Note to Rloð Lv 8^VIII (Ragn 24)

[3] máli Mundils ‘the close companion of Mundill <sea-king> [SEAFARER]’: There is no word in either ms. after Mundils which would provide a metrical l. 3, so eds have resorted to conjectural emendation to supply one. Vigfusson and Powell (CPB), Rafn (FSN) and Valdimar Ásmundarson (Ragn 1891) retain the 1824b reading mundils, without giving it a capital <M>. While no attempt is made in CPB or by Rafn to fill out the line by emendation, Valdimar adds mara f. ‘incubus, nightmare’ after mundils, thus producing the combination mundils mara ‘sea-king’s nightmare’ (?), which makes little sense in the context. Olsen (Ragn 1906-8, 211) and Finnur Jónsson (Skj B) emend to meiðir mundelds ‘destroyer of hand-fire [GOLD > GENEROUS MAN]’ and are followed in this respect by subsequent eds. This would certainly be consistent with the kennings brjótr baugs ‘breaker of a ring [GENEROUS MAN]’ in ll. 1, 2, and æ*gir* leygjar alnar ‘terrifier of the fire of the forearm [GOLD > GENEROUS MAN]’ in l. 7, but the context of the stanza suggests that the speaker (Ragnarr) is concerned to emphasise his seafaring capacity at least as much as his generosity, and the kenning máli Mundils ‘close companion of Mundill <sea-king> [SEAFARER]’, proposed here, seems appropriate, as well as involving relatively little emendation. The reading Mundils (gen. of Mundill, recorded as a sea-king name in Þul Sea-kings 1/5^III) has moreover the support of 147, although the name does not occur elsewhere in kennings.

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. FSN = Rafn, Carl Christian, ed. 1829-30. Fornaldar sögur nordrlanda. 3 vols. Copenhagen: Popp.
4. CPB = Gudbrand Vigfusson [Guðbrandur Vigfússon] and F. York Powell, eds. 1883. Corpus poeticum boreale: The Poetry of the Old Northern Tongue from the Earliest Times to the Thirteenth Century. 2 vols. Oxford: Clarendon. Rpt. 1965, New York: Russell & Russell.
5. Ragn 1906-8 = Olsen 1906-8, 111-222.
6. Ragn 1891 = 2nd edn (pp. 175-224) of Ragn as ed. in Valdimar Ásmundarson 1885-9, I.
7. Internal references
8. Elena Gurevich (ed.) 2017, ‘Anonymous Þulur, Heiti for sea-kings 1’ in Kari Ellen Gade and Edith Marold (eds), Poetry from Treatises on Poetics. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 3. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 988.