Note to Anon 732b 1III
[2] sá er fágiætr ‘he’s a rare one’: Lit. ‘he is rarely obtained’. An ironic expression of admiration, perhaps marking the negative insinuation of the antecedent cpd men-Týr ‘the Týr <god> of the neck-ring’ (l. 1). In his early edn, Finnur Jónsson (1886a, 192) translates the phrase as den sjældne mand ‘that rare man’ (cf. LP: fágætr), which he reads in a wholly positive light. In Skj B he reinterprets the phrase as an expression of open disapprobation; the revised translation, han opnår sjælden meget ‘he seldom achieves much’, is incorrect.
References
- Bibliography
- Skj B = Finnur Jónsson, ed. 1912-15b. Den norsk-islandske skjaldedigtning. B: Rettet tekst. 2 vols. Copenhagen: Villadsen & Christensen. Rpt. 1973. Copenhagen: Rosenkilde & Bagger.
- 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.
- Finnur Jónsson. 1886a. ‘Lønskrift og lejlighedsoptegnelser fra et par islandske håndskrifter’. In Kålund et al. 1884-91, 185-94.