Nítíða Saga in Late Medieval and Early Modern Iceland Sheryl Elizabe
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i Transforming Popular Romance on the Edge of the World: Nítíða saga in Late Medieval and Early Modern Iceland Sheryl Elizabeth McDonald Werronen Submitted in accordance with the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy The University of Leeds School of English January 2013 ii The candidate confirms that the work submitted is her own and that appropriate credit has been given where reference has been made to the work of others. This copy has been supplied on the understanding that it is copyright material and that no quotation from the thesis may be published without proper acknowledgement. © 2013 The University of Leeds and Sheryl Elizabeth McDonald Werronen The right of Sheryl Elizabeth McDonald Werronen to be identified as Author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. iii Acknowledgements There are many people whose help and support has made it possible for me to see this PhD through to its end, and as many of these people will know, it has not been an easy project. I should first thank my family for their support and encouragement, and my two supervisors Alaric Hall and Catherine Batt, who have enthusiastically supported me through everything, from the devising of the research proposal to the final draft. Many thanks are also due to the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC), for awarding me an invaluable Doctoral Fellowship from 2011 through 2013, and to the Viking Society for Northern Research for awarding me a grant to make a research trip to Iceland in August 2011. Thanks are also due to Matthew Driscoll, Svanhildur Óskarsdóttir, and the other instructors of the 8th and 9th International Summer Schools in Manuscript Studies held at the Arnamagnæan Institutes in Reykjavík and Copenhagen in 2011 and 2012, respectively. Finally, there are many others who deserve mention for their inspiration, help, and support, academic and otherwise, including, but not limited to, David Baker, Isabella Bolognese, Erin Dailey, Stephen Dunning, Jóhanna Katrín Friðriksdóttir, Silvia Hufnagel, Henna Iqbal, Nicola Lugosch, Alexandra Petrulevich, Werner Schäfke, and especially Stephen Werronen. iv Abstract This thesis focuses on late medieval and early modern Icelandic literature and society roughly spanning the years 1400–1700, including the reception and reinterpretation of medieval Icelandic popular texts after the Icelandic Reformation in 1550. The thesis discusses in detail one late medieval Icelandic romance called Nítíða saga, which was very popular in post-Reformation Iceland, surviving in 65 manuscripts. The thesis is organized into two parts. Part One discusses Nítíða saga’s internal and external contexts, looking at the saga as a physical and cultural artefact, as well as its setting. Chapter One delves into the saga’s manuscript context, including a classification of the surviving manuscript witnesses and a discussion of the medieval text’s post-Reformation reception and transformation through three case studies. Chapter Two discusses the saga’s intertextual relationships, through the analysis of a prominent motif and through two case studies highlighting the saga’s relationships with other Icelandic romances. Chapter Three analyses the saga’s setting, investigating the text’s unusual depiction of world geography. Part Two considers the saga’s characters and their relationships: Chapter Four discusses the depiction of the saga’s hero, including perspectives on gender and power; Chapter Five looks at the characterization of other figures in the saga and how they reinforce the hero’s position; and Chapter Six explores the role of the narrator. Overall this thesis shows, through material philology together with literary analysis, how Nítíða saga explores and negotiates the genre of Icelandic romance. The thesis also raises questions of Icelandic identity, both locally and in relation to the wider world, uncovering relationships among manuscripts and texts, which have previously gone unnoticed, and also shedding light on Icelandic attitudes towards literature and literacy in the late medieval and early modern periods. v Table of Contents Acknowledgements iii Abstract iv Table of Contents v Figures, Maps, and Tables vii Abbreviations: Manuscript Collections viii Abbreviations: Journals, Series, and Reference Works ix A Note on Icelandic Names and Translation x INTRODUCTION 1 I: Synopsis 2 II. Review of Scholarship and the Saga’s Classification 7 III: Methodologies and Sagas to Compare 12 IV: Thesis Organization 15 PART ONE: EXTERNAL AND INTERNAL CONTEXTS 17 Chapter 1: The Manuscript Tradition: The Text as a Physical Artefact 18 I: Manuscript Groups 24 1. Group A 36 2. Group B 39 3. Group C 43 4. Group D 47 5. Group E 49 6. Group F 53 II: Three Case Studies 55 1. JS 166 fol. (181v–190r) 57 2. Add. 4860 fol. (1r–16v) 69 3. Lbs 3941 8vo (1r–18v) 76 III: Conclusions 81 Chapter 2: Intertextuality: The Text as a Cultural Artefact 83 I: The náttúrusteinar: A Shared Motif 85 II: Case