Aspetti del fantastico e del mostruoso nella saga

The paper starts from the fact that even ‘realistic’ sagas such as those called Íslendinga sögur (family sagas) usually include fantastic elements such as monsters, prodigies, and other similar marvels. The study investigates the role of such elements in the narration focussing in particular on the figure of the draugr, a sort of roaming ghost or undead, analysing his function on the basis of a number of examples and showing that the use of monsters and other supernatural events, creatures or objects correlates with specific aims in relation to different narrative, but also social contexts

Atburð en eigi jartegn: il ‘miracolo’ nella letteratura norrena

The concept of miracle is not the same in each culture and its interpretation is strictly linked with what is perceived as ‘natural’ and what seems to go beyond human experience. Old Norse literature displays many examples of miracles from various kinds of texts which are mainly based on Latin sources (Passiones, Vitae, etc.). However, they are also to be inscribed into the Old Norse literary and cultural context which features a keen interest in the supernatural and the marvellous, in prose as well as in poetry. Even Old Norse sagas show capacity to adapt to the tendency of local literature to develop marvellous and fantastic elements, particularly from the fourteenth century on, notwithstanding the realistic pattern of some saga types. Miracles in the strict sense are traditionally associated with divine intervention and the saint is God’s ‘representative’ who ‘certifies’ God’s presence and power through the miracle. However, miracles too are liable to cross the border of the fantastic in Old Norse literature, allowing doubts as to their trustworthiness and reality. Ambiguity in the attitude towards miraculous events, or even true skepticism, is occasionally voiced in the sources and the terms used significantly reflect this uncertainty. On the basis of evidence from hagiographical texts, in this paper I try to show how critical views about miracles may be linked to different reasons and perspectives and to substantiate the hypothesis of an ongoing debate about the miraculous in the Norse Middle Ages

Iuxta teutonicam dictionem. Vernacular material in an unpublished manuscript from Admont Abbey, Austria

The essay is an edition and analysis of the German glosses and other vernacular material found in ms Admont, Stiftsbibliothek, 756, an unpublished manuscript from c. the XII century preserved in the Monastic library of Admont Abbey (Austria), containing mainly grammatical texts written in Latin

GRENDEL: ELLOR-GAST ‘ESSERE DELL’ALTROVE’

This essay examines the figure of Grendel in the Beowulf epic through the names given to him in the poem. The monster’s physical appearance is not described and we learn little more about him than his name and the terms applied to him in the poem. These however allow us a glimpse of the complex nature of Grendel, who far from being a mere ‘monstrous being’ shows different aspects. He is human (wer, guma ‘man’) but he is also a supernatural being, a ‘demon’ or ‘spirit’ (gāst), an ‘alien being’ (æl-wiht, ellor-gāst). He displays connections with the devil: among his titles are ‘fiend from hell’ (fēond on helle), ‘God’s adversary’ (Godes andsaca), ‘enemy of mankind’ (man-cynnes fēond), terms also used to describe the devil, in one case even deofol. In other cases, however, he is denoted by simpler terms referring to his terrifying appearance which strikes fear on those seeing him (such as æglæca ‘the awesome one’, one of the most frequent titles in Beowulf), or to the ‘damage’, the ‘injury’ brought about by his destructive activity (scaða). One intriguing aspect is the possible reference to the mythic Germanic past by the use of terms such as mæra ‘? incubus, night monster’ and perhaps þyrs, eoten ‘giant’ which allow different interpretations. Grendel therefore displays himself as a threshold figure moving about the boundaries between humanity, myth and the supernatural world. In the appendix a list of all titles used in Beowulf to denote Grendel in frequency order is provided