Edda [1760s]

Identity Statement

Reference code(s)	: GB 0103 MS ICELANDIC 6
Held at	: University College London   Click here to find out how to view this collection at http://www.ucl.ac.uk/Library/special-coll ›
Full title	: Edda [1760s]
Date(s)	: [1760s]
Level of description	: Collection (fonds)
Extent	: 1 volume containing 150 leaves
Name of creator(s)	: Unknown Ólafsson | Eggert | 1726-1768 | Icelandic poet and antiquarian

Context

Administrative/Biographical history:

Eggert Ólafsson: born to a farming family at Snaefellsnes, Iceland, 1726; took his bachelor's degree at the University of Copenhagen; interested in natural history and carried out a scientific and cultural survey of Iceland, 1752-1757; poet, antiquarian and advocate of Icelandic language and culture; died at sea in Breida Bay, off the northwest coast of Iceland, 1768. Publication: Reise igiennem Island (2 volumes, 1772) (Travels in Iceland).

'Edda' comprises a body of ancient Icelandic literature contained in two books, the Prose (or Younger) Edda and the Poetic (or Elder) Edda, and constitutes the fullest source for modern knowledge of Germanic mythology. The Prose Edda was written by the Icelandic chieftain, poet,and historian Snorri Sturluson, probably in 1222-1223, and is a textbook intended to instruct young poets in the metres of the early Icelandic skalds (court poets) and to provide the Christian age with an understanding of the mythological subjects referred to in early poetry. The Poetic Edda is a manuscript of the later 13th century, but containing older materials (hence the 'Elder' Edda), and contains mythological and heroic poems of unknown authorship, usually dramatic dialogues in a terse and archaic style, composed from the 9th to the 11th century.

Content

Scope and content/abstract:

Manuscript volume [1760s]: Edda samann tekinn af Snorra Sturlasyne (selections based on the Laufäs, or prose, Edda, in an unknown hand). A pencil note on the front flyleaf records: Marginal notes by famous Icelandic poet Eggert Olafsson; written during the reign of Christian VII of Denmark.

Access & Use

Language/scripts of material:
Icelandic

System of arrangement:

Conditions governing access:

Open.

Conditions governing reproduction:

Normal copyright restrictions apply.

Finding aids:

List at University College London Special Collections.

Archival Information

Archival history:

The volume contains the bookplate of Alexander, Baron Peckover of Wisbech.

Immediate source of acquisition:

Presented to University College London by Professor L S Penrose, grandson of Alexander, Baron Peckover of Wisbech, in 1967.

Allied Materials

Related material:

Publication note:

Description Notes

Archivist's note:
Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica online. Compiled by Rachel Kemsley as part of the RSLP AIM25 project.

Rules or conventions:
Compiled in compliance with General International Standard Archival Description, ISAD(G), second edition, 2000; National Council on Archives Rules for the Construction of Personal, Place and Corporate Names, 1997.

Date(s) of descriptions:
Aug 2001