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236 Reviews somewhat dry to read. The emphasis on sociological methodology may dismay some historians, but there are delights for them too: a close analysis of texts and a familiarity with some obscure materials are effectively employed by Kaelber. The bibliography and footnotes are extensive and very informative, also. Carole M . Cusack School of Studies in Religion University of Sydney Kalinke, Marianne E., The Book of Reykjaholar. The Last of the Great Medieval Legendaries, Toronto, University of Toronto Press, 1996; pp. xii, 322; R.R.P. US$65.00 (cloth), US$21.95 (paper). This book is a substantial monograph of eight chapters in length, wi notes, bibliography and index, on one of the most significant Old Icelandic manuscripts to have survived d o w n to the present century. The Book ofReykjaholar, or Reykjaholarbok in Icelandic, dated to the 1530s contains a large collection of saints' lives written in Old Icelandic. At a time when Lutheranism was sweeping across parts of western Europe, when the veneration of saints, especially the belief in their lives, was being questioned, and when the era of the production of legendaries that presented the lives of saints was coming to a close, in the West Fjords of Iceland, in a place called Reykjaholar, the great Reykjaholarbok was composed. In a contemporary context, Reykjaholarbok gains in significance given that it contains Old Icelandic translations of a Low German hagiographic corpus which is no longer extant. In this monograph, Marianne Kalinke closely examines both the context of the production of Reykjaholarbok and the production process itself. Reykjaholarbok preserves the last Icelandic collection of saints' lives. As Kalinke points out, 'hagiography is the oldest extant form of prose in Iceland, and the translation of Latin saints' lives is thought to predate the composition of the indigenous sagas' (p. 37). Reykjaholarbok contains 25 legends, including St. Anne and the Virgin Mary, the Three Wise M e n , and Lazarus, the martyrs Oswald, Sebastian, Lawrence, Christopher, George, Erasmus, and Stephen protomartyr, the legends of Gregory the Great, Ambrose, Augustine, Jerome, John Chrysostom, Reviews 237 and the apocryphal Barlaam and Josaphat, Seven Sleepers, and Gregorius peccator. Kalinke's examination of Reykjaholarbok is both detailed and informed and stretches over eight chapters covering most aspects of the topic. In Chapter O n e Kalinke argues convincingly that the legends in Reykjaholarbok, and indeed legends in a more general sense, served a dual purpose. Stories about the lives of saints, which sometimes contained quite fantastic material, 'filled the need both for edification and for amusement' (p. 8) and, more generally, 'the fifteenth century easily combined the ostensibly didactic with the predominantly entertaining' (p. 17). While this is not a new argument in the field, it is well applied to this particular collection of legends. Chapter T w o presents a fascinating and informed discussion of the development of vernacular hagiography in the German-language area, of medieval manuscripts and printed books, of ideas and opinions, that form part of the textual history of Reykjaholarbok. Kalinke presents a wealth of information about the goings-on in the bookish world of the late Middle Ages, particularly the turbulent world of Iceland on the eve of the Reformation. The reader is left with a firm sense not only of Kalinke's vast knowledge of the subject, but, importantly, of the relevant background to this particular collection of legends. The remainder of the monograph deals almost exclusively with the legends themselves, their contents, themes, style. There is, however, a substantial Chapter Four on the supposed force behind Reykjaholarbok, one Bjorn Torleifsson. In contrast to the Danish scholars Ole Widding and Hans Bekker-Nielsen, w h o suggested Oddur Gottskalksson was the scribe of Reykjaholarbok, Kalinke sides with the current consensus that Bjorn Torleifsson was in fact the scribe, compiler, editor and translator of these legends. While it is acknowledged that the evidence for Bjorn Torleifsson as 'author' is not concrete, though all things considered it does appear very likely that he was the 'author', Kalinke accepts the arguments put forth by previous scholars (pp. 29-30). One of the most significant contributions Kalinke makes to the existing knowledge of Reykjaholarbok is the re-examination of the...

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