Research Group for Medieval Philology: Eldar Heide, Bergen

Old Norse visionary literature and the term leizla 'guidance'

This paper investigates the medieval European tradition of visionary literature, Christian edifying narratives about journeys through the afterlife. Special attention will be given to the Old Norse translation of Latinvisions and the question of terminology. Eldar Heide examines why this kind of narrative is called visio 'sight, something one sees' in Latin, but was translated as leizla 'guidance' in Old Norse, and how this relates to the native narrative tradition.

The paper will be given in Norwegian. For further details, please see the full abstract in Norwegian.