SAGA-BOOK - Viking Society Web Publications

60 Saga-Book of the Viking Society
about Aron, which has been endorsed by Liestal'" and
Gu6ni Jonsson, 76 is likewise suspect. Jon J ohannesson77
states that, apart from the reference to Hdkonar saga and
of course the poems, nothing shows a reliance on
written sources, but he adds a word of caution by saying
that some of the material could well be drawn from
1slendinga saga, though the author may not have had it by
him when he wrote, and had perhaps not even read it.
This slightly cryptic statement hints in the direction of
what seems to be the only other solution to the problem.
The formdli to lslendinga saga mentions written records
(brefF 8 which were available for Sturla to consult when he
was writing. The existence of such material is also
attested by the words of the author of the Miosaga
version of Guomundar saga, who in his preface tells of a
collection of bre] which were to be used in expanding the
biography of the bishop, but which were burnt in 1258
in the church where they had been gathered (at
Laufas in Eyjafjoror) before he had the opportunity of
consulting them.t"
The supposition must be that the same sort of material
was available to Aron's biographer, and it seems
possible at least that some of it was the same as that
used by Sturla. It does not seem necessary to postulate,
as did Petur Sigurosson.s? that a lost saga of Bishop
Gu6mundr was the common source for the noted
correspondences. If Sturlas written sources were
something more substantial and more of a common
property than a private collection of rough notes then
they would no doubt have survived for use by other
writers. Moreover, a church establishment would in all
probability be the home of such stuff, as was the case with
15 op. cit.
,. Sturlunga saga (1948), III xii,
" Sturl. II xlix-I,
,. Sturl. I II5.
,. Biskupa Sogu« (1858-78), I 555-6.
8. Petur Sigurosson, 'Urn fslendinga Sogu Sturla I>6rCiarsonar', Safn til Sogic
Islands VI 175-7.