Tyske, franske og engelske oversættelser af færøkvæder

Abstract

The incredible fact that the medieval chain dance, accompanied by ballad singing with Old Norse or continental themes in very broad forms, is still alive in the Faroe Islands, has not been overlooked in the long series of English and German (plus two French) translations from Scandinavian ballads. Scattered texts from Lyngbye's edition of ballads of the Volsung/Nibelung (Sigurd or Sjúrðar) Cycle (the first book in Faroese, with Danish translation) were used here and there, while Xavier Marmier's
French anthology from 1842 also included a few texts from unprinted tradition. Hammershaimb's source edition 1851—55 called forth German collections translated by P. J. Willatzen 1865 (including the Sigurd Cycle and thoroughly revised 1897) and by Rosa Warrens 1866. Around 1900, Leon Pineau in France translated Faroese texts in a scholarly monograph (prose fragments only) and in a highly deserved anthology, while more recent times have seen one relevant book, one of E. M. Smith-Dampier's
five volumes of ballad translations: the whole Sigurd Cycle, 1934. The article comments upon the translations except for the Sigurd Cycle, but by nature it is so bibliographical that the author desists from a summary.