The medieval law code of Gotland survives in the Old Gutnish language in two manuscript recensions. The younger of these manuscripts, a sixteenth-century paper codex in the Arnamagnæan Collection, Copenhagen, shelfmarked AM 54 4to, has earned the nickname ‘Codex B’, despite possibly preserving an older recension than the fourteenth- century parchment manuscript, Stockholm, Royal Library, B 64, nicknamed ‘Codex A’. The language found in Codex B, though clearly Old Gutnish, differs greatly from its elder counterpart, Codex A.
This paper explores to what extent the characteristic language found in Codex B reflects actual linguistic developments on the island of Gotland between the copying of the two codices, and how much may be attributed to external factors such as the scribe of AM 54 4to, a Danish-born member of the ruling class in Gotland. In this paper I contend that the scribe’s exemplar manuscript, a lost codex dated 1470, was also copied by a Dane, and discuss which of the ‘Danicisms’ found in AM 54 4to are inherited from this exemplar text. This analysis is accomplished through (1) linguistic comparison with the contemporary runic material found on Gotland, as well as the Gutnish dialect spoken on the island today; (2) considerations of orthographical practices found in Codex B and their possible origins and influences; as well as (3) linguistic and orthographical comparison with Codex A. The results found provide a greater understanding of the developments of this unique Old Nordic language within the context of inter-nordic language contact and manuscript production.