The Icelandic Canadian - 01.06.1956, Side 38

36
THE ICELANDIC CANADIAN
Summer 1956
knights; whereas, in the ballads of the
Elder Edda, Sigurd and Brynhild ap-
pear before us in their full pagan
grandeur, holding nothing sacred but
their love, and defying all laws, human
and divine, in the name of that one al-
mighty passion. The Icelandic con-
tains the key to many a riddle in the
English language and to many a
mystery in the English character.
Though the Old Norse (Icelandic) is
but a dialect of the same language
which the Angles and Saxons brought
to Britain, though the Norman blood
is the same blood that ebbs and flows
in every German heart, yet there is
an accent of defiance in the rugged
northern speech, and a spring of dar-
ing in the throbbing northern heart,
which marks the northman wherever
he appears, whether in Iceland or in
Cicily, whether on the Rhine or on
the Thames. . .”
Daniel Willard Fiske, (1831-1904),
was Professor of Northern European
languages, and a librarian at Cornell
University, Ithaca, New York, from
1868 to 1883. He was undoubtedly the
most learned Northern scholar in Am-
erica. He spent several years in the
Scandinavian countries and was an
enthusiastic admirer and great friend
af Iceland, and valued highly the Old
Icelandic literature. He was a lifelong
devotee of the advancement of civil-
ization and culture. When he died he
bequeathed to the Cornell University
his library, including the Icelandic
section which contained 8600 books,
pamphlets and documents, which at
present number 25,000 items, called
“The Fiske Icelandic Collection”. He
also bequeathed a fund of more than
half a million dollars for the uses and
purposes of the whole library. He
further bequeathed to the University
a special fund of five thousand dollars,
the interest of which is to be used for
the publication of an annual volume
relating to Iceland and the Icelandic
collection in the library. Of these thirty-
seven volumes have been published
to date under the title Islandica.
Professor Fiske owned the most up-to-
date library on the game of chess,
which he bequeathed to the tiny, iso-
lated Island of Grimsey, which belongs
to Iceland. This island has a popu-
lation of around seventy people who
are noted for their interest in the game
of chess. Professor Fiske was given
special distinction by King Hubert of
Italy in 1892, and also by King Chris-
tian IX of Denmark and Iceland, at
that time.
Professor Fiske made the following
comment on the Old Icelandic liter-
ature: “It is not necessary to dwell
on the value of Icelandic to those
who desire to investigate the early
history of the Teutonic races. The rel-
igious belief of our remote ancestors,
and very many of the primitive legal
and social customs, some of which still
influence the daily life of the people,
find their clearest and often the only
elucidation in the so called Eddie and
Skaldic lays, and the Sagas. The same
writings form the sole sources of
Scandinavian history before the four-
teenth century, and they not infre-
quently shed a welcome ray on the ob-
scure annals of the British Islands,
and several continental nations. They
furnish, moreover, an almost unique
example of the modern literature
which is completely indigenous. The
Old Icelandic literature, besides which
the literature of the early Teutonic
dialects—Gothic, Old High German,
Saxon, Frisian, and Anglo-Saxon, are
as a drop to a bucket of water, develop-
ed itself out of actual life of the
people under little or no extraneous
influence. In this respect it deserves
the careful study of every student of