Cornell University Library is embarking on a three-year collaborative project with the National and University Library of Iceland to create the Icelandic National Digital Library, a first-of-its-kind international electronic repository selected from Cornell's Fiske Icelandic Collection, the National and University Library of Iceland, and Iceland's çrni Magnœsson Institute. When completed in 2000, the digital library will contain the world's most extensive digital collection on Icelandic history, language and literature.

The project is made possible by a $600,000 grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and grants from Iceland's Ministry of Culture and Education and the Icelandic Research Council. Project costs will total $1.3 million over the three years. The Mellon grant will not only contribute toward the cost of creating the database, but also will support an evaluation of the economics and changing use patterns of these materials, comparing electronic access with traditional pathways of research. Since scholars interested in Icelandic materials are scattered throughout the world, access to major collections in electronic format should prove cost-effective.

"SagaNet," as the project is called, will contain high-quality digital images of the full texts of Icelandic sagas, a unique genre of historical and fictional narrative that draws its themes from Nordic mythology, the lives of Norwegian kings, the adventures of settler families in Iceland and romances of continental Europe's age of chivalry; and r’mur, epic poems based upon the sagas. The digital library also will include relevant critical studies written before 1900.

Users will be able to search for these digital images in either English or Icelandic. Cornell will convert approximately 750 printed books into digital form, while the National and University Library and çrni Magnœsson Institute will convert about 380,000 manuscript pages.

The collection will be important to the international scholarly research community working in medieval studies, to those learning Nordic languages and to the population of Iceland, said the project's co-directors, Thorsteinn Hallgr’msson of the National and University Library of Iceland and H. Thomas Hickerson, director of Cornell's Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections and of the Cornell Digital Access Coalition.

"This project will create digitally a truly international collection and serve as a model for future international development in this field," Hallgr’msson said. "It is the first step towards an Icelandic Digital Library, and it is extremely important to the libraries, for Icelandic culture and for introducing Iceland abroad."

Hickerson added, "If successful, SagaNet will be a model to test the economic viability of national digital libraries with international audiences and to illustrate the potential that these technologies offer for changing the processes and costs of research."

The project will rely heavily on Cornell technical expertise in communications networking and will provide valuable information for electronic imaging projects in the future. The University of Iceland's Institute of Economic Studies will, in addition, conduct a detailed economic assessment of the project.

The Icelandic National Digital Library will provide access to the "collection of record" for a chosen subject -- that is, everything to be found in manuscripts and printed books. Patrick J. Stevens, curator of the Fiske Collection, noted that the collection will include several texts that he expects will be widely used, such as Nj‡ls saga, Hrafnkels saga and G’sla saga Sœrssonar, all family sagas featuring either fictional Icelanders or historic Icelanders in fictional stories; and Fl—res saga ok Blankiflœr, perhaps the best-known Icelandic romance.

In Iceland, sagas are not just for scholars. "For centuries, the sagas and related works were read aloud within farmers' families during evening chores," Stevens said. "Even today, paperback editions of medieval Icelandic sagas sell in service stations and supermarkets."

That is not as remarkable as it may seem when one learns that Iceland is one of the world's most literate nations. Four daily newspapers are published in this nation of only 265,000 people, and, per capita, Icelanders enjoy the world's largest publishing industry and buy more books than citizens of any other country.

What's more, Iceland is a country where 90 percent of its schools are hooked up to the Internet.

"For an island country, it is entirely appropriate that primary access to information should be via the Internet," Hickerson said. "Iceland is very interested in staying on top of the latest technologies, and the National Digital Library is a prime example of how they are putting such technologies to use."

Cornell's Fiske Icelandic Collection was established in 1905 at the bequest of Daniel Willard Fiske, a noted linguist and teacher who began collecting Icelandic books as a student in Sweden in the 1850s. In addition to being a professor and Cornell's first University Librarian, he was a diplomat, journalist and world traveler and remains today a household name in Iceland.

The Fiske Collection includes more than 38,000 volumes and virtually every publication issued in Iceland or written in Icelandic before 1930. Its treasures include an extremely rare printing of an Icelandic translation of the New Testament printed in Denmark in 1540. In addition to its value as a resource for study of Icelandic history, language and literature, the Fiske Collection is a rich repository for scholars of Old Norse and for the study of medieval Scandinavia.

"This project makes a unique treasure of the Cornell library a usable source for people anywhere on the globe," Hickerson said. "And Icelanders see this as a way to make their literature available to their own population while expanding worldwide access to their cultural heritage."