A Þingeyrar Book For Spiritual Ascent: Scribes and Items of AM 624 4to

In the present essay, I investigate the provenance and circulation of Reykjavík, Stofnun Árna Magnússonar í íslenskum fræðum, AM 624 4to (c. 1450–1475; c. 1500), a voluminous composite miscellaneous manuscript in small quarto format, transmitting mostly Old Norse-Icelandic translations of Latin theological, catechetical, homiletical, and computistic literature, along with numerous edifying short tales adapted from Middle English, and fewer original texts composed in the vernacular. Despite its late date of production, the codex bears an enormous historical and literary value within the corpus of Old Norse-Icelandic literature by virtue of its inclusion of some of the most rare and sophisticated devotional texts of the Old Norse-Icelandic corpus. The significance of these texts is threefold: AM 624 4to is often the sole surviving witness transmitting its texts (Items 1; 5; 7–8; 13; 15; 19; 27; and 32–33); in several cases it is the oldest extant witness within a given textual tradition (Items 9–11; 14; and 22); in three instances it combines significantly ancient texts with manuscript material that dates to around 1200 or earlier (Items 6; 10; and 31). In light of new manuscript evidence, I complement previous studies on the codex by presenting a fresh assessment of its codicological composition and paleographic features, producing a more informative analysis of its provenance and circulation, and providing a first exhaustive catalogue of its items. Particular attention is paid to the idiosyncrasies of the first codicological unit (pp. 1–14), which has hitherto received virtually no scholarly attention.