Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama Part 128

=Saga=, the G.o.ddess of history.--_Scandinavian Mythology._

=Saga and Edda.= The _Edda_ is the Bible of the ancient Scandinavians. A saga is a book of instruction, generally, but not always, in the form of a tale, like a Welsh "mabinogi." In the _Edda_ there are numerous sagas.

As our Bible contains the history of the Jews, religious songs, moral proverbs, and religious stories, so the _Edda_ contained the history of Norway, religious songs, a book of proverbs, and numerous stories. The original _Edda_ was compiled and edited by Saemund Sigfusson, an Icelandic priest and scald, in the eleventh century. It contains twenty-eight parts or books, all of which are in verse.

Two hundred years later, Snorro Sturleson, of Iceland, abridged, re-arranged, and reduced to prose the _Edda_, giving the various parts a kind of dramatic form, like the dialogues of Plato. It then became needful to distinguish these two works; so the old poetical compilation is the _Elder_ or _Rythmical Edda_, and sometimes the _Saemund Edda_, while the more modern work is called the _Younger_ or _Prose Edda_, and sometimes the _Snorro Edda_. The _Younger Edda_ is, however, partly original. Pt. i. is the old _Edda_ reduced to prose, but pt. ii. is Sturleson's own collection. This part contains "The Discourse of Bragi"

(the scald of the G.o.ds) on the origin of poetry; and here, too, we find the famous story called by the Germans the _Nibelungen Lied_.

=Sagas.= Besides the sagas contained in the _Eddas_, there are numerous others. Indeed, the whole saga literature extends over 200 volumes.

I. THE EDDA SAGAS. The _Edda_ is divided into two parts and twenty-eight lays or poetical sagas. The first part relates to the G.o.ds and heroes of Scandinavia, creation, and the early history of Norway. The Scandinavian "Books of Genesis" are the "Voluspa Saga," or "prophecy of Vola" (about 230 verses), "Vafthrudner's Saga," and "Grimner's Saga." These three resemble the Sibylline books of ancient Rome, and give a description of chaos, the formation of the world, the creation of all animals (including dwarfs, giants and fairies), the general conflagration, and the renewal of the world, when, like the new Jerusalem, it will appear all glorious, and there shall in no wise enter therein "anything that defileth, neither whatsoever worketh abomination, or maketh a lie."

The "Book of Proverbs" in the _Edda_ is called the "Havamal Saga," and sometimes "The High Song of Odin."

The "Volsunga Saga" is a collection of lays about the early Teutonic heroes.

The "Saga of St. Olaf" is the history of this Norwegian king. He was a savage tyrant, hated by his subjects, but because he aided the priests in forcing Christianity on his subjects, he was canonized.

The other sagas in the _Edda_ are "The Song of Lodbrok" or "Lodbrog,"

"Hervara Saga," the "Vilkina Saga," the "Blomsturvalla Saga," the "Ynglinga Saga" (all relating to Norway), the "Jomsvikingia Saga," and the "Knytlinga Saga" (which pertain to Denmark), the "Sturlunga Saga,"

and the "Eryrbiggia Saga" (which pertain to Iceland). All the above were compiled and edited by Saemund Sigfusson, and are in verse; but Snorro Sturleson reduced them to prose in his prose version of the old _Edda_.

II. SAGAS NOT IN THE EDDA. Snorro Sturleson, at the close of the twelfth century, made the second great collection of chronicles in verse, called the _Heimskringla Saga_, or the book of the kings of Norway, from the remotest period to the year 1177. This is a most valuable record of the laws, customs, and manners of the ancient Scandinavians. Samuel Laing published his English translation of it in 1844.

1. _The Icelandic Sagas._ Besides the two Icelandic sagas collected by Saemund Sigfusson, numerous others were subsequently embodied in the _Landama Bok_, set on foot by Ari hinn Fronde, and continued by various hands.

2. _Frithjof's Saga_ contains the life and and[TN-144] adventures of Frithjof, of Iceland, who fell in love with Ingeborg, the beautiful wife of Hring, king of Norway. On the death of Hring, the young widow marries her Icelandic lover. Frithjof lived in the eighth century, and this saga was compiled at the beginning of the fourteenth century, a year or two after the _Heimskringla_. It is very interesting, because Tegner, the Swedish poet, has selected it for his _Idylls_ (1825), just as Tennyson has taken his idyllic stories from the _Morte d'Arthur_ or the Welsh _Mabinogion_. Tegner's _Idylls_ were translated into English by Latham (1838), by Stephens (1841), and by Blackley (1857).

3. _The Swedish Saga_, or lay of Swedish "history," is the _Ingvars Saga_.

