Scribe, Redactor, Author: The Emergence and Evolution of Icelandic Romance

This essay examines the role played by Icelandic scribes and redactors in the transmission and evolution of narrative in the wake of the translations of foreign literature in the North. Four sagas exemplify how new narratives were created. The substantial revisions by an Icelandic redactor of the Old Norse Bisclaretz ljóð resulted in the creation of an exemplum in Tíódéls saga, while the conjoining of the foreign fairy-mistress motif and the indigenous maiden-king motif in Partalopa saga brought about a significant modification of the plot of its French source. The author of Gibbons saga created an original frame narrative with a plot that combined the fairy-mistress tale of Partalopa saga with the indigenous maiden-king paradigm. On the basis of Arthurian narrative structures and motifs the author of Ectors saga composed a serial narrative relating the adventures undertaken by seven knights.