Haraldur Hreinsson

Sagas and Secularity:
The (Re)Construction of Secular Literature in
20th-century Iceland

Working Paper #24

Working Paper Series of the Centre for Advanced Studies
in the Humanities and Social Sciences (CASHSS)“Multiple Secularities – Beyond the West, Beyond Modernities”
ISSN 2700-5518#24: Haraldur Hreinsson. “Sagas and Secularity: The (Re)Construction ofSecular Literature in 20th-century Iceland.”Leipzig University, 2022.
© Haraldur Hreinsson
This Working Paper has been published online and can be downloaded fromwww.multiple-secularities.de/publications/working-papers or ordered in print
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limit publication in any other venue. Copyright remains with the authors.
Please cite as:
Hreinsson, Haraldur. “Sagas and Secularity: The (Re)Construction of Secular
Literature in 20th-century Iceland” Working Paper Series of the CASHSS“Multiple Secularities – Beyond the West, Beyond Modernities” 24. Leipzig
University, 2022.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.36730/2020.1.msbwbm.24

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Contents

1 Introduction.............................................................................................................. 3
2 Historiographical Backdrop: The Particularity of Medieval Icelandic Culture
and Sagas.................................................................................................................. 9
2.1 The Case for an Icelandic Sonderweg............................................................... 10
2.2 The Medieval Genesis: Literature as a Field................................................... 12
2.3 Continuity or Rupture?....................................................................................... 15
3 Sagas and Secularity: The (Re)Construction of Icelandic Medieval Literature...... 19
3.1 Rationalism................................................................................................................... 22
3.2 Realism and Objectivity............................................................................................. 25
3.3 Individualism............................................................................................................... 27
3.4 Fatalism.......................................................................................................................... 29
4 Conclusion................................................................................................................ 32
5 Bibliography.............................................................................................................. 36

1

Sagas and Secularity: The (Re)Construction of Secular
Literature in 20th-century Iceland
1 Introduction

The Old Icelandic sagas enjoy a special place in Icelandic culture.1 In
recent decades, scholars have discussed how the sagas have contributed
to the shaping of Icelandic national identity, and especially the role they
played for the nationalist movement in the 20th century and its struggle for
Iceland’s independence.2 Icelandic society became rapidly modernised in
the course of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, as its focus shifted awayfrom rural farming, and it became an industrialised fishing society withurbanising tendencies.3 These comprehensive changes also had an impact
on the religious sphere, and Icelandic society gradually became secularised.

1

2

3

The term ‘sagas’ has to be qualified on several levels. In the academic field ofsaga studies, scholars distinguish between several different saga genres: kings’
sagas, sagas of Icelanders, contemporary sagas, legendary sagas, translated
chivalric sagas, indigenous chivalric sagas, hagiographic sagas. Massimiliano
Bampi, “Genre,” in The Routledge Research Companion to the Medieval Icelandic
Sagas, ed. Ármann Jakobsson, and Sverrir Jakobsson (London: Routledge, 2017),
4–5. Such a differentiated view of the medieval saga writings, however, does notcorrespond to how the term ‘sagas’ is used in popular discourse, where it is taken
to refer in a general way to writings composed in Iceland during the Middle Ages,
i.e. in the course of the 12th, 13th and 14th centuries. The surrounding intellectual
debate of the early 20th century, which will be subject to analysis in the latter partof this article, was usually carried out with reference to the better-known sagas of
the Icelanders, for example, Njáls saga, Egils saga, Laxdæla saga, Fóstbrœðra sagaor Hrafnkels saga, to name but a few. Furthermore, the perceived ‘Icelandicness’of the sagas is probably a modern construction. The notion of an Icelandic
national identity in the medieval period is a problematic one. At the time, Iceland
was part of the larger Norse-speaking cultural zone, and the discussion about acollective identity amongst the people living in Iceland in the Middle Ages has, inrecent years, been carried out in the more restricted terms of regional identities.
Jesse L. Byock, “Modern Nationalism and the Medieval Sagas,” in Northern
Antiquity: The Post-Medieval Reception of Edda and Saga (Enfield Lock:
Hisarlik Press, 1994); Jón Karl Helgason, Hetjan og höfundurinn: Brot úríslenskri menningarsögu (Reykjavík: Heimskringla, Háskólaforlag Máls og
menningar, 1998), and Jón Karl Helgason, “Continuity? The Icelandic Sagas
in Postmedieval Times,“ in A Companion to Old Norse-Icelandic Literature andCulture, ed. Rory McTurk (Oxford: Blackwell, 2004).
Gunnar Karlsson, The History of Iceland (Minneapolis, MN: University of
Minnesota Press, 2000), 195–296.
3

The study of secularity in Iceland has so far largely been restricted to
institutional differentiation, alongside legal aspects of the relationshipbetween the state and the country’s national church.4 This paper will approach
the formation of secularity in the country from a different angle. Adopting
a research perspective shaped by both cultural history and sociology ofculture, it will investigate the role of the Icelandic sagas, and the medieval
culture which spawned them, in the development of secularity in Iceland.
Instead of looking at the processes through which Christian religion cameto be separated from other spheres of society, it will probe the discourses
legitimising such a separation. It will pay special attention to the reception
and understanding of the sagas and the medieval culture which produced
them, and further ask how they provided a background against which asecular culture could be imagined, both in the past and for the present.
The historical analysis presented in this paper is carried out within
the theoretical framework developed by the Multiple Secularities projectat Leipzig University.5 In the Multiple Secularities approach, the term
‘secularity’ enjoys a central place as a heuristic concept, defined as the“culturally and symbolically as well as institutionally anchored forms
and arrangements of differentiation between religion and other social

4

5

On the topic of secularisation in particular, see Pétur Pétursson, Church andSocial Change: A Study of the Secularization Process in Iceland since 1830, 3rd ed.
(Reykjavík: [s.n.], 2017) and Þórunn Valdimarsdóttir, and Pétur Pétursson, Tilmóts við nútímann, vol. 4 of Kristni á Íslandi, ed. Hjalti Hugason (Reykjavík:Alþingi, 2000).
The conceptual framework of the project has been explained in detailelsewhere by the directors of the project and other affiliated members, see
Christoph Kleine, and Monika Wohlrab-Sahr, “Research Programme of
the HCAS ‘Multiple Secularities – Beyond the West, Beyond Modernities’,”Working Paper Series of the HCAS “Multiple Secularities – Beyond the West,
Beyond Modernities” 1, Leipzig University, 2016; Monika Wohlrab-Sahr, andMarian Burchardt, “Revisiting the Secular: Multiple Secularities and Pathways
to Modernity,” Working Paper Series of the HCAS “Multiple Secularities –Beyond the West, Beyond Modernities” 2, Leipzig University, 2017; Christoph
Kleine, and Monika Wohlrab-Sahr, “Preliminary Findings and Outlook of
the CASHSS ‘Multiple Secularities – Beyond the West, Beyond Modernities’,”Working Paper Series of the HCAS “Multiple Secularities – Beyond theWest, Beyond Modernities” 22, Leipzig University, 2020; Christoph Kleine,and Monika Wohlrab-Sahr, “Comparative Secularities: Tracing Social andEpistemic Structure beyond the Modern West,” Method and Theory in the Studyof Religion 33 (2021).
4

spheres.”6 This paper explores how Icelandic medieval culture, especiallyas represented by Icelandic medieval ‘literature’, has become an important
locus in which the religious came to be distinguished from a non-religious
sphere of society. More concretely, this paper aims to show, from a discursive
research perspective, how, at an important period in the social and political
history of the country, medieval Icelandic literature, and the culture it
represented, were framed in terms that can be described as secular.
The paper is divided into two parts. First, it will discuss how scholars
have attempted to analyse Icelandic medieval society, with a special
emphasis on the role of literature as a factor – or even a separate social
field – contributing to its development. This survey serves as a backdrop
for the analysis presented in the article’s second part; providing historicalinformation, framed in relevant sociological vocabulary, on what aspects ofIcelandic medieval society promoted and justified the construction of secularmedieval literature in the early 20th century. It should be noted that, in bothparts, the analysis takes place on the level of discourse, and is intended lessas a contribution and more as a prelude to an actual historical analysis of
Icelandic medieval society centring around the concept of secularity.7
For practical purposes, the analysis in the second part of this paper
will be constrained to roughly the first half of the 20th century, and to thewritings of intellectuals. This period was, in many respects, an important
one for the development at hand. As will be explained in more detail below,
in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the scholarly perception and theintellectual orchestration of Iceland’s medieval heritage and saga writingschanged significantly. One could even argue, as will be done below, that ina certain sense, the notion of medieval ‘literature’ was first introduced at
this point – or was at least reintroduced after a long period of absence. As
scholarship of recent years and decades has shown, such an interpretation

