Skráningarfærsla handrits

Parchment.

Foliated by Kristian Kålund in the upper right-hand corners of the rectos.

The manuscript consists of seven quires. The first four quires are complete and each consists of eight conjoint leaves. There are catchwords at the end of each quire with the exception of fols 38 and 46.

• I: fols 1-8.
• II: fols 9-16.
• III: fols 17-24.
• IV: fols 25-32.
• V: fols 33-38, the first and the eight leaves are missing.
• VI: fols 39-46.
• VII: fols 47-52, between fols 49 and 50 the two inner leaves are missing.

Written in one column and the number of lines varies from 37 to 45 lines per page. Red, green and blue chapter initials occur. In many cases, however, the colour is significantly faded or has vanished.

The manuscript consists of two fragments; the first consists of fols 1-32 and the second fols 33-52. It is badly damaged: leaves have gone missing and the writing is faded or almost illegible on many of the extant leaves.

At several places corners or margins are cut off, both with and without loss of text. The middle part of the conjoint leaves 2 and 7 was cut away, leaving only the seven and nine top lines and between thirteen and fifteen of the bottom lines.

Towards the end of the manuscript at least two leaves, containing the end of Laurentius saga, are missing.

It is difficult to determine whether the manuscript is written by one or more hands. The writing is larger at some parts of the manuscript than at other parts but the difference of letter sizing, does not necessarily mean a change of hands. There are not many significant differences in the orthography so even if the manuscript was written by two different scribes they were, in all probability, contemporary and belonged to the samme scribal school.

The script is Icelandic Gothic bookhand. The text is carelessly written; it exhibits various scribal errors, more apparent than most other Icelandic manuscripts from the same period, and on almost each page significant words have been left out.

• Lacunae are indicated by a nineteenth century hand in the bottom margins of fols 38v, 49v og 52v.
• A seventeenth century hand wrote the titles of the þættir (where the beginnings are still extant) and various hands wrote names of the people occurring in the sagas in the top part of some of the leaves.
• Árni Magnússon added the words Aptan af Conrads saugu. on the top of fol 1r and in the upper part of the outer margin another hand added H. Dunsta-|ni Saga | hefst her.
• On fol. 5v, top margin: S. Dunstanus Episcopus.
• Fol. 10r, top margin: Bærings saga er hin Skemtilegazta Saga.
• In the top margins of the rectos of fols 11-19: Bærings Saga.
• Fol. 19v, top margin: Knÿtlinga saga byriazt hier . This is written on top of an older text of which only the words Knutz [?] saga are visible.
• The margin of fol. 34r: Vitus saga.
• The margin of fol. 36r: Laurentius saga.
• Fol. 46v, top margin: Laurentius saga.
• Fol. 30r, top margin: bothill|dar leifj, referring to Bóthildr, the mother of Catune Lavard, against where she is mentioned for the first time in the saga.
• Fol. 33r, top margin: Incipit ex posteriore parte capitis XXII.
• On fols 44r and 48r, respectively, the scribe added the words: erchibiskupín and fiogr which were left out of the text.

• Many of the leaves also contain verses, single words, names etc.
• Fol. 5v, bottom margin, the name Jon is written upside down.
• An illegible patronymic is found on the bottom margin of fol. 34v: agnus .
• Fol. 35r, bottom margin: þa linner fyre.
• Fol. 38v, bottom margin: ser man et alfabet fra a til l.
• Fol. 48r, bottom margin: aue maria.

The manuscript is written in Iceland. The dating of it has been debated:

• c. 1400 ((Björn Þórólfson 1925 xviii ).
• The middle or the last half of the fifteenth century (Unger 1877 xxi and Guðbrandur Vigfússon 1858 I lxxxv ).
• The end of the fifteenth century (Cederschiöld 1884 clxxxviii ).
• The fifteenth century (Kålund, Katalog I 148 and af Petersens & Olson 1925 xxi ).
• The second half of the fifteenth century (Hreinn Benediksson 1961 35 and Stefán Karlsson pers.). This late dating is based on numerous spelling innovations.
• c. 1500( Björnsson 1969 s. xxxi and Halvorsen 1989 s. 18 ). Halvorsen, however, adds that the manuscript could be somewhat younger.

On fol. 11v, a monogram consisting of the letters G and Þ is written in the upper margin four times. According to Kålund ( KKKat ) this is the monogram of the bishop of Hólar Guðbrandur Þorláksson. Ólafur Halldórsson ( Rit37 s. 83, footnote 17 ) however, finds that the initials belong to Gísli Þórðarson.

Árni Magnússon acquired the book AM 180 a fol./AM 180 b fol. of owners in Northern Iceland. According to fols 139v-140r in his catalogue of Icelandic parchment manuscripts, AM 435 a fol., the codex was divided while it resided in Northern Iceland. Árni mentions that he acquired one part from Skúli Ólafsson and another part from Magnús Jónsson of Leirá. The following account comprises both AM 180a fol and 180b fol.: Karla Magnuss Saga, vantar framanvid og | vida i Miduna. | Aptanaf Konradz Sỏgu Keisarasonar. | Dunstani Saga (authore fratre Arnone Laurentii f.) vantar i. | Katrinar Saga, vantar i. Bærings Saga fagra. | Ur Knytlinga Sỏgu, um Knut helga, Olaf, | Eirik goda, og Nikulas. Vantar vid endan. | um Svein Ulfsson og Haralld Hein (ur | Knytlinga Sỏgu) vantar upphafed. | Vitus Saga Pislarvottz. vantar i. | Laurentius Saga Hola biskups. vantar i. | folio majore. | Þesse bok var komin i marga parta | nordur i lande, og hefi eg hana feinged | af ymsum. Nockurn part þar af hiä Skula Olafssyne, nockurn part fra Magnuse Jonssyne | ä leyrá, enn Magnus hafde sitt feinged i ym-|sum stỏdum. Nockra smägeira og mutilerud | blỏd hefi eg feinged a Islande epter 1702. | sitt ur hverium stad.

• 70 mm, 70mm10, s.d.
• Black and white photographs from september 1963.