing too many
“neumodische Geschmacklosigkeiten.”22 H46 was transcribed at the end
of the seventeenth century, but the text of Ivens saga was copied from the
now-lost Ormsbok, a manuscript dating from c. 1350-1400, and used
in the seventeenth century for lexicographical purposes.23 Although the
Stockholm 46 redaction of Ivens saga reflects considerable reduction of
the narrative when compared with the vellums - that are themselves
already condensed vis-å-vis the French Yvain - the seventeenth-century
text is nonetheless indispensable for assessing the character of the Nor-
wegian translation. In addition to demonstrating that the translation had
been more faithful to the French than the longer manuscripts would
intimate, this “worthless” manuscript of Ivens saga - worthless, as far as
21 Paul Schach, “Some Observations on Tristrams saga," Saga-Book, 15 (1957-61), p.
111. Also Ålfrun Gunnlaugsdottir, Tristån en el Norte, p. 142.
22 Riddarasogur (Strassburg: Karl J. Triibner, 1872), p. IX.
21 For a discussion of Ormsbok and its contents, see Jonna Louis-Jensen, Trdjumanna
saga. Editiones Arnamagnæanæ, A, 8 (Copenhagen: Munksgaard, 1963), pp. XI-XV.
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