<i>Amors Leikir:</i> The Reception of Ovid and the Poetics of Love Games in Late Medieval Iceland

Iceland's role in the reception and transmission of Continental literature in the north has recently undergone significant reevaluation. While thirteenth-century Norway has traditionally been seen as the primary center for the translation and adaptation of Latin and French sources, Iceland's previously assumed passive role in this process is now being questioned. Recent scholarship has explored direct connections between Iceland and Continental institutions like the Lincoln Cathedral in England and Saint-Victor in France through figures such as Þorlákr Þórhallsson (1133–1193), patron of Iceland and a brilliant intellectual of his time.1Analyzing intercultural exchanges between Iceland and Anglo-Norman England is challenging due to the lack of information about the sources of the Icelandic manuscripts and precise textual references. Often, the intellectual authorities that inspired Icelandic authors are merely passing references in highly composite works, complicating the understanding of the scribes’ cultural background and training. A group of texts in the Old Norse-Icelandic corpus that particularly suffers from this vagueness is the indigenous riddarasögur (romances), although recent studies have attempted to shed light on the complex narrative structures, diverse inspirations, and ideological implications of a genre that has often been ignored by critics.2This article aims to highlight previously overlooked aspects of the relationship between late medieval Icelandic romances and the courtly literature of Anglo-Norman England, particularly through the reception of Ovid's amatory poetry and the concept of iocus amoris (“love game”), which became a central theme in courtly literature. After an overview of Ovid's influence in medieval Europe, the focus will shift to Scandinavia and Iceland and one riddarasaga in particular, Sigurðar saga þögla.3 This saga exhibits striking Ovidian features, the phrase Amors leikir, and an explicit mention of Ovid. These elements indicate that the anonymous author was familiar with the courtly love tradition that began with Ovid and peaked in French and Anglo-Norman romances. Finally, a new hypothesis will be presented, proposing that Ovid and the concept of love games may have reached Iceland through direct contacts with England, thus bypassing Norwegian translations.The impact of Ovid's poetry on medieval literature has been a “perennial topic” of Medieval Studies.4 While the twelfth century is often seen as the age of the Ovidian renaissance, his works, especially the Metamorphoses, may have been rediscovered as early as the ninth and eleventh centuries.5 In this phase, the author was primarily appreciated in scholastic environments, where his works served as examples of poetic style, grammar, and rhetoric.6The earliest anonymous commentary on Ovid's Metamorphoses appeared around 1100 (Munich, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Clm 4610).7 This initiated a tradition of allegorical and critical explorations, accessus, and rewritings that gradually shifted the European intelligentsia's approach to Ovid's work from purely analytical to moral and philosophical.8 A turning point occurred with the twelfth-century Allegoriae by Arnulf of Orléans, which provided an ethical reading of the Metamorphoses that achieved significant success. Ovid became popular as praeceptor amoris for generations of scholars, fostering a discourse on love, exile, self-expression, and sexuality in medieval Europe.9Accordingly, southern Germany and key cultural centers in France, such as the School of Orléans, may be seen as the starting points of the Ovidian renaissance, as they recognized a potential in Ovid's poetry beyond its pedagogic value.10 Despite the monastic sensibility of the time, which conflicted with themes such as playful love and eroticism—especially after the Gregorian Reform—Ovid's name and quotations spread widely in sermons and textbooks.11 The Metamorphoses also began to appear in mythographic works early on, such as the First Vatican Mythographer (late ninth to early eleventh century), achieving notable success.12The French Loire Valley was a center of literary innovation in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, introducing Ovid to a broader audience than monastic students. The impact of their work—especially that of Baudri of Bourgueil (1050–1130), archbishop of Dol from 1108—cannot be overstated. Baudri, the most enthusiastic reader of Ovid in the Loire School (or School of Angers), emerges for his prolific poetic output and extensive rewritings.13 Gerald A. Bond has identified Baudri as the founder of the medieval Ovidian subculture, given his focus on love and other themes that would become prominent in France and England in the following decades.Baudri's engagement with the concepts of amor and intimate