1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910818836403321

Autore

Guðrún Nordal

Titolo

Tools of literacy : the role of Skaldic verse in Icelandic textual culture of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries / / Guðrún Nordal

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Toronto, [Ontario] ; ; Buffalo, [New York] ; ; London, [England] : , : University of Toronto Press, , 2001

{copy}2001

ISBN

1-4426-8266-3

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (451 p.)

Disciplina

839.61009

Soggetti

Scalds and scaldic poetry - History and criticism

Scalds and scaldic poetry - Social aspects

Old Norse literature - History and criticism

Criticism, interpretation, etc.

Electronic books.

Island Skaldendichtung Geschichte

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Nota di contenuto

Skaldic Verse and Learning -- The Twelfth Century -- Drottkvaett and the study of grammatica -- The grammatical literature -- Hattalykill -- A twelfth-century poet: Bishop Kloeingr Porsteinsson -- Snorra Edda and the Study of Grammatica -- Manuscript textuality -- The medieval codices of Snorra Edda -- The manuscripts of Snorra Edda and the grammatical literature -- The Sources and the Thirteenth-Century Poet -- Sources of Skaldic Verse -- Textbooks and treatises -- Translations from Latin -- A saint's life -- Historical writing -- The Poet's Profession -- Professional poets -- Aristocratic poets in Iceland -- Clerics as poets -- Excursus: The Thirteenth-Century Poet -- Unknown thirteenth-century poets listed in both versions of Skaldatal and their patrons -- Twelfth-century poets in Sturlunga saga -- Known thirteenth-century poets -- Theory and Practice in Skaldic Poetics -- Theoretical Discussion of the Kenning -- The Kenning in vernacular literary theory -- The fusion of vernacular and Latin traditions -- The Kenning in grammatica -- Categories of meaning in Skaldskaparmal



and Litla Skalda -- Pulur -- Theory and Practice in Skaldic Verse -- The Poetic treatises -- The human body dismembered in skaldic diction -- Sources of Inspiration -- Cosmology, Learning, and Body Imagery -- Neoplatonist ideas and the world-body -- Ymir's body in Snorri Sturluson's Gylfaginning -- The poetic landscape in body imagery -- Cosmological imagery -- Natural landscape -- Flora -- The human body -- Digging for Gold in Skaldic Verse.

Sommario/riassunto

"Tools of Literacy is a thorough, ground-breaking examination of skaldic verse or drottkvaett, Icelandic literary production in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, and of the textual culture that nurtured the poets. Gudrun Nordal demonstrates the connection between skaldic verse and the formal study of grammatica in Icelandic schools, outlining how skaldic verse was treated much like a Nordic equivalent to classic texts. She also reevaluates and reemphasizes the versatility of skaldic verse, establishing the links between Icelandic authors and intellectual currents in Europe at the time. By systematically tying poets together with leading families of the time and with ecclesiastical and secular learning, Nordal shows how skaldic verse-making was one of the class symbols of the new aristocracy in twelfth- and thirteenth-century Iceland." "In giving a faithful account of Icelandic skaldic verse-making at this time, Nordal has developed a database of approximately 1900 kennings and heiti which serves as a point of reference throughout the book. The book's content is new and its overall coverage is unique. Tools of Literacy will be of interest to scholars and students in the fields of comparative literature, comparative mythology, Old Norse/Icelandic literature and language, and medieval studies."--Jacket