6

7

Monika Wohlrab-Sahr, and Marian Burchardt, “Multiple Secularities: Toward
a Cultural Sociology of Secular Modernities,” Comparative Sociology 11 (2012):
881. For an extensive discussion on the difference between ‘differentiation’ and‘distinction’, as defined by the Multiple Secularities project, see Kleine, andWohlrab-Sahr, “Comparative Secularities,” 52–62.
The historical debate on the actual socio-religious make-up of medieval Icelandic
society is still ongoing. For a summary of the debate, see Haraldur Hreinsson,
Force of Words: A Cultural History of Christianity and Politics in Medieval Iceland(11th-13th Centuries), The Northern World 90 (Leiden: Brill, 2021), 4–17.
5

played a prominent role for the nationalist movement of the time, when
the struggle, first for increased political autonomy, and later for complete
independence from the Danish kingdom, predominated in Icelandic culture
and society. The sagas, and the medieval culture which produced them, notonly provided Icelanders with a ‘golden age’ to fall back on in the ongoingprocess of building a national identity, but also became a source of national
pride. This was thanks to a body of literary masterpieces, composed byauthors comparable to other masters of the Western literary canon. Less
attention has been paid to the ways in which the construction of the sagas
as literature implied a particular historical narrative; one which assumes thecontinuous autonomy of Icelandic ‘literature’ from the Christian religion
and the Christian church(es), from the late 10th century onwards.
Before engaging in the actual analysis, a note on the concept of literatureand its usage in the discussion on the formation of secularity in Iceland is inorder. With regard to differentiations and distinctions between the religious
and the non-religious, ‘literature’ has been something of a Grenzgänger,crossing back and forth across this divide. Like other practices of artistic
creation, literary production has often been described as having been‘inspired’ in one way or another. In such cases, however, the nature of theinspiration can be framed in a variety of ways, and defined accordingly as
religious or secular, depending on the nature and context of the writing.
Throughout history, literary creation and the art of the word have been
seen as both divina scriptura and litteratura mundi or litteratura saecularis,
to use terminology dating back to patristic authors such as Tertullian and
Jerome.8 In the modern period, literature has, alongside other branches of
the arts, increasingly come to be defined as autotelic, existing for its own
sake, separate from other spheres of society. Along such lines, Northrop
Frye defined literature as “an autonomous verbal structure” serving “theprimary literary aim of producing a structure of words for its own sake.”9Interesting as they may be, the present paper will not be concerned withquestions of such general scope regarding the concept of literature. Instead,89Eric Ziolkowski, Religion and Literature: History and Method, Brill Research
Perspectives in Religion and the Arts 3.1 (Leiden: Brill, 2019), 15.
Northrop Frye, “Ethical Criticism: Theory of Symbols,” in Anatomy of Criticism:
Four Essays, with a foreword by Harold Bloom (Princeton, NJ: Princeton
University Press, 1990 [1957]), 74.
6

it will focus on how the concept of literature was constructed in a particular
historical context, namely early 20th-century Iceland, paying particularattention to the distinction between the religious and the secular.
The history of Icelandic culture and society is a phenomenon that issocially relevant to the study of secularity and literature in many ways.
Since the 19th century, the production of literature – first medieval, andlater, additionally, modern – has figured prominently in public discourse,
as a central component of Icelandic national identity. Such preoccupation
with literature is, of course, not a phenomenon that is particular to Iceland,but should be seen in the context of a more widespread nationalisation ofliterature that took place in Europe in the 19th century.10 This development
was strongly influenced by Johann Gottfried Herder’s philosophy ofculture, and has even been referred to by scholars as the “Herderian
revolution” or the “Herder Effect.”11 Herder emphasised the uniqueness ofthe nation, reflected not only in its language and cultural traditions, but also
in its distinct vision and way of thinking – a Nationalcharakter (“national
character”), which manifested itself particularly clearly in a nation’s literary
production.12 In this period, the vernacular cultures of medieval Europe,
which had been either forgotten or neglected for centuries, were acquiring
a completely different place in the ongoing nation-building process.
Medieval literary compositions, long forgotten, were reintroduced andinterpreted as manifestations of the national character.13 In many cases,
such efforts required the recording and ‘textualising’ of oral folklore, which
was compiled, edited, and ultimately introduced as ‘literature’.14 In other

10 Viktoria Šeina, “Nation-Building Canons: Historical and Methodological
Considerations,” in Literary Canon Formation as Nation-Building in Central
Europe and the Baltics, ed. Aistė Kučinskienė, Viktorija Šeina, and Brigita
Speičytė, National Cultivation of Culture 24 (Leiden: Brill, 2021), 8–11.
11 Pascale Casanova, The World Republic of Letters, trans. Malcolm B. DeBevoise(Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2004), passim, e.g. 7.
12 Johann Gottfried Herder, “Briefe zur Beförderung der Humanität,” in Herders
Werke in fünf Bänden, 6th ed. (Berlin: Aufbau-Verlag, 1982), 5:160.
13 Viktoria Šeina, “Nation-Building Canons,” 3–7. Sometimes the same works
were claimed by several nations. Beowulf was, for example, hailed as national
literature by the English, Danes and Germans. Joep Leerssen, “Introduction:
Philology and the European Construction of National Literatures,” European
Studies 26 (2008): 23.
14 Šeina, “Nation-Building Canons,” 4.
7

instances, there was no recording needed, as the medieval material was
already compiled in existing manuscripts. In this regard, Iceland offers
itself as an interesting case in point, due to the high extent to which
medieval manuscripts containing diverse material have been preserved.
For various historical reasons, book production in medieval Iceland was
unusually vigorous compared to other countries, which explains, alongwith their efforts towards collecting and preserving the manuscripts in the
17th century, the large quantity of surviving medieval texts from Iceland,
compared to other Nordic countries.
For these reasons, alongside others to be discussed in the course of thispaper, the cultural and literary production of the Icelandic middle ages
became central to the cultural nationalism which dominated Icelandic
society and culture from the 19th century.15 It has even been argued thatthe medieval literary compositions acquired a particularly prominentplace in Iceland because of the limited extent to which other elements ofIceland’s material cultural heritage have been preserved; for example, there
are no medieval buildings still standing.16 This view was evident in a recent
remark made by the author Pétur Gunnarsson in a television interview,in which he described the contrast between the outer appearance of themanuscript of one of the best-known sagas, the Saga of Njáll (Njála), andthe work’s cultural significance:
It looks like a rat which has been run over on the highway. This is just a
shrivelled, twisted […] something like a lump. Shrivelled, twisted lump. It
is Njála. It is Notre Dame! They are the same age, Njála and Notre Dame.
Although it almost burned down, Notre Dame still stands but Njála looks
like this. Twisted and shrivelled, but the content we read of the manuscript
is this classical text which lives on, age after age.17
15 Byock, “Modern Nationalism and the Medieval Sagas”; Guðmundur
Hálfdanarson, Íslenska þjóðríkið: Uppruni og endimörk (Reykjavík: Hið íslenska
bókmenntafélag, Reykjavíkurakademían, 2001), 173–90; Sigríður Matthíasdóttir,
Hinn sanni Íslendingur: Þjóðerni, kyngervi og vald á Íslandi 1900–1930 (Reykjavík:
Háskólaútgáfan, 2004), 41–75; Sigurjón Árni Eyjólfsson, Trú, von og þjóð:Sjálfsmynd og staðleysur (Reykjavík: Hið íslenska bókmenntafélag, 2014), 283–301.
16 Arguably the most influential articulation of this view can already be found in
Sigurður Nordal, Íslensk menning, vol. 1 (Reykjavík: Mál og menning, 1942),
which will be subject to further analysis in the second part of the present paper.
17 Interview (in Icelandic) with Pétur Gunnarsson on the television show Handritin– veskú on RÚV1, first aired April 22, 2021. This translation, and others from8

In light of the above, it is clear that the formation of secularity, as evidenced
by the separation between religion and literature, took place in close contact
with the rise of romantic nationalism, as well as the Icelandic political struggle
for greater autonomy, and later full independence, in the first half of the 20th
century. With regard to the theoretical framework of the Multiple Secularities
approach, it emerged in response to a particular “reference problem,” i.e. “theproblem of social or national integration and development.”18
2 Historiographical Backdrop: The Particularity of Medieval Icelandic
Culture and Sagas

Medieval Icelandic society during the period between 930 and 1262/64,
variously referred to as the Icelandic Commonwealth or the Icelandic Free
State (Icel. Þjóðveldi), has been portrayed, both historically and in popular
culture, as having constituted a special chapter in European history. During
this time, a political arrangement developed which, unlike elsewhere inEurope, did not rely on decisions made in the court of a king, but rather on
the deliberation and, when the deliberation failed, violent feuding of theland-owning magnates.19 In this same period, a literary culture emergedthat brought forth the diverse body of writings, collectively referred toas ‘the sagas’, which describe the lives of the people living on the island.20
Nowhere in the Nordic region – or for that matter in the medieval West– did there emerge a comparable body of writings, consisting of what has
been described as “realistic prose stories, telling of the fates of common
people.”21 The place of religion in this society, and the role it played inpolitical and cultural developments, remain subject to debate. It has, for

Icelandic, Swedish, Norwegian, and Latin, are my own unless noted otherwise.
18 Wohlrab-Sahr, and Burchardt, “Revisiting the Secular,” 20.
19 Established scholarly accounts of the social and political situation include Jesse L.
Byock, Medieval Iceland: Society, Sagas, and Power (Berkeley, CA: University ofCalifornia Press, 1988); William Ian Miller, Bloodtaking and Peacemaking: Feud,
Law, and Society in Saga Iceland (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1990);
Jón Viðar Sigurðsson, Chieftains and Power in the Icelandic Commonwealth,Viking Collection 12 (Odense: Odense University Press, 1999).
20 For a recent overview of saga scholarship, including an up-to-date bibliography,see Ármann Jakobsson, and Sverrir Jakobsson, eds., The Routledge ResearchCompanion to the Medieval Icelandic Sagas (London: Routledge, 2017).
21 Gunnar Karlsson, Goðamenning: Staða og áhrif goðorðsmanna í þjóðveldi Íslendinga(Reykjavík: Heimskringla, háskólaforlag Máls og menningar, 2004), 430.
9

example, been suggested on serious historical grounds that the literaryculture amounted to a relatively autonomous sphere in the Icelandic Free
State, independent from other social spheres. This historical narrative, andthe historiographical backdrop on which it rests, provide an important
context for understanding the early 20th-century debate about the sagas,
and for explaining the significance of the medieval literary heritage for theformation of secularity in Iceland.
2.1 The Case for an Icelandic Sonderweg

