This page has not as yet been published.
It is work in progress, but we hope to get it published in the foreseeable future.
Details
Page name:
Source:Konungs skuggsjá/11/00009
Redirect (method 1):
Redirect (method 2):
Namespace
Source
Current visibility
Page class
textual items
Konungs skuggsjá - 11
[00009]
Belongs to context
11 —
[11] on the Irish marvels, tr. Laurence Marcellus Larson, The king’s mirror (Speculum regale-Konungs skuggsjá) (1917).
Item serial number
00009 ASCII-based serial numbers are used to sort items in consecutive order.
(ID: Konungs skuggsjá/11/Klefsancross-refs?)
I believe we have now mentioned all the features of this country that are most worth discussing. But there is one other matter that I can tell about, if you wish, for the sport or amusement of it. Long time ago a clownish fellow lived in that country; he was a Christian, however, and his name was Klefsan. It is told of this one that there never was a man who, when he saw Klefsan, was not compelled to laugh at his amusing and absurd remarks. Even though a man was heavy at heart, he could not restrain his laughter, we are told, when he heard that man talk. But Klefsan fell ill and died and was buried in the churchyard like other men. He lay long in the earth until the flesh had decayed from his bones, and his bones, too, were largely crumbled. Then it came to pass that other corpses were buried in the same churchyard, and graves were dug so near the place where Klefsan lay that his skull was unearthed, and it was whole. They set it up on a high rock in the churchyard, where it has remained ever since. But whoever comes to that place and sees that skull and looks into the opening where the mouth and tongue once were immediately begins to laugh, even though he were in a sorrowful mood before he caught sight of that skull. Thus his dead bones make almost as many people laugh as he himself did when alive. Now I know of no further facts about that country which appear to be suitable materials with which to lengthen a talk like this.
Agents
Klefsan ... Clessán <strong>Klefsan ... Clessán</strong> <br>Klefsan, an Irish buffoonish character described in one of the Irish marvels of <em>Konungs skuggsjá</em>, according to which he was able to provoke laughter even in death when his skull was put on display in the churchyard where his body lay buried. According to Kuno Meyer, <em>Klefsan</em> represents a corrupt form of an originally Irish name, <em>Clessán</em> (from <em>cless ‘</em>trick’). He suggests that its corrupt form is attributable to a misreading (implicitly, of Insular <em>s</em> for <em>f</em>). Cf. Mac Rustaing in the <em>Commentary to the Félire Óengusso</em>.
