Icelanders' sagas

Icelanders' sagas

 or family sagas

Class of heroic prose narratives written in the 13th century about the great families who lived in Iceland from 930 to 1030. They represent the zenith of classical Icelandic saga writing and are far in advance of any contemporary medieval literature in their realism, controlled style, character delineation, and overwhelming tragic dignity. Their artistic unity, length, and complexity suggest that they were written by individual authors rather than composed orally. Justice, not courage, is often the primary virtue, as in the greatest of the family sagas, Njáls saga.