Bibliotheca Arnamagnæana - 01.06.1981, Blaðsíða 207
Three robber knights
Five robber knights
Count Galoain.......
Guivret the Little .
*King Arthur’s Court
Kay
*Gawain
Two giants..........
The Count of Limors
* Guivret the Little
La joie de la cort.
Eight robbers
Earl Miion
Guimar
Two giants
*Flying dragon
*Seven armed men
Earl Placidus
Kay
Hirdar fagnadr
Through the interpolation of two new adventures and the re-arrangement
of others, Erex saga is a structural entity distinet from Erec et Enide.^ A
desire to make the narrative sequence as symmetrical as possible must
have impelled the author of Erex saga to rearrange and conflate existing
episodes, and to interpolate two new adventures. In so doing, he in faet
re-created the tale; instead of copying, the author interpreted and re-
wrote. His revisions bespeak a thoughtful editor, for they produced a
work that is consistent in style, structure, and tone. The editorial changes
in Erex saga are more far-reaching than those in the Stockholm 46 ver-
sion of Ivens saga; they are also more systematic.
The author of Erex saga was not disinelined to modify and interpolate,
but the alterations and additions are not always entirely original with
him. The Icelander was not above plagiarizing - in a Creative manner.
The interpolated flying dragon episode is a prime example of the author’s
use of other literature in revising the work which he was supposedly
copying. A struggle between a knight and an awe-inspiring reptile is, of
course, de rigueur in courtly romance. Chrétien de Troyes’ Erec et Enide
does not contain such an episode, but models can be found in Tristrams
saga and in tvens saga. The author of Erex saga must have recognized the
narrative and structural advantage to interpolating an account of a
struggle between the hero and a beast. Nonetheless, his primary source
8 For a comparative structural analysis of Erex saga and Erec et Enide, see Kalinke, “The
Structure of the Erex saga,” SS, 42 (1970), pp. 343-355; also, “A Structural Comparison of
Chrétien de Troyes’ Erec et Enide and the Norse Erex saga, ” MedScan, 4 (1971), pp. 54-65.
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