Repository path: workshop/translations/njala/R04-v1/translation.md · rendered 2026-09-09

Brennu-Njáls saga, chapters 1–2 — lead close translation, R04 v1.0

Source: workshop/canon/njala/source.txt (manifest canon-njala), SHA-256 a8e205197dfa1efb6cf84b9bcd10ec1f6639ee2ac4e167b99ffc1b863ed44007. 1,151 Icelandic words → 1,348 English words. Old Icelandic, c. 1280, in the modernised orthography of the snerpa.is edition. The project's fourteenth source language and its first medieval Scandinavian source.

Regime: R04 v1.0, lead close translation, source only. Draft frozen separately as draft-R06.md (an R06 output) and committed before the revision began, per R04 §Procedure 2a. Translator: lead agent, as a labeled subject (charter §3, A4). Cost: $0, never ledgered. Judge: never the lead.

Contamination: suspected — MEASURED, and the pre-measurement value is unchanged

The ordering was: this file and its frozen log committed at 81f2518, then the comparator opened, then this section written. No published rendering of this passage into any language was opened before that commit. The suspected above was declared before the measurement and the measurement does not move it — which is worth stating only because S079 wrote none before measuring the same kind of case and had to correct it two steps.

Measured by tools/dependence_check.py, unmodified, against Dasent 1861 (The Story of Burnt Njal; Project Gutenberg #597, out of copyright):

The 11-token run is he is here at the thing and his daughter too and — ten function words and the assembly noun, with not one proper name in it. That is not what L01–L03 predicted: the log expected convergence to show up in the names, because the anglicising convention for Norse names is fixed. It did not. The name-bearing shared 7-grams are the ones the name-exclusion column removes, and the longest run is in the part of the text where no name occurs at all.

Why suspected and not none: nothing here establishes independence. The 11-token run and the 34 shared 7-grams both clear the project's ≥7-token attention rule, and CLAUDE.md records three measurements against the premise that a canonical comparator gives the longer run. Precedent: T-son-makara-R04-v1 is suspected at a longest run of 8.

For comparison, and the comparison is not a ranking: T-pelsen-R04-v1 measured 24 tokens against Stork 1923 and is declared high. This is 11. The two runs are made of different material — one a stretch of narrative prose, the other a clause of reported dialogue — and neither figure is evidence about the other.

Full measurement, including the two materials defects found and repaired in the comparator: workshop/experiments/E-20260801d-name-ground-truth/gate/.

Lineage

• draft-R06.md — the frozen first pass (T-njala-R06-v1), committed fc38716 before revision.
• This file — that draft self-revised against the Icelandic. Every count over the log below is computed by parse_log.py and asserted by the verifier; none is written by hand.

Evaluation pointers

No quality judgement of this translation has been made or elicited. E-20260801d uses it as material for an instrument test — the ground truth for what tools/ngram_overlap.py::name_tokens should and should not call a proper name — and computes no quality figure of any kind about it.

Chapter 1

There was a man called Mord, who was called Fiddle. He was the son of Sighvat the Red. He lived at Voll in Rangarvellir. He was a powerful chieftain and a great pleader of suits, and so great a lawyer that no judgements were held lawful unless he was there. He had one daughter, called Unn. She was a handsome woman and courteous and accomplished, and was thought the best match in Rangarvellir.

Now the story turns west to the Breidafjord Dales. There is a man named Hoskuld. He was the son of Dala-Koll. His mother was called Thorgerd, and she was the daughter of Thorstein the Red, son of Olaf the White, son of Ingjald, son of Helgi. Ingjald's mother was Thora, the daughter of Sigurd Snake-in-the-eye, son of Ragnar Hairy-breeches. Unn the Deep-minded was the mother of Thorstein the Red; she was the daughter of Ketil Flatnose, son of Bjorn Buna. Hoskuld lived at Hoskuldstead in Laxardale.

His brother was called Hrut. He lived at Hrutstead. He had the same mother as Hoskuld. His father was Herjolf. Hrut was a handsome man, big and strong, a good fighter and gentle in temper, the wisest of men, sound in counsel to his friends, and a good adviser in the greater suits.

It happened one time that Hoskuld held a feast for his friends, and his brother Hrut was there and sat next to him. Hoskuld had a daughter called Hallgerd. She was playing on the floor with some other girls. She was beautiful to look at and well grown, and her hair was as fair as silk and so long that it came down to her belt.

Hoskuld called to her: "Come here to me," he said.

She went to him at once. He took her under the chin and kissed her. Then she walked away.

Then Hoskuld said to Hrut: "How does this girl seem to you? Do you not think her beautiful?"

Hrut said nothing. Hoskuld spoke to him a second time.

Then Hrut answered. "The girl is fair enough, and many will pay for it. But this I do not know: where thief's eyes have come into our family from."

At that Hoskuld grew angry, and there was little warmth between the brothers for a while.

Hallgerd's brothers were Thorleik, the father of Bolli, and Olaf, the father of Kjartan, and Bard.

Chapter 2

It happened one time that the brothers rode to the Althing, Hoskuld and Hrut. There was a great crowd there.