friendship involved a playful use of taboos that challenged contemporary morality and encouraged a “dialectic between the public language of restraint and the private thought of release.”14 A struggle to balance literary innovation with conservatism was common among the churchmen of the time, as proven by the notable ambiguity between homosexual and heterosexual relationships in Baudri's poems.15 Indeed, the subtle nuances of Ovid's amatory verses may be the key to his increasing popularity from the twelfth century onward, leading to imitations (Pseudo-Ovidiana) and, at the same time, efforts to position him among the most influential Latin authors.16 Not only the Metamorphoses, but also Amores, and became of the medieval being widely and brilliant Baudri's imitations of the monastic friendship was often through Bond that Baudri's use of in his love to and is and that with the than with the of his The of iocus amoris is central to his work and the Ovidian Baudri iocus and they are and often appear to one in his which are with and also is in this iocus amor with Ovid in the to an from where Ovid also between the of his poetry and the moral of his often amor and as in a is for a to to by love is often amoris with but with a have and and is the of In the iocus in an in in love and games is a of love and that the poetry of and Ovid a shift in the late of love, as the between iocus and became and iocus new to and as in authors The of courtly literature and the translation of the phrase amoris this of Ovid's and Baudri's concept of love of Latin love poetry in France by Anglo-Norman scholars, as by Baudri with the which through and literary works, such as the to of of the literature a shift the of which was by like France of the twelfth century), as was the of a discourse initiated by the Loire Baudri's are in only one by and are in that his work may also have this time, served as between and the of iocus amoris in the the This concept as early as of verses the balance between and and and phrase is also in the by the where the a and love are a the their of love the Ovidian that would influence European literature for centuries, the Old Norse-Icelandic The same is of France in England, as in thirteenth-century Norway as with love games through the of the Amors in the The to Ovid is in the verses as an and Ovid of in French a a France an of a in which Ovid the of the is to which is but recent scholarship an of the of and amoris than a of Ovid's the Latin author the point for on love for of the most notable examples of Ovid's influence in the century is by by The of iocus amoris are such as that will the of the a about the games of the games of love are the they are by of the games are also in the adaptation of the games of the late and the early centuries, in works such as the and the In the the to and authors reached a audience than at the of the was a of to and The that Ovid's influence in the as also by the of and which a of most of the the of his as praeceptor amoris the influence to authors like and and the (late to in particular, a to and the of love to Ovid are his such as in that love to in the of the with explicit and the of in for for began to and as Finally, a of love for thus a be after is love, where love his to which Ovid in his works, such as by the of the in his the same time, Ovid's his translation of the In studies of and works the of Ovidian texts in Latin and French at the the a of love by the phrase While and iocus become in poetry the by the on to the between and the by is for to of the same was common for to their in of the being and of with was common for the to use highly language in of late medieval England, the Ovidian This of poetry also to 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the in inspired the Icelandic Amors is that the and appear in to his and in love games with the Ovid's influence and his of iocus amoris as to the medieval discourse on love and the Loire to the has Ovid's reception the Old Norse-Icelandic of explicit references to Ovid that the French in the indigenous riddarasögur is often with the role of France and Anglo-Norman England in the Icelandic reception of his such as and saga the use of amor to a of the moral in Continental romances. have the hypothesis of a adaptation of the between and in the Metamorphoses, as as elements from such as and A would an use of Amors and the to Ovid's the and have been to the of and popularity is by medieval have been and most by the name of the to as in the Anglo-Norman and While the Norwegian translation saga to the Continental use of the with the the of Amors leikir, but is notable that the phrase only in one Anglo-Norman of the and that Amors are by as the between Iceland and England by and may new on 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manuscripts the century may be seen as the of medieval Icelandic by the same to new and for that Iceland a literary in medieval its