In the Icelandic context, the differentiation between religion andother social spheres has, as noted, in many respects developed along
similar paths to those of other northern European societies. There are,nonetheless, particular aspects of this development which stand out as
unique to Icelandic culture and society, when compared to other regionsin Europe. It is not only the composition of the medieval writings known
as the sagas which have been taken to constitute an Icelandic special case
– at least in the medieval period – but also (and no less importantly) the
non-monarchical political system in development since the 10th century.22
From a macro-sociological perspective, the sociologist Jóhann PállÁrnason has addressed this question from within the broader theoreticalframework of civilizational analysis.23 Probing into the issue as to whether
it is possible to speak of a distinct civilisation in Iceland (and elsewherein medieval Scandinavia), Árnason argues that while Icelandic society
in the High Middle Ages did not amount to a civilisation of its own, it
did, however, constitute a “highly specific” episode or a variant within
the history of Christian Western civilisation.24 Making much use of theworks of historian Gunnar Karlsson (1939–2019), Árnason suggests thatthe particular development that took place in medieval Iceland should be

22 Michael Borgolte, Europa endeckt seine Vielfalt 1050–1250, Handbuch derGeschichte Europas 3 (Stuttgart: Ulmer, 2002), 211–20, esp. 217.
23 Around a decade ago, Árnason published two articles on this topic: Jóhann
Páll Árnason, “A Mutating Periphery: Medieval Encounters in the Far North,”
Gripla 20 (2009), and Jóhann Páll Árnason, “Icelandic Anomalies,” in Nordic
Paths to Modernity, ed. Jóhann Páll Árnason, and Björn Wittrock (New York,
NY: Berghahn, 2012).
24 Jóhann Páll Árnason, “Mutating Periphery,” 32. In accordance with Icelandic
name tradition, full names will be provided also in short citations.
10

explained with regard to the political arrangement, in which matters weresolved by the political elite, through negotiation and feuding. No politicalorder of the same type existed elsewhere in Europe. It is unlikely that alarger community without a singular ruler existed anywhere in Christian
Europe.25 In the words of Karlsson, the particularity of the Icelandic caseis due to the “peculiar fusion of secular culture, concerned with personal
pride, love, courtship, forest resources, judicial decrees and assemblies,
and a clerical culture preoccupied with letters and book making.”26 AsÁrnason’s hypothesis goes, this ‘fused’ culture produced its special worksof literature in order to cope with the diverse challenges it was confronted
with in the course of the High Middle Ages.27
Árnason, who has long been active in the scholarly debate on ‘multiple
modernities’, has also addressed the distinctiveness of the Icelandic case (orthe “Icelandic experience,” as he repeatedly calls it) from the point of viewof modernisation theory. From such a point of view, placing Iceland in
the broader context of a European modernising transformation, Árnason
argues that the Icelanders belonged to a “New Society” of “transplanted‘fragments of the larger whole of Europe’, [while] separation made themlapse ‘into a kind of immobility’.”28 He suggests that the “exceptional
importance” of Iceland’s medieval heritage for the long-term process ofnation formation “can hardly be doubted.”29 The vernacular literary culture
which came into being at that time was the most influential factor in thisregard. The literary tradition combined Christian and Pagan elements, but,at the same time, a historiographical tradition emerged – culminating in
the works of Snorri Sturluson – which produced writings of a more secularspirit than could be found anywhere else in the Christian medieval world.30

25 Gunnar Karlsson, Goðamenning, 456.
26 Gunnar Karlsson, Goðamenning, 457.
27 Jóhann Páll Árnason, “Mutating Periphery,” 33.
28 Jóhann Páll Árnason, “Icelandic Anomalies,” 232.
29 Jóhann Páll Árnason, “Icelandic Anomalies,” 231.
30 Jóhann Páll Árnason, “Icelandic Anomalies,” 236. Early important works in thattradition include works such as the Book of Icelanders (Íslendingabók) written byAri Þorgilsson the Wise (1067–1148) in 1122–1133 and the Book of Settlements(Icel. Landnáma), originally composed in the 12th century. The most important
historical work by Snorri Sturluson is the collection of kings’ sagas called
Heimskringla. A description of Icelandic medieval historiography, in terms of asearch for truth for truth’s sake in seemingly positivistic terms, can be found in11Árnason – who appears very well versed in Icelandic literary history, bothmedieval and modern, but is nonetheless a non-specialist – takes a firm
stance in the long-standing debate about the extent to which Christianity
shaped medieval Iceland, by arguing that Icelandic medieval society andculture cannot be explained simply in terms of Western Christian medieval
culture, but rather constituted something particular.31 The literary cultureof the Middle Ages testifies to this this particularity.
2.2 The Medieval Genesis: Literature as a Field

The question as to when a literary field first emerged in Icelandic society has
been addressed by the literary scholar Torfi H. Tulinius, who has publishedextensively on medieval sagas and romances, as well as the socio-culturalsituation which spawned such writings. In his book on Egils saga, one of thebest-known Old Icelandic sagas, Tulinius argues that an autonomous literary
field, in a Bourdieusian sense, existed in 13th-century Iceland.32
Based on Orri Vésteinsson’s historical reconstruction of Icelandic society
as steadily moving towards an increasingly complex and differentiatedsociety in the centuries following Christianisation in the 11th century, Tulinius
assumes the existence of at least four distinct fields within Icelandic society:the field of the landed elite, the field of the Church, the field of the royal

Sigurður Nordal, Snorri Sturluson (Reykjavík: Þór. B. Þorláksson, 1920).
31 Árnason is critical of the position, prominent from the 1960s until well into
the 1990s, that Christian religion was a major force in the shaping of medieval
Icelandic society and culture, as represented by the production of saga literature.
As early as 1964, Lars Lönnroth had called for a farewell “to the image of the
Icelandic farmer, who far from the European culture of clerics and courtiers,
entertains himself by writing down old accounts from his home.” Lars Lönnroth,“Thesen om de två kulturerna: Kritiska studier i den isländska sagaskrivningens
sociala förutsättningar,” Scripta Islandica 15 (1964): 97. Another proponentof this view was Hermann Pálsson (1921−2002), who in his writings on the
medieval writing Hrafnkels saga, insisted that Icelandic medieval literature was,first and foremost, an offspring of “the Christian tradition of medieval Europe,”
and that the content of the Icelandic family sagas “is seen through Christian eyes
and intended for Christian ears.” Hermann Pálsson, Art and Ethics in Hrafnkel’ssaga (Copenhagen: Munksgaard, 1971), 10.
32 First published as Torfi H. Tulinius, Skáldið í skriftinni: Snorri Sturluson og
Egils saga, Íslensk menning (Reykjavík: Hið íslenska bókmenntafélag, 2004).
Citations here from a revised version in English, Torfi H. Tulinius, The Enigma
of Egill: The Saga, the Viking Poet, and Snorri Sturluson, trans. Victoria Cribb,
Islandica 57 (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2014).
12

Norwegian court and, finally, the field of literature. With regard to this last
field, Tulinius makes direct reference to Bourdieu’s theorising on the genesisof fields, in arguing for a separate field – or at least the beginnings of sucha field – of literature in 13th-century Iceland.33 The increased significanceof literature in medieval Iceland was, in Tulinius’ estimation, a part of “thegenesis and major flowering of secular literature in the West.”34 Surveying theavailable source material, Tulinius provides several cases in point.
Supporting the notion of an independent field of literature, Tulinius
maintains, is the fact that there existed specific aesthetic criteria and norms,
exclusively applicable to composition of so-called skaldic poetry, developedby Icelandic poets (Icel. skáld) in the Middle Ages. These rules were
codified at the time in poetry manuals, indicating that there was alreadyan existing discourse specific to the field.35 Those who mastered theserules were called ‘great poets’ (‘mikil skáld’), and enjoyed much recognition
as such. Individuals successful in other fields of society – the politician
Snorri Sturluson (1179–1241) being a well-known example – were also
concerned about their reputation as poets, suggesting “that poetry was anindependent pursuit” and not merely an instrument for improving one’s
status in other fields.36 There are also examples of individuals who enjoyeda highly respected status purely as a result of their poetic skills, despite theirlack of power or influence in other fields.37 Tulinius also highlights texts
which can be taken to indicate the emergence of a “discourse of ultimate
value,” as poetry was conceived of as a “craft beyond reproach,” and that alife in poetry is “unflawed,” bringing “true” wealth to the poet.38
While some of Tulinius’ findings have come under criticism, forexample the ascribing of the authorship of Egils saga to Snorri Sturluson,
his analysis of the socio-cultural landscape in terms of a literary field
33 As for the extent to which the production of saga literature can be shown tohave belonged to the emerging field of literature, the source material is not as
rich. Tulinius nonetheless argues that the composition of saga literature andpoetry were closely linked. He points out, for example, that the few saga writers
known by name were also poets, and many of the sagas have poets as theirprotagonists. Torfi H. Tulinius, Enigma of Egill, 207.
34 Torfi H. Tulinius, Enigma of Egill, 203.
35 Edda of Snorri Sturluson and the Third Grammatical Treatise.
36 Torfi H. Tulinius, Enigma of Egill, 205
37 Eyjólfr Brúnason serves as an example. Torfi H. Tulinius, Enigma of Egill, 206.
38 Torfi H. Tulinius, Enigma of Egill, 206–7.
13

