[1][4] The compilation is often thought of as containing the main texts belonging to the textual corpus (or sub-genre) commonly referred to as the samtíðarsögur or 'contemporary sagas'.
While it has been treated as a purely historical source, recent decades show acknowledgement that these are constructed texts representing a narrativised version of the past.
[5][6] Sturlunga saga is the main source of Icelandic history during the 12th and 13th centuries and was written by people who experienced the internal power struggle which ended in Iceland's loss of sovereignty and submission to Norway in 1262–64; the descriptions of wounds in Íslendinga saga are so detailed that they may be based on eyewitness accounts used in compensation claims.
[1] The work is preserved in somewhat differing versions in two defective Western Icelandic parchments dating to the second half of the 14th century, the Króksfjarðarbók and the Reykjafjarðarbók (AM 122 a fol.
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