Resident stranger: Sæmundr in the Ashkenaz
When did the Jews reach Iceland?1 There is no evidence that Jews lived there before the seventeenth century. Conversely, however, it may be suggested that Sæmundr inn fróði [the learned] Sigfússon (1056–1133), priest of Oddi and Iceland’s first book-learned historian, lived as a stranger among the J...
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| Format: | Book Part |
| Language: | English |
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Brill
2022
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| Online Access: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10082256/3/North%202%20Resident%20stranger.pdf https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10082256/ |
| Summary: | When did the Jews reach Iceland?1 There is no evidence that Jews lived there before the seventeenth century. Conversely, however, it may be suggested that Sæmundr inn fróði [the learned] Sigfússon (1056–1133), priest of Oddi and Iceland’s first book-learned historian, lived as a stranger among the Jews of Germany in the 1070s.2 This is partly because he was probably in the Rhineland for more than a decade, partly because one of the Icelandic snippets derived from his writing appears to be based on a commentary on Genesis for which the best analogue is found in Rabbinic commentary. Let us go over Sæmundr’s schooling and writing to see how this suggestion may be made. |
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