remains uncontested.39 It should be noted, however, that the cogency
of Tulinius’ argumentation rests on the extent to which one is willingto accept the application of Bourdieu’s theorising on the literary field –which is generally perceived as a fundamentally modern phenomenon– to pre-modern societies.40 According to Philip S. Gorski, a pioneer inapplying Bourdieusian theory to historical work, “a field exists if, and to
the degree that, it has an autonomous elite and an autonomous logic,” bothof which Tulinius successfully illustrates as having existed around literary
production in medieval Iceland.41 However, the question as to the degree
to which these two phenomena existed, and the related question as to how
autonomous the field was, are not explicitly addressed.42
While Tulinius devotes considerable energy to describing the nature of
the literary field, he nonetheless maintains that he is speaking only about“the beginnings of a separate literary field” existing in Iceland, noting thatthe means of production, distribution, and the principle of supply anddemand did not apply for this particular historical context.43 It could also beargued that framing the existence of a literary field in terms of “beginnings”
is misleading, insofar as it might be taken to suggest a continuity. For, even if
one accepts the hypothesis that there was a separate literary field in Iceland– irrespective of the degree of autonomy it may have possessed – it does
not mean that it continued to exist in the following centuries. As will beillustrated in the next section of this paper, it seems more likely that such a

39 For a slightly critical review of the original Icelandic version of the book, see Orri
Vésteinsson, “Smá-saga: Um nýlegar rannsóknir í íslenskum miðaldafræðum,”Ritið 5, no. 3 (2005): 166–67.
40 Although few scholars have made use of Bourdieu’s theories to argue forthe existence of pre-modern literary fields, there is a marked interest among
historians in applying his field theory to other contexts. For an important recent
contribution to the history of medieval Europe, see Sita Steckel, “Historicizing the
Religious Field: Adapting Theories of the Religious Field for the Study of Medieval
and Early Modern Europe,” Church History and Religious Culture 99 (2019).
41 Philip S. Gorski, “Bourdieusian Theory and Historical Analysis: Maps,
Mechanisms, and Methods,” in Bourdieu and Historical Analysis, ed. Phillip
S. Gorski (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2012), 329.
42 The autonomy and heteronomy of a field are decided by the extent to which thefield relies on other fields for its existence. Gorski, “Bourdieusian Theory andHistorical Analysis,” 329–30.
43 Torfi H. Tulinius, Enigma of Egill, 203–4.
14

field subsequently ceased to exist, as other fields in society came to dominate
whatever remained of an independent literary field.
2.3 Continuity or Rupture?

The so-called classical saga literature and other writings produced andreproduced during the medieval and early modern period did not findtheir way to the printing press until the 18th century.44 Even so, such
writings – broadly termed ‘popular literature’ – continued to circulate inmanuscript form, and their content was mediated to people around Icelandin various ways, most importantly through the social convention of theevening wake (kvöldvaka).45 As a social practice, the evening wake refers
to the gathering of the household in the communal living room, in thehours in which “the lamp was lit” – i.e. after sunset in the wintertime.46
Such evening entertainment was also part of life in the fishing stations(verstöðvar), where fishermen, whose primary occupation was still as farmlabourers, would come together early in the spring for the fishing period.47
During this time, the people would attend to different kinds of evening tasks(mostly related to the working of wool), while a member of the household
44 The sagas were transmitted orally and through transcripts. Jón KarlHelgason, “Continuity?,” 65. On the first printed editions of the sagas, seeÁrmann Jakobsson, “Íslendingasögur í mótun: um fyrstu heildarútgáfuÍslendingasagnanna, samhengi hennar og áhrif,” Andvari 142 (2017): 110.
45 Most prominent among the material performed at the evening wake wereliterary works categorised under the broad term ‘romance’. An important subsetof this group of texts consists of sagas of knights (riddarasögur). In the Icelandic
context, these include both translations of courtly literature and original works,
similar in content and structure, which have interchangeably been referred to as‘sagas of knights’, ‘lie-sagas’ (lygisögur) or, through its frequent use in German
speaking scholarship, Märchensagas. Another subgroup of the romances isthe ‘legendary sagas’ (fornaldarsögur), a disparate group of writings about theheroes of the Germanic legendary past. Original compositions of such writings
continued into the modern period. Mixed in with these kinds of writings were
texts which would come to constitute the canon of Icelandic classical literature:
the sagas of the Icelanders and the kings’ sagas. Well into the 19th century, thetexts read at the evening wake were preserved in manuscript form. Once agreater diversity of books had been printed, these also found their way into
the evening entertainment. Matthew Driscoll, The Unwashed Children of Eve:
The Production, Dissemination and Reception of Popular Literature in PostReformation Iceland (Enfield Lock: Hisarlik Press, 1997), 4–6, 44.
46 Driscoll, Unwashed Children of Eve, 38 and 40.
47 Driscoll, Unwashed Children of Eve, 41.
15

would read aloud from a chosen text.48 The performance did not have to be
restricted to a mere reading but, as scholars have suggested, could serve toinspire an oral improvisation of the text’s content. Another significant formof mediation was the rímur, a genre of poetry indigenous to post-classicalIceland, into the form of which the content of the diverse literature wasreformulated.49 For centuries, therefore, the saga writings constituted an
important and popular part of people’s evening entertainment.50
Over half a century ago, Hermann Pálsson argued, on the basis of his
readings of several prologues and other passages from medieval sagas, thatthe semi-public readings from the sagas did not go against the wishes of thelate medieval Catholic Church. While some medieval clerics are known tohave raised doubts about the reading of such material, the general opinion
seems to have been that the saga writings had a positive influence on the
moral integrity of the audience.51 From the Church’s point of view, the sagas
served the purpose of “useful entertainment,” to borrow one of Pálsson’s
phrases, as they introduced the audience to the challenges of humanexistence, and provided examples of admirable behaviour, acceptable to
the Christian authorities.52 Later, the literary scholar Vésteinn Ólasonemphasised how the saga literature provided Icelanders in the late Middle
Ages with role models in a less religious way than Pálsson had presumed.53
Their protagonists – the ‘saga heroes’ – exemplified strength and couragein adversity, threatened by inimical forces, or by the harsh environmental
surroundings that result from Iceland’s location in the North Atlantic. Later
research, most importantly that of Jón Karl Helgason, has suggested thatsuch an understanding of the popular reception of the saga writings can be

48 Driscoll, Unwashed Children of Eve, 40.
49 Pétur Húni Björnsson, “Rímur um Rímur: Hvað má lesa úr elstu rímum umrímnahefðina?,“ (MA-thesis, University of Iceland, 2020).
50 Hermann Pálsson, Sagnaskemmtun Íslendinga (Reykjavík: Mál og menning,1962), 163–64; Jón Karl Helgason, “Continuity?,” 66.
51 Hermann Pálsson, Sagnaskemmtun Íslendinga, 145. Pálsson makes special
mention of two priests who had doubts about the positive influence of thesagas, Grímur Hólmsteinsson. (d. 1298) and Einar Hafliðason (1307–1393).
Hermann Pálsson, Sagnaskemmtun Íslendinga, 150–51.
52 Hermann Pálsson, Sagnaskemmtun Íslendinga, 145.
53 Vésteinn Ólason, “Bóksögur,” in Munnmenntir og bókmenning, Vol. 6 of Íslenskþjóðmenning, ed. Frosti F. Jóhannsson (Reykjavík: Þjóðsaga, 1989), 209.
16

taken to apply to later centuries as well, at least as late as the 19th century.54
The historian Sigurður Gylfi Magnússon came to a similar conclusion in anarticle where he explains that in the adversity of their daily life, the virtues ofthe saga heroes – honour, courage, heroism – were of paramount importanceto the moral development of children, after they had been made accessible
in printed editions in the early 19th century.55 Even though the content of
the sagas had been mediated orally through the centuries, Magnússon
maintains that the appearance of printed editions marked a watershed,even to the extent that it ushered in the decline of the Lutheran church, andcontributed in a significant way to the secularisation of Icelandic society.56
As Pálsson suggests, there is potentially evidence indicating that the
medieval Catholic church was not opposed to the less explicitly religious
sagas. Equally, scholars broadly agree that at least some of the sagas werecomposed within an ecclesiastical setting in this period. In the late Middle
Ages, particularly after the Lutheran Reformation (a period that has beentermed the ‘post-medieval period’), the circumstances surrounding the
production and diffusion of the sagas changed, as did the ecclesiasticalauthorities’ attitude towards the saga literature.57
After the introduction of the printing press around the mid-16th
century, the literary landscape inevitably changed. From then until the late
18th century, the Lutheran Church monopolised the printing press, and thechurch authorities consistently opposed traditional secular literature.58 In
a preface to a new hymnal (Ein nij Psalma Bok) from 1589, GuðbrandurÞorláksson (1541–1627), bishop of the Northern Hólar bishopric, and themost influential religious leader of his age, stated that he hoped that thebook would put an end to “useless songs of trolls and poetry of the ancients,”
which were read and performed for entertainment purposes “more after
54 Jón Karl Helgason, “Continuity?,” 65–78; Jón Karl Helgason, Hetjan og
höfundurinn, 15–49.
55 Sigurður Gylfi Magnússon, “Siðferðilegar fyrirmyndir á 19. öld,” Ný saga 7 (1995):
65–70. For a detailed discussion of the printed editions of the saga literature in
the 19th century, see Ármann Jakobsson, “Íslendingasögur í mótun,” 111–15.
56 Sigurður Gylfi Magnússon, “Siðferðilegar fyrirmyndir á 19. öld,” 59, 70.
57 See, for example, the title of a collection of articles, edited by Andrew Wawn,
Northern Antiquity: The Post-Medieval Reception of Edda and Saga (Enfield
Lock: Hisarlik Press, 1994).
58 Driscoll, Unwashed Children of Eve, 1. The first printing press not run bychurch authorities was that of Hrappsey, founded in 1773.
17

