Oddi ( Icelandic: ) is a small village and church at Rangárvellir in Rangárvallasýsla, Iceland. Oddi at Rangárvellir was a cultural and learning center in South

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 ...

during the

Middle Ages In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the 5th to the late 15th centuries, similarly to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire and ...

. There has been a church at Oddi since the introduction of Christianity. The current church at Oddi dates from 1924. For centuries, Oddi (

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 ...

: ) was the central home of the powerful family, Oddaverjar. The two best known leaders in Oddi were Sæmundur Sigfússon the Learned (1056–1133) and his grandson Jón Loftsson (1124–1197). The historian

Snorri Sturluson Snorri Sturluson ( ; ; 1179 – 22 September 1241) was an Icelandic historian, poet, and politician. He was elected twice as lawspeaker of the Icelandic parliament, the Althing. He is commonly thought to have authored or compiled portions of th ...

(1178–1241) was brought up and educated in Oddi by Jón Loftsson. It has been suggested that the name of the

Edda "Edda" (; Old Norse ''Edda'', plural ''Eddur'') is an Old Norse term that has been applied by modern scholars to the collective of two Medieval Icelandic literary works: what is now known as the ''Prose Edda'' and an older collection of poems ( ...

is derived from Oddi. The derivation of ''Edda'' from ''Oddi'' proposed in 1895 by Eiríkr Magnússon is discussed and rejected by Anatoly Liberman, "Ten Scandinavian and North English Etymologies,
''Alvíssmál'' 6 (1996): 63–98
here pp. 67–70. On the derivation of ''Edda'' see also Anatoly Liberman, "An Addendum to 'Ten Scandinavian and North English Etymologies' (''Edda'' and ''glide/gleiten''),
''Alvíssmál'' 7 (1997): 101–4
here pp. 101–2. Iceland's patron saint Þorlákur Þórhallsson received his education at Oddi from the age of nine (1142–1147) and looked upon the priest Eyjólfur Saemundsson as his foster-father. Þorlákur received Holy Orders in the Diaconate at the age of fifteen and then the Catholic priesthood at age eighteen.

References

Medieval history of Iceland Geography of Iceland {{Iceland-geo-stub