Editiones Arnamagnæanæ. Series A - 01.06.2003, Side 144
102*
INTRODUCTION
Group B
AM 391 4to.
Two slips by Ami Magnússon preserved with this number give infor-
mation about the origin of the copy it contains. (The opening of the
first slip is printed AMKat. I, 601, the rest of it and the second slip are
in Levned II, 161.) The first says that the manuscript was written by
Gísli Einarsson, ‘(sidan prestr ad Mula) þa studiosus i Kaupenhafn’,
from a copy in folio which Arni Magnússon had himself made from
‘pergaments bok i storu folio, sem fyrrum hefr leiged vid Skalholltz
kirkiu’, i.e. from S2 in AM 234 fol. Gísli (eldri) Einarsson was en-
rolled in the university in Copenhagen in November 1687. His father,
Einar Þorsteinsson, was incumbent of Múli (Aðalreykjadalur, Suður-
Þingeyjarsýsla), and Gísli obtained leave to succeed him and to serve
as his curate in 1688; he is said to have left Denmark in 1689, but
Westergárd-Nielsen makes a case for assigning AM 184 4to, also a
copy made in Copenhagen by Gísli from one of Ami Magnússon’s
own transcripts, to 1691-92 (EIMIX, 55-57). He was certainly back in
Iceland before August 1692, the month in which he accompanied his
father, consecrated bishop of Hólar in March that year, on a visitation
in his diocese. After ordination Gísli moved to the Múli living in May
1693 (a date which gives a firm terminus for Árni Magnússon’s note
with 391), and remained as parson there until his death in 1723 (HÞ;
Hafnarstúdentar, 49-50; Prestatal, 306; ÍÆ II, 47-48). Árni Magnús-
son’s copy must have been made when Bartholin had S2 on loan, prob-
ably in the winter of 1687 or during 1688 (cf. p. 15*; Bartholin died
5 November 1690). The rest of Árni Magnússon’s note tells us that he
gave his own transcript to sr. Þórður Jónsson á Staðarstað (Snæfells-
nes) and that on his death (in 1720) it passed into the possession of
Oddur Sigurðsson - ‘og á þad ennnu 1726-28’. Sr. Þórður was a stu-
dent in Copenhagen from September 1688, but made a swift and fa-
mous voyage to Iceland in the summer of 1691 to defend the good
name of his father, the late Bishop Jón Vigfússon of Hólar (Biskupa-
sögur Jóns Halldórssonar II, 134-39); he came home to stay in 1693
and was finally ordained to Staðastaður in 1702 (Hafnarstúdentar, 50;
ÍÆ V, 103-04; Prestatal, 147). Árni Magnússon most probably gave
Þórður his autograph copy in time for him to have it with him to Ice-
land in 1691 (see p. 117* below). Oddur lögmaður Sigurðsson and his
turbulent career are well known (see i.a. ÍÆ IV, 19-20; Jón Jónsson