A Saga Is an Icelandic Prose Narrative
A saga is a long involved story. The word names a specific medieval literary form.
A saga is a long involved story, and specifically a medieval Icelandic prose narrative. The Icelandic sagas are unusual in world literature: written in the thirteenth century about events two or three hundred years earlier, they are in prose rather than verse, tell of farmers and feuds rather than kings and gods, and are told in a flat, understated voice that almost never enters a character's head. Old Norse *saga* simply means a story or a saying, and it is related to English *say*.
- A long story. *A family saga.*
- An Icelandic narrative. *Njal's Saga.*
- A drawn-out affair. *The whole saga.*
- Say — the same root. *To say.*
- Old Norse — *saga*, a story. *The source.*
Word forms
| Form | Word | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Noun | saga | A saga. |
| Plural | sagas | Sagas. |
| Related | say | To say. |
| German | Sage | A legend. |
| Old Norse | saga | A story. |
- The Icelandic sagas.Literature.
- A long legal saga.Figurative.
- Saga means a story.Etymology.
What makes the sagas distinctive
- Prose, at a time when heroic literature elsewhere was verse
- Farmers and feuds, not kings and gods
- Understatement — grief and violence reported flatly
- Almost no interiority — we see actions, not thoughts
- Written down in the 1200s about events around 930 to 1030
Old Norse *saga*, a story or narrative, related to Old English *secgan*, to say.
What is an Icelandic saga?
A medieval prose narrative about Icelandic families and feuds, written in the thirteenth century about earlier events.
Is saga related to say?
Yes. Both descend from a Germanic root meaning to tell.