Bibliotheca Arnamagnæana - 01.06.2003, Page 191
IB 180 8vo
177
The general impression is that of an insensitive abridgement, and com-
pared to (relatively) careful and competent transcriptions like Aa, Z is a
rather poor representative of the ‘A class’. Even so, the text of Z is by
no means valueless for the constitution of the *A text.
From a comparison with the three seventeenth-century manuscripts
that constitute the ‘Vatnshyma version’, it emerges that, for all its own
omissions and childish mistakes, Z is far from sharing all errors com-
mon to the other three.22 The following is a list of loci where the
‘Vatnshyma version’ can be corrected from Z with the support of one or
more vellum manuscripts (G, W or M), or a B-class paper manuscript
(AM 446 4to) in cases of all the vellums being defective. Negative evi-
dence from the variants Torbur Jonsson copied into 447 from Melabok
(i e absence of variants) is only included in exceptional cases, since it is
obviously incomplete (see my edition, p. 126).
I.
IFIV, 10.10 skal segja (Aa, Aj, Ak)] er ad segja Z = GM.
IFIV, 15.17 vårr (Aa, Aj, Ak)] vys Z = G.
IF IV, 17.2 storlangt (Aa, Aj, Ak)] storum langt Z = G.
IF IV, 17.8 hafa fallit (Aa; fallid hafa Aj, Ak)] er fallid hofdu Z = G.
IF IV, 24.17 obarin (Aa, Aj, Ak)] o-bord Z (ey bord 446).
IF IV, 26.17 fyrir innan stokk (Aa, Aj, f. i. stokks Ak)] fyrir buinu Z
= 446.
IF IV, 29.21 svå (Aa, Aj, Ak)] satt Z (= 446).
IF IV, 53.4 utan (Aa, Aj, Ak)] nema Z = W.
IF IV, 58,20-21 slundasamliga (text corrected from B); Aa, Aj, Ak all
corrupt (Aa: space + ædasamliga, Aj: sludru samliga, Ak: skindasam-
liga)] slundursamleg(a) Z (slundasamlega WG).
IF IV, 69.14-15 liøsemS (Aa, Aj, Ak)] lidveislu Z = WGM.
IF IV, 70.10 at (Aa, Aj, Ak)] a medal Z; imilli WG, aa milli M.
IF IV, 70.12-13 til handlaga (Aa, Aj, Ak)] til handsala Z = WGM.
22 AM 448 4to (Aa), written in Copenhagen by Åsgeir Jonsson and Ami Magnusson,
probably for the most part in 1687 or early in 1688 (Stefan Karlsson, Um Vatnshymu,
Opuscula IV, Bibliotheca Amamagnæana XXX, 1970, p. 290) carries the annotation in
Grimur Thorkelin’s hånd: “Ex Codice Academico in folio in Bibliotheca Reseniana”,
which, as argued by Stefan Karlsson (1970, p. 288), must be copied from an older source,
now lost. The only manuscript of Eyrbyggja saga in Peder Resen’s library was the vellum
Vatnshyma (Membr. Res. 5), which means that we can be almost certain that Aa is a dir-
ect transcript of Vatnshyma itself. The derivation is less certain for Ak (written by Ketill
Jorundsson, d. 1670), which is very closely related to Aa but does not contain explicit in-
formation about its exemplar, and, especially, for Aj (written by Jon Gissursson before
1643), which in a few places contains better readings than those shared by Aa and Ak, see
below, pp. 179-80.