ON THE INTERPRETATION OF EVIDENCE: YNGVARR'S EXPEDITION IN RUNIC INSCRIPTIONS AND OLD NORSE TEXTS.

This article deals with different hypotheses concerning the dating and destination of the socalled Yngvarr expedition. First, the primary sources are discussed, i.e., the runestones that can be found in central Sweden and that were carved during the Viking Age. As the information in these inscriptions is limited, researchers have also drawn upon Old Icelandic texts preserved in manuscripts that where written three to four centuries after the expedition. The annals and Yngvars saga víðforla are discussed, especially concerning the credibility of dating Yngvarr's death to c. 1041. One section focuses on the acceptance or rejection of this dating based on runestone ornamentation. Hypotheses about Yngvarr's expedition can be broadly divided into those that accept the dating to c. 1041 as a 'fact' for further considerations and hypotheses, and those that reject it. Hypotheses that draw on Yngvars saga víðforla for proving the route or destination of the historical expedition tend to not sufficiently acknowledge that the setting (among other things) is part of the saga's storyworld. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]