essay
þógunna's testament: a myth for moral contemplation and social apathy
From sagas to society : comparative approaches to early Iceland • Enfield Lock, Middlesex, Uk • Published In 1992 • Pages: 125-146
By: Odner, Knut.
AbstractBrief abstract written by HRAF anthropologists who have done the subject indexing for the document
Throughout this article, Odner tries to establish a connection between sagas as myths and sagas as rituals. The particular saga used as an illustration in the text is the 'Eyrbyggja saga', particularly with the part called the þórgunna story which the author considers as a myth.in the Lévi-Straussean sense (i.e.that myths have a binary structure and that their oppositions explore contradiction in social and other relations [p. 125]). As a result of a detailed analysis of the above, Odner concludes that 'traditions of orality, traditions of literacy (more than 1000 years) and the context of saga reading all indicate to me that saga writing and reading were ritual acts' (p. 146).
- SubjectsDocument-level OCM identifiers given by the anthropology subject indexers at HRAF
- Sociolinguistics
- Writing
- Verbal arts
- Classes
- Ethics
- Ingroup antagonisms
- Cosmology
- Spirits and gods
- Revelation and divination
- cultureCulture name from the Outline of World Cultures (OWC)
- Early Icelanders
- HRAF PubDateThe date HRAF published the document
- 2004
- RegionThe area the document pertains to
- Europe
- Sub RegionThe more specific area the document pertains to, which is located within the Region
- Scandinavia
- Document TypeMay include journal articles, essays, collections of essays, monographs, or chapters/parts of monographs
- essay
- Evaluation
- Creator TypeThe type of person writing the document, e.g. Ethnographer, Missionary, Archaeologist, Folklorist, Linguist, Indigenous Person, and so on.
- Social Anthropologist
- Document Rating A ranking done by HRAF anthropologists based on the strength of the source material on a scale of 1 to 5, as follows: 1 - poor; 2 - fair; 3 - good, useful data, but not uniformly excellent; 4 - excellent secondary data; 5 - excellent primary data.
- 4: Excellent Secondary Data
- AnalystThe HRAF anthropologist who subject indexed the document and prepared other materials for the eHRAF culture/tradition collection
- John Beierle ; 2002
- Field DateThe date the researcher conducted the fieldwork or archival research that produced the document
- no date
- Coverage DateThe date or dates that the information in the document pertains to
- ninth-thirteenth centuries
- Coverage PlaceLocation of the research culture or tradition (often a smaller unit such as a band, community, or archaeological site)
- general Iceland
- NotesAdditional notes
- Knut Odner
- For bibliographical references see document 10: [Gísli Pálsson]
- LCCNLibrary of Congress Control Number
- 93150093
- LCSHLibrary of Congress Subject Headings
- Icelanders