Note to Eil Þdr 18^III

[4] langvinr þrǫngvar ‘the old friend of the tight spot (þjálfi ‘enclosure’ = Þjálfi) [= Þórr]’: Unlike other eds, who have interpreted this Þórr-kenning as ‘friend of Freyja’ (see below), the assumption here is that þrǫngvar is an onomastic play on one of the names of the persons involved: þrǫng f. means ‘tight spot, narrowing’ (LP: þrǫng 2) and it is synonymous with þjálfi ‘sth. that encloses and holds together’ (LP: 2. þjalfi). The latter in turn is homophonous with the name of Þórr’s servant Þjálfi, who is with him on this journey. Hence Þórr is referred to periphrastically here as ‘friend of Þjálfi’. For Þjálfi see st. 10/4 and Note there. Sveinbjörn Egilsson (1851, 23) takes þrǫngvar to be Þrúngva, an alleged name for the goddess Freyja found in the þulur (Þul Ásynja 3/4); the mss, however, have ‘þungra’ or ‘þrungra’, which Finnur Jónsson emends to Þrungva (Skj B, 661). Even though the gen. form of the name Þrungva cannot possibly be Þrǫngvar, the resulting interpretation of ‘old friend of Freyja’ as a periphrasis for Þórr has been adopted by most subsequent eds. Þórr is nowhere depicted as a friend of Freyja, however.

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. 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.
4. Sveinbjörn Egilsson. 1851. Tvö brot af Haustlaung og Þórsdrápa. Reykjavík: Prentað á kostnað skólasjóðsins.
5. Internal references
6. Elena Gurevich (ed.) 2017, ‘Anonymous Þulur, Ásynja heiti 3’ in Kari Ellen Gade and Edith Marold (eds), Poetry from Treatises on Poetics. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 3. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 768.