Front flyleaf: Margret|ar | saga, | Haminingia fi|lger og heijll margfolld | þeijm ä þessa Bök |A | Helga Si|gurdar Dötter. | A þig Drötten Treÿ|ster eg. Added in the seventeenth century.
Wolf, Margrétar saga II 68-78
The saga ends with a prayer in Latin followed by a brief acoount of the death of her suitor, Olibus.
Svavar Sigmundsson, Íslenskar bænir fram um 1600 107, 108
The two first prayers are in Latin, each containing an epilogue in Icelandic written in another hand. The third prayer, written by a third hand, is in Icelandic and ends defectively.
„Þetta er skrifad a þessare Bök |epter gmlum kalfskinz Bokum Og epter Nyum Bænum vr |saxlendsku vtlogdum |Anno MIↄCXC þann |xvj Martii“
„Nu Ender þær gm |lu Bæner“
Hier Epter filgia Nockr |ar gödar Bæner Nylega |Vtlagdar
„Nockrar gödar Bæner Nylega |vtlagdar“
Parchment.
The manuscript is paginated.
Written in one column throughout. In the older part the number of lines per page varies from 13-16, in the younger part it varies from 8-17. The older part has rubrics in red.
Pp. 2-29:3, 30-31:2, 31:7-13 are written in an practiced Icelandic Gothic bookhand from the fourteenth century.
Pp. 29:4-14, 31:3-7, 31:13-15, containing Icelandic epilogues for the Latin prayers, are written in a second hand. As the previous hand, this is also a practiced Icelandic Gothic bookhand from the fourteenth century, yet the writing is smaller and more neat.
P. 32, containing an incomplete Icelandic prayer, is written in a third hand. According to Christopher Sanders (pers. 1988, see ONP) this hand is from the sixteenth century. It is an Icelandic Gothic bookhand resembling the first hand the most, but the writing is more casual.
The younger part of the manuscript (pp. 33-87 and 92) is written in an Icelandic Neogothic Cursiva.
Page 1 contains a full length picture of Saint Margrét. She is standing under a trefoiled arch, with a crown on her head, and the hair falling down over her shoulders, in flowing drapery, and with a book in her left hand, in the right a sword whose point pierces the dragon under her feet. The picture has been coloured and tampered with in later ages.
The initials of the older part of the manuscript are in red and blue ink.
The initials of the younger part of the manuscript are exuberantly flourished in red and gilt.
On page 92 a stanza from 1716 reads: Fyrer bökar lánid bid eg ydur |blessn sende |Raunum ollum Riett af vende |Rijkur gud meth sinn hende |Anno1716 |3 |febr.
An AM-slip pasted on the first fly-leaf reads: Fra Jon Haldorsen i Hiterdal annammet med Buudeskib 1728. den 10. Julii. Var þä innbunded, enn eg tok banded af.
The manuscript is written in Iceland in the fourtheenth to the seventeenth centuries. The manuscript consists of two parts: an older and a younger. The older part, pp. 1-32, originates from the fourteenth century (p. 32, however, from the sixteenth century (see above); the younger part, comprising the flyleaves and pp. 33-92, is written in the seventeenth century..
According to a note on page 92 the manuscript once belonged to Rev. Þorkell Guðbjartsson and afterwards to Bishop Jón Arason and after him to his daughter Helga Aradóttir. Presumably their names written were on the last page of the codex before it was rebound in 1689. The note, written in the seventeenth century hand, says: þessa Bok Hefur Att Adur |Sira Þorkell Gudbiartzson og |Sydar Effter Hann Jon Biskup Arason Huoria Eygnadest Sydan | Helga Ara Dotter og voru allra þe|szra Nofn a Sydasta blada A Bok|enne Adur hun var uppbundenn. |Anno 1689 þann 27 Decembris |JSsmeh. The next known owner is the Priest Jón Halldórsson of Hítardalur.
According to the AM-slip Árni Magnússon got the codex from the Priest Jón Halldórsson of Hítardalur in 1728: Fra Hr. Jon Haldorsen i Hiterdal annammet med Buudeskib 1728. den 10. Julii. Var þä innbunded, enn eg tok banded af.
Catalogued 30. mars 2000 by EW-J.
The manuscript was photographed in 1969.
A second set of photographs were made in 1973.