the vexing fashion of the heathen men than Christian.” He believed suchpractices were more widespread amongst the “common people” of Icelandthan in any other Christian country.59 Bishop Guðbrandur kept up his fightagainst traditional literary production, and, in 1612, he published a bookof verses (Ny Wiisna Bok), in which he made an attempt to Christianise
the old home-grown type of poetry called rímur.60 Other clergymen would
follow Bishop Guðbrandur’s lead, and even well into the 18th century one
still finds churchmen expressing their worries about the preponderanceof traditional literature. There are some interesting exceptions to thistendency. In 1756, two books were printed in the Hólar printing press,
both containing material on the Icelanders of former times. The printingof the books was criticised by pastors around the country, and was
generally poorly received, possibly because of the common opinion thatentertainment material was not suitable for the printed medium, whichshould be reserved for Christian literature.61
While literary scholars continue to discuss questions of genre and otherissues regarding the classification of literature, the distinction between
secular and religious literature has established itself as an uncontested
convention in classifying Icelandic literature. Compared to the scholarly
discussion on different literary genres, there is, however, limited discussion
on what constitutes secular literature and what constitutes religious
literature. In the five-volume edition of Icelandic literary history, thedistinction between the religious and the literary is made based on thecontent of the writings.62 Writings on religious topics – almost exclusively
59 Guðbrandur Þorláksson, “Formale,” in Ein ny Psalmabok, Med morgum Andligum
Psalmum, Kristelegum Lofsaunguum og Vijsum, skcikanlega til samans sett og
Auke nog endurbætt (Hólar in Hjaltadalur: [s.n.], 1589).
60 Ein Ny Wiisna Bok: Med mórgum andlegum Viisum og Kuædum Psalmum, Lof
sønguum og Rijmum. teknum wr heilagre Ritningu. Almuga Foke til gagns og goda
Prentud, og þeim ødrum sem slijkar Vijsur elska vilia, og jdka Gude Almattugum til
Lofs og Dyrdar, enn sier og ødrum til Gagns og Skiemtunar (Hólar in Hjaltadalur:[s.n], 1612), no page numbers.
61 Driscoll, Unwashed Children of Eve, 15.
62 See the volumes of Íslensk bókmenntasaga, 5 vols. (Reykjavík: Mál og menning, 1992–
2006). It should be noted that in the post-­production of this paper a new overview
work on Icelandic literary history was published which could unfortunately not
be taken into account. See Aðalheiður Guðmundsdóttir, Ármann Jakobsson, ÁstaKristín Benediktsdóttir, Jón Yngvi Jóhannsson, and Sveinn Yngvi Egilsson, Íslenskar
bókmenntir: Saga og samhengi (Reykjavík: Hið íslenska bókmenntafélag, 2021).
18Christian – are counted as religious, while writings on practicallyeverything else are deemed to be secular. It should also be noted that all thewritings – secular and religious alike – discussed in the around 4000 pagesof Icelandic literary history are broadly categorised as ‘literature’.
From the Late Middle Ages, the classical saga literature did not enjoy
any particular popularity above other types of literature. It was read andknown, but no more than other literature circulating after the so-calledclassical period. People’s awareness of the texts in question was not related
to the position of the saga literature as literature. The Icelandic sagas
constituted a source of information about the past, but most importantly
they constituted a part – and not necessarily a particularly prominent one– of the Icelandic population’s repertoire of after-dark entertainment. The
content of the sagas was taken to be ‘true’ – i.e. they were understood tocontain reliable information about events and people from the country’s
past. As noted, scholars have argued and illustrated how such ‘historical’
figures – heroes and anti-heroes – contributed to the shaping of people’s
identity and, as some have argued, became important role models forcoping with the hardships of life. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries,
this perception of the sagas began to change drastically.
3 Sagas and Secularity: The (Re)Construction of Icelandic Medieval
Literature

In the 19th century, as romantic nationalist currents were on the rise, claims
to national autonomy, accompanied by issues concerning nationhood andnational identity, were frequently raised in Icelandic public discussion.
In the first half of the 20th century, this tendency would only intensify as
things began to gradually change in the political realm and the idea of
independence from Denmark did not seem as far-fetched as it had for mostof the 19th century. At the same time, Iceland’s medieval literary culture
came to enjoy an increasingly prominent place in public intellectual
discussion.63 There are direct links between the rise of nationalism and theincreased interest in the saga writings as the sagas were believed to contain
63 This does not mean that nothing of particular significance happened in the 19th
century. Indeed, some of the pioneers of modern saga studies – e.g. Konrad
Maurer (1823–1902), Björn M. Ólsen (1850–1919) and Finnur Jónsson (1858–1934) – published some of their most important works then.
19

important information about what it meant to be an Icelander.64 Such
concerns can be seen in the writings of the natural scientist Helgi Pjeturss(1872–1949), and Guðmundur Finnbogason (1873–1944), professor ofphilosophy at the University of Iceland.
Irrespective of such questions, there was also much activity in the fieldof Icelandic literary history and in the field of ‘literature’ more generally.
The shifts taking place in the first half of the 20th century – marked by
the founding of the University of Iceland in 1911, with a chair devoted to
Icelandic literary history, as well as the appearance of the idea of the ‘great
author’ – have recently been described as amounting to a reshaping of theartistic system.65 Although they have not received much attention, theseshifts had a significant impact on the formation of secularity in the country.
Of considerable importance to the reshaping of the Icelandic literary
field was a radical change in how scholars in the field of Germanic andNordic studies understood the nature and origin of the saga writings. This
shift was already underway in the 19th century. Risking simplification,
this change entailed the historical value of the sagas being called into
question, while emphasis was instead put on the sagas being the artistic
constructs of capable authors. In its earlier stages, this development
was part of another scholarly debate related to the sagas – that on the
degree to which the medieval accounts were based on oral traditions.66
After decades of debate on the extent in which the oral component of
the saga material could be considered to be a) reflected in the preserved
versions of the text and b) factually accurate, the opinion won out that
the Icelandic sagas should be understood first and foremost as literary
constructs crafted by skilled authors and in some cases works of genius.
Without ignoring the contribution of early promoters of these ideas, suchas the German legal historian Konrad Maurer (1823–1902) and Björn M.
Ólsen (1850–1919), the first professor of Icelandic language and literary

64 See Byock, “Modern Nationalism and the Medieval Sagas.”
65 Þröstur Helgason, Opna svæðið: Tímaritið Birtingur og íslenskur módernismi(Reykjavík: Bókmennta – og listfræðistofnun Háskóla Íslands, Háskólaútgáfan,2020), 58.
66 This debate is generally described in terms of its opposite poles, i.e. theFreiprosalehre and the Buchprosatheorie, as framed in Andreas Heusler, Die
Anfänge der isländischen Saga (Berlin: Verlag der Königlichen Akademie derWissenschaften, 1914).
20

history of the University of Iceland, it was the scholars of the so-called‘Icelandic School’ of Nordic studies who determined the sagas to beworks of literature. In this sense, it can be argued that they ‘discovered’or ‘rediscovered’ Icelandic medieval literature.67 Through their various
publications on medieval Icelandic literary culture, and the publishingof influential critical editions of the Icelandic sagas – not least thanks totheir introductions to these editions – these scholars were successful inredefining the sagas in terms of ‘literature’.
Senior among the early proponents of the ‘Icelandic School’ and its
most important ideologue was Sigurður Nordal (1886–1974), professor of
Icelandic language and literature at the University of Iceland, and a leading
intellectual in Iceland in his time. Although Nordal’s early writings
already show clear indications of where his scholarship was heading,his best-known contributions to the Icelandic School’s programme, as
it were, are his introduction to the critical edition of Egils saga (1933),
and a small monograph on Hrafnkels saga (1940).68 Also important inthis context is Nordal’s now famous introduction to an anthology of‘Icelandic literature’, in which he argued in favour of the idea of Icelandic
literature being an unbroken literary tradition, spanning from at least the
9th century to the time of his writing in the early 20th century.69 Other
important intellectuals who have been counted among the Icelandic
School are Einar Ólafur Sveinsson, scholar of medieval literature, andthe writer Halldór Laxness –although the latter’s contributions to the
Icelandic public discussion should by no means be understood as having
been restricted to the programme of the Icelandic School.

