HARVARD UKRAINIAN STUDIES - See also - Harvard University

22 OMELJANPRITSAKsumar Alexius Grikkjakonungr;báhafoihannâtta vetr ens fjoröa tegarsetit at stólií Miklagaröi.En tveim vetrum siôarrvaró aldamót.I>a hofôu beir Eysteinnok Sigurör verit sjautjánvetr konungar i Norvegieptir Magnus foöur sinn ÓláfssonHaraldssonar. Pat vas tuttuğuvetrumens annars hundraös eptir failÓláfs Tryggvasonar, en fimmtegum ens priöja hundraöseptir dráp EadmundarEnglakonungs, en sextan vetrumens sétta hundraös eptirandlát Gregóríus páfa, besses Kristni kom á England,atpvíestalites.En harın andaöisk á poraári konungadóms Fókukeisara, fjórum vetrum enssjaunda hundraös eptir buröKrist at almannatali.I>at verör allt saman tuttuğuár ens tolfta hundraös.same summer, Alexius [Comnenus;August 15],emperor of the Greeks; at that time hehad occupied the throne at Constantinoplefor thirty-eight years [1081 -1118].But two years thereafter, there was aturn in the lunar cycle.Then Eysteinn and Sigurör had beenseventeen years kings of Norway[since 1103]after their father Magnus Óláfsson,son of Haraldr. It was 120 yearsafter the fall ofÓláfr Tryggvason, 250 yearsafter the slaying ofEdmund, king of England,and 516 years after the deathof Pope Gregory [I; 590-604]who, as is said, introduced Christendomin England.But he [Gregory I] died in the second yearof the reign of the [Byzantine] emperorPhocas [602-610], 604 yearsafter the birth of Christ accordingto the common era.That makes altogether1120 years. 45II.3.\In analyzing the placement and structure of the time intervals in the relativechronology occurring in the above-quoted passages, it becomes clear thatsome are repeated in several texts, whereas others are omitted. From this we45"The three years 870, 1000, and 1120 in the 'Book of the Icelanders' [Islendingabók] thusappear to have been chosen for arithmetical reasons as the nearest round years after the dates ofthe three principal events of the Book [of the Icelanders]: the first settlement of Iceland, theintroduction of Christianity, and Bishop Gissur [=Gizurr] isleifsson's death. None of the threeevents which Ari has attached directly to these years—the murder of King Edmund in 870,Olaf Tryggvason's fall in 1000, and the end of a lunar cycle in 1120—belong to the history ofIceland; but Ari has endeavored to attach to the three years events known to his readers."Einarsdóttir, Studier, p. 345.