Sophus Bugge

Sophus Bugge was a Norwegian philologist and linguist who made significant contributions to the study of runic inscriptions and Norse literature. He was born in Larvik, Norway, in 1833, to a family of merchants and ship owners. He showed an early interest in languages and literature, and studied at the University of Christiania (now Oslo), Copenhagen, and Berlin. He became a professor of comparative philology and Old Norse at the University of Christiania in 1866, and remained there until his death in 1907. He was also a member of several scientific societies and received honorary degrees from Uppsala and Copenhagen. Bugge's scholarly work was directed to the collection and analysis of ancient Norwegian inscriptions, folk songs, and sagas. He published a critical edition of the Poetic Edda, the 13th-century Icelandic collection of heroic and mythological poems, in 1867. He also edited and commented on various skaldic poems, Eddic poems, and sagas. He proposed controversial theories about the origin and influence of Christian and classical elements in Norse literature, which were often rejected by his contemporaries. He also made important contributions to the study of Celtic, Romance, Oscan, Umbrian, and Etruscan languages. He collected a large number of runic inscriptions from Norway and other countries, and published them in a monumental edition that was completed by his assistant and successor Magnus Olsen after his death. Bugge's scientific work was of fundamental importance for the development of Norse philology and runic research. He was widely respected and admired by his peers and students, and influenced generations of scholars in his field.