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4:2 INTEODUOTION.
CHAPTEE II.
THE EDDAS AND SAGAS OF ICELAND.
The Icelandic poems which Brynjulf Sveinsson
found in 1643, and gave the name of " Edda," were
collected and written down in the latter part of the
twelfth century by Ssemund, a learned ^Icelander.
They had existed before in the mouths of the peo-
ple, and had thus been handed down from generation
to generation, perhaps for centuries. They
are evidently the product of various ages in a remote
antiquity, but nearer than this we can decide
nothing in regard to their origin. These poems dif-
fer much, not only in age and value, but also in
their contents. In the latter respect they may be
classed under two heads : the Mythological and the
Epic, although few of them are either purely epic
or mythological." The Ethical poems, only, may be
separated from the mythological, and taken as a
distinct class. The poems of the mythological part
are naturally the most important for us. They are
either general or special in their subject matter,
that is, some embrace a comprehensive view of the
whole field of Northern Mythology, while others
are limited to a single group of legends, or to a sin-