Bibliotheca Arnamagnæana - 01.06.1981, Page 184

larly in those belonging to the Tristram-group.40 Certain types of verbs
tend to appear in participial form more frequently than others, such as
verbs of speaking (e.g., mælandi) or of motion (e.g., komandi, ridandi).
Because of the frequency with which some verbs consistently appear in
participial form, the participles tend to be little more than clichés, and
their stylistic value is minimal. An accumulation of significant vocabulary
in participial form and in a markedly dramatic scene suggests, however,
“conscious stylistic manipulation by the author.”41
Tristrams saga, more than any other saga in our group, contains a high
frequency of participles in a series, or clusters of participial phrases. In
faet, the use of the present participle is “one of the most objectionable
features of Friar Robert’s style to Old Norse purists.”42 Meissner attribut-
ed the occurrence of the present participle in this saga to a copyist, not to
Brother Robert, a copyist “dessen eifer am anfang der saga gross war,
dann aber nachliess, nur am schlusse hat er wieder eingegriffen.”43 Meiss-
ner must have considered the occurrence of the present participle in
Tristrams saga random and automatic, its use indiscriminate and not
intrinsically related to content. That is hardly the case. “Whenever there
is a concentration of these constructions in a passage or episode, it is for
the purpose of intensification.”44 Thus, for example, the decision to con-
vey the pathos and eloquence of Tristram’s dying words by a combination
of alliteration and a participial cluster is commendable. When Tristram
learns from his wife that the sails on Kardin’s ship are black, signifying
that Isond has not come, his despair is complete:
40 Schach, “The Translations of Brother Robert,” pp. 123-24. For a general discussion of
the use of the present participle in Old Norse, and especially in the translated sagas, see:
Nygaard, Norrøn Syntax (Kristiania: H. Aschehoug & Co., 1906), pp. 236-48; Nvgaard,
“Den lærde stil i den norrøne prosa,” pp. 156-60; F. W. Blaisdell, “The Present Participle in
the I vens saga,” Studies for Einar Haugen. Presented by Friends and Colleagues, eds.
Evelyn Scherabon Firchow, Kaaren Grimstad, Nils Hasselmo, Wayne O’Neil (The Hague,
Paris: Mouton, 1972), pp. 86-92. Blaisdell, “Some Observations on Style in the riddara-
sogur, ” Scandinavian Studies: Essays Presented to Dr. Henry Goddard Leach on the Occa-
sion of his Eighty-fifth Birthday, eds. Carl F. Bayerschmidt and Erik J. Friis (Seattle:
University of Washington Press for the American-Scandinavian Foundation, 1965), pp. 87-
94; Meissner, Die Strengleikar, pp. 312-17.
41 F. W. Blaisdell, “A Stylistic Feature in the ‘Erex saga’,” Studies in Language and
Literature in Honor of Margaret Schlauch, eds. Mieczyslaw Brahmer, Stanislaw Helsztyn-
ski, Julian Krzyzanowski (Warsaw: Polish Scientific Publishers, 1966), p. 47.
42 Schach, “Style and Structure,” p. 74.
43 Die Strengleikar, p. 313.
44 Schach, “Style and Structure,” p. 75.
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