Editiones Arnamagnæanæ. Series A - 01.06.2003, Blaðsíða 264
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INTRODU CTION
might be coincidental or inferential, but enough firm parallels (2, 7, 9,
10, 11, 13, 15) remain to warrant belief in a connection. It was sug-
gested above that sr. Jón had some access to 392 in Skálholt in the
winter 1709-10 and made some excerpts then. It need not surprise us if
his work was unsystematic. If, when he put his material together on
Jón helgi, he was working both from his own notes and from the bor-
rowed 391, the circumstances would help to explain why he took the
name Þorvaldur in preference to Þorvarður in ex. 11; and why, when
speaking of Illugi Bjamarson, the man who gave up Hólar for the new
bishopric, he cited Laurentius saga as his authority for saying ‘Sá 111-
hugi prestur kallast öðru nafni Hilarius’: the double name is also given
in H 13/24, but Árni Magnússon did not record it in 391 and sr. Jón
presumably did not note it either when he made his passing acquain-
tance with 392.
Slight evidence tending toward the same conclusion, that sr. Jón had
excerpted 392, is possibly to be found in Historia ecclesiastica Is-
landiæ by his son, Bishop Finnur. He naturally has several passages on
Bishop Jón (chiefly Historia eccl. I, 262 (a), 320-27, 334, IV, 29-30).
He refers more than once to a ‘Vita ... manuscripta’, but it is evident
throughout that he based his account on his father’s work, with some
rearrangement and additional comment. His source is especially clear
in the two Icelandic quotations he presents as from “Vita Joh. Aug-
mundini” in Historia eccl. I, 181, notes (a) and (b), where the phrasing
answers to the text of Lbs. 167 4to, p. 33, and not to S chs. 34 and 33
(H chs. 54-55 and 53), which sr. Jón summarised. In one passage,
however, Bishop Finnur deviates a modicum from his father’s descrip-
tion. This is in Historia eccl. I, 334, on the exhumation of Bishop Jón’s
relics and the decision to translate them. He writes ‘Aqvam vero, qvæ
huic usui adhibita fuit, ut præsentissimum omnium malorum medica-
men asservari curavit’. This may appear a little closer to H 39/3-4 than
to the expression used by Jón Halldórsson, see (14) above, but may
also be simply a rephrasing of the latter. In the following brief account
of the visitation experienced by the woman at Hólar, S ch. 33, H ch.
53, the man who appears to her is ‘vir qvidam fulgente facie, vestibus
splendens, perqve omnia humanam sortem superans’. S 33/9 has
‘maðr ... mykill vexti og virðulegr yfir litz’; H 53/11-12 and 14-15 has
‘madur ... mikill vexti og virduligur yfirlits ... hann var so biarttur. ad
hun þottist ecki geta J mot honum sied’; cf. L 51/7-8 ‘æinn s^miligr