4. _The Russian Saga_, or lay of Russian legendary history, is the _Egmunds Saga_.

5. _The Folks-Sagas_ are stories of romance. From this ancient collection we have derived our nursery tales of _Jack and the Bean-Stalk_, _Jack the Giant-Killer_, the _Giant who smelt the Blood of an Englishman_, _Blue Beard_, _Cinderella_, the _Little Old Woman cut Shorter_, the _Pig that wouldn't go over the Bridge_, _Puss in Boots_, and even the first sketches of _Whittington and His Cat_, and _Baron Munchausen_. (See Dasent, _Tales from the Norse_, 1859.)

6. _Sagas of Foreign origin._ Besides the rich stores of original tales, several foreign ones have been imported and translated into Norse, such as _Barlaham and Josaphat_, by Rudolph of Ems, one of the German minnesingers. On the other hand, the minnesingers borrowed from the Norse sagas their famous story embodied in the _Nibelungen Lied_, called the "German _Iliad_," which is from the second part of Snorro Sturleson's _Edda_.

=Sagaman=, a narrator of sagas. These ancient chroniclers differed from scalds in several respects. Scalds were minstrels, who celebrated in verse the exploits of living kings or national heroes; sagamen were tellers of legendary stories, either in prose or verse, like Scheherazade, the narrator of the _Arabian Nights_, the mandarin, Fum-Hoam, the teller of the _Chinese Tales_, Moradbak, the teller of the _Oriental Tales_, Feramorz, who told the tales to Lalla Rookh, and so on. Again, scalds resided at court, were attached to the royal suite, and followed the king in all his expeditions; but sagamen were free and unattached, and told their tales to prince or peasant, in lordly hall or at village wake.

=Sage of Concord= (_The_), Ralph Waldo Emerson, author of _Literary Ethics_ (1838), _Poems_ (1846), _Representative Men_ (1850), _English Traits_ (1856), and numerous other works (1803-1882).

In Mr. Emerson we have a poet and a profoundly religious man, who is really and entirely undaunted by the discoveries of science, past, present or prospective. In his case, poetry, with the joy of a Baccha.n.a.l, takes her graver brother, science, by the hand, and cheers him with immortal laughter. By Emerson scientific conceptions are continually trans.m.u.ted into the finer forms and warmer lines of an ideal world.--Professor Tyndall, _Fragments of Science_.

=Sage of Monticello= (_The_), Thomas Jefferson, the third President of the United States, whose country seat was at Monticello.

As from the grave where Henry sleeps, From Vernon's weeping willow, And from the gra.s.sy pall which hides The Sage of Monticello ...

Virginia, o'er thy land of slaves A warning voice is swelling.

Whittier, _Voices of Freedom_ (1836).

=Sage of Samos= (_The_), Pythagoras, a native of Samos (B.C. 584-506).

=Sages= (_The Seven_). (See SEVEN WISE MEN OF GREECE.)

=Sag'ittary=, a monster, half man and half beast, described as "a terrible archer, who neighs like a horse, and with eyes of fire which strike men dead like lightning." Any deadly shot is a sagittary.--Guido delle Colonna (thirteenth century), _Historia Troyana Prosayce Composita_ (translated by Lydgate).

The dreadful Sagittary, Appals our numbers.

Shakespeare, _Troilus and Cressida_ (1602).

(See also _Oth.e.l.lo_, act i. sc. 1, 3. The barrack is so called from the figure of an archer over the door.)

=Sagramour le De'sirus=, a knight of the Round Table.--See _Launcelot du Lac_ and _Morte d'Arthur_.

=Sailor King= (_The_), William IV. of Great Britain (1765, 1830-1837).

=Saint= (_The_), Kang-he, of China, who a.s.sumed the name of Chin-tsou-jin (1653, 1661-1722).

=St. Aldobrand=, the n.o.ble husband of Lady Imogine, murdered by Count Bertram, her quondam lover.--C. Maturin, _Bertram_ (1816).

=St. Alme= (_Captain_), son of Darlemont, a merchant, guardian of Julio, count of Harancour. He pays his addresses to Marianne Franval, to whom he is ultimately married. Captain St. Alme is generous, high-spirited, and n.o.ble-minded.--Thomas Holcroft, _The Deaf and Dumb_ (1785).

=St. Andre=, a fas.h.i.+onable dancing-master in the reign of Charles II.

St. Andre's feet ne'er kept more equal time.

Dryden, _MacFlecknoe_ (1682).

=St. Asaph= (_The dean of_), in the court of Queen Elizabeth.--Sir W.

Scott, _Kenilworth_ (1821).

=St. Basil Outwits the Devil.= (See SINNER SAVED.)