Fróðskaparrit - 01.01.1987, Page 33

SANDOYARBÓK
37
kvæði« (CCF 1) and »Grips kvæði« (CCF
57) from their solo song. Sara Thomas-
datter, on the other hand, was a familiar
face in Sandur, and Clemensen probably
knew her well from the time when she had
lived at undir Brekkuni. On the day he col-
lected »Hermundur illi« (CCF 66) from
her, she was evidently visiting her grand-
nephew Jens Jensen, who had moved into
her house at undir Brekkuni: that day
Clemensen also picked up a text from
Jensen’s wife, Birgitte Andersdatter, and
one from his cousin J. Michael Widerøe.
Clemensen collected nine ballads from
five singers from Skálavík, more than from
any other village on Sandoy, with the sole
exception of Sandur itself. He was acquaili-
ted with three of the singers - Thomas Han-
sen, Poul Pedersen, and Hans Jakobsen -
in much the same way as he was to his in-
formants from Húsavík and Skúgvoy. As
we have learned, Hansen was the grandson
of Clemensen’s near neighbors; and Poul
Pedersen, the younger brother of the royal
tenant at á Trøð, was related to Clemensen
and his neighbors, too, many times over by
marriage: in J807 Pedersen had married
Clemensen’s first cousin Kristin Simons-
datter of Skálavík, and two years later his
elder brother Trond married another,
Elsebet Joensdatter of uttan fyri Á in
Sandur. In 1809, more than a decade after
his first wife’s death, Poul Pedersen mar-
ried again, this time Sunnevad Thomas-
datter of í Kirkjugerði, whose paternal
aunts Maren and Malene Blasiusdatter had
each married close neighbors of Clemen-
sen’s, the brøthers Poul and Joen Joensen
of á Heyggi. Sunnevad’s maternal aunt,
moreover, was Clemensen’s second cousin
Elsebet Joensdatter, married to his neigh-
bor Joen Jakobsen of á Skeljalaðnum.
Judging from the fact that Clemensen re-
corded Pedersen’s text of »Koralds kvæði«
(CCF 111) on the same day that he picked
up a text from Joen Jakobsen, we may rea-
sonably assume that Pedersen was in Sand-
ur at the time on a visit to his wife’s mater-
nal aunt. The second ballad collected from
Pedersen, »Frúgvin Olrina« (CCF 81), is
said originally to have been his wife’s,
given to her by her father as a vøggugáva
(cradle gift).23
Hans Jakobsen’s connection with Sandur
was also very close: his mother and her two
sisters had all spent a part of their child-
hood in the household of their maternal
aunt and uncle at í Koytu, and one sister
married into the farm there.24 In 1821, this
sister’s daughter, Maren Jensdatter, mar-
ried J. Michael Widerøe of undir Skarði,
and the couple set up housekeeping at á
Reyni, not far from Clemensen’s home at í
Króki. The collector may well have first
heard Jakobsen perform »ívint Herintsson«
(CCF 108) at the Jensdatter/Widerøe wed-
ding in November of 1821 and then found
an opportunity to record the text the
following summer, when Jakobsen was in
and out of Sandur conferring with the
sheriff about family matters.25
Clemensen was acquainted with his re-
maining informants from Skálavík, as well
as his lone informant from Dalur, through
his wife’s family, who had resided in Skála-
vík until 1818, when they moved to Sandur
to live at Skáli undir Reynum. In 1823, just
prior to his marriage, Clemensen obtained
two ballads from Lauridz Olesen of Dalur,
the husband of the aunt of Clemensen’s fi-
ancee. The collector probably met Joen
Danielsen of Skálavík at his own wedding: