The King's Mirror (Speculum regale-Konungs skuggsjá)
Philosophy
The King's Mirror (Speculum regale-Konungs skuggsjá)
Education of princes; Encyclopedias and dictionaries -- Early works to 1600; Scandinavia -- Civilization
undertook to edit a series of Old Norse texts, among which was the
_King’s Mirror_, which was published under the auspices of the
University of Christiania in 1848.
The Christiania edition is based on the main manuscript of the _Speculum
Regale_, the manuscript 243 B of the Arnamagnean collection. This was
produced in Norway some time during the last quarter of the thirteenth
century, perhaps not long after 1275.[157] As the manuscript was
incomplete in part, the editors also made use of the copies which had
been made the basis of the earlier edition. Inasmuch as the materials to
be used had been copied at different times and consequently reflected
various stages of linguistic development, it was thought desirable to
normalize the orthography: and in this part of their task the editors
made use of a fragment which was thought to belong to a somewhat earlier
date than the main manuscript.[158] If this belief is correct, the
Christiania edition must, in respect to orthography, be a comparatively
close approximation of the original manuscript.
Footnote 157:
See Flom’s edition of _Konungs Skuggsjá_, introduction.
Footnote 158:
See the Christiania edition, pp. xiii-xvi.
In 1881 a third edition prepared by the German philologist Otto Brenner
was published under the title _Speculum Regale, ein altnorwegischer
Dialog_. Brenner based his text on the Norwegian manuscript 243 B, but
he also made use of the Icelandic copy (243 A) and of some of the older
fragments. His edition consequently includes all the materials that had
been used in the earlier editions. It was Brenner’s purpose to prepare a
text which should give the Norwegian version in its original form, so
far as such a restoration is possible. Though scholars are not agreed
that Brenner achieved his purpose, all have acknowledged the value of
his work, and since its publication his version has been regarded as the
standard edition.
Two years ago (1915) the University of Illinois published, under the
editorial direction of Professor George T. Flom, a photographic
reproduction of this same manuscript, 243 B. This important linguistic
monument has thus been made accessible to scholars in its original form.
Professor Flom has also prepared the Old Norse text of the manuscript,
which makes a part of the publication, and has prefaced the whole with
an extended introduction in which he discusses the history of the
manuscript, marginal addenda, abbreviations, and other paleographic and
linguistic problems.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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