Note to Sigv Knútdr 10^I

[5, 6] rauf af suman veg ‘enjoyed some of the glory’: The basic meaning of rjúfa is ‘to break, tear’, and af must be adverbial, hence ‘enjoyed’, lit. ‘broke off’, with suman veg as the acc. sg. object. There are two identical nouns vegr, both m., one meaning ‘way’ and the other ‘glory’. (a) Finnur Jónsson (Skj B; LP: rjúfa 5) assumes the former, and so interprets the clause ‘quickly put behind him some of the way’, i.e. ‘quickly travelled some of the way’. (b) Kock prefers the latter (NN §652), and so offers skördade en del av Roms berömmelse ‘reaped a portion of the glory of Rome’. Kock’s reading is preferred here, as it avoids the potential illogicality of Finnur’s reading (why did Knútr not travel all of the way to Rome?), and more appropriately emphasises Knútr’s glory and European horizons. In his 1027 Letter Knútr declares that in Rome the pope, the emperor, and the attendant nobles omnes me et honorifice suscepere et muneribus pretiosis honorauere ‘all both received me with honour and honoured me with precious gifts’ (Darlington and McGurk 1995-, II, 514-15).

References

1. Bibliography
2. Skj B = Finnur Jónsson, ed. 1912-15b. Den norsk-islandske skjaldedigtning. B: Rettet tekst. 2 vols. Copenhagen: Villadsen & Christensen. Rpt. 1973. Copenhagen: Rosenkilde & Bagger.
3. NN = Kock, Ernst Albin. 1923-44. Notationes Norrœnæ: Anteckningar till Edda och skaldediktning. Lunds Universitets årsskrift new ser. 1. 28 vols. Lund: Gleerup.
4. LP = Finnur Jónsson, ed. 1931. Lexicon poeticum antiquæ linguæ septentrionalis: Ordbog over det norsk-islandske skjaldesprog oprindelig forfattet af Sveinbjörn Egilsson. 2nd edn. Copenhagen: Møller.
5. Darlington, R. R. and P. McGurk, eds. 1995-2007. The Chronicle of John of Worcester. 3 vols. Oxford Medieval Texts. Oxford: Clarendon.