--- In norse_course@yahoogroups.com, "Patricia" <originalpatricia@...>
wrote:

>
> Nevertheless I wish I could reconcile in my own mind the reason you

make óheilagur mean outlawed - notwithstanding you agree with MMandHP,
there is no suggestion of making this word to mean outlawed, in any of
the dictionaries unless it is where one of them (dictionaries) says
something like unholy, the Complete Sagas of the Icelanders also gives
it this meaning, (outlawed) and yet I am not comfortable with it, can
you help


Patricia,

Zoega gives all words with the negative prefix ó- according to the
alternative spelling ú-. He has the definition "outlawed" for
'úheilagr', as well as "unholy". The phrase 'falla óheilagr' is given
in the CV entry for 'heilagr', which agrees with the translators.
'óheilagr' is here the opposite of 'heilagr', CV "inviolable, one
whose person is sacred, who cannot be slain with impunity" [
http://lexicon.ff.cuni.cz/png/oi_cleasbyvigfusson/b0248.png ]. I'm
not at all knowledgable about Icelandic law, but I think being
declared an outlaw means that the person could be legally killed by
anyone who caught them, and that no wergild/recompense could then be
demanded by relatives.

LN