Árni Magnússon

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
100 kroner banknote with the portrait of Árni Magnússon

Árni Magnússon (* 1663 ; † January 7, 1730 ) was an Icelandic scholar.

He is also known by his Danish name Arne Magnussen. As a professor at Copenhagen University , he spent many years collecting and archiving medieval Icelandic manuscripts. He was the collector of Icelandic manuscripts. The resulting collection is known as the Arnamagna Collection . Two research institutes in the capitals Copenhagen and Reykjavík are named after him. His image can also be found on the Icelandic 100 kroner banknote , which is now rarely in circulation. It also served as a template for the character of Arnas Arnaeus in the novel Die Icelandglocke by Halldór Laxness and (probably) for the character of Arne Saknussemm from The Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne .

resume

Árni Magnússon was born in Kvennabrekka in Dalir in 1663 . His father, his two grandfathers and two of his brothers were pastors. At 19 he went to study in Copenhagen and became assistant to the royal antiquarian Thomas Bartholin . He worked for him for six years and then spent two years in Germany. Four years after his return to Copenhagen, during which he worked as director of the Royal Danish Archives, at the age of 38 he was appointed professor of philosophy and Danish history at Copenhagen University in 1701.

From 1702 he spent ten years in Iceland, as a member of a royal commission, instructed to keep a register of all farms in the country, to conduct a census and to check whether law and order were guaranteed by the officials, merchants and other powerful people. This was an overall review of conditions in Iceland aimed at restoring the economy and politics in this extremely poor country (population 50,000). In his work, which inevitably took him across the country, he collected or copied old manuscripts and fragments of manuscripts, which he took back to Copenhagen in 1713. In 1708/1709 he returned to Copenhagen for a short time to marry the rich Danish widow Mette Fischer.

Tragically, in a major fire in Copenhagen in 1728, a large part of Árni's manuscripts, copies and records were destroyed, but fortunately the most important manuscripts were saved. Until his death in early 1730, he was able to put some of the writings back on paper from memory.

estate

The collection of manuscripts begun by Árni Magnússon came to the University of Copenhagen as the Arnamagna Collection . It is considered to be one of the most important collections of medieval Icelandic manuscripts and is researched by its own institute ( Arnamagna Institute ). The Árnastofnun (Árni Magnússon Foundation) supports their entertainment.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Jules Verne: Journey to the center of the earth: Novel (=  Winkler world literature: Blue series ). Artemis and Winkler, Düsseldorf Zurich 2005, ISBN 978-3-538-06972-5 ( dnb.de [accessed on March 21, 2018]).
  2. ↑ Sigrún Davíðsdóttir p. 16.

literature

  • Sigrún Davíðsdóttir: Håndskriftens Saga (= Odense University Studies in History and Social Sciences. Vol. 216). Translated from Icelandic into Danish by Kim Lembek. Odense Universitetsforlag, Odense 1999, ISBN 87-7492-998-4 .
  • Már Jónsson: Arnas Magnæus philologus (1663-1730) , University Press of Southern Denmark, Odense 12 (The Viking collection, Volume 20), ISBN 978-87-7674-646-9 .
  • Jens Eike Schnall: Árni Magnússon. In: Albrecht Classen (Ed.): Handbook of Medieval Studies. Terms, Methods, Trends Volume 3. de Gruyter, Berlin / New York 2010, ISBN 978-3-11-018409-9 , pp. 2150-2153 (for a fee from de Gruyter).

Web links


Note: Icelanders are referred to by their first name or first and last name, but not just their surname. Further information can be found under Icelandic personal name .
personal data
SURNAME Árni Magnússon
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Magnussen, Arne; Magnússon, Árni
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Icelandic scholar
DATE OF BIRTH 1663
DATE OF DEATH January 7, 1730