The Arnamagnæan Institute
The Arnamagnæan Institute is a research centre focused on philology, manuscript studies and language studies, specifically West Norse (Icelandic, Norwegian and Faroese) and East Norse (Swedish and Danish) in addition to modern Icelandic and Faroese.
The centre is home to several collections, the most important one is the Arnamagnæan manuscript collection which comprises around 3000 items. Around 1400 are in Copenhagen, and the rest has been given back to Iceland. In 2009 the collection was added to UNESCO’s Memory of the World Register in recognition of its historical value.
Read about the collection.
In collaboration with the Arnamagnæan Commission the institute publishes the series Bibliotheca Arnamagnæana and Editiones Arnamagnæanæ. A new series of digital editions, Editiones Arnamagnæanæ Electronicæ, is under development.
The Arnamagnæan Institute was established in 1956 in order to provide a research environment that would ensure that the Arnamagnæan manuscript collection would be put to the scholarly use for which it was intended. This is done by conducting research into:
- Manuscript studies and philology (including digital philology)
- Scholarly editing: history and methodologies
- Language and literature (including Latin) in medieval and early-modern Scandinavia
The Arnamagnæan Institute works closely with its sister institute, the Árni Magnússon Institute for Icelandic Studies in Reykjavík as well as the National Library of Iceland. In addition to cooperation on the database handrit.org, which contains descriptions and images of Icelandic and Norse manuscripts in Denmark and Iceland, the three institutions also arrange an annual summer school in manuscript studies, which is held alternately in Copenhagen and Reykjavík.
The Arnamagnæan Institute is also a partner in the Nordic Master's Programme Viking and Medieval Norse Studies, which offers an interdisciplinary approach to Viking and Medieval Scandinavia at four different Nordic universities and associated research institutes.
Furthermore the Institute hosts a biennial interdisciplinary seminar on the Care and Conservation of Manuscripts. In recent years between 100 and 200 scholars, conservators, photographers and students from all around the world have gathered in Copenhagen every other year to discuss their work with each other.
Projects and ressources
- A dictionary of Old Norse Prose
- manuscript.ku.dk - explore the manuscript collection online
- Script and Text in Time and Space - interactive digital editions of diploma from St. Clara's Convent in Roskilde (project)
- Stories for all time: The Icelandic fornaldarsögur – catalogue of all the manuscripts in which fornaldarsaga texts are found
- Textual scholarship (research group)
- The Book of Books: Hernando Colón's Libro de los Epítomes
- When Danes Prayed in German
Researchers
| Name | Title | Phone | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Driscoll, Matthew James | Professor | +4535328471 | |
| Hansen, Anne Mette | Associate Professor | +4535328713 | |
| Jensson, Gottskálk | Associate Professor | +4535328473 | |
| Kjeldsen, Alex Speed | Associate Professor | +4553600121 | |
| Lassen, Annette | Associate Professor - Promotion Programme | +4535328491 | |
| Vrieland, Seán | Associate Professor | +4535337566 |