分类：
2008-05-11 09:02:21
Introduction to Snorra Edda
The name of snorri sturluson holds a special place of honour in the literary history of medieval Iceland.Those works which can be attributed to him with the greatest certainty,sagas of the Norvegian kings and snorra Edda,are invaluable sources on the ancient cultural heritage of the Nordic nations,better preserved in Iceland than elsewhere.In addition to which they bear witness to the unique talents of the author,his writing prowess and knowledge. Snorri´s nephew and disciple,Sturla þórðarson,who wrote a history of the century a few decades after his death,makes no mention of his writings, however,with the exception of one sentence,not even mentioning them by name. Snorri was at one point the wealthies leader in Icland,enjoying great respect both among his countrymen and at the court of the Norwegian monarch,where he stayed from 1218 to 1220.His fortunes waned as he grew older,however,in the internecine struggles of Icelandic shieftains for power and influence and he was finally killed in his own home at Reykholt on 23 September 1241.
Snorri was of a prominent family in west Iceland,with a number of illustrious ancestors.Born in 1179,he was the youngest son of a dominant and quarrelsome chieftain who died while snorri was still a young child.At the age of two years snorri was sent to Oddi,in south Iceland,where he was fostered by Jón Loptsson and would dwell for the next decades.At this time Jón Loptsson was the most powerfulIcelandic leader,and a close relative of the Norwegian royal family.His family included numerous learned men,priests and bishops,with the family´s wealth to a significant extent the result of its to the time of the priest s´mundr sigfússon the Learned(1056-1133),who had studied in the Frankish realm and was the first Icelandic author.He wrote a brief Latin chronicle of the Norwegian kings,which is now lost with the exception of a few lines quoted in works by other authors.þorlákr þórhallson,who was the bishop in Skálholt 1178-1193.began his dtudies in Oddi,then continued to Paris and Lincoln,where Jón Loptsson´s won son Páll,who was bishop 1195-1211,also studied.
There is no mention of snorri taking orders at Oddi, although he doubtless learned some Latin there together with the basics of other clerical instruction of the time. The subsequent course of his life indicates that he did not intend,but rather a worldly one. In 1215 he became the Icelandic Lawspeaker, the most respected secular positon in the country,and on which he would retain until 1231,with a brief interruption while he was abroad.He no doubt studied law with his foster-father Jón Loptsson and other learned men in Oddi.The first scholar of Oddi had written of the Norwegian kings and there would have been books there on these kings,as well as the kings of Denmark and earls of Danish kings from ancient times) and Orkneyinga saga ( the Saga of the Earls of Orkney) were composed in Oddi or by members of family at Oddi during Snorri´s youth.Oral lore,both prose and poetry,of men and events in Iceland and abroad would also have been frequently recited at Oddi,providing knowledge of which Snorri could later avail himself in his writings,snorri´s most important sources,and the ones which in particular enabled him to correct and supplement earlier works on the same subject,were laudatory poems celebrating kings and earls,their battles and struggles for supremacy.
The art of skaldic poetry dates back into ancient times among the Norwegians and possibly other Nordic peoples.while the oldest preserved fragments are considered to date from the 9th century, towards the end of the 10th Icelanders appear to hold a monopoly as court poets, or skáld, a profession they would continue to pursue right up to snorri´s day.
