Íslenskt mál og almenn málfræði - 01.01.2023, Síða 92

whether the genitive ills gengis really is governed by the preposition án,
which is (intentionally or unintentionally) omitted by the scribe. As án
does not appear in the manuscript, it is not registered in van Arkel-de
Leeuw van Weenen (1987). It is, however, reasonable to categorize the
phrase in question as a genitive because it is an instance of the proverb án
er ills gengis nema heiman hafi ‘ill luck is home-bred’, which occurs in Gísla
saga 32 (AM 556a 4to:67v, see also Magnús Ólafsson 1650:1). Thus, there
is one genitive example in Table 1.
The data from the Old Norwegian manuscripts present a clear con-
trast to those from Old Icelandic. In Table 2, the genitive occurs most fre-
quently (5a), followed by the accusative (5b).
(5) a. þvi at hvarge ma vera væl ǫn ann[arr]ar.
because neither can be well without other(G)
‘because neither can be perfect without the other.’  (AM 619 4to:3r27)
b. Ecci mego þer gera n mic.
nothing can you do without me(A)
‘You cannot do anything without me.’             (AM 619 4to:14r4)
In Table 2, the genitive accounts for more than one-third of all the exam-
ples. The only clear examples in Strengleikar in DG4–7 and Barlaams
saga ok Jósafats in Holm. perg. 6 fol. involve genitives. AM 243 b α fol.
contains both accusative and genitive, and Holm. perg. 4 fol. has only one
example, which governs the accusative.
As has been shown above, the dative was most often used as a prepo-
sitional case of án in Old Icelandic, whereas the genitive was chosen most
frequently in Old Norwegian. On the basis of the data, it seems that the
difference in the case government of án may be attributed to dialectal dif-
ferences between Old Icelandic and Old Norwegian. In other words,
while the genitive was the primary prepositional case of án in Old Nor -
wegian, the dative was its primary case in Old Icelandic. Such dative use
in Old Icelandic can also be seen in skaldic poetry, as in (6):
(6) Hykka fót án flekkum / – fell sár á il hvára
I-think-not foot without sores(D) fell wound on sole each
– hvast gengum þó þingat /þann dag – konungsmǫnnum.
keenly we-went still there that day kingʼs-men(D)
‘I think not a foot of the king’s men was without sores; a wound
landed on each sole; still, we travelled keenly there that day.’
(Fulk 2012:587)
Yuki Minamisawa92