Magnús Jónsson í Tjaldanesi
Magnús Jónsson í Tjaldanesi (1835-1922) was one of the foremost Icelandic scribes of his time.
Life
Magnús received no formal education, and spent most of his life as a farmer living on the farm Tjaldanes in Dalasýsla, for which he is named.[1]: 56
Copying
Magnús is known today for his extraordinary output as a scribe, copying
Icelandic sagas. He is unusual, if not unique, for only copying works in this form (and not, for example, poetry or genealogies).[1]: 57 As of 2013, 43 surviving manuscripts by Magnús had been identified, comprising 28,000 pages, or over 6 million words. Magnús appears to have begun copying in his teens,[1]: 57–58 but the datable manuscripts are from the period 1874-1916 (though nine are undated and seem to be from before 1874). In total, these contain copies of 171 different sagas—the majority of which Magnús copied two to four times. Moreover, at least some (perhaps half) of Magnús's output is now lost.[1]
: 56–57, 62 n. 20
The sagas that Magnús copied range across the main genres, and include all or nearly all the Lbs 1510 4to.[2]
Influence
Perhaps twelve sagas are known solely from Magnús's copying.National Library of Iceland spent around half its acquisitions budget for the year on a twenty-volume set of his Fornmannasögur norðurlanda (250 krónur).[1]: 60
In recent years, Magnús's work has attracted growing scholarly interest.[3][4][5]
References
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j Driscoll, Matthew James 2013. 'The Long and Winding Road: Manuscript Culture in Late Pre-Modern Iceland'. In: Anna Kuismin & Matthew James Driscoll (eds.), White Field Black Seeds. Nordic Literacy Practices in the Long Nineteenth Century. (Studia Fennica Litteraria 7.) Helsinki: Finnish literary society SKS. Pp. 50-63.
- doi:10.17613/M6J49W.
- ^ Driscoll, Matthew James 1997. The Unwashed Children of Eve: The Production, Dissemination and Reception of Popular Literature in Post-Reformation Iceland. Enfield Lock, Middlesex, UK: Hisarlik Press.
- ^ Driscoll, Matthew James 2012. Um gildi gamalla bóka: Magnús Jónsson í Tjaldanesi und das Ende der isländischen Handschriftenkultur. In: Jürg Glauser & Anna Katharina Richter (eds.), Text – Reihe – Transmission: Unfestigkeit als Phänomen skandinavischer Erzählprosa 1500–1800. Tübingen, Basel: Francke. Pp. 255–282.
- '^ Hufnagel, Silvia Veronika Sörla saga sterka in its final phase of manuscript transmission', in Legendary Sagas: Origins and Development, ed. by Annette Lassen, Agneta Ney, Ármann Jakobsson (Reykjavík: University of Iceland Press, 2012), pp. 431-54.