67 While there is still debate regarding which scholars should be counted as
the initiators of this movement, there is little doubt as to when and throughwhich scholarly efforts it rose to prominence. Jón Hnefill Aðalsteinsson,“Íslenski skólinn,” Skírnir 165 (Spring 1991). Cf. Jón Karl Helgason, Hetjan og
höfundurinn, 120–22.
68 Sigurður Nordal, “Formáli,” in Egils saga Skalla-Grímssonar, ed. Sigurður
Nordal, Íslenzk fornrit 2 (Reykjavík: Hið íslenzka fornritafélag, 1933); Sigurður
Nordal, Hrafnkatla, with a summary in German, Studia Islandica 7 (Reykjavík:Ísafoldarprentsmiðja, 1940). An important early work on the subject is Nordal,
Snorri Sturluson, esp. 129–249.
69 Sigurður Nordal, “Samhengið í íslenzkum bókmenntum,” in Íslenzk lestrarbók
1400–1900, ed. Sigurður Nordal (Reykjavík: Bókaverzlun Sigufúsar Eymundssonar,
1924), 9–32.
21

In the second part of this paper, the moment of the (re)discovery of
the Icelandic literary field and literature will be explored in more detailwith regard to how Icelandic medieval literature, and the culture which
produced it, came to be constructed in terms of the distinction between
the religious and the secular. From a discursive research perspective, thefollowing will examine the discussion that took place in the first half ofthe 20th century amongst Icelandic intellectuals. In an article from 2000,
literary historian Helga Kress analysed many of the same sources froma gender perspective, illustrating how these early 20th-century scholars
constructed the sagas and the saga authors in a way “that builds up thescholars’ identity as educated Icelandic men, belonging to a masculine
culture on an international scale.”70 In a similar way, it is interesting to seethat many of the traditional and classical virtues conventionally attributed
to a secular, modern man are also clearly visible in the writings of theseauthors, as they discuss medieval culture and literature. The following
analysis will revolve around four discursive themes which frequently
appear in the intellectual discourse of the period, namely rationalism,
realism and objectivity, individualism, and fatalism. Each of these themes
contribute in their own way to how the medieval sagas – and by extension
the concept of Icelandic literature – was distinguished from the religious
sphere, especially Christianity.
3.1 Rationalism

The notion that medieval Icelandic culture was characterised by rationalism
goes back a long way. It already appeared in the writings of the scholar andapologist Arngrímur Jónsson the Learned (1568–1648). In a writing called
Crymogæa, a description of Iceland printed in Latin in 1609, he alludes to a
medieval period of increased reason, even a golden age of sorts, after belief
in heathen deities had started to dwindle. This decline had occurred as
Christianity was introduced for the first time. In the anti-Catholic spirit of
his time, however, Arngrímur the Learned emphasised that this had been
a form of Christianity that had not been tainted by Roman Catholicism
70 Helga Kress, “Mikið skáld og hámenntaður maður,” in Speglanir: Konurí íslenskri bókmenntahefð og bókmenntasögu (Reykjavík: Háskóli Íslands,
Rannsóknastofa í kvennafræðum, 2000), 393. See also Sigríður Matthíasdóttir,
Hinn sanni Íslendingur, 94–8.
22

or “the sour dough of the papacy,” as he put it. He said that it was “withgrowing reason” that men abandoned their belief in the heathen deities,
and entered into this interim period of a more “pure Christianity,” before
the Roman Church established itself in Iceland.71
The idea that the Nordic medieval world view had come to be
characterised by reason, rather than belief in the deities, was visible in theworks of scholars of medieval Iceland in the early 20th century. In Sigurður
Nordal’s major work, Íslenzk menning (Icelandic Culture), he explains thatstories of men who refused to worship the gods, believed in their own
might and power, and had ‘godless’ as their epithet, point to a decline inheathen belief, while Christianity had not yet become a leading force inreligious affairs in the country.72 Nordal had already discussed ‘rationalism’
in the context of Icelandic medieval culture in a book published in 1920.
This book on Snorri Sturluson, however, covers a later period of Icelandic
history. In it, he states:
The truth is, that, in addition to the fact that the Icelander’s view of life
before and after 1200 was vague and incoherent, and their entire life force
surprisingly weak […], there existed direct atheism and mistrust of clerics
and their teachings.73

Another author who discussed the prominent place of reason in the
medieval Icelandic culture that produced the sagas was Helgi Pjeturss, aninfluential natural scientist in the first part of the 20th century, and later
prolific esoteric writer.74 In an article published in 1906, on the “religious

71 “Interdum etiam forsan præcedente tempore, cum Deorum Ethnicorumæstimatio, ductu rationis, cæpit imminui,” Arngrímur Jónsson, Crymogaea sive
rerum Islandicarum – Libri III (Hamburg: Philippus ab Ohr, 1609), 77. It should
also be noted that, in the anti-Catholic spirit of his time, he described themedieval period as a time of “a more pure Christianity” (synceriorem viguisse)
because it had not come “infected by the sour dough of the papacy” (fermento[…] infecta est). Arngrímur Jónsson, Crymogaea, 106.
72 Sigurður Nordal, Íslenzk menning, 180. More details on the context andintended purpose of Íslenzk menning, see Sigríður Matthíasdóttir, Hinn sanniíslendingur, 105–6.
73 Sigurður Nordal, Snorri Sturluson, 66.
74 For more on Helgi Pjeturss, see the following article by Pétur Pétursson,“Nýalismi og dulspeki: Hugmyndafræði íslenskrar borgarastéttar á öðrum
23

history of the Old Icelanders,” Pjeturss makes much of the difference
between the “old Icelandic culture” which existed in the country before
the arrival of Christianity, and the Christian culture which succeeded it.
Although he does not directly assert that the Icelanders of heathendom
could be described as irreligious (trúlausir), he states that their deities
did not enjoy a very elevated status. Other factors, such as courage andvalour, were more important to the world view of the Old Icelanders. The
medieval Icelanders – whom Pjeturss repeatedly calls “Vikings,” which,from a historical perspective, can only apply to a fragment of the medieval
Icelandic population – possessed considerable “spiritual freedom,” though
they had not “come far enough” to resist the degradation which came with
Christianity.75 At that point, reason had to give in to superstition. In fact,
the article could be described as an account of how Christianity and thechurch smothered the free spirit of the Viking age – as exemplified inmedieval literature. This is made plain in the following passage, in which
Pjeturss blames the most successful leaders of the Church, with theirstruggle against the Icelandic political elite:
And would ‘the glow of Iceland’s age of fame,’ our ancient literature, nothave been dimmer, if the spirit which emerged in the holy men Jón andÞorlákr, in Guðmundr Arason and bishop Árni (not to mention the foreign
bishops), had already blinded the good Icelandic reason in the 12th century,
as it would later do?76

This article by Helgi Pjeturss seems to have been well received. Einar Ólafur
Sveinsson, one of the proponents of the Icelandic School, and Guðmundur
Finnbogason, Iceland’s first professor in the field of philosophy, bothprominent intellectuals in the first half of the 20th century, specificallyog þriðja áratug 20. aldar,” Ritröð guðfræðistofnunar 35 (2012), as well as thatof Benedikt Hjartarson, “‘Magnan af annarlegu viti’ Um strangvísindalega
dulspeki Helga Pjeturss,” Ritið 1 (2017).
75 Helgi Pjeturss was strongly influenced by the evolutionary theory of neoLamarckism, as has been rigorously discussed by Benedikt Hjartarson,“‘Magnan af annarlegu viti’,” 149–57. At the same time, he also seems to havemade use of Herbert Spencer’s social Darwinism. In this particular article,
he refers to “the great” Herbert Spencer, and compares his critics to a lamp
fuelled by whale oil, next to Spencer’s bright electric light. Helgi Pjeturss, “Úrtrúarsögu Forn-Íslendinga,” Skírnir 80 (1906): 69 and 71.
76 Helgi Pjeturss, “Úr trúarsögu Forn-Íslendinga,” 62.
24reference it as a source in their writings. In his book on the national identityof the Icelanders, Finnbogason states that the world view of medieval
Icelanders is encompassed in the “cold and calm reason” of Hávamál, awell-known didactic poem dating to the Viking Age (800–1066).77 He
further explains the world view of Hávamál in the following passage:
The moral instructions of Hávamál are entirely concerned with theconsequences of our actions in this life. Its ethics do not rely on any religious
view, but solely human nature, as is manifested in experience. Life reaches
a higher degree of perfection, the more we follow the commands of reason
and maintain the golden mean, which is the hallmark of true health.78

In his book on the Sturlung Era, Einar Ólafur Sveinsson, maintains that in
the 12th century, religious and spiritual life was “calm and tempered” andthere was “neither fanaticism nor vehemence.”79
3.2 Realism and Objectivity

