Migratory Legends

Reidar Thoralf Christiansen, a Norwegian folklorist, served as archivist of the Norwegian Folklore Collection and later as a professor of folkloristics at the University of Oslo. His early studies were in theology, from 1904 to 1909, and he worked as a language teacher for Finnish and Sami, preparing priests for postings in Finnmark, though he was never ordained. Under the guidance of Moltke Moe, he turned to folkloristics. A scholarship took him to Finland in 1912 to study with Kaarle Krohn, followed by studies in Copenhagen from 1914 to 1916 under Axel Olrik, and a visit to Lund University to work with Carl Wilhelm von Sydow.

In 1919, the Nansen Fund supported field research in Ireland, leading to his 1931 publication The Vikings and the Viking Wars in Irish and Gaelic Tradition. At Carl Marstrander’s suggestion, he learned Irish in Ballyferriter, County Kerry. Osborn Bergin wrote a poem urging him to return to Ireland. In 1921, he became archivist of the newly established Norwegian Folklore Collection and married Karin Lundblad, whom he had met in Lund; they had five children and lived in Blommenholm, outside Oslo.

Christiansen’s comparative research focused on fairy tales, especially between Scandinavian and Irish folklore traditions. His 1958 work The Migratory Legends introduced a type catalogue for classifying “migratory legends”—a term borrowed from German Wanderlegenden, referring to folk tales spread through trans-cultural diffusion—organized by motif, with examples from Norwegian folklore. He became a full professor at Oslo University in 1952 and received an honorary doctorate from University College Dublin in 1954.

After retiring in 1956, he spent a semester at Indiana University Bloomington at Stith Thompson’s invitation, and in 1957–1959 returned to Dublin to work with Seán Ó Súilleabháin. In 1958, he chaired the Commission Internationale des Arts et Traditions Populaires (CIAP). His later publications include Studies in Irish and Scandinavian Folktales (1959), European Folklore in America (1962), and Folktales of Norway (1964).