Gripla - 2023, Blaðsíða 216

214 GRIPLA
damaged and contain numerous small holes.24 These holes have since been
repaired (1958–1959), but the signs are clearly visible.25
The text of 655 was published by Konráð Gíslason in 1860 in a normal-
ised version that contains small errors.26 In 2008 this edition was replaced
by Fabian Schwabe’s digital edition on the website of the Medieval Nordic
Text Archive, with a second edition published in 2020.27 Schwabe’s edi-
tion includes a facsimile, a diplomatic version, and a normalised version.
A close examination of the fragment’s linguistic features and orthography
has yet to be conducted. However, Kristian Kålund concludes in his 1907
examination of AM 434 4to, published with variants from AM 655 4to,
that both these Icelandic manuscripts include some Danish and Norwegian
words and word forms, indicating that they both stem from a Norwegian
translation of a Danish text.28 Their common ancestor, predating 655, is
likely to have been transmitted through this route.
As for the content of the fragment, each of the fifty-two articles is
fairly short and concise, and most refer to common general health prob-
lems one might reasonably expect in a thirteenth-century household. For
instance, there are cures for insect bites, infections, cough and lung prob-
lems, hoarseness, eye problems, problems of digestion and bad breath, as
well as ways to exterminate mice and flies. There is also advice for stop-
ping bleeding, for healing wounds and broken bones, and for getting rid
of warts. There is counsel for how to minimise lasciviousness, prevent
conception, and on obstetrics. The medical conditions discussed in the
fragment are quotidian rather than extraordinary and thus reflect a selec-
tion of cures based on common functionality.
The articles are generally of the two types that are most common in
medieval European medical manuscripts in the vernacular: ailments listed
with recipes for their cures, and herbal pharmacology (on the medical
24 Kålund, Katalog II, 66.
25 I am thankful to Anne Mette Hansen, curator at the Arnamagnæan Institute in
Copenhagen, for providing me with additional information on the repair and preservation
of the fragment.
26 Konráð Gíslason, ed., Fire og fyrretyve for en stor deel forhen utrykte prøver af oldnordisk sprog
og litteratur (Copenhagen: Gyldendal, 1860), 470–475.
27 Schwabe, Ór lǽknisbók.
28 Kålund, Den islandske lægebog, 398–400.