skjalum

Skjalum is a term that appears in Icelandic-language contexts and in discussions of medieval manuscript culture. It is most often encountered as a grammatical form rather than a distinct lexical entry. The base noun skjal means a document, charter, or sheet of parchment. In Icelandic grammar, skjalum functions as the dative plural form of skjal, used in sentences where the documents are the recipient or the location of an action, among other possible grammatical roles.

In scholarly usage, skjalum may occur in quotations from legal charters, royal grants, or other archival material. It appears as part of phrases describing collections of documents, the transmission of records, or references to manuscript sources. Because Icelandic is a highly inflected language, the same root skjal can appear in multiple forms depending on case, number, and grammatical function; skjalum specifically signals a plural, often related to the indirect object or location in a sentence.

Beyond its linguistic function, skjalum can also surface in discussions of paleography and manuscript studies as a generic reference to archival documents from Icelandic or Norse historical contexts. In these discussions, the term is more about the category of material (documents) than about a particular text.

See also

Skjal, the Icelandic word for a document; Icelandic grammar and inflection; medieval Icelandic manuscripts and paleography.