THE STORY OF THE HEATH-SLAYINGS Heitharviga Saga

[Ulf]

Heitharvtga saga, as a literary product, is unquestionably the oldest of all the
sagas of Iceland. Unfortunately it has come down to us in a sadly mangled state.
Ours being the first attempt at an English rendering of the difficult original, we
consider that a concise account of the "fata libelli" containing it, is in place at
the head of our prefatory remarks.
It was acquired by purchase from Iceland by the Royal Academy of Antiquities in
Sweden, through the agency of the Icelander, Jon Eggertsson, in the year 1682. (1)
It is now incorporated in the Royal Library at Stockholm, bearing the signature 18
among the Icelandic quartos. At the time of its purchase it may or may not have been
a perfect book, probably the latter was the case; (2) at any rate, when Arni
Magnusson ascertained its existence in Sweden, after 1722, it was but a remnant of a
book, consisting of thirty-six leaves. Of these the first 25-1/2 contained a
fragment of the story of Slaying Stir and the saga of the Heath-slayings complete,
with the exception of one leaf (see our translation, Chapter XXXIV). The remaining
12-1/2 leaves contained the text of the saga of Gunnlaug the Wormtongue, the best
existing of that saga.

Arni Magnusson having applied to the Swedish Academy for the loan of the MS,
obtained, fortunately, only the first twelve leaves of it, the obvious reason being
that those leaves had become disconnected from the rest, of the existence of which,
for a long time afterwards, no one had the least idea. Of these twelve leaves Arni
caused his able amanuensis, Jon Olafsson from Grunnavik (1705-1778), to take a copy,
in the latter part of the year 1727; but original as well as copy were both
destroyed in the Copenhagen conflagration of 1728. In the following year Olafsson
wrote down from memory the contents of the destroyed leaves, from which we have
drawn the brief introductory matter to the story. On a journey of antiquarian
research to Stockholm in 1772, Hannes Finnsson (son of the famous Church historian
of Iceland, Finnur Jonsson) discovered the lost remainder of the precious fragment,
the best edition of which is Jon Sigurdsson's in the second volume of
Islendingasogur, 1847. On his edition our translation depends.

Of all the Icelandic sagas this is the most quaint in style. The author knows
not yet how to handle prose for the purpose of historical composition. In one and
the same sentence allocutive speech and historic narrative are blended together in
the most unconscious manner. The author assumes tacitly all throughout that the
reader knows all about his tale; hence he hardly ever takes the trouble to add to
the Christian names of the actors the patronymic. In one instance this confidence in
the reader's knowledge carries him even so far as in chap. xxxix. to refer to a
person mentioned in the beginning of chap. xxxvi. (Thorod Kegward) as "he". This,
more than any other Icelandic saga, affords us an insight into what the saga-telling
was like during the period of oral tradition. It was the common property of teller
and listener alike. This the former knew, and need not be on his guard against
disjointed, loopholed delivery; the listener's knowledge supplied all troublesome
little details, the teller took care of facts, characters, dramatic action.