Scholars usually refer to the stylistic ‘realism’ and, to a certain extent,‘objectivity’ of the medieval saga writings as ‘saga realism’.80 While theseare strictly stylistic concepts, some scholars – notably those analysed
here – use the term to refer to both the stylistic approach employed in the
medieval sagas, and the world view of the authors and their culture. For
these scholars, the stylistic realism reflects the authors’ world view.
Such a fusion of stylistic concepts and world view can be seen in thewritings of Björn M. Ólsen (1850–1919), a prominent member of the
Icelandic intellectual elite in the early 20th century. Ólsen was the first
rector of the University of Iceland, and professor of Icelandic grammar
and literary history. His work on the medieval Icelandic sagas has been
77 Guðmundur Finnbogason, Íslendingar: Nokkur drög að þjóðarlýsingu(Reykjavík: Bókadeild menningarsjóðs, 1933), 54.
78 Guðmundur Finnbogason, Íslendingar, 52.
79 Einar Ólafur Sveinsson, Sturlungaöld: Drög um íslenzka menningu á þrettándu
öld (Reykjavík: Nokkrir Reykvíkingar, 1940), 119.
80 For a concise overview of the history of research on realism and the sagas of the
Icelanders, see Daniel Sävborg, “Style,” in The Routledge Research Companion
to the Medieval Icelandic Sagas (London: Routledge, 2017), 119–20. Whilethe chapter is primarily concerned with literary stylistics, it also addresses
and attempts to clarify the conceptual messiness which has characterised thediscussion on the topic.
25

interpreted as constituting an early indication of the direction which the
Icelandic School would later take.81 In his discussion of the ‘objectivity’ of
the sagas of the Icelanders, he makes much of the “main rule of Icelandic
narrative art, that the account should be completely objective.” This applies
both to the descriptions of the characters and events of the sagas, and to
distinct aspects such as the descriptions of the pagan religion. “In thiscomplete objectivity of the storytellers, one encounters a particular viewof life,” Ólsen maintains.82 As reflected in the following passage, this viewof life was unique, or at least special, and manifested itself in a “spiritual
freedom” and “open-mindedness” which was rare in the Middle Ages:
We can see from this that they [the saga authors] were spiritually free men,humane and open-minded in their judgment, and free from the clericalfierceness which characterises the Middle Ages. The tolerance towards
the pagan religion that one finds there is rarely found in the writings ofmedieval authors, but is reminiscent of the writings of the renaissancehumanists. The same tolerance, the same freedom of spirit, the same
humanity is found in the myths of Snorri’s Edda.83

Although Ólsen was of the opinion that the saga authors were Christianbelievers, he perceived this form of Christianity to be unlike anything else one
would encounter in medieval Europe. Amongst those authors who agreed thatthe saga authors could be called Christian, there was a widespread agreementthat this must, at least, have been a special and particular kind of ‘Icelandic
Christianity’ that was sober, modest, tolerant, humane, and down-to-earth.
In a book about Snorri Sturluson, Ólsen’s student Sigurður Nordal would goeven further in assuming the objectivity of the saga authors, stating that the
magnates who wrote did not have faith which could make them biased,
nor principle of law, to make them deal out temporary judgments. No
ambition of state, nor party loyalty could get between them and theirnarrative material.84

81 For references, see Jón Hnefill Aðalsteinsson, “Íslenski skólinn,” 103–7.
82 Björn M. Ólsen, “Um Íslendingasögur: Kaflar úr háskólafyrirlestrum,” in
Safn til sögu Íslands og íslenzkra bókmennta að fornu og nýju, ed. Einar Ólafur
Sveinsson, and Sigfús Blöndal (Reykjavík: Gutenberg, 1937), 77.
83 Björn M. Ólsen, “Um Íslendingasögur,” 80.
84 Sigurður Nordal, Snorri Sturluson, 256.
26

Yet another representative of the Icelandic School, Einar Ólafur Sveinsson,
discusses what he calls the “heroic realism” of the sagas in a lexical entry(written in Danish) on the medieval Icelandic sagas (which fall slightly
outside the temporal scope of this study). He uses this concept to describe
the sagas’ attitude to reality, as reflected in their treatment of the narrative
material. Their content is supposed to be “interesting, saga-like: worthy oftelling about” but at the same time there is a clear demand for realism, as
regards both events and individuals. In the sagas, one can find a synthesisof realism and a particular ‘idealism’. This ‘idealism’, to quote Sveinsson, is“secular, and Nordic.”85
3.3 Individualism

The ideal of the autonomous individual is prominent in discussion of Icelandic
medieval culture and literature.86 This appears clearly in the writings of
Sigurður Nordal, for example in his book about Snorri Sturluson, in which
he describes the cultural context in which the medieval politician was writing:
Christianity was an empty name, it lacked both religious education andstrong religious movements. Therefore, the ethics of heathendom, whichcame into being in parallel with the [pagan] religion, and was derived fromthe same roots, but was not dependent on its teachings, could live on during
the first centuries of Christianity. This ethics, which was shaped in the fight ofeveryone against everyone, made the individual into the centre of existence.87

Decades later, in his book on Icelandic culture, Nordal proceeded along
the same lines, making special mention of the “rise of the individual,”
which, in his opinion, consisted of two related shifts: first, the release of
the individual from mob mentality and, second, their release from the fearof moody deities and monsters.88 Nordal takes the protagonist from Egils
saga, the viking-poet Egill Skallagrímsson, as a prime example of this. Egill

85 Einar Ólafur Sveinsson, s.v. “Íslendingasögur,” Kulturhistorisk lexikon for nordisk
middelalder fra vikingetid til reformationstid (KLNM), vol. 7 (Copenhagen:
Rosenkilde og Bagger, 1962), 509.
86 For a discussion on individualism in the context of the nationalistic movementin 19th- and 20th-century Iceland from a gender perspective, see Sigríður
Matthíasdóttir, Hinn sanni Íslendingur, 85–90.
87 Sigurður Nordal, Snorri Sturluson, 253.
88 Sigurður Nordal, Íslenzk menning, 225.
27

is “too much of an individual” and will, therefore, not prioritise his kindredand family.89 His poetry reflects his most important interests: “the growing
might and independence of the individual, rising against nature, gods, andmen.” Nordal’s interpretation of Egill’s mentality resembles the ways inwhich he describes the world view of the composers of Hávamál:
The poem is composed by men who found themselves on a very similar level
to Egill, proclaiming a new vision and new ideals: those of the Viking, thefar-traveller, the free individual, who thinks mostly about himself, and relies
primarily on his wit and might.90

This assessment of Hávamál’s world view comes close to the interpretationof Guðmundur Finnbogason, who also makes much of the ideals of
individualism. In his analysis of the Icelander’s view of life, Finnbogason
makes individual autonomy the prerequisite for happiness:
An important ideal of our ancestors was: You lead yourself [Sjalfr leið sjalfanþik], which harmonises well with the idea that the first priority for happiness is
to be autonomous, and that it is better to take care of one’s own farm, no matter
how wretched it may be, rather than have to rely on the support of others.91

Finnbogason’s emphasis on the independence of the individual also resonates
through Einar Ólafur Sveinsson’s book on the Sturlung Era. In that time, “itwas the man himself who led himself,” and such a mentality was characterisedby the “awareness of one’s own freedom, the feeling of being worth something,of being in power over one’s own affairs and others.”92 Years later, Sveinsson
would expand on this topic with regard to the sagas of the Icelanders:
In general, the ethics of the sagas of the Icelanders are marked by the spiritof self-elation. They often show individualism (contrary to the spirit ofsolidarity reflected in the law). They are the manifestation of the aristocratic
democracy of the free state: each free man can become the hero of a saga:
ability and achievement matter more than social standing.93

89 Sigurður Nordal, Íslenzk menning, 171.
90 Sigurður Nordal, Íslenzk menning, 174.
91 Guðmundur Finnbogason, Íslendingar, 44.
92 Einar Ólafur Sveinsson, Sturlungaöld, 63.
93 Einar Ólafur Sveinsson, s.v. “Íslendingasögur,” 509–10.
28

3.4 Fatalism

In the first part of the 20th century, particularly in Germany and theNordic countries, fatalism, as an approach to life, became prominent in thediscussion of the medieval view of life in the north.94 Many descriptions
reflect the opinion, noted above, that during the transition period in which
the heathen religion receded without Christianity yet gaining the ground to
fully replace it, as it later would, there existed a view of life which assumed
neither the support of heathen deities nor salvation in Christ. This outlook
was repeatedly described in terms of ‘fatalism’, a term which has been
conceptualised in diverse ways.95
In his book on Icelandic culture, Nordal discusses fatalism inconsiderable detail. He describes how a fatalistic world view came to serve
as a point of contact between the old heathen customs and Christianity. He
states that “for Icelandic culture, it was of utmost importance how fatalism
manifested itself when heathendom was coming to an end, and lived on in
the Christian tradition.”96 Nordal contextualises the emergence of fatalism
historically, and explains how, as Icelanders converted to Christianity, they
began thinking of ‘fate’ as “an inscrutable and impersonal power whichgoverned over both gods and people.”97 The medieval ideas of fate had, in
Nordal’s opinion, continued significance for modern people:
There is one thing Nordic ancients will never be accused of: that they weredupes fooled by existence, who looked away from bitter reality or sought
faulty shelter in castles of air. The brutal honesty of such a vision is thebiggest reason why their thoughts and accounts are still meaningful.98

94 Debora Dusse, “Grundzüge der Erforschung germanischer Religion in der Zeit desNationalsozialismus,” in Die völkisch-religiöse Bewegung im Nationalsozialismus:
Eine Beziehungs- und Konfliktgeschichte, ed. Uwe Puschner, and Clemens Vollnhals,
2nd ed., Schriften des Hannah-Arendt-Instituts für Totalitarismusforschung 47(Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2012), 431.
95 An example of an attempt to systematise the medieval Nordic concept of fatecan be found in a speech, originally given in Danish by the writer Gunnar
Gunnarsson, later translated into German as Nordischer Schicksalsgedanke: Eine
Rede, trans. Helmut de Boor (München: Langen Müller, 1936).
96 Sigurður Nordal, Íslenzk menning, 178.
97 Sigurður Nordal, Íslenzk menning, 178–79.
98 Sigurður Nordal, Íslenzk menning, 185.
29

