The Tradition of Icelandic sagnakvæði

Aðalheiður Guðmundsdóttir. 2013. „The Tradition of Icelandic sagnakvæði“. RMN Newsletter 6: 15–20.

Ágrip: The late medieval Icelandic poems called sagnakvæði or sögukvæði [‘poetic or metrical tales, folktale poems’] have long been neglected by Old Norse scholars. As a consequence, they have not been widely known – at least not until recently – despite their great significance for the history of Icelandic literature, the developments of Old Norse poetic metres, the use of formulaic language in oral poetry, and, not least, the age and circulation of medieval folktales and fairytales. In this article. the sagnakvæði will be introduced, as well as the history of research.