Editiones Arnamagnæanæ. Series A - 01.06.1997, Side 159

CLVII
Lbs 2122, 4to
Lbs 2122 4to is a large manuscript of miscellaneous contents written at vari-
ous times in a period of twenty-one years by Sigmundur Matthíasson Long.
Long was born in 1841, and lived in the Eastern Quarter of Iceland, until he
emigrated to Canada in 1889. He was a keen collector and copier of manu-
scripts (ÍÆ, IV 204-5; Jón Helgason 1962-81, VI pp.xux-LVin).
On the flyleaf of the manuscript Long has written ‘S.Mattiasson 1866’ and
above this and to the right ‘N° 64’, the number the manuscript has in the cata-
logue Long himself wrote of his manuscripts (Lbs 2154-2155 4to). A title-
page follows, not numbered but allowed for in the pagination as p. 1. It reads,
within a red frame: ‘Dægra-Dvöl | eða | Leiðinda-Ljettir | med öðrum orðum |
Safn af ymsu i óbundnu mál. (sic) | svo sem Brjefum og fleýru. | safnad hefur
| Sigmundur Mattiasson | býrjað um 1866’. On the verso is a list of contents,
ending with the statement ‘skrifaði S. M. Long’; it runs to thirty-three very
varied items (for an impression, see Skrá, III 276).
Twenty-six items end with a date and Long’s name or initials, and in twelve
of them the place of writing is also given. From this information the writing
of the manuscript can be seen to have taken place in four phases: first, pp. 3-
84, written in November 1866, at Gilsárteigshjáleiga (in Eiðahreppur, Suður-
Múlasýsla); second, pp. 85-136, January-February 1868, at Gilsárteigur;
third, pp. 136-49, March 1871, at Hamragerði (same locality); fourth, pp.
149-376, November 1886 - January 1888, ‘á Blómsturvöllum við Seýðis-
fjörð’ (i.e. in Norður-Múlasýsla).
Mírmanns saga is on pp. 3-84, and thus constitutes the whole of the first
section of the manuscript. It has the colophon, ‘Endud 22an Nóvem-|ber 1866,
af Sigmundi | Mattiassini á Gilsár-|teigshjáleigu i Eiða-|Þinghá’. At this date
Long did not consistently make the distinction between ‘ð’ and ‘d’ to which
Jón Helgason drew attention (1962-81, VI p. lvii); alongside clear ‘ð’ and
clear ‘d’ (which are only very rarely confused), he has forms with variously
shaped ascenders which are mostly used for ‘ð’ but also for ‘d’.
The saga has the title ‘Sagann af | Myrmant Jalli Geirmannssyni’ on p. 3.
Above this is a running title ‘Sagann af Myrmant Jalli’; this title is sub-
sequently divided over the facing pages, and the name in it is consistently
spelled with ‘i’. The text is divided into the same twelve chapters as in F (the
text in 152), here headed ‘1" Kapituli’ etc.
The whole of the text is of the F type, and like 1756 described above, it is
derived from 2146. It agrees with 2146' (the text on the original leaves in
2146) in all but one of the variants of 2146' listed above, p.CLiv; the excep-
tion is at 427, where 2122 has reintroduced the reading ‘sid’, one of its own
numerous innovations.
2122 was written earlier than the substitute pages in 2146 (i.e. 21462). The