Acta sanctorum in Selio is a Latin hagiography of saints Alban and Sunniva and their companions.

The tale is directly based on that in Acta sanctorum in Selio, and thus slightly younger, although likely still belonging to the 12th century.

[3] According to the legend, Sunniva was the heir of an Irish kingdom, but had to flee when an invading heathen king wanted to marry her.

She and her brother Alban (post-Reformation accounts add two sisters, called Borni and Marita) and their followers settle the previously uninhabited islands of Selja and Kinn in Norway during the rule of the pagan Jarl Hákon Sigurðarson (r. 962–995).

Their Norwegian neighbors on the mainland suspect the Christians of stealing sheep and complain to Jarl Hákon.

After another account of similar events by a different witness, the king and bishop travelled to Selja and found many sweet-smelling bones.

Sunniva's relics (allegedly again found incorrupt) were moved to the new cathedral in Bergen in 1170, and as a result, her veneration spread throughout Norway.

Sunniva also has a separate feast day commemorating her translation to Bergen in 1170, on either 31 August or 7 September.

[6] Norwegian author Sigrid Undset, who had converted to Roman Catholicism at age 42 in 1924, visited the remains of Selja monastery in 1926 and was inspired to write a novella based on the legend, completed by 1928, for which she commissioned fifteen watercolour illustrations by her friend Gøsta af Geijerstam.