King’s College 2004 v Mistress Gunnvör sílfrahárr
14
Sources:
Histories and Chronicles
Landnámabók
vSurvives in five
redactions, the earliest two being Sturlubók, composed
by Sturla Ţórđarson (d. 1284) and Hauksbók, written
by Haukr Erlendsson in 1306-1308. An
account of the discovery
and settlement of Iceland, deals with roughly 430 settlers, their families and their descendants,
preserving over 3,500
personal names and almost 1,500 farm names. Many sagas rely upon Landnámabók as a source for genealogical and biographical information.
Snorri Sturluson’s Heimskringla
vThe Heimskringla
of Snorri Sturluson, written in Old Norse ca. 1225, is a collection of sagas concerning the various
rulers of Norway, from about 850
to 1177 AD. Although the early sections
especially draw very heavily on Old Norse mythological materials and there is a consistent
blurring of fiction and
fact, Heimskringla is still considered an important original source for information on the Viking Age, a
period which Snorri covers
almost in its entirety.