Note to ÚlfrU Húsdr 1III
[4] geðfjarðar ‘of the mind-fjord [BREAST]’: Unlike the other mss, R has ‘geðniarþar’ here. In an attempt to retain the R reading, Faulkes (SnE 1998, II, 285) construes the following poetry-kenning: geð-Njarðar hildar lá ‘liquid of battle-Njǫrðr’s mind (i.e. breast)’. However, literally this kenning translates as ‘the liquid of the mind-Njǫrðr of battle’; to be comprehensible the kenning would need to be rearranged as lá geð(s) Njarðar hildar, which results in an unacceptable word order, because the cpd geð-Njarðar ‘mind-Njǫrðr’ is split and geð- exchanged for the gen. hildar ‘of the battle’. Wisén (1886-9, 19-20) argues that geðfjǫrðr cannot be a kenning for ‘breast’ because base-words in kennings construed according to this pattern always denote a country or a landscape; hence he emends to geðjarðar ‘of the mind-earth’. Fjǫrðr can denote both the watery area of a fjord and the surrounding areas, however (cf. Firðir ‘Fjordane’, a district in Norway).
References
- Bibliography
- Wisén, Theodor, ed. 1886-9. Carmina Norrœnæ: Ex reliquiis vetustioris norrœnæ poësis selecta, recognita, commentariis et glossario instructa. 2 vols. Lund: Ohlsson.
- SnE 1998 = Snorri Sturluson. 1998. Edda: Skáldskaparmál. Ed. Anthony Faulkes. 2 vols. University College London: Viking Society for Northern Research.