[4] kerlaug ‘the cup-liquid’: Laug f. is ‘bath, washing’, or ‘hot-spring’ in an Icel. context, hence here liquid in general, and ker n. is often specifically a cup or drinking-vessel (LP: ker 1). The cpd could be regarded as a kenning for ‘drink’ or ‘ale’ (cf. TorfE Lv 1/6 kerstraumr ‘cup-stream [DRINK]’), but if so the structure of the overall poetry-kenning is unusual, with a kenning as the base-word. Kerlaug could alternatively be a river-name, as it is in Þul Á 6/4 Kerlaugar tvær ‘two Kerlaugar’ and in Grí 29/2 (NK 63), where the phrase designates a pair of rivers through which Þórr wades.
References
- Bibliography
- 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.
- Internal references
- Elena Gurevich (ed.) 2017, ‘Anonymous Þulur, Á heiti 6’ in Kari Ellen Gade and Edith Marold (eds), Poetry from Treatises on Poetics. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 3. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 850.
- Not published: do not cite ()
- Russell Poole (ed.) 2012, ‘Torf-Einarr Rǫgnvaldsson, Lausavísur 1’ 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. 131.