As Nordal presents it, before Icelanders converted to Christianity, fatalism
constituted a world view which had lost much of its religious components.
In that regard, his version of this history stands as an example of what
Charles Taylor has called a “subtraction story,” in which a previously
religious framework loses its religion.99 The belief in the deities declined
and fatalism – though it can be framed in terms of certain religious or
mythical discourses, for instance that of the three norns (witches) of fate –did not require any religious framing or organised rituals.100 Thus, Nordal
explicitly states that fatalism was “the explanation of existence, or the
resignation from trying to explain existence, which is left when all otherexplanations have proven inadequate,” a point he paints more dramaticallyin the following passage:101
Men could stop believing in trolls, but not the cold. They could desist frombelieving in Urðr, but not death. The anger of the gods, but not bad harvest.
Similarly, one could stop thinking about ghosts, norns, luck and bad luck,to strengthen oneself as much as possible in order to make one’s own luck.
But it would always become more evident that one was competing against
something more powerful. The more the belief in the heathen deities would
decline, the stronger and more mysterious fate would become.“102

Nordal points out that this understanding of fate called for a particular
view of life, namely that which has been described as belief in one’s own
might and power. According to him, there was nothing in this world which
could be played against the force of fate “other than the might and power of
oneself, as far as it went.”103 This view of the world demanded persistence,courage, and serenity in adversity, to face the state of things shaped by fate.
In a well-known article, “Notes on the Old Sagas,” the writer Halldór
Laxness contended that “the Viking Age’s belief in reason,” which he definedwith the term fatalism (Icel. Örlagatrú), became the foundation for the viewof life in which the Icelandic medieval writings are grounded.104 Laxness,

99 Charles Taylor, A Secular Age (Cambridge, MA.: Harvard Belknap, 2007), 26.
100 Sigurður Nordal, Íslenzk menning, 179.
101 Sigurður Nordal, Íslenzk menning, 182.
102 Sigurður Nordal, Íslenzk menning, 179.
103 Sigurður Nordal, Íslenzk menning, 181.
104 Halldór Laxness, “Minnisgreinar um fornsögur,” Tímarit Máls og menningar 8 (1945).
30

who was later awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1955, was by thisstage already a well-known public intellectual, and had published many ofhis most important novels. At the time he wrote the article, which reflects his
increasing interest in Iceland’s medieval cultural heritage, he was already inthe process of preparing his own editions of some of the sagas, with modern
spelling.105 His interest in the sagas culminated in his novel Gerpla (publishedin 1952), his own version of a saga, which is loosely based on the medieval
Fóstbræðra saga. In “Notes on the Old Sagas,” Laxness expressed the viewthat the pre-Christian view of life lived on after Christianity had arrived on
the island, and that the ‘saga literature’ was a manifestation thereof:
This literature is an invaluable source for Icelandic culture in the thirteenth
century. It is a source for a heathen view of life which still lives a good life in
Iceland, despite a legally enacted superficial Christianity at a time when theultimate power of the pope, plenitudo potestatis, did not come into doubt
anywhere in the West.106

It should be noted that Laxness would later drastically revise his viewon the medieval Icelandic sagas, and began to allow for more Christian
influence on the saga writings.107 In this particular article, however, Laxness
maintained that fatalism entailed “the denial of Christian ethics.”108 Nordic
fatalism is, in Laxness’ opinion, unrelated to Christian ideas. He argues
that according to the Christian understanding of divine providence, it is
impossible for God and the good to not prevail, while “fatalism is inherently
pessimistic.”109 He further explains this attitude in the following passage:
105 Laxness’ editions of the sagas caused an uproar in public discourse, and evenangered the then minister of education, Jónas Jónsson of Hrifla (1885–1968),
who ultimately took Laxness to court on the grounds that only the Icelandic
state was allowed to publish the medieval sagas. For a detailed discussion of thesaga affair, see Jón Karl Helgason, Hetjan og höfundurinn, 115–67.
106 Halldór Laxness, “Minnisgreinar um fornsögur,” here 36.
107 See, for example, Halldór Laxness, “Harmleikur Dana á sextándu öld,” in Og árin líða(Reykjavík: Helgafell, 1984). Laxness‘ attitude towards the sagas has been describedin a number of articles: Ástráður Eysteinsson, “Er Halldór Laxness höfundur
Fóstbræðrasögu? Um höfundargildi, textatengsl og þýðingu í sambandi Laxness við
fornsögurnar,” Skáldskaparmál 1 (1990); Vésteinn Ólason, “Halldór Kiljan Laxness
og forn sagnahefð: Fornsögurnar og ættjarðarástin,” Ný saga 10 (1998); Jóhann PállÁrnason, “Halldór Laxness og heimur fornsagnanna,” Skírnir 185 (2011).
108 Halldór Laxness, “Minnisgreinar um fornsögur,” 34.
109 Halldór Laxness, “Minnisgreinar um fornsögur,” 31.
31

The spirit of these works is, despite their Christian façade here and there,
either one of immorality or of moral pessimism. Thus, horrendous events
can take place, which are unthinkable in Christian literature from otherregions in Europe; the best men, such as Gunnar of Hlíðarendi, the Sonsof Njáll and Flosi, do the most horrible deeds, and the worst men begin to
do good deeds, even though they have not been seen to regret or repent. 110

These writings are to a large extent in harmony with the ideas of Sigurður
Nordal and the Icelandic School, although Laxness went further than manyof the proponents of the Icelandic School, especially regarding the questionof Christian influence on the sagas.
4 Concluding Remarks

The above discussion has thrown light on the historical arguments inwhich medieval Icelandic ‘literature’ has been described as distinct fromthe Christian religion, and how it has been argued to have constituted an
independent sphere in society – autonomous from, or at least unaffectedby, religion, in particular the Christian religion. It has shown that, in 20thcentury historiography of medieval Iceland, there is a clear tendency todescribe ‘literature’ as a continuous secular project throughout the historyof Icelandic culture.
The first part of this paper explored how scholars who have analysed
Icelandic medieval society from a socio-historical point of view, mostimportantly Jóhann Páll Árnason and Torfi Tulinius, have argued that the
production of the literary works known as the sagas reflected the special
character of Icelandic society. Both scholars frame such a view within aparticular socio-historical framework. In Árnason’s opinion, the fact thatwritings emerged in medieval Iceland that were of a more secular spirit
than anywhere else in the Christian medieval world, stands as evidence
for viewing the culture of the Icelandic Free State as a highly specificepisode in the history of the West. In a more detailed engagement withthe literary products of the time, Tulinius argues that this particularity
can be described in terms of an independent poetic or literary field – or atleast the beginnings of such a field – in the sense of Bourdieu.

110 Halldór Laxness, “Minnisgreinar um fornsögur,” 35.
32

Part two of this paper contains an inspection of the historical period– roughly the first half of the 20th century – during which Icelandic
intellectuals came to consistently speak of medieval Icelandic culture andliterature in terms of a distinction between the religious and the nonreligious. Through analysis of the works of influential authors writing
about medieval Icelandic literature at the time, the paper demonstrates
how characteristics and ideals of a secular outlook became central to how
the saga authors, the sagas, and their entire cultural context were described.
The discussion is organised around four discursive themes: 1) rationalism,2) realism and objectivity, 3) individualism, and 4) fatalism. Each of these
themes contribute in their own way to how the medieval sagas – and, byextension, the concept of Icelandic literature – was distinguished from thereligious sphere, and from Christianity in particular.
There are, at least, two ways to interpret the information outlinedin this paper. On the one hand, one could accept the historical analysis
of authors such as Gunnar Karlsson, Árnason and Tulininus. In doingso, one would entertain the notion that medieval Icelandic society
contained a literary sphere which was so independent from other spheresthat it could be seen as secular, and even described in terms of social
differentiation. If this were the case, the intellectual discourse of the firstpart of the 20th century could be seen as an early manifestation of suchtheorising, grounded in comparable historical analysis of the same sociocultural context. Early 20th-century authors, such as Sigurður Nordal
and Einar Ólafur Sveinsson, could, from such a point of view, be creditedwith having re-discovered ‘literature’ as a secular project of sorts – whichthen came to be described with more sociological finesse in the early 21st
century by authors such as Árnason and Tulinius.
On the other hand, one could question the conclusions of Árnason and
Tulinius, seeing them as reproducing a distinction that was constructedin the 20th-century discourse and which had been inherent to thenationalist historical paradigm. It goes without saying that such doubts
would have to be supported by a more extensive, critical analysis of thesescholars’ interpretations of the historical evidence, which is beyond thescope of the present paper.
In other words, the question as to whether there was something about
medieval Icelandic society and literary culture which warrants a readingin terms of a distinction and differentiation between the religious and33

the secular remains open. In that sense, this paper has only scratched thesurface, and should be seen as the first step of more extensive research,where the actual historical context and not only later interpretationsof it must be analysed in view of the heuristic concept of secularity. To
such ends, the Multiple Secularities approach seems promising for future
research on medieval Icelandic cultural history, offering new perspectives
on well-known sources and old bones of contention, such as therelationship between the emerging church and the political elite, where
the word ‘secular’ has been used without much consistency or precision.

34

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