Guðni Jónsson
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Guðni Jónsson (22 July 1901 – 4 March 1974) was an
Iceland Iceland is a Nordic countries, Nordic island country between the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic and Arctic Oceans, on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge between North America and Europe. It is culturally and politically linked with Europe and is the regi ...
ic professor of history and editor of
Old Norse Old Norse, also referred to as Old Nordic or Old Scandinavian, was a stage of development of North Germanic languages, North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants ...
texts.


Life and career

Guðni was born at Gamla-Hraun at
Eyrarbakki Eyrarbakki () is a fishing village on the south coast of Iceland with a population of about 570 people, not including inhabitants of the prison located there. The village is founded on the Great Þjórsá Lava. History For centuries, the harbou ...
Páll Lýðsson
"GUÐNI JÓNSSON"
Minningargreinar, ''
Morgunblaðið ''Morgunblaðið'' (, ''The Morning Paper'') is an Icelandic daily newspaper. ''Morgunblaðið''s website, mbl.is, is the most popular website in Iceland. It is currently the country's only daily printed newspaper and the newspaper of record. Hi ...
'', 22 July 2001
into a poor family who had a total of 17 children. He was raised by relatives at Leirubakki until he was twelve, worked two seasons as a fisherman and then was taken in by his married sister in
Reykjavík Reykjavík is the Capital city, capital and largest city in Iceland. It is located in southwestern Iceland on the southern shore of Faxaflói, the Faxaflói Bay. With a latitude of 64°08′ N, the city is List of northernmost items, the worl ...
, enabling him to attend evening school there. He received a
middle school Middle school, also known as intermediate school, junior high school, junior secondary school, or lower secondary school, is an educational stage between primary school and secondary school. Afghanistan In Afghanistan, middle school includes g ...
certificate in
Flensburg Flensburg (; Danish language, Danish and ; ; ) is an independent city, independent town in the far north of the Germany, German state of Schleswig-Holstein. After Kiel and Lübeck, it is the third-largest city in Schleswig-Holstein. Flensburg's ...
in 1921 and a school certificate from
Menntaskólinn í Reykjavík Menntaskólinn í Reykjavík (MR; official name in English: Reykjavik College) is collegein Iceland. It is located in Reykjavík. The school traces its origin to 1056, when a school was established in Skálholt, and it remains one of the oldest ...
in 1924. In 1923 he served as president of the student society ''Framtíðin''. He then attended the
University of Iceland The University of Iceland ( ) is a public research university in Reykjavík, Iceland, and the country's oldest and largest institution of higher education. Founded in 1911, it has grown steadily from a small civil servants' school to a modern co ...
, first in
theology Theology is the study of religious belief from a Religion, religious perspective, with a focus on the nature of divinity. It is taught as an Discipline (academia), academic discipline, typically in universities and seminaries. It occupies itse ...
and then in the faculty of Old Norse studies. He completed a master's degree in Icelandic studies in 1930 with a thesis on ''
Landnámabók (, "Book of Settlements"), often shortened to , is a medieval Icelandic written work which describes in considerable detail the settlement () of Iceland by the Norse in the 9th and 10th centuries CE. is divided into five parts and ov ...
'', comparing the manuscripts with each other and with other texts. His doctoral thesis, published in 1952, was in
genealogy Genealogy () is the study of families, family history, and the tracing of their lineages. Genealogists use oral interviews, historical records, genetic analysis, and other records to obtain information about a family and to demonstrate kin ...
and history: ''Bólstaðir og búendur í Stokkseyrarhreppi''. He began a career as a teacher at a primary school in the
Vestmannaeyjar Vestmannaeyjar (, sometimes anglicized as Westman Islands) is a municipality and archipelago off the south coast of Iceland. The largest island, Heimaey, has a population of 4,414, most of whom live in the archipelago's main town, Vestmannaeyja ...
in winter 1926–27, taught evening school himself in Reykjavík in 1927–28, taught at the Commercial College of Iceland in 1928–29, and then taught at Reykvíking Middle School from 1928 until 1945, when he became headmaster. In 1957 he became professor of history at the university, and held that position until 1967, when he had a stroke. He died on 4 March 1974.


Personal life

He was married twice: his first wife, Jónína Margrét Pálsdóttir, whom he married in 1926, died in 1936 and two years later he married Sigríður Hjördís Einarsdóttir. He had five children from his first marriage, one of whom died young, and four from his second.


Publications

Guðni Jónsson published extensively in history and genealogy, including ''Bergsætt'', ''Saga Hraunshverfis á Eyrarbakka'' and ''Stokkseyringa saga''. He also published histories of the Flensburg school (1932), the
Eimskipafélag Íslands Eimskipafélag Íslands hf. (, ), trading as Eimskip (, ), is an international shipping company with 56 offices in 20 countries and four continents; Europe, North America, South America and Asia. Eimskip specialises in worldwide freight forwarding ...
shipping company (1939) and the University of Iceland (1961). He edited the works of Brynjúlfur Jónsson and several other popular writers and published twelve volumes of popular histories and legends, ''Íslenzkir sagnaþættir og þjóðsögur'', in 1940–57 and two volumes of ''Skyggni'', studies of Icelandic folklore, in 1960 and 1962. He made an important contribution to the availability of Old Norse works. With Bjarni Vilhjálmsson he edited the '' Fornaldarsögur Norðurlanda'' (3 volumes, 1943–44), then on his own, volumes 1 to 12 of the complete
Sagas of Icelanders The sagas of Icelanders (, ), also known as family sagas, are a subgenre, or text group, of Icelandic Saga, sagas. They are prose narratives primarily based on historical events that mostly took place in Iceland in the ninth, tenth, and earl ...
, which were published in 1946–47 and included some material that had not been readily available before. He completed this edition with an index of names published in 1949, and continued until 1957 to publish editions of other texts, some of which, such as the Bishops' sagas, had only been previously available in 19th-century editions.''Konunga sögur I-III'' by Guðni Jónsson, review by Stefán Einarsson, ''
Modern Language Notes ''Modern Language Notes'' (''MLN'') is a peer-reviewed academic journal established in 1886 at the Johns Hopkins University, with the intention of introducing continental European literary criticism into American scholarship. The journal is publis ...
'' 74.5, May 1959, p. 479 .


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Jonsson, Gudni 1901 births 1974 deaths Gudni Jonsson Gudni Jonsson Old Norse studies scholars Gudni Jonsson