SAGA-BOOK - Viking Society Web Publications

Saga-Book of the Viking Society
edition) are only found in Flateyjarb6k. The closing
passage of A and the early part of B are dependent on the
accounts of the discovery of Greenland and its settlement
found in Sturla I>6rl'5arson's Landndmabok, which differ
from those given in Haukr Erlendsson's Landndmab6k.
It is possible to explain this material from Landndmab6k
in many ways, but it is most likely that the author of the
text in Flateyjarb6k inserted it as a connecting link when
he incorporated the Saga of the Greenlanders in the Saga of
Old]«. The date of the Saga of the Greenlanders cannot
thus be in any way determined from its relation to
Landndmab6k, and there is nothing to indicate that other
written sources were used in the composition of the Saga
of the Greenlanders.
Both the Saga ofthe Greenlanders and the Saga ofEirikr
the Red deal with the Vinland voyages, but they differ
greatly. The latter is more detailed and agrees with
various other sources, where comparison is possible, but
the Saga of the Greenlanders has its own distinct version
in these matters. For this reason most scholars have
concluded that the Saga of the Greenlanders is not as
trustworthy as, and younger than, the Saga of Eirikr ­
that its composition may be as late as the fourteenth
century. Sigurl'5ur Nordal was the first to point out how
weak these arguments were. He writes:
"Finally it should be noticed concerning the two sagas
dealing with the Vinland voyages, Eiriks saga and
Grcenlendinga pdttr (Saga of the Greenlanders) , that
there does not seem to be any particular reason to treat
the latter as much younger (and less trustworthy) than
the former. On the contrary, the two sagas, which
each deal with the same subjects, are so independent
of each other that the natural conclusion appears to be
that they were both written about the same time, but
in different parts of the country. Eiriks saga uses
information which may stem from Gunnlaugr Leifsson