Then Hoskuld said to Hrut: "I would like it, brother, that you should better your lot and ask for a wife."

Hrut answers: "That has long been in my mind, though I have been of two minds about it. But now I will do as you wish. Where shall we look?"

Hoskuld answered: "There are many chieftains here at the Thing and there is plenty to choose from, but I have already made a beginning in one quarter on your behalf. There is a woman called Unn, the daughter of Mord Fiddle, the wisest of men, and he is here at the Thing, and his daughter too, and you may see her now if you wish."

And the next day, as men were going to the Law Council, they saw women outside the booth of the men of Rangarvellir, finely dressed.

Then Hoskuld said to Hrut: "There is Unn now, the one I told you about. How does she seem to you?"

"Well," he said, "but I do not know whether we shall have luck together."

After that they go to the Law Council. Mord Fiddle recited the law as was his custom, and went home to his booth. Hoskuld stood up, and Hrut with him, and they went to Mord's booth and inside. Mord was sitting at the inner end of the booth. They greeted him. He rose to meet them and took Hoskuld by the hand, and Hoskuld sat down beside him, and Hrut sat next to Hoskuld.

Then they talked of many things, and Hoskuld's speech came round to this: "I have a bargain to propose to you. Hrut wishes to become your son-in-law and to buy your daughter, and I shall not spare what is mine."

Mord answered: "I know you are a great chieftain, but your brother is unknown to me."

Hoskuld said: "He is a better man than I am."

Mord said: "You will need to lay out a great deal with him, for she takes everything I leave."

"There is no need to wait long for what I shall settle on," said Hoskuld. "He shall have Kambsness and Hrutstead and the land up to Thrandargil. He also owns a trading ship at sea."

Then Hrut said to Mord: "Bear in mind, goodman, that my brother will have pushed me forward a great deal out of affection. But if you are willing to take the matter into consideration, then I want you to name the terms."

Mord answered: "I have thought about the terms. She shall have sixty hundreds, and it shall be increased by a third from your side; and if the two of you have an heir, then there shall be equal partnership between you."

Hrut said: "These terms I accept. Let us have witnesses to it now."

Then they stood up and shook hands, and Mord betrothed his daughter Unn to Hrut, and the wedding feast was to be a fortnight after midsummer, at Mord's.

Now both parties ride home from the Thing, and they ride west past Hallbjorn's Cairns. There Thjostolf, the son of Bjorn Gold-bearer of Reykjardale, rode to meet them and told them of a ship come in at Hvita river; Ozur, Hrut's father's brother, had come out on it, and wanted Hrut to come and meet him as soon as possible. When Hrut heard this he asked Hoskuld to go down to the ship with him. Hoskuld went, and they both rode there.

When they came to the ship Hrut greets his kinsman Ozur warmly and kindly. Ozur invited them into the booth to drink. Their horses were unsaddled, and they went in and drank.

Hrut said to Ozur: "Now you shall ride west with me, kinsman, and stay with me this winter."

"That will not do," he said, "for I have to tell you of the death of your brother Eyvind. He named you his heir at the Gulathing, and now your enemies will take it if you do not come for it."

"What is to be done now, brother?" said Hrut. "The matter grows awkward for me now, since I have already fixed my wedding."

Hoskuld said: "You shall ride south to meet Mord and ask him that the two of you make a different agreement, and that his daughter sit three winters betrothed. I will ride home and bring your goods down to the ship."

Hrut said: "Now I want you to take meal and timber and whatever else of the cargo you like."

Hrut had his horses fetched and rode south, and Hoskuld rode home to the west.

Hrut came east to Rangarvellir, to Mord, and was well received there. Hrut told Mord the whole of his business and asked him to give counsel.

Mord spoke, and asked how much the property was.

Hrut said it was two hundred marks, if he got it all.

Mord said: "That is a great deal against my own inheritance, and you shall certainly go if you wish."

Then they altered the agreement, and Unn was to sit three winters betrothed.

Now Hrut rides down to the ship and stays by it through the summer until it was ready. Hoskuld brought all the goods that Hrut owned down to the ship. Hrut put into Hoskuld's hands the keeping of his property there in the west while he should be abroad. Hoskuld rode home to his farm.

A little later they got a fair wind and they sail out to sea. They were three weeks at sea and made land at Hernar in Hordaland, and then sailed east to Vik.

Translator's log

Frozen 2026-08-01, before any evaluation of this translation was designed and before any published rendering of this passage was opened (charter §3, A4; R04 §Procedure 3). Decisions and alternatives, not quality claims. Rows are parsed mechanically by workshop/experiments/E-20260801d-name-ground-truth/analysis/parse_log.py; every tally over this table in any artifact of this session comes from that parser and not from reading (workshop/translations/README.md, the S074 binding condition, note (bey)).

Codes in kind: NAM a name-form decision · REG register · SEM sense/lexis · SYN syntax or sentence shape · TNS tense · OMI something in the source not carried over. Codes in stage: D settled in the draft · R changed at the self-revision.