Search results for ""viking society""

Edition, with parallel text translation, of the Old Norse account of the Vision of St Paul and its Latin analogue.

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An edition, with stanza-by-stanza commentary and translation, of the late-medieval Icelandic rímur cycle þrymlur, which is based on the story of the Eddic poem þrymskviða, in which the god þórr disguises himself as the goddess Freyja to retrieve his stolen hammer from the giants. An extensive introduction examines the relationship between these poems as well as ballad analogues, and gives an account of the poetics of þrymlur and the rímur genre in general. A glossary is provided.

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Landnámabók, thought to have been first compiled in the twelfth century, documents the settlement of Iceland through accounts of some 430 settlers, their families and descendants. It was copied repeatedly throughout the Middle Ages and later, and survives in several redactions, all more or less fragmentary. This new translation is based on the version made by Haukr Erlendsson in the early fourteenth century, never before translated into English. The translator, Matthias Egeler, gives special attention to the texts sense of place, as conveyed in the place names bestowed on the land by the settlers and in the anecdotes told about them. The book is illustrated by numerous black and white photographs taken by the translator. It includes an introduction and an index of primary settlers, showing the relationship of the Hauksbók recension to that of Sturlubók.

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In the summer of 1350, as a deadly pandemic tore across Europe, nine people were burnt at the stake in the Hanseatic city of Visby on the island of Gotland. Ostensibly, this was a sadly familiar story: the Black Death was rampant, and a supposed Jewish plot was offered as an explanation. The alleged perpetrators were forced to confess, and were duly executed. But the people who were consigned to the flames in Visby were not Jewish. In fact, there were no Jews on the island to be victimised. Of the nine accused, two were Christian preachers, and the only named individual, Tidericus, was an organista -- probably the organ player at the church of St. Olaf in Visby. The outlandish theory was that the plague was a poisoning scheme run by an international conspiracy of Jews, oligarchs and secular administrators. This book traces the story of the unfortunate Tidericus, and examines the implications of the antisemitic fantasy which led to his death. The positions of the different ethnic groups in Visby is considered against the backdrop of panic and paranoia which pandemics inspire. The interests of the native Old Gutnish-speaking population are compared to the motives of the Low German-speaking mercantile elite who were administering Visby at the time. A context of social unrest, with class divisions bisecting proto-national identities, proved to be a dangerous fuel for a surreal conspiracy theory. A popular willingness to believe in this lurid nightmare proved to be the undoing of Tidericus and his co-accused. The sources which record the affair, namely two pieces of Hanseatic correspondence, are edited and translated into English for the first time in the appendices.

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In 1897 W G Collingwood and Jón Stefánsson undertook a journey to Iceland in order to visit, explore and paint the locations of some of the most prominent sagas of Icelanders. After their return to Britain they wrote an account of their journey which, as they themselves succinctly put it, aimed primarily to be "a picture book to illustrate the sagas of Iceland". A Pilgrimage to the Saga-Steads of Iceland more than fulfilled this modest aim, its text accompanied by more than forty paintings and drawings by Collingwood, a unique record of saga sites and of the Icelandic landscape. Today it is one of the classics of English travel writing on Iceland. The present volume presents a facsimile of the original 1899 edition of the Pilgrimage, reproducing the volume in its original size, with full-colour reproductions of the original colour plates, and hard-back binding.

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Presents a translation of two early Icelandic histories with introduction and notes.

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Vilmundar saga viðutan is an entertaining romance composed in the late Middle Ages in Iceland, where it remained popular for another five centuries. It tells of the adventures of Vilmundur, the rustic son of a farmer, whose rise through society is characterised by a combination of unrefined social etiquette and raw athletic prowess. Influenced by narratives of both indigenous and foreign origin, the saga is a good example of the eclecticism that characterises medieval Icelands indigenous romances. It also holds a place of folkloric significance, as it is currently the earliest known variant of the Cinderella folktale (ATU 510A) which contains a cinder-name. Discussion of all this and other points of literary, textual and folkloric interest can be found in the introduction of this volume, which precedes a facing-page text and English translation of the saga.

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The four translations assembled here are intended to supplement the early Bishops Sagas that are already easily available in translation. The texts included are Hungrvaka (Foretaste), Páls saga byskups (The Saga of Bishop Páll Jónsson), Oddaverja þáttr (An Account of the People at Oddi) and Prestssaga Guðmundar góða (The Priesthood of Bishop Guðmundr Góði). All have been dated to the first years of the thirteenth century. Together with the Viking Societys edition of þorláks saga byskups (2013), they typify the first emergence of saga writing and show how the evolution of saga composition began. The texts are translated by Theodore M. Andersson who also provides a full introduction. The book includes a bibliography and index of names.

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This book provides a modern, scholary edition of the runic inscriptions, Scandinavian and Anglo-Saxon, discovered in the Isle of Man. All are carved into stone and most are commemorative in nature. A broad view has been taken of the Manx runic material. Weight is given to runological and linguistic questions, in particular graph-types and their implications, orthography, the origin and linguistic background of the rune carvers, and language contract and its possible consequences. But attention is also directed at matters such as dating and the implications of what the inscriptions say for our understanding of Manx society at the time they were made. Archaeology and art history are brought into the discussion insofar as these fields of study cast light on the inscriptions and their context. Emphasis is further placed on the nature of the discovery of the rune-stones, their subsequent history and their treatment by earlier scholars. The work is copiously illustrated. It contains recent photographs of all the stones and their runes, computerised drawings of each inscription, and significant early depictions of parts of the material.

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