Note to Eyv Lv 4^I

[7, 8] njótr hranna ‘user of the waves [SWIMMER = Eyvindr skreyja]’: Another kenning that has caused difficulty. (a) In this edn it is interpreted literally, since the poet may be alluding to the event described in Egill Lv 10^V (Eg 15), where Eyvindr skreyja, worsted in battle, leaps from his ship to swim to safety. (Ranna in all Fsk mss would be a Norw. form of hranna.) Given the likelihood that Hákon had conducted a previous naval campaign in Danish waters (Schreiner 1927-9e, 526; Bagge 2004, 189-90), some familiarity with Eyvindr skreyja on the part of the king’s Norwegian supporters would not be surprising. For the poet’s aspersions on the other Danish military leader at Fitjar, see Note to Lv 5/2. For a possible parallel to (or echo of) this kenning, see Note to Bjbp Jóms 13/6, and Poole (1988, 176). (b) For Finnur Jónsson’s interpretations, see Note to l. 5, søkkspennir. (c) Reichardt (1928, 33, cf. NN §1057A; ÍF 26; ÍF 29; Hkr 1991) treated njótr hranna as a kenning for ‘seafarer, steerer of the ship’, taking it as a vocative with imp. halt(u) ‘keep’. But hranna needs to be complemented with a base-word equivalent in function to ‘timber’ or ‘horse’ if it is to yield a standard ship-kenning.

References

1. Bibliography
2. NN = Kock, Ernst Albin. 1923-44. Notationes Norrœnæ: Anteckningar till Edda och skaldediktning. Lunds Universitets årsskrift new ser. 1. 28 vols. Lund: Gleerup.
3. ÍF 26-8 = Heimskringla. Ed. Bjarni Aðalbjarnarson. 1941-51.
4. Hkr 1991 = Bergljót S. Kristjánsdóttir et al., eds. 1991. Heimskringla. 3 vols. Reykjavík: Mál og menning.
5. ÍF 29 = Ágrip af Nóregskonunga sǫgum; Fagrskinna—Nóregs konungatal. Ed. Bjarni Einarsson. 1985.
6. Reichardt, Konstantin. 1928. Studien zu den Skalden des 9. und 10. Jahrhunderts. Palaestra 159. Leipzig: Mayer & Müller.
7. Poole, Russell. 1988. ‘The Cooperative Principle in Medieval Interpretations of Skaldic Verse: Snorri Sturluson, Þjóðólfr Arnórsson, and Eyvindr Skáldaspillir’. JEGP 87, 159-78.
8. Bagge, Sverre. 2004. ‘A Hero Between Paganism and Christianity: Håkon the Good in Memory and History’. In Hoff et al. 2004, 185-210.
9. Schreiner, Johan. 1927-9e. ‘Slaget på Fitjar’. HT(N) 28 (5 ser. 7), 526.
10. Internal references
11. (forthcoming), ‘ Unattributed, Fagrskinna’ in Kari Ellen Gade (ed.), Poetry from the Kings’ Sagas 2: From c. 1035 to c. 1300. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 2. Turnhout: Brepols, p. . <https://skaldic.org/m.php?p=text&i=56> (accessed 7 May 2024)
12. Emily Lethbridge (ed.) 2012, ‘Bjarni byskup Kolbeinsson, Jómsvíkingadrápa 13’ in Diana Whaley (ed.), Poetry from the Kings’ Sagas 1: From Mythical Times to c. 1035. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 1. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 970.
13. Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.) 2022, ‘Egils saga Skalla-Grímssonar 15 (Egill Skallagrímsson, Lausavísur 10)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross, Kari Ellen Gade and Tarrin Wills (eds), Poetry in Sagas of Icelanders. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 5. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 190.