In recent years, various branches of memory studies have provided useful tools of analysis that offer new ways of understanding medieval cultures. The articles in this collection draw on these new theoretical tools for studying - and conceptualizing - memory, in order to reassess the function of memory in medieval Nordic culture. Despite its interdisciplinary and comparative basis, the volume remains very much an empirical study of memory and memory-dependent issues as these took form in the Nordic world.
In addition, the articles deal with a variety of theoretical concepts and areas of investigation which are of relevance when dealing with memory studies in general, such as transmission and media, preservation and storage, forgetting and erasure, and authenticity and falsity. The articles cover a wide range of medieval texts, such as saga, myth, poetry, law, historiography, learned literature, and other forms of verbal expression, such as runic inscriptions.