Guess I have sheep on the brain here - - pics on the blog
http://antique-spinning-wheels.blogspot.com

> og sá muni sæll er þann fær heldur
> and he will be well who keeps those sheep???

"and whoever takes that one (i.e. that faith) instead (of the old one)
will be happy/fortunate", "it will be well for anyone who accepts that
one (that faith)"

A bit of a tricky sentence because there are a couple of words with
other meanings:

'fær' is here the present 3rd person sg. indicative of 'fá' "to get,
take, receive, catch, etc.", rather than 'fær' f. "sheep" although I'm
sure he'd be happy with sheep too ;-)

'þann' is masculine accusative, referring to 'átrúnaður' "faith" or
'siður' "custom, way, religion".

'heldur' (ON normalised spelling 'heldr') "rather, instead", an
adverb, rather than the present 3rd person sg. indicative of the verb
'halda' "to hold, keep" (which takes a dative object for what is
held). So the grammar rules out the possibility of it meaning that
would be keeping sheep, since 'þann' is masculine rather than
feminine, and accusative rather than dative.

Grace
Fred and Grace Hatton
Hawley Pa