SNORRE STURLESON, the author of the “Heimskringla” and the “Younger,” or “Prose Edda,” is the best representative of the early prose literature native to Northern Europe. In his writings, and especially in the “Younger Edda,” we see the first beginnings of the coherent development of the Teutonic prose essay as distinct from the Latin. In the change of form which takes place between the “Elder” and the “Younger Edda,” we see how the essay originated as a vehicle for the traditional thought of primitive peoples. The “Elder Edda” stands for the expression of religious myth, or primitive science, philosophy, and ethics, in its natural form—the poetical. In the “Younger Edda,” a later age translates the archaic poetical form into the first phase of the essay—a prose paraphrase of the verse, relieved by frequent quotations from the verse itself. Sometimes these quotations are exact; oftener they are paraphrased to please the taste of the later editor. We see in Persian literature the same phenomenon which is presented by the far North. The parallel is so close that if we were wholly ignorant of the laws of the parallel development of mind under pressure of related circumstances, we would be forced to the erroneous conclusion that the early Icelandic and the classical Persian writers had necessarily a common model, or were governed by some common tradition of style. The Homeric tradition undoubtedly influenced Iceland as it did Persia; but beyond the scope of its influence, we can see the effects of the natural laws of the mind working out in the literature of both countries. Comparisons of this kind have only to be made sufficiently comprehensive to force the conclusion that in all countries style itself is a product of natural causes, with an underlying unity governing in all its diversities.

  Snorre (spelled also “Snorri,” and “Snorro”; “Sturlason,” “Sturleson,” and “Sturluson”) was born at Hvamm in Iceland in 1178 or 1179, He was a man of the highest Icelandic culture at a time when the literary culture of Iceland was the most remarkable native growth of Northern Europe. He visited Norway twice and was in favor at the Norwegian court. In his own country he served as “lawman,” as well as the historian, poet, and prophet of his people. He met the usual reward of prophets at the last, for his great talents and his patriotism necessarily forced him into political leadership, and as he took sides against the Norwegian court influence, his assassination was instigated as a measure of court policy, and he was killed September 23d, 1241, by his own kinsman and friends. He is, in his own right, one of the greatest men produced by the primitive culture of Northern Europe. As a historian he has been compared to Thucydides, and in the “Younger Edda” he has left an immortal work of genius. His knowledge of poetical composition belongs to a time when the art of poetry was still consciously a part of the art of music, and what he has written on the subject has a high value as material for scientific investigation in the comparative study of the “Iliad,” the “Odyssey,” and the early poetry of Palestine and Persia. The most important philological discoveries of the twentieth century are likely to be made along lines of research which will show how great is the scientific importance of the unconsidered knowledge in which this thirteenth-century poet and philosopher was superior to the nineteenth.