Page:The Heimskringla; or, Chronicle of the Kings of Norway Vol 1.djvu/41

 sist almost entirely of historical events, or of the achievements of individuals, which, whether real or fabulous, were calculated to sustain a national spirit among the people for whom they were composed; and scarcely any of it consists of the legends of saints, of homilies, or theological treatises, which constitute the greater proportion of the literature of other countries during the same ages, and which were evidently composed only for the public of the cloisters. It is distinguished also from any contemporary literature, and indeed from any known body of literature, by the peculiar circumstance of its having been for many centuries, and until the beginning of the 12th century, or within 120 years of Snorro Sturleson's own times, an oral not a written literature, and composed and transmitted from generation to generation by word of mouth, and by memory, not by pen, ink, and parchment. This circumstance may affect the historical value of these documents, if the authenticity of what they relate be not supported by internal or collateral evidence, but does not affect their literary value as the compositions, during five centuries, of the North men, and as such to be compared with the compositions, during the same five centuries, of the cognate Anglo-Saxon people. It is of great importance, however, to examine the value, as historical documents, of these compositions.

The early history of every people can only have been preserved by traditionary stories, songs, ballads, until the age when they were fixed by writing. The early history of Tome, for many centuries, has had no other foundation than such a saga-literature as this of the Northmen. Homer, whether the Iliad and Odyssey be the works of one mind or of several, has had traditionary accounts as the historical foundation and authority for the events and personages he celebrates. Snorro Sturleson has done for the history