The Medieval Annals of Iceland: A First English Translation

FAIN: FB-52321-06

Elizabeth Ashman Rowe
Unaffiliated Independent Scholar (Somerville, MA 02143)

Ten annals from medieval Iceland are preserved in the original or in copies. Written mostly in Old Norse, their notices were composed retrospectively, sometimes later that year, sometimes many years afterwards, and sometimes by eyewitnesses. Most were produced for the church, but a few were written by or for laymen. THE MEDIEVAL ANNALS OF ICELAND will be the first English translation of these important primary sources, and the introduction will be the first comprehensive treatment of the subject since 1888, covering the development of the annals, their textual relationships, their socio-political functions, and problems such as the relationship between annals and sagas and the abrupt end of medieval Icelandic annalistics in 1430.