AM 676 b 4to is a copy from the seventeeth century. Even though there are, admittedly, a good many mistakes, it is characterized by an attempt to reproduce the original exactly. Both spelling, abbreviations and, to some extent, even the character of the letters, are imitated. AM 676 b 4to was in turn copied in AM 676 a 4to by Einar Eyjólfsson.
Det Arnamagnæanske Haandskrift No. 674. A
Firchow, The Old Norse Elucidarius 1992 Edition and translation.
Firchow & Grimstad, Elucidarius in Old Norse Translation 3-59, 69-71, 131-159Ed. 674.
Jón Helgason, The Arna-Magnæan manuscript 674A, 4to Elucidarius
„Ofst vas ek beÞeɴ af samlere suei|nom minom “
„gialda GoÞe braut tekeɴ“
Konráð Gislason, Brudstykker af den islandske Elucidarius s. 53-68 Text A
Firchow and Grimstad, Elucidarius in Old Norse Translation 1989 s. 3-59
„Discipulus Vas christus veɴ at licam “
„eɴ leidde afstr ein faldan til“
Konráð Gislason, Brudstykker af den islandske Elucidarius s. 68-69 Text B
Firchow and Grimstad, Elucidarius in Old Norse Translation 1989 s. 69-71
„ma oc Þvi trua at hann site adomstole“
„ oc mego þeir iam sciot fara“
Konráð Gislason, Brudstykker af den islandske Elucidarius s. 69-75 Text C
Firchow and Grimstad, Elucidarius in Old Norse Translation 1989 s. 131-148:3
„cleÞe oc goÞ hús oc at hevra fagran | song“
„ am uir Þelegar oc oumbrøÞe“
Konráð Gislason, Brudstykker af den islandske Elucidarius s. 75-81 Text D
Firchow and Grimstad, Elucidarius in Old Norse Translation 1989 s. 148:4-159
Parchment.
Page and line numbers are added by a nineteenth-century hand. The manuscript shows no foliation.
There are three complete and two defective gatherings:
Written in one column with 17 lines per page. Initials, which are now entirely faded but were perhaps red originally, occur only on fol. 1r of the prologue and on fol. 1v where the dialogue begins.
There are four major lacunae. The first occurs between fols 17 and 18, the second between fols 18 and 19, the third between fols 26 and 27, and the fourth after fol. 33. Several leaves are damaged at the top, with the result that some of the writing is lost on fols 9, 13, 15, 16, 30 and 31. Most of fol. 32 was excised, and fol. 33 lacks its outer part. There are holes in fols 28 and 30; the first, at least, is older than the writing.
The handwriting is rather large and very regular.
There are a few, apparently old, signs in the margins:
Other marginal notes from later times are quite short and unimportant.
The manuscript was apparently unbound until 1888, when it was given its present binding.
Written in Iceland: Kålund dated it to c. 1200 ( Katalog II s. 92 ). ONP, however, quoting (Hægstad 1906 s. 10 and Helle Jensen & Stefán Karlsson (pers. 1983) dates it to the second half of the twelfth century. AM 674 a 4to is thus one of the oldest surviving Icelandic manuscripts written in the vernacular.
Nothing can be said with certainty about the history of the manuscript before it came into Árni Magnúson's possession. On the basis of a letter from Grímur Einarsson, now preserved as AM-slips in AM 676 a 4to, it seems probable that that it belonged to Grímur's father, the lögmaður Einar Eyjólfsson who called it Bókin dýra. For hypotheses on the history of the manuscript, see e.g. ( Jón Helgason 1957 ).
Catalogued 23. ágúst 2005 by EW-J.
The manuscript was restored by Birgitte Dall from 1958 to 15 August 1959.