Hugleiðingar um stafréttar uppskriftir*

Abstract

The purpose of this article is to look in detail at some transcription practices in scholarly editions of Old Norse texts. First there is a short look at the most common practices in editing and transcribing Old Norse texts. I then recommend a certain degree of normalization of punctuation, minuscules and majuscules and one and two words to increase the readability of the transcription. Problems that arise in transcription are then discussed, i.e. selecting of special letters and the handling of abbreviations. I point to a discrepancy in editions with regard to the handling of consonant and vowel signs and also look at the difference between suspensions and abbreviations and try to clarify the difference between them. In a chapter on special signs I recommend that an asterisk (*) be used to mark all conjectural signs in editions and that ‘} {’ be used not only to mark duplicated words but also extra letters and punctuation signs. I also warn editors against restoring too many words in a text.