Editiones Arnamagnæanæ. Series B - 01.10.1968, Side 138

CXXXVI
From chapter 16 there survives a description of
the serpent. It is said that it formerly walked upright
on two legs and had a woman’s face but that it is
now called “Jaspis” and crawls on its helly. The
same account is found in Konungs Skuggsjá10.
It is only possible to make doubtful guesses about
the contents of chapters 18-21, from which no excerpts
are found.
In the section about the Latin Leg. mention is
made of an ancient oriental Adam legend frorn which
Leg. borrowed several important features, including
Seth’s journey to Paradise (see p. xxvii f.). A Latin
version of this legend, Vita Adae et Evae, formed the
basis for a number of late medieval translations
and adaptations in the vernaculars11. Ure contents
of Vita Adae can be summarised as follows: After
the Eall Adam and Eve are driven out of Paradise.
They repent and make penance. Adam stands in
the River Jordan for 40 days and tells Eve to stand
for 37 days in the Tigris. The devil, however, entices
Eve out of the river so that she does not accomplish
her penance. Adam and Eve live for a long time
and have many descendants, including Cain, Abel
and Seth. When Adam is lying on his death-bed,
racked with pain, he sends Eve and Seth to Paradise
to ask for the oil of mercy to sooth his pain. The
archangel Michael refuses to grant their request but
he promises Adam dehverance after the passage of
5,500 years. Shortly afterwards Adam dies and his
10. Kommgs Skuggsiá, ed. Ludvig Holm-Olsen, Oslo 1945, p. 80.
Stjórn, too, says that the serpent had “meyjar ásiónu”, p. 34,
cf. Anne Holtsmark in Kulturhistorisk Leksikon I, 1956, col. 16 f.
Since it is known that Jón Guðmundsson made use of Konungs
Skuggsjá (see Halldór Hermannsson: Jón Guðmundsson and his
Natural History of Iceland, Islandica XV, New York 1924,
pp. xv, xxv ff.), it is possible that he himself made this addition.
11. See AdBA XIV: 3, p. 210 ff.; Verfasserlexikon I, 1933,
col. 4 ff.