Page:Curious myths of the Middle Ages (1876).djvu/272

 entitled “Della Sfera;” and it is in Asia that he locates the garden:— “Asia è le prima parte dove l’ huomo Sendo innocente stava in Paradiso.” But perhaps the most remarkable account of the terrestrial Paradise ever furnished, is that of the “Eireks Saga Vídforla,” an Icelandic narrative of the fourteenth century, giving the adventures of a certain Norwegian, named Eirek, who had vowed, whilst a heathen, that he would explore the fabulous Deathless Land of pagan Scandinavian mythology. The romance is possibly a Christian recension of an ancient heathen myth; and Paradise has taken the place in it of Glœsisvellir.

According to the majority of the MSS. the story purports to be nothing more than a religious novel; but one audacious copyist has ventured to assert that it is all fact, and that the details are taken down from the lips of those who heard them from Eirek himself. The account is briefly this:—

Eirek was a son of Thrand, king of Drontheim, and having taken upon him a vow to explore the Deathless Land, he went to Denmark, where he picked up a friend of the same name as himself. They then went to Constantinople, and called upon