Study: Clári saga 91 III: Case Study: Nikulás saga leikara 102 IV: Conclusions 116 Chapter 3: Geography and Space: The Setting 119 I: Introduction: Europeanization 120 II: Geography 128 vi III: Case Studies 140 1. Frakkland 141 2. Serkland 150 3. Visio 156 IV: Conclusions 159 PART TWO: CHARACTERS AND THEIR INTERACTION 163 Chapter 4: The Hero 164 I: Defining the Hero 166 II: Liforinus 176 III: Nítíða 184 IV: Conclusions 199 Chapter 5: Characterization 203 I: Female Companionship: Sýjalín and Listalín 204 II: Servants: Íversa and Ypolitus 210 III: Villains: Virgilius and Serkland 216 IV: Helpers: Refsteinn, Slægrefur, and The Dwarf 228 V: Conclusions 235 Chapter 6: Characterizing the Narrator 237 I: The Narrator Opens the Saga 239 II: The Narrator Closes the Saga 250 III: The Narrator Throughout the Saga 256 IV: Conclusions 260 CONCLUSIONS 262 Bibliography 265 vii Figures, Maps, and Tables Figure 1.1: Group A Manuscripts 38 Figure 1.2: Group B Manuscripts 40 Figure 1.3: Group B and D Manuscripts 43 Figure 1.4: Group C Manuscripts 46 Figure 1.5: Group D Manuscripts 48 Figure 1.6: Group E Manuscripts 50 Figure 1.7: Group F Manuscripts 54 Figure 1.8: Rough Stemma of Nítíða saga Manuscripts 55 Figure 3.1: T-O Map 131 Figure 3.2: Alternative T-O Map 135 Map 1.1: Groups A–F Manuscript Locations 28 Map 1.2: Group A Manuscripts 39 Map 1.3: Group E Manuscripts 52 Table 1.1: Earlier Nítíða saga Manuscripts 30 Table 1.2: Later Nítíða saga Manuscripts 32 Table 2.1: The Use of gimsteinn in Sagas 98 Table 2.2: Descriptions of Female Beauty 105 Table 2.3: Descriptions of Travel 106 Table 2.4: Identical Diction in Nikulás saga leikara and Nítíða saga 106 Table 2.5: Modesty Topoi 107 Table 2.6: Direct Influence 108 Table 2.7: The náttúrusteinar 112 viii Abbreviations: Manuscript Collections Add. Additional Manuscript AM Den arnamagnæanske håndskriftsamling ÍB Safn Hins íslenska bókmenntafélags ÍBR Handritasafn Reykjavíkurdeildar Hins íslenska bókmenntafélags JS Jón Sigurðsson Lbs Handritasafn Landsbókasafn – Háskólabókasafn Íslands Nks Den nye kongelige samling Papp. Pappers-Handskrifter Perg. Pergaments-Handskrifter Rask Rasmus Rask SÁM Stofnun Árna Magnússonar á Íslandi ix Abbreviations: Journals, Series, and Reference Works Cleasby-Vigfusson Gudbrand Vigfusson, An Icelandic-English Dictionary, Based on the MS. Collections of the Late Richard Cleasby (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1874) DONP Ordbog over det norrøne prosasprog / Dictionary of Old Norse Prose <http://dataonp.hum.ku.dk> Heilagra Manna Søgur C. R. Unger, ed., Heilagra Manna Søgur: Fortællinger og Legender om hellige Mænd og Kvinder, 2 vols (Christiania: Bentzen, 1877) JEGP Journal of English and Germanic Philology KLNM Kulturhistorisk leksikon för nordisk middelalder fra vikingetid til reformationstid LMIR Agnete Loth, ed., Late Medieval Icelandic Romances, 5 vols, Editiones Arnamagnæanæ, B20–24 (Copenhagen: Munksgaard, 1962–65) Mediaeval Scandinavia Mediaeval Scandinavia: A Journal Devoted to the Study of Mediaeval Civilization in Scandinavia and Iceland Namn och Bygd Namn och Bygd: Tidskrift för Nordisk Ortnamnsforskning Neophilologus Neophilologus: An International Journal of Modern and Mediaeval Language and Literature Parergon Parergon: Bulletin of the Australian and New Zealand Association for Medieval and Renaissance Studies PMLA Publications of the Modern Language Association of America Saga-Book Saga-Book of the Viking Society for Northern Research Scandia Scandia: Tidskrift för historisk forskning Scripta Islandica Scripta Islandica: Isländska sällskapets årsbok Skírnir Skírnir: Tímarit hins íslenska bókmenntafélags Speculum Speculum: A Journal of Medieval Studies x A Note on Icelandic Names and Translation I have alphabetized the names of Icelanders by first name, as is common practice in Iceland and Icelandic scholarship. Additionally, in the bibliography, authors’ names beginning with the characters <Å> and <Þ> appear at the end of the alphabet, in line with Scandinavian and Icelandic conventions, respectively, and accented vowels follow unaccented vowels. All translations are my own unless otherwise noted. When quoting from Nítíða saga and other works in either edited or manuscript form, I have not modified or normalized the texts. 1 INTRODUCTION …er og ei audsagt med öfrodre tungu i utlegdumm veralldarinnar, so mnnum verde skemtelegt, hvor fgnudur vera munde i midiumm heimenum af sliku hoffolke samannkomnu…1 [ …it is also not easily said with an unlearned tongue in the outer regions of the world, how it might be entertaining for people, what joy may be in the middle of the world when such courtiers come together… ] In the Middle Ages Iceland might well appear to sit somewhat uneasily on the ‘outer regions of the world’. Under the control of Norway from 1262 and part of the larger Kalmar Union just over a century later, Iceland, while clearly different from its Scandinavian neighbours in history, literature, and language, was for better or worse drawn into the mainland European community with which the Nordic monarchies were keenly interacting.