Gripla - 2022, Page 160

GRIPLA158
In a seminal paper, Jón Steffensen drew scholarly attention to the dozens
of post-medieval copies of Margrétar saga in circulation and concluded that
Margrétar saga continued to be used as a childbirth aid in Iceland long after
the Reformation.7 One of Steffensen’s key observations about Margrétar
saga is that only two seventeenth-century copies of the saga are known: the
vellum fragment AM 677 VIII 4to (used as bookbinding material) and JS 43
4to, which is a thick paper manuscript from c. 1660–1680 that according
to its title-page was compiled by the well-known Icelandic scribe Magnús
Jónsson of Vigur (1637–1702). By contrast, there are at least thirty-five cop-
ies from the eighteenth, nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
As discussed below, Jón Steffensen concluded that Margrétar saga
was associated with witchcraft in the seventeenth century and that during
what he called the “witch-hunting age” from 1554 to 1719 the copying of
Margrétar saga almost ceased but was revived in the eighteenth century.8
However, the number of currently surviving manuscripts does not neces-
sarily reflect the status or popularity of works in manuscript circulation
within the community at a given time. For instance, Árni Magnússon
states that Magnús Jónsson’s son-in-law Páll Vídalín (1667–1727) owned a
now-lost copy of the prologue to Margrétar saga in a quarto volume in the
hand of the Rev. Magnús Ketilsson (1675–1709), which would be unusual
if the saga were indeed closely associated with sorcery.9
The concept of the codicological unit is useful for studying the place of
Margrétar saga in the seventeenth century, since it can capture the chang-
ing uses and functions of manuscripts over time. This paper focuses on
a single manuscript, AM 428 a 12mo, which was deliberately altered and
augmented with newly copied religious material in 1689–1690 for the
benefit of a woman named Helga Sigurðardóttir. When viewed in context
with other evidence on Margrétar saga, manuscript culture, childbirth and
magic in early modern Iceland, there is little to suggest that the saga was
seen as dangerous or spiritually damaging reading, although it could be
potentially misused in connection with obstetrical magic.
7 Jón Steffensen, “Margrétar saga and Its History in Iceland,” Saga-Book 16 (1965): 273–82.
8 Jón Steffensen, “Margrétar saga and Its History in Iceland,” 281.
9 Árni Magnússon, Arne Magnussons Private Brevveksling (Copenhagen: Gyldendal, 1920),
95.